History, and our view/understanding of it tends to be a rather interesting phenomenon. Enter Orwell:

“Contrary to popular belief, the past was not more eventful than the present. If is seems so it is because when you look backward things that happened years apart are telescoped together.
…
But if you were alive during the war [WWI], and if you disentangle your real memories from the later accretions, you find that it was not usually the big events that stirred you at the time. I don’t believe that the battle of the Marne, for instance, had for the general public the melodramatic quality that it was afterwards given. I do not even remember hearing the phrase ‘battle of the Marne’ till years later. It was merely that the Germans were 22 miles from Paris – and certainly that was terrifying enough, after the Belgian atrocity stories – and then for some reason turned back.
…
If I honestly sort out my memories and disregard what I have learned since, I must admit that nothing in the whole war moved me so deeply as the loss of the Titanic had done a few years earlier. This comparatively petty disaster shocked the whole world, and the shock has not quite died away even yet.” – Facing Unpleasant Facts – Narrative Essays (by George Orwell), Compiled by George Packer, page 52 [Specific essay: My Country Right or Left (1940)]

Admittedly a bit long for an introduction but something to pause and think about before I dive into what I really want to talk about today…

Somewhere back on the legacy site I have stated something along the lines of the history of the history of U.S. Grant is probably as important to us in our times as the man and his actual direct legacy. I have read in some long lost reference how, even a quarter century after completing two terms in the oval office (for which the braindead mantra today has the word “corruption” habitually tagged), Grant was extremely popular and considered among the top three Americans of all time (See Washington and Lincoln). If you are not up to speed on the topic, the since disgraced Mr. Mirengoff can shed some light from the Powerline archives with WHY HAVE HISTORIANS TREATED PRESIDENT GRANT SO UNFAIRLY? (2012) and RON CHERNOW’S “GRANT” (2017). I bring this up to possibly mature the telescoping concept mentioned by Orwell to add the shadowing effect of the nearer terrain of history that fools the lazy historian. In this case the (intentional) overreliance on the presumed wisdom of the early twentieth century version of the history of Grant distorts/degrades the true history of Grant…and our lazy modern historians largely enable the phenomenon.

Another case of the phenomenon used a bit differently might be that of FDR. Without the mountain of history that is WWII casting a long and dark shadow from this distant perspective, his performance during his first two terms just might paint another picture. But don’t get me started on that one…

Even with just two brief examples, it is interesting how predictable the “selective speakers-of-truth-to-power” are in their cynical use of selective views of history…both near and far. Did I say predictable? Well…

These thoughts came back to mind several weeks ago with another Powerline post: THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: HATING BILL CLINTON :

Hating Bill Clinton was thought to have been an obsession of the right, but as I have been tracking for a while, the left has been turning against him for a long time now. …

Nothing so clearly ratifies the Democratic Party’s sharp lurch to the left in recent years than this kind of revisionism that reviles the Clintons. I fully expect that sooner or later leftists will openly express regret that Clinton wasn’t convicted in his impeachment as it would have paved the way for the certifiably cuckoo Al Gore to become president.

For those of us old enough to remember the Clinton years, any revisionism might be more than a bit surprising from the collective that showed (and promised) just how far they would go to defend the bum. Especially since it was just over six years ago that – under the watchful eye of the Democrat Media Complex – “we” all had to pretend not to notice the rapist just off the stage in order to allow the victim-bashing, enabling wife to try her hand in the big leagues too. That she failed is of little consequence given the not-even-hidden crime syndicate they have been allowed to operate under the same protective media-wide iron dome for more than two decades. While this apparent willingness to turn on Bubba so soon (historically speaking) might get hopes up for a reckoning among a weaker stock, wake me when the first thousand enablers of three decades of the hyper-corrosive Team Clinton are being treated like J6 protestors.

Speaking of J6, today it appears that the long hidden video footage from the Capitol grounds may start revealing some real unpleasant facts: “[the start of the J6 riot] was caused by a policeman misfiring a tear gas canister into the police line causing them to retreat. … The J6 committee probably had this tape. Did they commit fraud by not releasing it?” (Apologies for that link…it likely will not make it out of the Member Feed. If not, try here.) Of course, any real facts regarding this case/event will be a refreshing change from the selectively scripted charade we have witnessed for nearly two years. While we must all expect any such revelations to be smothered into non-history…much like all of the damning evidence that has come out through the Twitter Files…there are characters and details that must not be allowed to hide in the shadow of bigger history: They must be denied, as the great man once quipped, “the most favorable history [the most corrupt class in American History] can hope for …–oblivion.” At minimum, as more of the long hidden truth comes to light in the coming days and weeks, remember who the dishonorable characters were and what institutions they chose to taint at the very time they were participating in the fraud that was the J6 committee:

Do your part to ensure good history.

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February 26 UPDATE

The trash that is modern journalism…after two years of maintaining their well practiced reliably incurious posture while progressive talking points are dictated to them as “news” it seems they are now energized to prop up the selectively crafted false narrative that their dereliction of duty enabled to be established as the first pass at this bit of history:

A JANUARY 6 NARRATIVE? WE CAN’T HAVE THAT!

…a group of left-wing media companies now wants access to the January 6 tapes that Kevin McCarthy has given to Tucker Carlson…

Where have they been for the last two years? Why haven’t they wanted to see the footage until now? To date, apparently, they have been happy with the isolated clips and spin provided by Nancy Pelosi. This is the hilarious part:

“Without full public access to the complete historical record, there is concern that an ideologically-based narrative of an already polarizing event will take hold in the public consciousness…”

But wait! Until now, we haven’t had “full public access to the complete historical record,” because Nancy Pelosi wouldn’t permit it. An “ideologically-based narrative” of the “polarizing event” has been propagated–by Pelosi and her Democrats–and has “take[n] hold in the public consciousness.” It has taken hold largely because it was eagerly adopted by the very news organizations who now, belatedly, are demanding “full public access.” You can’t make this stuff up. …

The J6 narrative was openly built on a foundation of sand…only the willfully blind could not see it. The new found urgency for the footage is telling to the extreme…but far from unexpected. They need to get the new spin out into the “fake news” pipeline and into the hands of the town criers in social media and the comment section stoolies across the land.

Personally, I would like to see documentation from House records of all such requests for this video over the last two years. Any entity that hadn’t submitted a request by July of 2021 should have to wait another two years before direct access is granted. Maybe they could learn something about being actual journalists between now and then.