Posted on 06/21/2015 2:49:11 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Ted Cruz said Saturday that the Confederate flag flying in front of their statehouse is “a question for South Carolina” to decide.
He is not alone. Marco Rubio said the same: “This is an issue that they should debate and work through and not have a bunch of outsiders going in and telling them what to do.” Scott Walker and Carly Fiorina also feel it is an issue for South Carolina alone to decide.
Funny. I seem to recall South Carolina trying to decide that issue in 1861, when on April 12 they opened fire on Fort Sumter, inaugurating the Civil War.
Also, as I recall, they lost. The flag they waved at the end was white.
That should have been an end to that affair.
By the vote of an all-white legislature, a Confederate flag was raised once again above the South Carolina statehouse in 1962. In 2000, another vote removed it, and placed a square battle flag – oddly, the battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia – over a monument to Confederate dead. This is the flag that is, in the wake of the Charleston massacre, the point of contention between Democrats and Republicans.
The flag chosen was not the national colors of the Confederacy – or even of South Carolina – though it did form a component of the second (1863) and third (1865) national flag.
It may have been raised in 1962 because that year was during the Civil War Centennial. It may also have been a reactionary white racist response to the Civil Rights Movement. Opinions differ. Perhaps both accounts are true.
The point is this: there is no long, unbroken tradition of this flag flying in the vicinity of the statehouse since the Civil War.
It is not even a South Carolina flag, nor the Confederacy’s national flag. There is nothing special about it even for descendants of Confederate soldiers unless their ancestors served in the Army of northern Virginia.
In other words, it is a peculiar way of honoring South Carolina’s Civil War dead and likely one that would not have been understood by the Civil War generation.
Ted Cruz ignores all this. Cruz wants us to believe he is a reasonable man, the voice of impartiality, a claim he threw away when he claimed Democrats were using the flag as a “wedge” issue:
"I understand the passions that this debate evokes on both sides. Both those who see a history of racial oppression and a history of slavery, which is the original sin of our nation, and we fought a bloody civil war to expunge that sin.
But I also understand those who want to remember the sacrifices of their ancestors and the traditions of their states, not the racial oppression, but the historical traditions, and I think often this issue is used as a wedge to try to divide people."
NAACP President Cornell Brooks admits there are different viewpoints here, but he has a different answer: “Yes, there may be multiple sides to this debate, but clearly we all have to be on the side of those who lost their lives in a church.”
According to Cruz, however, “the last thing they need is people from outside the state coming in and dictating how they should resolve that issue.”
That’s funny. Last time – I’m talking 1861 again – South Carolina needed all kinds of help. The Confederate march, “The Bonnie Blue Flag” tells us (third and fourth verses below),
First gallant South Carolina nobly made the stand Then came Alabama and took her by the hand Next, quickly Mississippi, Georgia, and Florida All raised on high the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star.
Ye men of valor gather round the banner of the right Texas and fair Louisiana join us in the fight Davis, our loved President, and Stephens statesmen rare Now rally round the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star.
Never mind that the song’s writer, Harry McCarthy, got the order of secession wrong in the third verse. The point to be made is that South Carolina had ten other states siding with it, rather than leaving it to South Carolina to decide alone. People from outside certainly did have a say in 1861.
In response, other states, known as the Union – twenty free states and five border states – stood up to oppose the Confederacy’s defense of slavery. We all – the entire nation – helped South Carolina with its “flag” issue.
It was very much a national affair then, and it is very much a national affair now. The wedge issue then as now is racism, and the rebel flag represents that wedge.
The Army of Northern Virginia’s battle flag is not the American flag. It is the flag of traitors. Of traitors whose cause was lost a century-and-a-half ago. It has no business flying over any state capitol.
Ted Cruz is wrong when he says this is South Carolina’s affair only and there is an answer to him: The NAACP has a long-standing boycott in place due to the flag. Brooks points out that,
“One of the ways we can bring that flag down is by writing to companies, engaging companies that are thinking about doing business in South Carolina, speaking to the governor, speaking to the legislature and saying the flag has to come down.”
