'Rebels' can't identify Confederate flag!

So anyway, I found myself visiting relatives south of the Kerry-Bush line last month, and, more to the point, in a store catering to those nostalgic for the good ol' CSA. For $20 given to me by a curious friend, I also found myself carrying a clipboard with, among other things, this graphic attached.



What's most surprising is that only three people out of 32 at that store were able to correctly identify that flag. Several said it was the flag of Texas, some said it was an old flag of the USA, one claimed it was the British flag, and one even claimed it was 'probably the new flag over in Iraq or somethin'.

So they fly the battle flag or naval jack of the CSA to show their pride in their 'southern heritage,' but are unable to identify the actual confederate flag?

Seriously, I wonder what proportion of the Rebel crew actually know what flag they're flying. I haven't ever seen a redneck with the Stars and Bars on his truck, though I've obviously seen quite a few with the Southern Cross.

Or is our history dead-wrong?

as just "the Confederate flag".

It's a common mistake. And one I don't feel very strongly about, I must say. Southern bigots are ignorant? Wow! Who knew?

As a Northerner, I was unaware of that flag.

with the raw reality of the Civil War - A small minority of Southern slave-holders convinced the common folk in the South to fight and die for the right of the slave-holders to lord it over the other whites and slaves alike.

so I laugh whenever I see these racists flyin' the military flag of the confederacy and not the actual fuckin flag of the regime. do they even realize that the confederacy enslaved millions of people?

will not prosper." Sam Houston's opinion of Jeff Davis.

Houston was governer of Texas when Secession happened. He was forced out of office in 1861 because he refused to go along.

Strictly speaking, the "confederacy" didn't enslave anyone; slavery began before those traitors were born. They did break the Union to defend States' Rights (rights to enslave other humans).

And half of the idiots there are up in arms because it doesn't include the Confederate battle flag anymore. The flag below stopped flying in 1996 because they wanted to host the Olympics and the Superbowl. I think it changed for the Olympics but was still present for the Superbowl.

I'm surprised no conservatives have tried trumpeting their 'victory' in sneaking the confederacy back into the flag.

On the one hand, all the Confederacy ever managed to do was fight-- it was their attack on Fort Sumter that started the Civil War-- so it stands to reason that the battle flag is the one we all remember.

On the other hand, for better or worse the Stars and Bars have been attached to a bunch of wildly diverse situations and causes, ranging from hardcore white supremacist ideology to Lynyrd Skynyrd fandom. When Dean was telling the Dems we needed to appeal to the guys with the Stars & Bars on their pickups, I figured he was talking about the Skynyrd crowd, who would be a natural Dem constituency once we stopped making them think we thought they were yokels. (Note that Skynyrd once wrote an anti-gun song, "Saturday Night Special.")

Of course the Repukes can keep the racists, they'll be much happier together.

the flag of France . . .

The reason they settled on the "Battle Flag" or Saint Andrews Cross is that the actual Confederate Flag is illegal to fly. Has been since Lee surrenderd. Granted it would be nice if people actually knew their history. But what do you expect these days.

I'm not surprised that nobody recognized it. After just 2 years, it was replaced by one that contained the battle flag image:

http://americancivilwar.com/south/conflag/southflg.html