This is a fact check from the Associated Press:
Biden did not eulogize former KKK “grand wizard”
CLAIM: When former KKK Grand Wizard Robert Byrd died in 2010, he was eulogized by Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
AP’S ASSESSMENT: Partly false. Biden did eulogize Sen. Robert C. Byrd when he died, but Byrd was not a “grand wizard” in the Ku Klux Klan. He was a member of the KKK in the early 1940s but later renounced his affiliation with the hate group.
THE FACTS: Byrd died in 2010 at the age of 92, and was the longest serving senator in American history.
A widely shared post on Facebook claims, “When he died in 2010, former KKK Grand Wizard Robert Byrd was eulogized by Joe Biden. Go ahead Facebook fact-checkers. Verify this. I DARE YOU!”
But the post is misleading. Byrd never held the post of “grand wizard” in the Ku Klux Klan — a top leadership role — though he was a member of the organization in the early 1940s.
As a young man in West Virginia, Byrd recruited members to a local KKK chapter and was elected to the post of “exalted cyclops” according to his 2005 autobiography. Later, in 1964, when Byrd had become a Democratic U.S. senator, he stalled and opposed major civil rights legislation.
Byrd later renounced his early political views. He called his KKK affiliation “an extraordinarily foolish mistake” in his autobiography.
Yep, he wasn’t the Grand Wizard and voted against civil rights legislation, but never mind that because he called it a mistake after the Democrats decided to court the black vote with affirmative action other forms of soft bigotry of low expectations.
So it’s fine that Biden eulogized him.
Now let’s go back 10 years back to before Biden’s candidacy.
From Slate:
What Does an Exalted Cyclops Do?
He reports to the Dragon and coordinates the Centaurs.
Robert Byrd, the longest-serving senator in U.S. history, died Monday at 92. While he was most famous as a master of the Senate’s obscure rules, Byrd wore many hats during his lifetime, including that of Exalted Cyclops in the Ku Klux Klan. What are the job responsibilities of an Exalted Cyclops?
He presides over the Council of the Centaurs and writes quarterly reports to the Grand Giant. In the Klan hierarchy, each local chapter, or Klavern, is led by an Exalted Cyclops. This member is typically elected by his fellow Klansmen and serves a one-year term. According to the original 1867 Prescript of the Ku Klux Klan, the Exalted Cyclops reports to a Grand Giant, or provincial leader; a Grand Dragon, or state director; and the Grand Wizard, or national chair. Below the Cyclops on the org chart were the Grand Magi, the Grand Monk, the Grand Exchequer, the Grand Turk, and, finally, the rank-and-file members known as Ghouls or Knights. (Many of these titles have changed over time, and most of the sub-Cyclops ranks have been eliminated.) The Exalted Cyclops’ responsibilities include presiding over Klavern meetings, initiating new members, and appointing Councils of Centaurs—that’s Klan-speak for a jury—to try and punish wayward Ghouls.
So he wasn’t the big cheese of the Klan, just the big cheese of a Klavern.
Given that, what the AP said is equivalent to saying:
While he made Colonel and brigade commander, he wasn’t the Service Chairman of the Army so it’s not really a big deal, and he said that his time in the Army was a foolish mistake.
No, when you are in for decades and become Klavern leader, that’s a big fucking deal.
By today’s progressive standard, anyone associated with Byrd should be unpersoned, but this is about electing Biden, so his association with Exalted Cyclops Byrd is no big deal.
Orwell’s Mintrue has nothing on the current state of the media. The Minture was a branch of the government. The media does this out of desire and with alacrity. That’s worse.
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