If we, as a Nation, can make the State of Indiana stand up and take notice, as we did in the case of their RFRA directed at gays, we can certainly have the same effect on South Carolina for flying a symbol of hatred directed at blacks.
bump
sorry. believe it or not, I don’t waste any time pondering your mania.
Which just goes to show some people have the presence of mind to know when to STFU about something. :-)
On the upside, while these retards waste their time worrying about the Confederate flag, it takes away some of the energy they could have used to attack something actually important.
I FIND it interesting that your first post was a defense of Ted Cruz, then when you did not swear absolute fealty to the Cruz candidicy, you were suddenly a miserable SOB. Not worthy of even being allowed on FR.
Boy Howdy, those Cruz subjects are loyal. And kinda rabid.
Seriously??? Is that a real name???
What is it about it’s a State’s issue that you didn’t understand?
I agree with the vanity earlier. That despicable flag of a corrupt society and it’s criminal government should not be tolerated in the US and anyone displaying should receive all the legal harassment which they have richly earned. The Mexican Flag should never again be seen on US soil!
What is a “Hrafnkell?”
Thanx.
5.56mm
I’m trying to understand your position on Cruz. You don’t like his position on trade and don’t think he’s decisive enough on amnesty, yet you like Walker?
Which of Walker’s amnesty positions do you like best? Also, Walker supports TPA and TPP.
When they expend the same amount of energy getting Che Guevara off of the t-shirts and flags of leftists, I will perhaps give a smidgen of attention to them.
Otherwise, they can pound sand anytime they try to lecture someone else about divisive images of hate, whatever that means.
We have known and have discussed over the last year that expected to see that liberal news jockeys would fire away at Cruz every chance they got and that it would be relentless.
This is just beginning.
The good news is that as these liberal spinsters ratchet up the intensity of their focus on Ted Cruz, he gets more and more name recognition and then when people see the real him, they can’t understand why there is so much hostility shown towards him because he’s eminently likable, funny, incredibly articulate and informed, and hugely inspirational. The grassroots are left shaking their heads wondering “why is the Ted Cruz I see and like so much so much different than the one these news commentators keep writing about?”
The general answer to this gross disconnect is that liberals hate and fear Ted Cruz. That’s the good news.
Reagan Redux.
What crybabies you are. Point to even one poster zotted just because they didn’t “support” Ted Cruz. Hell, there are numerous Trump, Romney, Bush and Christie supporters here. Get over yourselves.
But, the posters and trolls on here said that Cruz is finished, toast! Remember, he lost 95% of his base with TPA and doesn’t have a chance.
That is, what they said...
That isn’t reality. One man, and only one man, scares them. His name, Ted Cruz.
Yep, SC should decide the fate of the flag. Great “non-answer”. Get a grip, Reno.
BTW, who do you support if not Cruz? How is YOUR candidate answering the question?
You are right, John. He does attract Angry people...
And most of them, like you, TROLL on Cruz’s site to bash the candidate. The venom of the anti-Cruz people is what you were referring too, I am sure...right?
I mean, surely, your candidate (who might that be again?) attracts only sane people?
I stand with 2nd....and Cruz
“...and placed a square battle flag – oddly, the battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia...”
That was the command structure, similar to the Federal Army of the Potomac. In 1862 my GG Grandfather fought in a South Carolina unit that was under the overall command of Robert E. Lee. Agree or disagree on other points, trying to make a point like that obviously without knowing the facts diminishes one’s argument.
LOL...you were never a Cruz supporter...if you were, you’d know that Trump is echoing EVERYTHING Cruz has said on immigration, etc.
But, of course, you support Trump, so what did I expect?
You’re proving my point.
You know what amuses me 2nd?
All of these posters who come on here and have “issues” with Cruz. He is the best most Conservative candidate we have had in years...yet, either Trump is paying them or Rand is, well, asking them to be Paulies or the Bushes are out in force.
Either way, what I find interesting is how many of them feel the need to comment negatively about Cruz. If he was really awful or didn’t stand a chance, they wouldn’t be on here. I think these trolls are getting desperate because they know they are losing.
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