Markos Moulitsas: Party of Lincoln no more

While progress on racial issues generally moves slowly, the nation took a big step last week as the Confederate flag came down from the South Carolina Statehouse grounds. 

Unfortunately, that progress didn’t extend to Congress, where House Republicans fought a pitched battle on behalf of the centuries-old symbol of racism and treason. 

{mosads}It started last Tuesday, when the House passed by voice vote a Democratic amendment to the Interior appropriations bill to ban Confederate flags from National Park Service properties and gift shops, except where they provide “historical context.” 

Once they realized what had happened, rebel Republicans like Mississippi Rep. Steven Palazzo were furious, claiming the amendment was passed “in the dead of night with no debate,” which is probably true, but so what? The GOP leadership was doing its party a favor by quietly letting it pass.

But this is the modern GOP. It is no longer “the party of Lincoln” — it is a party literally defending the racism and treason Abraham Lincoln fought against. It’s a GOP transforming from a party of self-styled “patriots” to one embracing the biggest symbol of treason in our nation’s history. 

So Republican California Rep. Ken Calvert introduced an amendment that would reverse that flag ban. 

“The amendment offered last night … was brought to me by Leadership at the request of some southern Members of the Republican Caucus,” he claimed in a statement, dubiously putting blame on the same leadership that had quietly acceded to the original flag ban amendments. 

In any case, GOP House leadership responded by shutting down the vote on the entire Interior Department appropriations bill, lest they suffer the spectacle of hundreds of Republicans voting to save the Confederacy. 

So, to reiterate, the GOP leadership had to cancel a major vote because it didn’t want to remind the country that its elected officials are utterly beholden to racists. 

But House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi wasn’t about to let Republicans off that easy, introducing a privileged resolution instructing that “the Speaker of the House of Representatives remove any State flag containing any portion of the Confederate battle flag, other than a flag displayed by the office of a Member of the House, from any area within the House wing of the Capitol or any House office building.”

You’d think that a move to prohibit flying a symbol of racism and treason on federal grounds would be uncontroversial. But only one Republican was reasonable enough to agree, while the rest raged at the “stunt” Pelosi (D-Calif.) had pulled. And maybe it was a stunt — but it wouldn’t work as such if Republicans weren’t in bed with racists. In a rational world, this wouldn’t be controversial stuff. 

Just as the GOP embraces Donald Trump’s new racism, it has a hard time letting go of its old racism. While civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) talked about being surrounded by hostile onlookers waving Confederate flags as he marched in Alabama, beaten close to death, the best his state colleague Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland could muster was a pathetic whine, “The question is, does [Lewis] understand where I’m coming from? If I believe it comes from heritage, does he understand why, where I’m coming from?”

Oh, Lewis understands what that “heritage” means, as does most of the country. Once again, Republicans are left fighting a rearguard action as America passes them by. That’s their prerogative as conservatives, I suppose, but the least they could do is surrender that “Party of Lincoln” conceit. 

Moulitsas is the founder and publisher of Daily Kos.