Why do you think they're using the "Confederate Battle flag," specifically?

Let's talk about the Confederate flag, shall we?

In the wake of the racist hate crime in Charleston, South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley apparently felt that residents of the Palmetto State weren't ready to discuss removing the Confederate flag just yet.

You know, right now, to start having policy conversations with the people of South Carolina, I understand that's what ya'll want, my job is to heal the people of this state... There will be policy discussions and you will hear me come out and talk about it. But right now, I am not doing that to the people of my state.

Apparently, this sort of flag talk is very traumatizing in South Carolina.

Eternal debutante Lindsey Graham positively got the vapors at the thought.

If at the end of the day, it is time for the people of South Carolina to reconsider that decision, it would be fine with me, but this is part of who we are.

The flag represents to some people, a Civil War, and that was the symbol of one side. To others it is a racist symbol, and it has been used in a racist way. But the problems we have today in South Carolina and across the world are not because of a movie or because of symbols, it is because of what is in peoples' hearts.

How do you go back and reconstruct America? What do you do in terms of our history?

Well, here's the thing about history, Scarlett. You aren't required to celebrate it. Particularly when it's the history of a group of people who felt they were allowed to keep other people as livestock, because those other people happened to have a darker skin.

There are things we shouldn't be proud of. Slavery is one of them.

The "heritage" argument has been around for years, and it's always been a fairly thin argument. As Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention put it:

Some would say that the Confederate Battle Flag is simply about heritage, not about hate. Singer Brad Paisley sang that his wearing a Confederate flag on his shirt was just meant to say that he was a Lynyrd Skynyrd fan. Comedian Stephen Colbert quipped, "Little known fact: Jefferson Davis - HUGE Skynyrd fan."

Or, to put it another way,

And it's not like this is a big secret, either. It's literally known around the world.

And yes, that is a fact.

So let's consider not clinging to your slave-owning past, and put away the symbols of racism. Maybe it's time to move on.