Confederate flag will fly along I-95 (Richmond VA)
Last edited Wed Aug 7, 2013, 08:20 PM - Edit history (2)
Source: Richmond Times-Dispatch
The flag will fly on a 50-foot pole, and will be visible from the northbound lane, said Susan Hathaway, founder of Virginia Flaggers, the group behind the flag. It’s tentatively scheduled to go up Sept. 28.
“Basically, the flag is being erected as a memorial to the memory and the honor of the Confederate soldiers who sacrificed, bled and died to defend Virginia from invasion,” she said.
Hathaway accused Richmond and state officials of excluding Confederate history from their “PC sesquicentennial celebration” of the Civil War. The flag will provide recognition, she said, for the pride many in Richmond feel for the city’s “rich Confederate history.”
The group is perhaps best known in Richmond for its frequent demonstrations outside of the Virginia Museum of Fine Art and, more recently, the Museum of the Confederacy. The group feels neither institution pays due respect to the Confederate flag.
Read more: http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/local/city-of-richmond/confederate-flag-will-fly-along-i/article_14dcfb38-3535-5016-a110-7e786b8817e2.html
Like this city wasn't already littered with enough second place trophies.
From the most popular local TV station
http://downtown.nbc12.com/news/news/147733-group-plans-fly-huge-confederate-flag-i-95
"Slavery was on the way out. I mean, it was on the way out," said Jennings.
"It was about the entire people of the South fighting for their freedom from the federal government, just as in the American Revolution," said Karen Cooper, who also has African American roots.
"The whole country practiced slavery. It was a legal institution. If I'm not offended by the U.S. flag, why should I be offended by the Confederate battle flag?" continued Cooper.
BTW- if you want a treat check out the comments on the newspaper link by the guy holding a shotgun.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Looks like I won't be heading in that direction anytime soon.
Yes INDEED!!!!
This really takes the "It is history, get over it" prize. 
Edit: And of course I mean that towards the idiots trotting out the flag, not the OP for posting this.
they protested AT the Museum of the Confederacy?!?!?!? 
than it already is.
lot's of Kraft cheez Barrels there
is how to retire one, and it's how to protest and show great umbrage. *BECAUSE* you can burn our flag, hang it upside down as a sign of distress is the reason no other flag flies first.
Que Lee Greenwood. lol
big letters -
"I'm with Stupid" -->
Though I am sure DUers could come up with a thousand better short messages.
Or maybe just drape a big white sheet and hood over the top, turn it in a scareKKKrow.
I wonder if there's a crowd funding mechanism that could pay for an alternative message like that...
Best response yet.
We already have one of these be-flagged monuments to moronity. So, this isn't new to us here in Nashville.
I say let the fuckers have their stupid-ass flag. It shows how desperate they've become for recognition. The last flailings of ''life'' from the shallow end of the gene pool.
It's a loser's flag, first of all. And the X makes a great visual aid. I know, I know, the worst ones are the ones with no flag, but you take what life gives ya. Besides, it makes it easier to identify racists in crowds.
- Which I've always found, quite handy.....
K&R
Here is the FIRST NATIONAL FLAG OF THE CONFEDERACY (Please read the note at the bottom about the Museum of the Confederacy and this flag):
Here is the SECOND National Flag (1863-March 4, 1865)
Here is the third National Flag (March 4, 1865 till the end, some question if it actually ever did fly given Lee surrender just over a month later):
https://www.moc.org/haversack-store/flags/13-star-first-national-confederate-flag
Here is the Battle Flag, adopted after the Battle of Bull Run to differentiate Confederate Units from Union forces using the US National Flag, Notice it is SQUARE not rectangular for Battle Flags were always SQUARE and only used by actual infantry units (Calvary units used a Pennet instead, but I have NEVER seen a Confederate Pennet, thus it appears Confederate forces used the Battle flag instead of a Pennet).
Here is the Naval Jack, flown ONLY on the rear of Confederate ships, NOT on land. It is the version adopted by the Second KKK in 1905 (Wikipedia repeats they story that some units in the Army of Tennessee used a rectangular flag instead of a Square flag, that appears to be more post 1905 reports based on memories of veterans, who by then had become used to rectangular flags not the square flags of the actual Battle flag).
