---

Columbia, S. Car. -- The populist campaign of Mike Huckabee, seeking to mobilize an insurgency of white evangelicals against the Republican establishment, took an abrupt turn today after the former Arkansas governor directly appealed to voters on the issue of race, summoning his fellow candidates to stop calling for the removal of the Confederate flag from government offices.

"You don't like people from outside the state coming in and telling you what to do with your flag. ... If somebody came to Arkansas and told us what to do with our flag, we'd tell them what to do with the pole. That's what we'd do," he declared to applause at a campaign rally in Myrtle Beach Thursday.

At the same time, an Atlanta, Georgia, based organization, Americans for the Preservation of American Culture, began running radio ads attacking John McCain for his opposition to displays of the Confederate flag on public buildings and praising Huckabee.

"McCain has been doing it -- calling the flag a racist symbol -- for years," the announcer declares. "After McCain, Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee stands as a breath of fresh air. Governor Huckabee understands that all the average guy with a Confederate flag on his pickup truck is saying is, he's proud to be a Southerner." The ad concludes: "In South Carolina, we're proud to be Southerners."

---

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/18/huckabee-embraces-confede_n_82199.html

Didn't know McCain was black...

-------
"Everyone helpin' each other whenever they can we makin' it happen, from nothin' to somethin'
That's how we be survivin'" - BEP

---

Why, do you say most whites associate the Confederate flag with racism? In my experiences, it is usually Blacks. Whites could care less.

---

Every white person I've spoken to personally about it has called it racist.

---

Quote: from Headst0ck at 8:42 pm on Aug. 27, 2008

---

Nah, being in VA, I've known good guys who wore the confederate flag. It could mean a many number of things not necessarily racism....like southern decency/tradition. Generally most whites like to associate the confederate flag with racism or in some cases even nazism though....which is stupid and basically overshadows any good/positive intent it would have.

---

Why, do you say most whites associate the Confederate flag with racism? In my experiences, it is usually Blacks. Whites could care less.

---

I have a friend named Steven and he needed to borrow his father's belt (which has a confederate sign in the middle of it)...I asked him if he was pro-confederacy and he says "HELL NO I'm not a racist...my dad just lent me this belt because I didn't have one."

So pretty much what shakenbake said.

-------
I'm jazzy jeff.

---

Quote: from Keltic Fighter at 8:41 pm on Aug. 27, 2008

---

Why, do you say most whites associate the Confederate flag with racism? In my experiences, it is usually Blacks. Whites could care less.

---

Every white person I've spoken to personally about it has called it racist.

---

---

Quote: from richair123 at 5:03 pm on Aug. 27, 2008

---

it shouldnt offend them i mean white people led the south

---

The war was fought to keep the country together.

Slavery was not a part of this war. It was to reunite the USA, not to end slavery.

---

I think we have proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Slavery was a part of the war, a large part of the war in fact. We can also reasonably conclude since it appears in the majority of the articles of secession that it was the MAIN cause of the war. The war did not set out to end slavery though, you are correct.

---

The confederacy's attempt at independence was honorable. What's the point of claiming to be the united states, if union is not optional? States don't have anything like the autonomy they should have (Federal drug laws supersede state law, so even if medical marijuana is legal in your state the feds can tell your state government to fuck itself and prosecute according to federal standards. That's just one example). The slavery was wrong. The cause (independence) was right.

The confederate flag can be used to assert racist, white-supremacist ideas, but it is not inherently so.

---

I also disagree that states should be allowed to leave the union. South Carolina did not have just cause to start a rebellion and had absolutely no reason to secede other than the self-fulfillment of a few selfish individuals who managed to rally the support of misinformed mobs.

And no, it is not. However, more often than not, the people raising that flag are racist.

-------
"It's not about a salary, it's all about reality"
KRS-One

---

However, more often than not, the people raising that flag are racist.

---

---

---

However, more often than not, the people raising that flag are racist.

---

Are you sure?

---

Positive.

-------
"It's not about a salary, it's all about reality"
KRS-One

---

Quote: from kidd rune at 5:04 pm on Sep. 5, 2008

---

---

However, more often than not, the people raising that flag are racist.

---

Are you sure?

---

Positive.

---

---

Im not black so i dk. But im curious, what exactly does the confederate's flag represent?

---

---

Quote: from Keltic Fighter at 1:23 am on Aug. 27, 2008

---

Quote: from muahzxox3 at 1:21 am on Aug. 27, 2008

---

Im not black so i dk. But im curious, what exactly does the confederate's flag represent?

---

 
 Southern heritage and pride, not to mention it is part of our history.

---

Oh i know it's a southern thing. But pride in what exactly?

---

---

I really don't know. I'm from the south, I wish I wasn't, but it's basicly pride in rebellion over slavery, and taxes.  Then after the south got it's asses kicked it repressented a century of hatetred and civil supression. Basicly I hate the south and all the confederate flag waving rasists in it

---

They can't be proud of where they live? I'm sure MANY people are proud of their country, why can't you be proud of the part of the country that you live in?

-------
"One of the Germans... would frequently snatch a child from the
woman's arms and... tear the child in half... Such incidents...
occurred all the time." - A Year in Treblinka, Yankel Wiernik,
Treblinka's "most authoritative eyewitness"