The name and identity of the suspect in last night’s tragic shooting at a black church in Charleston, S.C., were just released, and already liberals such at the ones at Vox have explained the killer’s motivation. Dylann Storm Roof, the man now in police custody, drew a .45-caliber pistol and shot nine people to death because the Confederate flag is permitted to fly above the South Carolina statehouse:
Wednesday night, a white man walked into a historically black church in Charleston, South Carolina, and shot nine parishioners. Today, a Confederate flag is flying on the grounds of the South Carolina statehouse in Columbia — as it does every day. While the flags on top of the statehouse itself are flying at half-mast, the Confederate flag (displayed at a Civil War memorial) is flying at full mast.
This is more than just an awkward juxtaposition. As Cornell historian Edward Baptist explains in a series of chilling tweets, the Confederate flag isn’t just a symbol of the pro-slavery rebellion, it’s also a symbol of post-Civil War white supremacy — including the KKK and other groups that expressed that supremacy violently, at times by attacking black churches.
SC’s stars and bars flag started as the battle flag of proslavery traitors who refused to accept an election’s results.
— Edward Baptist (@Ed_Baptist) June 18, 2015
In the course of Civil War, the flag became the symbol of not only slavery and treason, but the murder of black soldiers. — Edward Baptist (@Ed_Baptist) June 18, 2015
Leave it to Ezra Klein and his team of “accountable journalists” to inject politics into a horrible tragedy. The atrocity is so fresh that the names of the victims have not yet been released, and Vox is already at it, in full post-Tuscon mode, rounding up the conservative culprits.
Don’t think that Vox is alone in this. Former Obama administration official Brandon Friedman tweeted this last night soon after the story of the shooting broke:
In October, Gov. Nikki Haley defended flying the Confederate flag outside the South Carolina statehouse. http://t.co/1OFHhM7Ryl #Charleston
— Brandon Friedman (@BFriedmanDC) June 18, 2015
Charles Madar, columnist for al-Jazzeera America, also wasted no time wrote:
Governor who flies Confederate flag at SC capitol says “we’ll never understand what motivates” #Charleston massacre: http://t.co/OQcgGjm5Af — Chase Madar (@ChMadar) June 18, 2015
Cross-posted at The Lid. Howard Portnoy contributed to this report.
