As George Orwell put it in 1984, "those who control the present control the past, and those who control the past control the future." 

And who controls the "present"?  It is the media, and less apparent, those who control high school history books and university history departments.  Thus, the past may be purposely contorted, especially the history of the United States of America.  Editing via omission is the subliminal tack.  Sadly, it doesn't take long to misinform an entire generation.  But why would there be those who would delight in that venture, the venture of "controlling the past"?

The Founding Fathers have been characterized as slaveholding racists rather than brilliant minds schooled in the world history of governments and the creators of the greatest experiment in self-governance the world has ever known.  The War between the States was "only about slavery," we are told, despite many other complications, regional issues, constitutional considerations, and official resolutions by Congress to the contrary.

The use of concocted historical misrepresentations to create the current frictions between those misinformed and the facts of history becomes inevitable.  We are at that point.  And what could be more inflammatory than past racial injustices?

Witness the contrast and conflict between those who feel one way about history and those who harbor other proclivities of belief.  Some defend what they perceive to be their heritage, and others object in tune with what they have been led to understand.

Politics of the moment enter.  But these politics involve nefarious disregard for the law in order to create environments and incidents detrimental to the current administration.  It has become sport for Democrat-ruled urban areas to foment incidents by withdrawing legal protections for certain legal demonstrators and thus allow and promote situations that will later be used by biased media to attack a sitting president.

Why are Democratic local authorities eager to withhold legal protections of property and free speech when it suits their purposes?  I point to the Trump rally in Chicago and incidents in Berkeley, Charlottesville, and others.  It is useful to their agendas of deposing Trump and cleansing history to their liking.

Certainly, this author is not promoting racism on either side of the ledger.

However, when groups appear from nowhere with weaponry to contest a legally sanctioned event, that party must be identified as a perpetrator.  They have not been, to date.  When legal permits are acquired for demonstration, there is a strong implication by the issuer of such permits that the rights of the legal demonstrators will be protected.  They have not been protected.  This is nothing more than selective enforcement of the law.  Who has been charged with toppling the Confederate statue in North Carolina?

Antifa and its clear mission to cause disruptions of legally protected events seem un-American at the very least and likely constitute anarchy.  ZeroHedge runs an article about their organizational antics to disrupt legal activities.

A brief clarification of history is warranted.  It is curious that Virginia, a state that seceded and fought on constitutional grounds, is the epicenter of the slavery issue.  Virginia did indeed have legal slavery, but Virginia did not immediately secede with the Deep South (S.C., Ga., Fla., La., Ala., Miss., and Texas), who clearly made their concerns over slavery the prime issue of secession.  Six months passed from South Carolina's secession until the eventual secessions of N.C., Va., Ark., and Tenn.  Why?  Those states believed what Lincoln asserted: that he had no legal power to interfere with slavery where it already existed.

In the late days of May 1861, Virginia's convention to consider secession was two to one against secession.  It was not until Lincoln called for troops and a blockade of the Deep South that Virginia, North Carolina, Arkansas, and Tennessee voted, in democratic fashion and under representative government, to secede.  They were motivated by what they deemed unconstitutional actions by the federal government.

In the Upper South, slavery was already in decline, much as it had previously declined in the North.  Free blacks in Petersburg, Virginia, for example, were nearly half the entire black population of that city (The Last Citadel. Petersburg, June 1864-April 1865, page 6).

The "white supremacists" who cling to the Rebel battle flag do damage to history.  Their racial views should be separate from any efforts to preserve statues and history.  And the media should be asked why Antifa is not mentioned in their reports, why local authorities issue "stand down" orders to allow escalation and dodge protection obligations for those legally assembled.  And the Department of Justice might be asked why crossing state lines to incite rioting is no longer militated against by the federal authorities.

"It is unfair to judge a man's views on the issues of his day by the ideological fashions of another era."  One must place oneself in the era and circumstances of that man represented by the statue in question.  It is quite an academic task.  We could use more of it.  Additionally, the duty of the historian is "not to invent."  Unfortunately, wisdom such as this has been cast aside, deliberately, and for political expedience.  It damages our nation and "controls our past."  Orwell's caution.  Sadly, some are delighted.