A year ago we thought Confederate politics lined up with modern politics. Were we right?

The Confederate Identity Project launched on Aug. 3, 2017, less than two weeks before the violence in Charlottesville. What got it going was a Confederate Flag sticker on a local car, 2,900 miles from Richmond. But we didn’t know much about the Confederacy, the Civil War, Reconstruction, or really, the American South at all. Here’s …

The Russians posed as Confederates online. They don’t sell as well in real life.

Did the Russians rally folks down South with fake calls to the Confederacy? Seems so. But that doesn't mean the actual Russian government can win friends on the same ground. President Trump seemed to endorse of Russian President Vladimir Putin's denial of hacking the 2016 presidential campaign when the two met in Helsinki. The fallout …

Laughing at a another Civil War? There’s cause for second thoughts.

Let’s hope we are still chuckling years from now. A warning worthy of Henny Penny -- “BREAKING: Democrats Plan To Launch Civil War On July 4th” -- ended up stealing the show from a trio of serious warning flags in recent weeks. A majority of Americans believe the country is in “real danger of becoming …

The Case for White Civility: Bleeding Kansas

A new argument has been made in recent weeks, or perhaps an old argument has been revived, holding that calls for “civility” in public discourse amount to a smoke screen, that white people call for civility as a way to tamp down non-white peoples’ calls for greater equality. “We were going to end up here …

Cops and Confederate Flags

One time, a police officer in South Carolina put on some Confederate battle flag underwear. We probably would never have known this, except he took a picture of himself in said underwear and posted it online. And if there is one thing social media is good for, it’s conveying the power of identity politics to …

From Cambridge Analytica to Johnny Reb in Four Steps

How to go from data mining Facebook to stirring up Confederate sympathizers in four steps.

California Secede? Never(ish).

Perhaps we should’ve mentioned that while we didn’t see a single confederate flag in California, we did spot approximately 10,000 Bear Flags. And they wave as something like a flag of the Trump “resistance.” California, today the world’s sixth largest economy, has been raising eyebrows for seeming to live up to the "Republic" title on …

When Confederates Wrote Tax Law

With the passage of a monumental package of tax changes on the horizon, the Republican Party has arguably taken another step in its Confederate transformation. Republicans like Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, and probably even more Democrats, may be befuddled at how the GOP party went from excoriating President Obama for his 2009 stimulus package …

Sex, identity and an Alabama Senate race

There’s a notable experiment in social identity theory in which people were asked to sign up for a program that offered a small amount of cash if their favorite team lost. There was virtually no downside. You signed the paper. If your team won, great. If your team lost, you got paid. But people wouldn’t …

Seahawks flag slammed for representing Confederacy, murder, rape

A Seahawks football flag with St. Andrew's Cross on it had apparently hung in a Tacoma bar for four years without a problem. But then a customer noticed it looks a bit like the Stars and Bars. “I just happened to look up and I saw it there, and I was just really shocked. To …