#twitterstorians, we are in hell.
this is hell.
watch the world burn live, below: https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1306624450884972551

we are just now learning, from Larry Arnn, that while Thomas Jefferson owned slaves and wrote the Declaration of Independence, he also favored the prohibition of slavery in the Northwest Territories, which indicates that he was not in fact a hypocrite. #BadHistory

Arnn has now jumped to Hitler's enabling act. #BadHistory

"I thank the President for his keen interest in this subject."
Fabulous. #BadHistory

wow, a think-tank prof at an institute dedicated to the study of Western Civilization. She's gonna be hella original. Dr. Mary Graeber. #BadHistory #BadWhiteHouseHistory

yep, here's Mary Graeber's original take: Howard Zinn is bad.

"Zinn's book is full of the ideas that are inspiring riots this year, such as 'systemic racism,' 'economic inequality,' and 'police brutality.'"

Here's what's so damn hilarious: Mary Graeber has been socialized into the tradition of reading papers aloud to an audience of other historians. I predict low ratings for this White House conference. "Zinn said, Quote....End quote." LOL.

Peter Wood, NAS President, is next. Former Provost of King's College. So was he provost when married Dinesh D'Souza was doinking his secretary like all good Christian college administrators do?

LOL. Peter Wood is going to cry about "cancel culture."

Damn these idiots with their damnable "history" conference practically forcing themselves into my book's epilogue. Damn their mediocre minds.

Campus activists are the ones behind all current demonstrations in America, writing the "script" of protestors. This from Peter Wood, a talking wax figure.

You wanna know when the National Association of Scholars was founded? 1987-1988 -- when the Stanford Canon Wars were reaching their conclusion.

Peter Wood: valuing diversity really hides disdain for America. Because if you love America and Western Civilization, you can't value diversity, apparently. #BadWhiteHouseHistory

Peter Wood: some historians have "an Ivy League diploma in one hand and a Molotov cocktail in the other."
Naw, ya dumb-ass, we just have plain old cocktails. Did you not get invited to any of our parties? #BadWhiteHouseHistory

ah yes. now we have Alan Guelzo, here to complain about "tribalism," and how one nation "broke with this pattern."
What nation could it be?!

lol this is so freaking hilarious. Guelzo is lauding the Enlightenment origins of America. can't wait until someone else in this accursed conference squares the circle for and points to Western Civilization as an ethnocultural heritage. Or, see the Cornerstone Speech.

Alan Guelzo complains about "truth at the mercy of narrative." Quite a story he's telling here. #twitterstorians

poor Alan Guelzo is haunted by Hayden White.

oh for FUCK'S sake. BILL MCCLAY IS AT THIS ACCURSED CONFERENCE.

this is NOT A DRILL.
Bill McClay is participating in this accursed "White House History" conference.
I am live-tweeting this as a public service to #twitterstorians.
Also, we live in hell.
#USIH

#USIH / #twitterstorians, wanna know a secret? this charming young woman speaking now is following in my footsteps. I pioneered this role -- articulate and formidable champion of traditional liberal education -- during the Stanford canon wars.
I was better at it, FWIW.

she is pro Great Ideas and anti Great Injustices.

Here comes "the great Bill McClay," who apparently will be leaving OU to go to "a fine place." I think the chair just disclosed that McClay is leaving OU. Anyway, Bill McClay is about to put his imprimatur on this White House History Conference by speaking. Charming. #USIH

McClay is telling a story about how Lincoln drew on Mason Weems's mythologizing history of George Washington in a speech. So we're going to learn that bad and inaccurate history can actually be good? #BadWhiteHouseHistory

So now McClay is telling us that Abe Lincoln's invocation of the bad history of Weems helped to create a sustaining vision of the American past. Southern planters believed the nation was founded on slavery, but Lincoln refused that vision.

McClay says history must be based on truth, not on myth. So we don't want to be Weemses. We have to be accurate, but realize we are creating myths for Americans to cling to. But Lincoln was inspired by myths, not accuracy. What a tangled and awful argument. #USIH

McClay is headed to Hillsdale College. #USIH

Bill McClay's conclusion was that history must be both truthful and inspiring. So for him, it's not enough for historians to simply be truthful. #USIH #twitterstorians

Now we're hearing from Ted Rebarber.
I do appreciate how everyone at this conference (with the exception of McClay) delivers a paper in the most boring possible way. They really are nailing the style of history conferences.
And we all know this is all. about. style.

Ted Rebarber is complaining about how the AP US history framework is needlessly negative about American history. Ted, honey, you can burn the whole College Board scam right to the ground and nobody will bat an eye.

lol. Rebarber's main complaint with his example is that the AP US History framework does not sufficiently encourage students to respect the private property of others.

Rebarber is complaining about how history courses don't discuss religious history in connection with American history, or don't discuss the influence of the Bible.

