Chris Rodda

Thoroughly researched and footnoted, this book reveals the not too subtle revisionism of self-proclaimed historian David Barton. Barton tries to resurrect Thomas Jefferson as a born-again evangelical who would be in favor of the agenda of today's religious right, using out of context and sometimes just plain made up quotes. The author puts the quotes back in context, and provides the relevant history. She also traces the evolution of the religious mythology from its beginning in 1850, when the religious community began claiming Jefferson. A bit dry at times for some general readers, but an important piece of work. The Texas Board of Education should read this before re-writing their textbooks ala David Barton.… (lisätietoja)

This book is a thoroughly researched response to the attempts of evanglical Christians to rewrite American history. The author quote extensively from the writings of the founders, as well as from other works of the time, to demolish all attempts to demonstrate that the US was intended to be a Christian nation. For a self-published book, it is very well done, with very few typos or blatant errors, especially for such a thick book. The typefaces are a bit less than great, but overall, the work is well edited, and some of the typeface changes were intended to set apart the different types of works she was quoting. I do think there would have been better ways to do it, and that detracted from the professional look of the book. The only real complaint I have with the book itself is the title. Though I am not one to ignore in your face confrontation, I think the problem with this title is that few of the people who need it the most will ever pick it up - those people who are moderate to liberal Christians but are finding themselves convinced by the slew of books by evangelicals. In this particular case, the title is the sort that could leave the author preaching to the choir, and though the choir often needs a bit of information to arm themselves, in this case the book would be much more useful in the hands of the moderate Christians, who unfortunately get up in arms everytime they think someone is slighting or mocking Jesus. Other than that, it is a book that has been researched down to the minutest detail of history, and should prove a valuable addition to works on the topic.… (lisätietoja)

I read the Kindle edition, which had some glitches (I've seen worse, though) where sentences ended in mid-air or sentence fragments drifted.
Rodda does a terrific job laying what the religious right says about US history and the Founding Fathers up against primary source documents. Even if people are a bit put off by the title, I really don't see how they can argue with the accuracy of it. These lobbyists for the christianization of the US are prooftexting in historical material the same way people prooftext in the Bible. They cut off ends of sentences if that last little bit negates their point. It would be one thing if it were just a point else where in a multi-page document, but they are clearly including only the fragments that support their view. They assign the wrong author to material to make them look more religious. And Rodda is just getting started.
Where she really shines is when she has to pause and set the scene for us. Her background material on historical events is really quite vivid and compelling and turned what I thought was going to be just a point-by-point refutation (and it is for the most part) into a stroll through the past with a seasoned docent. If there were more of that fleshing out, I'd have given it that last star, but that isn't the point of this book. It's for those of us who need quick access to just the facts, ma'am, to arm ourselves against The Liars.… (lisätietoja)