This confederate flag kerfuffle is easier to understand once you put it into proper perspective. Think of the man on the street-type interviews that late night talk show hosts have done going back to the Jack Parr days. People are stupid and they are out there walking among us and many have no qualms about going on TV and showing the nation how little they know. Think about this; millions of the people watching them display their stupidity are every bit as stupid as they are! Millions of adult Americans don't know who the Vice President is even, closer to home, who their governor or senators are. That's pretty typical. You can fear that they vote but, come on- these people don't vote, except on American Idol-type shows. Stuff they care about. They can name all the Kardashians but they don't know who won WWII.
So, when you hear adults saying things like; "The confederate flag is a flag of heritage- not hate!" you have to understand that such people belong to the largest group of hyphenated-Americans in the country...Stupid-Americans.
How many young people today might even know who fought in the American Civil War? I assume everyone in my age bracket knows but, should I? The knowledge that I possess, I shouldn't take for granted that anyone knows. Technically, I have but a high school education but, I didn't stop there. Post school there are books to learn from, there is life itself and, more recently, the internet. I enjoy cat videos and Lord knows I fucking love arguing with strangers on the internet but, I Google too. A lot. There's a lot of info out there, you just have to know where to find it and where not to find it. You still have to figure it out for yourself because so many people are actively trying to figure it out for you.
Even if people are presumably book smart and technically better educated than you, don't believe everything they say. You have to consider their motives. Republican politicians, for example, will tell you that absolutely everything President Obama does is wrong. Everything. He's wrong to get health care for Americans. More recently, he's wrong to negotiate with Iranians when clearly the right thing to do is go to bloody war with them! Duh. Any fucking idiot knows that! AND, did you know that the minimum wage is a bad thing and that every current GOP candidate believes there should be no minimum and that it would actually be better for us if there were no floor as to how low people could be paid?
Isn't it ironic that some folks today totally disavow that the Civil War was fought over slavery despite articles of secession- official documents- saying that was the reason for treason? How about the irony of, 150 years later, many of the same leaders of the secessionist part of the country wanting to eliminate the minimum wage? And not just southern politicians but conservative politicians from all over the country. People should be offended that their leaders are telling them- with straight faces- that they make too much money with the minimum and that they could actually make more without it!
How the fuck does that work? Do I need to send $19.95 to find out? Where do I sign?
Conservatives, especially in the south, seem to have had enough. They've grumbled about possibly seceding again. One more democrat president might push them over the edge. All they have to do is figure out how to go to war with the US and keep that federal money coming in because they know they can't make it on their own.
We'll see what drives them to quit and wage war. They'll maybe lose it over gay marriage. Maybe the minimum wage getting raised. Or healthcare. It doesn't matter what they say now. I just wonder what they'll say it was really about 150 years from now? Since when do we let the losers write their own history.