The sad part of this, this group probally wants the Naval Jack, and it is the version most tied in with the KKK and the version LEAST connected to the Confederate soldiers who fought in the Civil War (most probally never saw one, seeing only the Various National Flags and the Battle Flag instead).
As to Pennets, the only state flag that is a Pennet is Ohio's state flag. I mention it for I did mention pennets above and it shows the shape of a Pennet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flags_of_the_Confederate_States_of_America
After going to the web site of the Museum of the Confederacy, I can see what the Flaggers objections are. The Museum of the Confederacy has basically adopted the FIRST NATIONAL FLAG as its flag, thus avoiding any issue related to using the Naval Jack or Battle Flag.
http://www.moc.org/visit-us?mode=appomattox
of course. 
But they're calling it the Battle Flag. Idiots.
http://www.vaflaggers.blogspot.com/
You have to understand, slavery was on the way out in the 1780s and early 1790s. Even in the south, it was found slaves would escape and defect to any invader (in the case of the American Revolution, the British). Then the cotton gin was invented, and having slaves became VERY PROFITABLE.
In the period from 1795 and 1865, importation of slaves continued (yes, slaves were being imported into the South as late as 1865). Unlike almost any other Slave culture in history, the rights of slaves actually DECLINED between 1795 and 1865 (in some states it became illegal to free your own slaves for example, something the Romans did not even adopt).
The main reason is that is how profitable Cotton was in that period. It almost completely replaced linen, it was over 50% of US exports during that period (and that continued during the Civil War).
After the Civil War, efforts were made to continue slavery in all but name, but reconstruction ended that, but starting in the late 1870s, after reconstruction had ended, southerns adopted some harsh rules as to African Americans share cropping (which many whites ended up also doing) AND criminal charges of not paying debts (that crime permitted the owner of the debt to take the debtor into custody and work him like a slave). This was ruled to be peonage and illegal, but continued till after WWI.
As to Share cropping, it kept families tied in with their landlords generation after generation. It was almost the same as slavery but had the appearance of NOT being slavery. A child ended up owning the debt his parents incurred and had to work it off before he could leave the area (and such people just could not work it off). If the African Americans objected, it was not unusual to pull guns on them (during the 1927 Mississippi Flood, African Americans were ordered at gun point to work on the levies in the state of Mississippi. While working on the levies, that did NOT protect their homes, they were held on the levies in the driving rain by men and boys with rifles, all with orders to shoot any African American who tried to leave the levy (This was a job the Boy Scouts of Mississippi fully participated in).
The three point hitch was not invented to 1939, with out that hitch, any work in the fields AFTER the crop had been planted had to be done by horses. The Three Point Hitch permitted something more then plows to by pulled by tractors.
Now the Cotton Picker was invented in 1937, but problems with the design made it still more cost effective to pick cotton by hand till those problems were solved in 1943. WWII was on, so the improved Cotton Picker was not available till 1947. IT took off like hot cakes for it was now cheaper to pick cotton by machine then by hand. Hand picking survived till the early 1960s but became more and more marginal as you went through the 1950s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cotton_picker
The significance of the Cotton Picker in this discussion is that before the improved model of 1947 went on the market, Slavery would still have been profitable. With the Cotton Picker, slavery would have ceased to be profitable some time in the 1950s and most slave owners would have then either freed their slaves (or more likely demanded that the Federal Government pay them to free their slaves, we are taking about "Property" here).
Share Cropping and chain gangs both died out in the 1950s for the same reason Slavery would have died out. The Cotton Picker and the three point hitch made it cheaper to use those machine to get crops planted and picked then it was to keep share croppers on those same fields.
Thus Slavery would NOT have died out till the 1950s, for it would have remained profitable till then. Share Cropping almost reduced African Americans to being slaves, but not quite for they could educate themselves, something slaves could not legally do. Some African Americans were able to get out of the Jail system, chain gang and share cropping system of the south, mostly due to being able to read and write. It was illegal to teach slaves to read and write and thus it was harder for them to escape and thus cheaper then the share cropping system adopted in the late 1870s and 1880s.
GERMANY AND THE SOUTH RECONSTRUCTION:
As to the treatment of the South AFTER the Civil War. If you look at African Americans, we did treat them better then we treated the Germans after WWII, they had AIDED the cause of national unity and viewed as reliable allies, unlike the majority of white southerns who the north viewed as rebels,. In at least two states, Mississippi and South Carolina, the majority of people in those states were African Americans and when the North insisted on majority rule, African Americans out voted the white population in both states. This was viewed as unacceptable treatment by many white southerns, white southerns expected to rule their states NOT African Americans. How dare the NORTH impose Democracy and majority rule by African Americans on WHITE SOUTHERNS.
