"You Lie!"

"You lie!" Joe Wilson, the congressman from South Carolina who heckled the president during Wednesday's State of the Union address, was also a strong advocate for keeping the Confederate flag up in his home state.

Years ago, when protests over the flag had reached a boiling point, it was Wilson who argued that the Confederate flag was part of the South Carolinaian tradition.

The congressman said, "The Southern heritage, the Confederate heritage is very honorable."

But opponents of the flag view it as a symbol of blatant racism, especially towards blacks. After all, the battle flag has been appropriated by the Ku Klux Klan and other racist hate groups, says Borgna Brunner. The Southern Poverty Law Center also reports that more than 500 extremist groups use the flag as one of their icons.

On the other hand, proponents of the flag agree with Wilson, maintaining that it is a distinct symbol of Southern culture.

But that notion is steadily losing its force.

In 1962, the decision to fly the Confederate battle flag was reached by an all-white legislature as the civil rights movement began to pick up steam, writes Chris Kromm from the Institute of Southern Studies. In 2000, a bill was passed that called for a different version of the flag to be flown in front of the state house instead of on top of it. Yet, the state has never agreed to remove the symbol entirely.



To this day, South Carolina is the only state that still flies the Confederate Flag not incorporated into a state flag. Wilson was also one of only seven members of the South Carolina Senate, where he initially served before his election into the House of Congress, who voted to keep the flag standing.

Moreover, it should be noted that Wilson was wrong.

When President Obama stated that his proposed health care changes "would not apply to those who are here illegally,"Obama was reiterating a fact.

The House bill on health care reform explicitly prohibits spending any federal money to help illegal immigrants receive health care coverage.