This Hamilton–Pence thing got me thinkin’. I’ve been pretty clear for years about the ~gendering of “America’s” love/hate relationship with (or at least attitude to) NYC. The short version: it’s like spousal abuse. For decades, in America’s imagination NYC epitomized [racial / ethnic / religious / gender / preference / language stereotypes]. So big parts of the country were not so secretly thrilled on 9/11: that city full of goddamn *****s finally got its ass whupped. (That’s what the “Muslims cheering” thing is right? Projection.) Americans had been paying hard-earned money for decades to watch NYC be destroyed in disaster movies, and 9/11 was the real deal. As a bonus, they got to invade. And they’ve been invading ever since. That’s the city most of you know now: not the NYC Americans were terrified to set foot in but their Trumpified playground. And that’s the background of this Hamilton–Pence thing: a bunch of [those dark-skinned ‘theater people’] talked back to Mr. Pence. I think they’re heroes, because they just showed us an important strategy for countering Trump’s MAGA agenda.