Thus if you view the rights of White Southerns to rule the South as a right the north took away, when the North permitted African Americans to vote, yes the North did treat such Southern Whites worse then we did the Germans. The North took their state away from White Southerns and gave those states to the larger number of African Americans that lived in those states. We did NOT do that to the Germans, they could still rule Germany after WWII, but then the majority of people living in Germany were Germans.
Now Virginia, North Caroline, Tennessee, and Texas had larger white populations then African American Populations after the Civil War. Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas appear to be more evenly divided between the two sets of populations. Thus you do NOT hear of much problems on race relations in Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee (when compared to the rest of the ex-Confederacy). Texas seems to be on its own for it had a long history after the Civil War of repression of African American and Hispanics, including taking lands from both groups. Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Arkansas along with Mississippi and South Carolina is where you hear a lot about repression by the North during reconstruction (also Texas but to a much lower degree).
The reason for this was simple, Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee had always had the lowest number of slaves in the US among slave owning states after 1800. Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee had been viewed as to far North to do extensive up land Cotton crops. Slaves were most profitable in the Cotton Belt, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas and East Texas. Slavery was also profitable in the Sugar Cane States of Louisiana and North Florida (Both of which also planted Cotton). South Carolina was on the edge of the Cotton Belt but its indigo plantations supplemented its reliance on Cotton (Artificial Dyes were invented during the Civil War, but in Britain and would take another 20 years to take off, but when it did South Carolina switched to more Cotton).
Thus the states with the greatest number of Cotton Plantations came to view Reconstruction in the worse light, for given the huge numbers of ex-slaves in those states, African Americans could out vote White Southerns, especially given the 14th amendment's second section which gave CONGRESS the right to determine when a person who had participated in a rebellion against the US could vote. During Reconstruction Congress was slow to restore voting whites to such ex rebels, thus strengthening African American power in the ballot box.
The Long Depression, 1873-1897
http://www.politonomist.com/history-of-economic-recessions-00273/4/
This was all made worse by the Economic Crisis of the 1870s, 1880s and 1890s. The GOP controlled Congress during this time period and wanted to restore the pre Civil War value of the Dollar to $20 to an ounce of gold. Government spending was cut, the economy suffered from the rapid withdraw of the money the Federal Government had spend in the national economy during the Civil War and that lead to what is now called the "Long Depression" (at the time it was called the "Great Depression" but that name was later given to the 1930s). In many ways the North decision to end reconstruction in 1877 was more to do with how bad the economy was and the GOP solution then is the same as it is today, austerity. It was the wrong prescription then and it is the wrong prescription today but it was the one that was embraced.
This austerity did NOT end the Long Depression, it continued into the 1880s. It became so bad that a new party came into existence, the "Free Silver" Party, which advocating increased federal spending by abandoning $20 to a ounce of gold, by printing Silver dollars (in 1857, when the Silver Dollar, as it was set between 1857 and 1964) the Silver in a Silver Dollar was about 99 cents. By the 1880s, due to massive silver mining in Nevada, the value of the Silver in a Silver Dollar had dropped to 55 cents. Same amount of silver but the price had dropped. The Democratic party adopted it as their platform in 1896. Outspent something like 15-1, the Democrats almost won the election that year (and at least one commentator observed that the Democrats lost the election through voting fraud for it was only the second election where people voted with a secret ballot, the first had been in 1892, Secret Ballots opened all types of frauds possibilities including changing ballots).
The Long Depression finally ended after the election of 1896. New Gold Fields were opened in Alaska, Australia and South Africa. This brought into the market more gold, which lead to a drop in value of gold and the inflation people had been demanding since the 1870s. In the 1900 election, the economy was no longer the big issue due to this inflation, thus "Free Silver" was not a big issue after 1896, but it started the Democratic Party to become a party for reform instead of a me to party to the GOP.
