Some on the far right have become very enamored of a fellow named David Barton. For one example of his influence, when the current right-wing majority on the Texas state board of education set out to rewrite the standards for teaching history, Barton was one of the “experts” they appointed to help.
Barton’s views are actually fairly extreme even on the right. For example, he thinks U.S. highways, including the Interstate system, are unconstitutional. And of course he thinks Thomas Jefferson didn’t know what he was talking about when he described the first First Amendment as separating church and state. (Perhaps not coincidentally, Texas wound up eliminating Jefferson from the history standards.)
Since Barton shows up so often now (for example, as a teacher in Glenn Beck’s “university”), it might be worth listing some places where you can read more about his pseudoscholarship. Yes. these are mostly liberal websites and have an obvious agenda, but that doesn’t invalidate the factual content.
And finally, this amusing bit from Keith Olberman’s old show.
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