Oh My: "History" Fraudster Michael Bellesiles Has A New Book Coming Out, And The Promotional Materials Claim He Was "Swiftboated"

The NRA swiftboated him?

1877 is also notable as the comeback book for a celebrated U.S. historian. Michael Bellesiles is perhaps most famous as the target of an infamous “swiftboating” campaign by the National Rifle Association, following the publication of his Bancroft Prize-winning book Arming America (Knopf, 2000) — “the best kind of non-fiction,” according to the Chicago Tribune — which made daring claims about gun ownership in early America.

That will come as a surprise to Emory University, which fired him over gross misconduct (part of their report at the link).

Jim Lindgren also rebuts the "NRA conspiracy" myth here.

Because Bellesiles was fired, I guess, he's not required to acknowledge the findings against him. If he'd been kept on at Emory, he'd have been disciplined, and I imagine part of that discipline would have involved and admission and a forbidding of ever downplaying his guilt.

But what he did was so blatantly fraudulent they canned him.

So he can say whatever he likes.

Just as Dan Rather was framed by a conspiracy of closet conservatives at CBS, so too was Michael Bellesiles.

posted by Ace at 04:46 PM

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