Historians in the News

This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in each source note. Quotation marks are not used.

Source: The Washington Post

7-31-14

Bob Woodward congratulates John Dean on writing a solid history of the Watergate Cover-up

by Bob Woodward

The new material reveals further examples of the administration’s contempt for the law.

8-2-14

Kent State history professor says "academic friends of Israel" are "directly responsible for the murder of over 1,400 Palestinian children, women and elderly civilians"

"This is not symbolic or even legally justified homicide on your part but actual, cold-blooded, calculated killing, for which you are culpable."

Source: Commentary

7-30-14

Why Benny Morris is both right and wrong

by Max Boot

Morris is surely right. Hamas remains dedicated to Israel’s destruction and it remains intent on keeping its grip on Gaza. What can or should Israel do about it?

Source: MWC News

7-28-14

Professor Ilan Pappé: Israel Has Chosen to be a 'Racist Apartheid State'

"I think Israel in 2014 made a decision that it prefers to be a racist apartheid state and not a democracy," Pappé says.

Source: Townhall

7-30-14

History Professor: Convicted Cop Killer Mumia Should Be Celebrated Like Martin Luther King Jr. in Schools

"Essentially by the end of his life, Martin Luther King like Mumia Abu Jamal, was a radical."

Source: NYT

7-30-14

Robert Drew, Cinema Verite Documentarian, Dies at 90

Filmmaker Robert Drew mastered the intimate, spontaneous style known as cinema verite and schooled a generation of influential directors .

Source: Salon

7-30-14

Rick Perlstein: “Ronald Reagan absolved America almost in a priestly role not to have to contend with sin. The consequences are all around us today”

"From climate change to foreign affairs, Reagan pushed America toward easy lies, just as reckoning seemed possible."

Source: The Economist

7-5-14

History wars are raging in East Asia

This time the bickering has spread beyond Japan and China, its usual homes.

Source: Mosaic Magazine

7-30-14 (accessed)

Round 2: It's Benny Morris vs. Martin Kramer ... Was there a massacre in 1948 in Lydda?

Morris takes off the gloves in a debate about what happened in Lydda.

Source: Radio Free Europe

7-31-14

World War I Anniversary: Five Historians, Two Questions

A century after the outbreak of World War I, can we now answer the eternal question -- who was to blame?

Source: NYT

7-29-14

While French historians take a common view of WW I, British and German don't

by Sylvie Kauffmann

"While our German and British neighbors have been passionately debating theories about the origins of the war or its utility, all is quiet on the French front."

Source: Philadelphia Magazine

7-29-14

Historian: Proclamation Naming Pa. State Gun Gets Facts Wrong

A historian who once lived in Berks County says the bill that designated the Pennsylvania long rifle as the official state gun is riddled with errors.

Source: Irish Central

7-29-14

Irish slave owners were compensated historian reveals

Hogan writes that the British paid slave owners over $30 million in compensation for the loss of their ‘property.’

Source: NYT

7-29-14

Two historians are in a race against time to preserve early church records from destruction

The historians are racing against inexorable church closings, occasional fires, and a more mundane but not uncommon peril: the actual loss of documents, which most often occurs when a church elder dies.

Source: Los Angeles Times

6-24-14

Yale's Jay Winter sums up what we should remember about WW I

Jay Winter has spent his adult life trying to figure out the war that didn't end all wars but opened the bloody gates of 20th century industrial slaughter.