Kevin Levin has been having some fun with Larry Schweikart’s recently published — and oddly titled — 48 Liberal Lies About American History. (I mean, only 48? Seriously? He couldn’t find two more? Clearly, he hasn’t reviewed the latest scholarship on George Washington’s ursine sex fetishes and contributions to the early cocaine trade, to say nothing of his extra testicles and his callous disregard for the British children.)
Anyhow, Schweikart — last seen writing a book that should have embarrassed his mother — has discovered some remarkable untruths that are, he claims, standard leftist issue in US History texts. Among them:
- “John F. Kennedy was Killed by LBJ and a Secret Team to Prevent Him from Getting Us Out of Vietnam”
- “Ronald Reagan Knew ‘Star Wars’ Wouldn’t Work but Wanted to Provoke a War with the USSR.”
- “September 11 Was Not the Work of Terrorists. It Was a Government Conspiracy.”
It hardly needs mentioning that none of these claims are even remotely endorsed by any current US history textbooks — or at least those that haven’t been self-published by unmedicated crazy people — and that Larry Schweikart must be confusing “liberal US history textbooks” with “amateur videos I found on YouTube.” None of that will matter to the Texas School Board, for whom I’d guess Schweikart is eagerly preparing a high school version of his Patriot’s History, complete with its reassurances that the men who died at the Alamo were “freedom fighters” and that Mexico’s finest soldiers ran from San Jacinto like screaming children.
But since Schweikart seems particularly concerned about the alleged presence of delusional conspiracy theories in American history texts, perhaps it’s worth reviewing his and Michael Allen’s treatment of the Oklahoma City bombing for a point of comparison. From pp. 785-786 of A Patriot’s History of the United States, the authors treat us to this:
[I]n his haste to lay the blame on antigovernment extremists, Clinton and the entire U.S. intelligence community missed several troubling clues that perhaps McVeigh and Nichols had not acted alone. Nichols, for example, was in the same part of the Philippines — and at the same time — as Al Qadea [sic] bomb maker Ramzi Yousef. Moreover, numerous witnesses testified that McVeigh and Nichols lacked sufficient bomb-making skills, but that their bomb was a near-perfect replica of the 1993 World Trade Center bomb devised by Yousef.
The footnotes to this section lead us to a handful of books published by the distinguished Regan Press and — the phrase “no shit” comes to mind here — World Net Daily’s publishing house. All of which makes me wonder if the University of Dayton’s history department allows Larry Schweikart to teach its undergraduate methods seminar. At any rate, the “Third Terrorist” theory has long been a staple of right-wing mythology and was promoted vigorously in 2001 and 2002 by such totally credible experts as Bill O’Reilly, Frank “Sharia” Gaffney and Larry “Whitey Tape” Johnson. The fact that the theory has no basis in evidence hardly disqualifies it from inclusion in Schweikart’s book; apparently, its top-shelf wingnuttery more than compensates for its actual flaws. It’s an impressive trick, though, to follow up this sort of insane conspiracy-peddling by publishing a book that indicts “liberal” historians for circulating conspiracy theories they’ve actually done nothing to promote.
23 comments
March 24, 2010 at 3:34 pm
silbey
But…but…health care reform! Socialism! Borodino!
March 24, 2010 at 3:45 pm
Chris
I work at UD (in a completely different area than Schweikart). FWIW, he’s currently teaching American history to 1865, American business and economics history, and a course titled “Technology and the Culture of War” (which is part of a specific cluster requirement for undergrads). He’s also teaching a Civil War course this summer. Since the history department’s website is remarkably crappy, I’m not able to tell if he teaches any methodology courses. The above indicates that he’s doing more than enough damage, regardless.
March 24, 2010 at 5:08 pm
Elliott
If Cox + Combes’ Washington is a liberal lie, I don’t want the truth.
March 24, 2010 at 5:14 pm
dana
I think this is an instance of the general rule that “liberal” means “I don’ like it.”
March 24, 2010 at 5:16 pm
TF Smith
This review of Dr. Schweikart’s dissertation-turned-first-book is, um, pointed.
Review: [untitled]
William G. Shade
The American Historical Review, Vol. 94, No. 3 (Jun., 1989), pp. 855-856
Published by: American Historical Association
His RMP ratings run quite the gamut…
March 24, 2010 at 6:46 pm
kid bitzer
you lie-berals are defaming the father of our country again.
he had exactly the canonical number of testicles, plus 29 supernumerary goddamn dicks.
March 24, 2010 at 7:41 pm
davenoon
no, kb. he had two on the vine, two sets of testicles — so divine.
March 25, 2010 at 3:36 am
Timothy Burke
That’s a lot of RMP entries on him. Most of them making it clear that he brings all of what he says in the book into the classroom and retaliates against students who disagree with him.
Gee, I wonder where all the folks who are so concerned about political bias in the classroom have gone to in this case? Why, in the past, they’ve sounded the alarm based on a single anonymous report of liberal bias. This looks like a case to really worry about. I wonder what’s different in this instance? How very puzzling.
March 25, 2010 at 4:10 am
ExurbanMom
Hey Chris, does this joker have tenure? Because, wow, my opinion of UD just took a nosedive
March 25, 2010 at 7:48 am
jvhillegas
Thanks for bringing this to our attention, davenoon. Your review of Patriot’s History and the review of Banking in the American South that TF Smith cited point to some disturbing shortcomings of Schweikart’s work.*
I have a question for the Great Collective EotAW Oracle, but first a bit of background.
