David Weigel: Editing Wikipedia to Make Palin Right About Paul Revere

David Weigel is a columnist for Slate.

This is a hell of a get by Charles Johnson. Starting on Sunday, as Sarah Palin kept explaining that her version of the Paul Revere "Midnight Ride" was historically accurate, Palin fans emerged on Wikipedia to "fix" the Revere biography. Palin's taking heat for saying Revere "warned the British"? No problem: Just add the line in italics.

Revere did not shout the phrase later attributed to him ("The British are coming!"), largely because the mission depended on secrecy and the countryside was filled with British army patrols; also, most colonial residents at the time considered themselves British as they were all legally British subjects.

That revision is deleted with the explanation "content not backed by a reliable sources (it was sarah palin interview videos)." The people who keep cleaning this up are getting sort of bored now....