Huckabee: Decision to fly the Confederate flag is for SC'ians to decide

As, of course, it is. And I don't see how saying so amounts to "repulsive pandering."

Rudy Giuliani faced a similar controversy last April when he visited Montgomery.

Like Alabama, South Carolina has reached a moderate and altogether reasonable compromise on this issue. In both states, some version of the Confederate battle flag now flies on the grounds of each State Capitol alongside memorials to Confederate troops. That seems to me to be an appropriate way to display it. (It's also very much preferable to flying it above a state Capitol, and I'm glad that both Alabama and South Carolina have decided to stop doing that.)

I'm not sure exactly what those who accuse Huckabee and Giuliani of "pandering" with respect to the flag would prefer for them to say. Neither the President, nor Congress, nor the federal courts have the constitutional authority to do anything about it one way or the other. As far as the federal government is concerned, it's a moot issue. In fact, if either candidate had said the flag should be removed, they could rightly have been accused of pandering to those who unreasonably object to any display of the flag.