[lbo-talk] O'Reilly vs Churchill: treason? sedition?

[jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net]

> At 11:20 pm -0500 9/2/05, Doug Henwood wrote:
> >Chuck Grimes asked me offlist why I didn't want any discussion of 
> >Churchill's footnoting practices. It's a good question, and here's 
> >what I said:
> >
> >>I'm afraid it'd be a lot of people talking about what they don't 
> >>know much about. Also, I gotta say, it makes me nervous that 
> >>pissing on Churchill's scholarship will contribute something to 
> >>minimizing the horror of Indian genocide. So what if he got some 
> >>details wrong, white people did kill 90% of them and still treat 
> >>them like shit.
> 
> On the first -- yes. The reason for posting was to have people who 
> are knowledgeable about this comment on it.
> 
> But on the latter -- it's best not to have any shocks down the line. 
> If they are determined to get Churchill, then his scholarship better 
> stand up to muster.
> 
> kj

By posting on this I'm contributing to the problem. The best reason not to discuss any problem 
with Churchill's scholarchip or even his footnoting practices is because no problem exists. 
There is nothing to the charge and continuing to discuss it suggests that there is. People will 
assume if there is an ongoing discussion concerning these matters then there has to be 
something to the charge. It also distracts from the real issue concerning free speech which is 
what I believe it is intended to do.

John Thornton