This conference is turning into a commercial for Bill McClay's survey textbook, Land of Hope, and for Rebarber's complete curriculum based on McClay's book. Charming. Will there be signed copies available in the back?

The NEH has provided grant money for this initiative.

Oh fantastic! Now we're going to hear from an administrator of charter schools! And another former employee of The King's College -- Dr. Robert Jackson. A D'Souza hire?

Well, I guess McClay didn't circulate his paper beforehand, because here comes Jackson with a Weems-esque nod to Washington's integrity. These "scholars" do the founding fathers the grotesque injustice of considering them as paper cut outs, Punch and Judy puppets, caricatures.

Now Jackson is complaining that academic historians are treating history as a "morality tale." No, hon, that's what you're all about right here and right now. You've just trotted out cannot-tell-a-lie Washington and self-made Douglass to tell a morality tale about America. FFS.

Jackson is the head of the Great Arts Academies, and now he's touting "classical schools" across the country.
Great Books are back, baby! Everything old is new again! Bring back Western Civ at Stanford! etc etc etc

Now we're hearing from Jordan Adams at Hillsdale College. Also, if you're keeping score at home, this panel is all white dudes, with the exception of the initial speaker, the UVA student speaker ("a prodigy!") and, inexplicably, Ben Carson, who is sitting there in silence.

Adams: good teachers love their students and love their subject matter. By contrast, evil leftist college professors show no love for their students by teaching history via simplistic theories like class struggle. Skeptical historians rob students of heroes.

Another infomercial for Bill McClay's "Land of Hope," coming from this Hillsdale administrator. So, heads up, #twitterstorians: a "grass-roots" (read: astroturfed) campaign for schools to adopt this curriculum coming to a college/school system near you. #USIH

Real talk: Bill McClay is an engaging historian and a fine writer. I doubt he's written an error-riddled or deeply-misguided book. But what does it say about Bill McClay that he seems happy/willing to be endorsed by the Trump Administration via an official White House event #USIH

oh fabulous. 20 minutes for a discussion and then "some important person" is going to come here. now we're hearing from Ben Carson, who has what expertise exactly in history?

Ben Carson re: the Constitution of the United States: "I believe that's a divinely inspired document and something that need not be tampered with."
Pal, I'm pretty sure the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendment were some pretty necessary tampering.

I'm warning you guys: the Orange Menace is going to show up at this history conference / infomercial for Bill McClay's book. We are going to see Bill McClay, w/ a shit-eating grin on his face, listen to the inchoate ramblings of Donald Trump.
We. live. in. hell.

Ben Carson with fabulously unoriginal thinking calling out a culture of minority victimhood / white guilt. Ben Carson gets a round of applause.

Now Peter Wood is answering a question about "good trends" in the academy. Good trends he identifies:
charter schools
Bill McClay's book
financial challenges - he's glad colleges can't make their budgets, because now they're desperate for money and will rethink their curriculum

PLEASE PAY ATTENTION: these conservative ideologues WANT colleges to struggle for funding. they have worked toward the deligitimization/defunding of higher education PRECISELY SO THAT they can force upon colleges a retrograde curriculum.

Alan Guelzo talking about what he's going to write, or what books are on the horizon. Another plug for Bill McClay's Land of Hope. Now Guelzo is praising the movies: Spielberg's Lincoln, "an affirmation of the entire process of democratic deliberation moving towards...abolition."

"The great success of the Zinn project has little to do with Howard Zinn being a great historian," but a great deal to do with "how the Zinn project has been packaged and sold." - Guelzo.

More complaints about Zinn in this conference than about Guelzo. Because the '80s will never die, baby!

whew does Alan Guelzo revel in the sound of his own white magisterial male voice!

Now a leading question from Larry Arnn. Why are charter schools better?

I hate to say it, but @tressiemcphd and/or her students might have to watch this absolutely accursed circle-jerk of a panel. #lowered coming to a community near you, riding upon the hobby horse of reforming the teaching of American history.

One more leading question. This one for Bill McClay. Poor little Victoria, the prodigy, wanted to add a comment, but was cut off by Arnn. No worries, though -- I'm sure the Cato institute will be hiring.

Bill McClay talking about the extraordinary editorial freedom he had in writing his textbook w/o research assistance, w/o a leave of absence, etc. He went with a non-traditional textbook publisher.

McClay's book has been published with Encounter Books.

Uh oh. McClay is being an intellectual historian here, cautioning people that history is not written in a disembodied voice of objectivity. History is not written in the voice of God, but in a human voice, he says.
How will Ben Carson deal with this?!

Arnn: "Right now is a time for choosing"

Is it 1964?

the event livestream has ended. we will not have to watch Bill McClay be commended for his scholarship by the Very Stable Genius himself.

omg. I spoke too soon. The PRESIDENT* is going to address the White House History Conference. Here is the YouTube waiting room for the shortly-to-be-livestreamed event:

I will now live tweet the remarks of the President*
THEN I will have a drink.