The effect of the Long Depression on the South was terrible, value of land DROPPED from the 1870s till 1900, prices of crops DECLINED during the same time period (as did wages). Social unrest became the norm (including the General Strike of 1877, through the further south the General Strike went was Baltimore and St Louis). Unrest existed in the 1880s and the early 1890s (Massive strikes and the repression of those Strike by President Cleveland was one of the reason the Free Silver Democrats were able to take over the Party in 1896, Cleveland was a "Gold Democrat" .
In the Cotton belt South, more and more small farmers, both black and white, ended up losing their lands to the rich and agreeing to stay on as share croppers during this time period. Downward pressure on crops and wages, both black and white, lead to social unrest and in the South that became anti-African American lynchings.
While technically the Long Depression started during Reconstruction (1873) it lasted long after Reconstruction was done (it really did not stop till just before the 1900 elections as the effect of those Gold Fields and the inflation caused by those gold fields came into play). Many White Southerns blamed their economic problems on reconstruction NOT on Congress's rush to restore the Gold Standard. In many ways this rush to return to the Gold Standard was the second punch to the South, the first was that African Americas were no longer slaves and could vote, the second was this general economic decline of the 1870s. This second punch meant even where whites were able to stay in charge, they lost money.
In the case of Germany the US did not require it to return to the Gold Standard, and what the US had set the price of the US Dollar in terms of Gold was while within the ability of the US to control (i.e. sell gold if the price went to high, buy gold if the price went to low, this continued till the Cost of the Vietnam war and Nixon's refusal to raise taxes ended that ability and the US left the dollar to float in relations to gold).
Thus in economic terms Germany was treated better the the South was during Reconstruction, but the South suffered NOT from any attack on its Economy, but the Congress of the period wanting to return to the gold standard, no matter who suffered when that occurred. In the case of Germany the US knew by 1945 HOW to prevent recessions by then, spend money when one occurred, and reduce spending during booms. In the 1870s Congress was NOT willing to do that even for the North let alone the South.
Lets remember in 1945 Germany could participate in the Marshall Plan, where Germany could get money from the US to rebuilt itself, something the North refused to due when Andrew Johnson was President from 1865 to 1869 and refused to do when Grant became president in 1869 for Congress wanted to return the US to the Gold Standard. This hurt the South extensively but it also hurt the North for the GOP of that time period had the same view on economics as the GOP of today.
It is hard to say the US treated the South in the 1870s then it did Germany in the late 1940s, when you understand in both situations the Congress of the US applied the same rules to each as it was applying to the US at the same time (austerity in the 1870s, spending like a drunken sailor in the late 1940s). On the other hand the effect of this Austerity can NOT be under played in the world view of Southerns to this day. That it hurt the North as much of the South is forgotten, all that is remember is the North freed the slaves, gave them the Vote, left them run State Governments while wages, land prices and crop prices all declined. That such declines continued AFTER the end of Reconstruction is unimportant to this view, what is important it is the view of many in the South, even if false once you look at the historical record and understand the main objections of white Southerns was their loss of complete control over the politics and government of the South.
As to the First National, it is the flag used by the Confederacy Museum and the VA FLAGGERS protested that move. It was a good choice for the Museum, it is a Flag flown by the Confederacy BUT one that does NOT look any where near the flags used by the KKK.
The Bonnier Blue Flag:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonnie_Blue_Flag
"the official flag of gun humping racist cowards". 
Karen Cooper: Richmond Tax Day Tea Revolt, 2010
Uploaded on Apr 16, 2010
The Cooper Express runs right over the Progressive agenda.
I suspect that those who stayed home in 2010 didn't see this coming,. but some of us did. The cynics won the day, tho'. I found it here:
Karen Cooper Speaks Out
Posted on August 3, 2012 by Brooks D. Simpson
That page notes that she was interviewed here:
http://missouritenth.com/2012/08/02/karen-a-proud-defender-of-liberty-in-her-community/
And the article itself says:
...I found what Cooper had to say to be very interesting and revealing. For example, when she declares that if she was a southerner in 1860, she would have supported secession, I wondered what sort of southerner she would have imagined herself to be in that year. She explicitly links her interest in a state rights interpretation of the coming of the Civil War with her interest in the Tea Party, suggesting that her interest in the past was shaped by present concerns. Of course, secessionists saw state rights as a means to an end, but on that issue Cooper’s silent. She’s also silent on evidence that white southerners were not always so interested in state rights when it came to protecting their own interests, especially slavery. Nor does she allude to the mixed record of the Confederacy when it came to state rights. Finally, she doesn’t seem to understand that “the South” did not speak with one voice … far from it. But she’s not alone in those beliefs.