I hold an MA in history, am currently able to patch together part-time jobs in the field that keep the creditors at bay (at least), and would be thrilled to pursue a PhD one of these day. I willingly understand my historical work as an ethical practice — by which I mean that I endeavor to produce interpretations that are as accurate, thorough, and representative as possible. To do so means to eschew anachronism, to be mindful of my own biases, and to cite and use sources correctly.
So here I am, plugging away on my passionate calling in my own little slice of paradise, and then I learn about a schmuck like Schweikart. How did this caricature of a historian even make it through grad school, how did he then get a professorship, and how can respectable publishing houses continue to churn out his schlock? It’s almost enough to discourage me from working toward a PhD if the field can’t filter from its ranks hacks like Schweikart. I suppose I could turn this logic around and conclude that — hey! — if ideological puppets like Schweikart can make it, so might I, if I lower my standards and find a party-line niche!
My question for the Oracle, then, is: How does such poor scholarship exist and thrive, particularly in the field of history where there seems to be far more qualified potential professors then there are professorships?
—-
* Although some reviews of Banking in the American South say exactly the opposite: see, for example, Ira Cohen, JAH 75: 3 (Dec. 1988), 939-940; Walter L. Buenger, Journal of the Early Republic 8: 2 (1988), 198-199; Naomi R. Lamoreaux Business History Review 62: 3 (1988), 525-526; and Richard Timberlake, Journal of Economic History 48: 4 (1988), 969-970, who writes that this book “adds to the growing body of documented experience that supports a quarantining of any state involvement with the monetary system.”
March 25, 2010 at 8:24 am
AaLD
Was Schweikart always a partisan hack? Or did he start out as a legitimate (though perhaps undistinguished) academic, then turn to hackdom for the money ala Victor Davis Hanson?
March 25, 2010 at 10:39 am
kevin
I want to have your History Teacher review of A Patriot’s History crocheted onto a throw pillow for my couch. That’s a work of beauty and comfort.
March 25, 2010 at 10:44 am
silbey
My question for the Oracle, then, is: How does such poor scholarship exist and thrive, particularly in the field of history where there seems to be far more qualified potential professors then there are professorships?
My immediate sense (stepping into the Oracle role for the moment) is that at least part of the reason is the inherent price of tenure. Guaranteeing people something like lifetime employment has its great advantages but it also means that people can take it and do different things (as Schweikart has). I don’t think that’s the entire context, but it’s some of it.
March 25, 2010 at 12:37 pm
politicalfootball
I’m so happy that VD Hanson was brought up here. It gives me a chance to link this, which discusses Obama’s disdain for the wishes of the electorate – just like FDR:
March 26, 2010 at 7:54 am
kevin
Yes, they hated FDR so much they elected him four times.
March 26, 2010 at 8:25 am
Julian
That’s a good point, and FDR is exceptional in many ways, but George W. Bush was reelected too. Reelection doesn’t preclude loathing.
March 26, 2010 at 12:00 pm
kevin
Fair enough.
But if an historian wanted to make broad statements about whether or not the American people “liked” a president “at the time,” one would think that historian might consult that president’s approval ratings which were recorded “at the time.” And if he had done so, he would have seen proof that his statement was demonstrably false.
March 27, 2010 at 10:09 am
kid bitzer
the folks at lgm have up a squidalicious clip of liam neeson and his new pet. so get over there and get kraken!
March 28, 2010 at 6:23 am
Neddy Merrill
29 supernumerary goddamn dicks
Are you saying only his primary phallus had a singing part? Foul slander!
March 28, 2010 at 7:29 am
kid bitzer
i said they were supernumerary, not spear-carriers.
March 28, 2010 at 9:24 pm
AYY
Prof. Burke, you asked where all those who are complaining about political bias in the classroom have gone to in this case.
I’m glad you asked that question. See one of the design defects of this blog is that they forgot to insert a light that goes on in every conservative household once there’s a post that mentions a conservative professor. What that means is that the very people you were asking about probably weren’t even aware of this post.
And even if they were aware of it, they might have thought that the subject of the post was the book, rather than the reviews of Prof S.’s teaching style, or the general liberal bias of academia.
So maybe what happened was that they didn’t realize that they had to drop everything to check the reviews of Prof S. within the 12 hours between the post and your comment and report back to Edge of the West with an appropriate criticism.
BTW I don’t know anything about this particular professor or the book, or whether the reviews are valid. But even if they are, it doesn’t show that the concerns about liberal bias aren’t well taken. It means only that there’s one exception to the rule.
March 28, 2010 at 11:00 pm
TF Smith
Not to be cynical or anything, but does anyone in the professional group have any opinions re the History Department at UCSB? Especially circa the early ’80s?
March 30, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Timothy Burke
Well, AYY, obviously your Bat-signal is working just fine. I sort of figured that there was a division of labor such that every liberal blog is being monitored by at least one conservative. But you see, many of the people who complain about bias in the classroom also claim that they’re not at all partisan in their concerns, that they worry equally about any bias. Many of those folks also maintain that they’re trying to investigate reports of bias actively–and tend to comment on any fresh report of bias quickly once it occurs.
Unless, of course, it doesn’t fit the script for “bias”. And, of course, if it’s this well-sourced, as opposed to a complaint based on a single anonymous report about an unknown professor in an unnamed university or some such, that clearly doesn’t merit the same kind of concern.