History Lesson: No Settling Scores With Ghosts

From a superb column by Mark Hendrickson in The Epoch Times:

The tone underlying the banishment of Smith from Yankee Stadium and the Flyers’ Wells Fargo Center are ominous and McCarthyesque. The Flyers actually took down their statue of Smith. Is the intent to turn her into a nonperson as the Soviet communists did to their enemies? Will those who agitated to ban Smith launch a new Inquisition, summoning thousands of dead Americans before their self-appointed tribunal to determine, “Did you ever use a racially derogatory term or hold any racist opinions at any time in your life?”
And what about those people in the Yankees’ and Flyers’ organizations who caved in so readily to the complaints of a small number? Why didn’t they show respect for their fans by polling them about whether they wanted to keep or replace Smith’s “God Bless America”? It seems to me that they acted on the basis of shortsighted expediency.
Why give positive reinforcement to people who apparently want to wield power, not only over the present and the future, but even the past? Such characters can’t be appeased. On the contrary, their success in banning Smith will encourage them to embark on a quixotic quest, going around tilting at windmills as they try to settle scores with ghosts.