The stream is running but the President hasn't taken to the podium yet. I will pour a drink now. And I will tweet.

This portion of the live tweeting will be brought to you courtesy of a cranberry juice cocktail with one shot of peach liqueur, one shot of strawberry liqueur, one shot of vodka, and a soupçon of existential despair

there are 1800 people in the waiting room for this White House livestream. What's the over/under on at least 1500 of us being actual historians?

#twitterstorians, like this tweet if you're in the waiting room for this livestream of the President's* remarks at the White House History Conference.

by the way, I am going to count attendance at this conference as "professional development" in my annual review. anyone else who watched it should as well. to prove that I attended, I will provide a link to this live-tweet thread.
we live in hell.

I guess somebody is wiping the adderall powder off of POTUS's nose and retouching his rouge. Hence the delay.

okay. first to appear: Mike Pence.

Pence invokes John Adams, "our first Vice President." May he be as happy in his office as John Adams was.

Pence quoting Lincoln now. No dominionist theology just yet.

"Our founders knew history. Sadly, we live in a time when too many are forgetting history today."

"We gather here today, soon to hear from the President of the United States, as Americans who are committed to affirming the greatness of this nation and the ideals of our founders." - Pence

"No one can preserve what they do not love, and no one can love what they do not know." - Pence
au contraire, @VP, America will preserve the memory of your damnable administration for the moral scourge it truly has been, until the very end of time.

"So it's Constitution Day in America," says Mike Pence, so we're gonna show our gratitude by giving a big F U to the emoluments clause.

(Pence is introducing #WickednessInHighPlaces now, AKA Donald Trump.)

Trump is truly honored to be at the "very first White House Conference on American History." defend the founders, the heroes, and the American character.

The President of the United States is heavily sedated and is slurring his speech.

pretty sure Stephen Miller wants him on downers now so that he'll stick to the fascist script that Miller has written.

POTUS on the Constitution: "It was the fulfillment of a thousand years of Western Civilization."
Me to me: I really need to call my editor.

"Left-wing mobs have torn down statues of our founders, desecrated our memorials, and carried out a campaign of violence and anarchy. Far Left demonstrators have chanted the words, 'America was never great.'" - Trump
Hon, what do you think "a more perfect union" means?

drugged POTUS complains of cancel culture

Arnn had a lot of F-ing nerve invoking 1984 to kick off the conference with this authoritarian in the White House.

Trump namechecks Howard Zinn as if he has actually heard of him before.

Now Trump is whingeing about the #1619Project

PSA: if you teach in a publicly funded college or university and use the #1619Project, be ready for administrative encroachments on your academic freedom.

Now POTUS is pretending he knows what critical race theory is.

If you want to know how old and boring a talking point this is, please refer to the relevant chapter in @HartmanAndrew's *A War for the Soul of America*

Oh dear. POTUS has just attacked @SmithsonianMag for publishing a recent piece that features the "horrible doctrine" of critical race theory. He will burn it all down rather than let go of white supremacy. ALL OF IT.

American parents, the POTUS says, aren't going to tolerate this kind of curriculum. Not sure American parents have time to worry about it at the moment, since the POTUS is dedicated to exposing children and their families to death and chronic illness via a pandemic virus.

Now POTUS invokes every conservative's favorite MLK quote re: color of skin / content of character.

"By viewing every issue through the lens of race they want to impose a new segregation, and we must not allow that to happen. Critical race theory, the #1619Project, and the assault on American history" is destructive propaganda. - POTUS

Please note: the President of the United States is heavily sedated, barely able to keep his eyes open, and heavily slurring his speech in delivering this address. Historians, note this.

Trump is touting the development of "a pro-American curriculum that celebrates the truth of our great nation's history. We're joined by" some scholars involved in this project, "including Professor Wilfred McClay. Dr. Peter Wood of the NAS. And Ted Rebarber."

Trump will soon sign an executive order to establish a national commission to promote patriotic education, to be called the #1776commission.
He's not mad tho.
#twitterstorians

So, shoutout to Bill McClay for selling your birthright as a respected historian for the bowl of pottage that is Donald Trump's endorsement and approval. Big props to you.
#USIH

Trump is charging Joe Biden with the crime of silence re: the dismantling of statues of founding fathers in Delaware. "The statue of Caesar Rodney will be added to the National Garden of American Heroes." which does not yet exist. and shouldn't.

https://s-usih.org/2017/08/to-a-future-unknown/

Now POTUS, heavily drugged, is signing the Constitution Day proclamation.

So there it is: a respected US intellectual historian has willingly participated in a propaganda session overseen by the atrocious autocrat currently occupying the WH.
shame.
#TWITTERSTORIANS

this concludes my service to the profession and my scholarly development for the day.
I am dumping the rest of this drink in the sink and will email my editor stat.