Fighting For Their Flag

The one that stands for treason as well as for slave-owning. In other words, the "party of Lincoln" reacts to a VA announcement that "Confederate flags will not be displayed from any permanently fixed flagpole in a national cemetery at any time." A Trump advisor, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, has something to say about that — 

In a Facebook post published Thursday, Miller suggests the Civil War was first and foremost about protecting free speech — not slavery. He also strikes a skeptical note about whether Confederates who fought against the United States behaved treasonously.

Responding to a Washington Post column supportive of the VA's move, Miller writes that the piece "makes my blood boil" and says the Post isn’t "entitled to... attempt to read the minds of my long-dead Confederate ancestors and determine that their actions and motivations during that awful war were treasonous."

Seeing as he's an historian and all, Erik Loomis simultaneously manages to both ponder and answer the question, "Boy, I wonder how we could determine the thoughts of those who committed treason to defend slavery?"

More Loomis—

Truly, no one can read the minds of long-dead Confederates.

And hey, the Civil War was actually about free speech! That's why conservatives should totally secede from the nation if those big government PC liberals dare to criticize them. After all, saying mean things when Sarah Palin or Donald Trump say something dumb is the ultimate restriction of free speech! And this is just outstanding.

In the lead up to the aforementioned House vote on Confederate flags, a staffer for Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA) circulated an email making a case for preserving the Confederate flag that's similar to Miller's. The staffer, Pete Sanborn, wrote, "You know who else supports destroying history so that they can advance their own agenda? ISIL. Don't be like ISIL. I urge you to vote NO." He signed the email, "Yours in freedom from the PC police."

Among comments that follow—

C.V. Danes says...
You mean the last Civil War, or the one they're trying to start now?

FlipYrWhig... [referring to the Sanborn ISIL quote]
You know who else is very proud to wave the flag of a grandiose, illegitimate, fictitious nation?

Dr. Waffle says...
So. Much. Economic. Anxiety.

And on another history note—

Colin Day says...
Hey, it might have been about free speech, as in allowing the Post Office to deliver abolitionist literature in Southern states.

Abolitionist mail