On Tuesday, President Trump raised a question about the removal of Confederate statues and memorials and said local authorities should make their own decisions. This morning, he offered his own opinion: They should stay.
A lot of different issues are getting jumbled up this week, so I thought I should note: While I disagree with the president about these statues and memorials, for reasons I have discussed here and here, I also acknowledge that his view is one that many well-meaning people hold and for which reasonable arguments can be made. (Trump has made one of those reasonable arguments: the where-does-it-stop argument.)
But it would be better if the most prominent defender of the statues was someone who was willing to condemn neo-Nazis and white supremacists explicitly and without being pressured, and who had not said that “very fine people” had participated in their march.