Cooper also shares her understanding of what the Founders believed: “If I don’t like what is happening in my state, I must work to change it, or I vote with my feet by moving. This is what our Founders wanted us to do to keep our State Sovereignty.” This displays a curious understanding of the Founders. I know of no Founder who said that the way to defend state sovereignty was by moving out of state. Nor do I know which Founders she references. Surely Washington, Hamilton, Madison, and Adams would not have embraced her explanation, and both Washington and Madison were Virginians. Nor does this explanation address the issue of secession. Oddly enough, I do know of an American who said that if white southerners did not like to stay in the United States, they could secede by moving elsewhere. That man was William T. Sherman.
In short, Cooper’s grasp of history is unsure and incomplete. She’s rather selective in her understanding of the past, picking (and warping) only that which supports her political philosophy.
Cooper is a proud southerner. “What I love about the Southern way of living is that we don’t care what you do up North, but you will not change how we do things down here. Things like God, family, our Statehood and capitalism.” I’m unaware of any efforts by northerners to change God or family in the South; if anything, while issues of family and religious values sometimes divide Americans, they do not do so along a neat North/South axis (I have no idea where the transMississippi West, Alaska, and Hawaii fit in this scheme). The term “statehood” remains undefined; “capitalism” is one of those words often invoked and rarely understood, and for years there was a vigorous debate over whether the Old South was capitalist, with that icon of southern heritage defenders, Eugene Genovese, arguing against that notion. Perhaps Cooper needs to take this up with Genovese. She clearly disagrees. “I don’t have much hope for the American people today – and that includes Southerner’s because of how reconstructed they have become,” she says (is that an attack on Rainbow Confederates?). “In order for Southerner’s to live peacefully together, they must understand the principles that the South fought for. Things like States Rights, Capitalism, Christianity and simply the Southern way of living...”
Another video from there:
Black woman attacked for carrying Confederate Flag
Uploaded on Oct 30, 2011
On Friday, October 28th, Virgina Flaggers gathered on the Boulevard in Richmond, Virginia to protest the VMFA's forced, illegal removal of Confederate Flags from the Confederate War Memorial/Pelham Chapel. Most conversations with pedestrians were very good. This one was a bit challenging. The first minute or so are missing, in which this woman berates Karen for carrying the Confederate Flag. The conclusion is also missing...basically, the woman gets a phone call and walks off in disgust.
http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2012/08/03/karen-cooper-speaks-out/
I found this too.
http://downtown.nbc12.com/news/news/147733-group-plans-fly-huge-confederate-flag-i-95
And this. but I'm not sure it's her. She does not look the same in the images, so it may be wrong:
?w=500&h=500
I posted the writings of the Vice President of the Confederacy here on DU a long time ago. Yes, the Confederacy was about slavery. They thought that the Founding Fathers were wrong in their belief that in time, all people would be treated equally. Here is their Confederate Philosophy:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014260932#post149
I listened to this drekt growing up, thankfully not in my home, but had to associate with people who believed just what that says. That was the old States' Rights that finally got such a bad name they had to change the name of their system.
Since then, we have been hearing thsoe who insist the 10th Amendment to the Constitution gives each state the right to eliminate the human and voting rights of others in all sorts of ways, due to States Rights. They just don't call it that.
Those who think it can't spread, or isn't doing so now, are apathic or too proud to admit it. And Libertarians want this state of affairs as what they see as a return to the natural order of things.
You don't have to use racial slurs to be against those who are poor or not of your own blood. You can use other terms, and they do. Despite the disdain here for the Democratic Party and all elected officials, they do stand for human rights as their voters do.
And every single one of those Teabaggers will vote in every election, no amount of mocking them or name calling will stop them, but it appears to work very well with us. A nation divided up into fifty fiefdoms under the rule of the Koch brothers or their clones, will be our fate is we let this go. And that point, civil liberties will be ended as most of us have known them in our lifetimes.
JMHO.
I'm black and from the South. I will share with my entire family and friends. Thankfully, no one I know supports the Confederate flag and understands fully what it stands for. Nevertheless, your research is impeccable!!! 
from my own people. Depressing as hell!!
Why put up this affront to Gawd's plan???
