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Politicians Are Just A Bunch Of Followers

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South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley says: Take down the Confederate flag. Not every American agrees. (Tim Dominick/The State via AP)

Politicians were tripping over themselves to call for the Confederate flag to be taken down in the wake of the Charleston shootings. But a new poll found Americans weren’t quite so decisive.

In fact, for once, politicians might actually have gotten out ahead of public opinion.

The Suffolk University/USA Today poll conducted two weeks after the apparently racially motivated shooting and a week after calls for the flag to come down first built. It found that 42 percent of Americans think the flag is racist and should be removed from state grounds, while 42 percent of Americans think the flag is not racist and represents Southern history.

(Those numbers break down less along regional lines and more along partisan lines, with 63 percent of Democrats calling the flag racist and 61 percent of Republicans saying it’s not.)

Check out Politicians Are Just A Bunch Of Followers at https://absoluterights.com/politicians-are-just-a-bunch-of-followers/

This poll didn’t ask whether those who thought the flag was a part of Southern heritage had opinions on whether it should stay or go on state property. But the heritage argument is a key one for flag supporters. While they offer many reasons, it basically all comes back to that.

So while it’s possible that people who think it’s about heritage rather than racism would still remove the flag from government property, we’re making an educated guess that this poll shows America is pretty split on the Confederate flag. That makes last month’s political race to drop the flag like a hot potato all the more surprising; politicians are usually much more deliberate.

This is the first national poll since South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) called for the flag to be taken off state capitol grounds in the days after a white man killed nine black church members. Haley’s speech launched a wave of Republicans questioning the flag’s place on government property, from presidential candidates to other southern governors.

[The looming demise of the Confederate flag, in 7 steps]

But political change almost never works this way. In fact, it usually is the opposite.

We can look back at a number of social issues — from gay marriage to guns — to find politicians following rather than leading public opinion.

Example one: same-sex marriage. Most Democratic politicians — including President Obama and Hillary Clinton — didn’t support it publicly until it had clear majority support.

On the other side of the political spectrum, gun laws help prove our point. After mass shootings from Newtown, Conn., to Charleston, there’s almost no chance Congress will move to tighten gun laws — in part because the public doesn’t want that to happen.

This Suffolk University/USA Today poll asked about that, too. It found 56 percent of Americans said tightening gun laws or background checks would not prevent more mass shootings in the United States, while about 40 percent of respondents said it would help.

Check out Politicians Are Just A Bunch Of Followers at https://absoluterights.com/politicians-are-just-a-bunch-of-followers/
Respondents are probably right about this.

As to why the Confederate flag is the exception to all this? The Fix has some theories.

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