Sarah Palin explains American history

[Sam Lord]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oS4C7bvHv2w"]YouTube - ‪Sarah Palin: Paul Revere Warned The British‬‏[/ame]

[Andrew49]

The Palins are coming! The Palins are leaving ......

[TotalMayhem]

Palin attempted to explain away her error as asserting that Revere went on his Midnight Ride to warn British troops that colonists were set on protecting their Second Amendment rights- a right that didn’t actually even exist for another decade and a half.

[Indiana Jones]

Palin attempted to explain away her error as asserting that Revere went on his Midnight Ride to warn British troops that colonists were set on protecting their Second Amendment rights- a right that didn’t actually even exist for another decade and a half.

(Soundbite of TV show, "Fox News Sunday")
National Public Radio’s MELISSA BLOCK: We are going to fact-check Palin's Paul Revere history now with Robert Allison. He's chair of the history department at Suffolk University in Boston. (Note that NPR is not an ally of Palin)

let's review Paul Revere's midnight ride, April 18, 1775. He's going to Lexington, Massachusetts. And according to Sarah Palin, he's riding his horse through town, sending warning shots and ringing those bells. True?

Professor ROBERT ALLISON (Chairman, History Department, Suffolk University: Well, he's not firing warning shots. He is telling people so that they can ring bells to alert others. What he's doing is going from house to house, knocking on doors of members of the Committees of Safety, saying the regulars are out. That is, he knew that General Gage was sending troops out to Lexington and Concord, really Concord, to seize the weapons being stockpiled there, but also perhaps to arrest John Hancock and Samuel Adams, leaders of the Continental Congress who were staying in the town of Lexington.

Remember, Gage was planning - this is a secret operation; that's why he's moving at night. He gets over to Cambridge, the troops start marching from Cambridge, and church bells are ringing throughout the countryside.

BLOCK: So Paul Revere was ringing those bells? He was a silversmith, right?

Prof. ALLISON: Well, he was - he also was a bell ringer. That is, he rang the bells at Old North Church as a boy. But he, personally, is not getting off his horse and going to ring bells. He's telling other people - and this is their system before Facebook, before Twitter, before NPR - this was the way you get a message out, is by having people ring church bells, and everyone knows there is an emergency.

And by this time, of course, the various town committees of safety, militia knew what the signals were, so they knew something was afoot. So this is no longer a secret operation for the British.

Revere isn't trying to alert the British, but he is trying to warn them. And in April of 1775, no one was talking about independence. We're still part of the British Empire. We're trying to save it. So this is a warning to the British Empire what will happen if you provoke Americans.

BLOCK:Sarah Palin also was saying there that Paul Revere's message to the British in his warning was: You're not going to take American arms - you know, basically a Second Amendment argument, even though the Second Amendment didn't exist then.

Prof. ALLISON: Yeah. She was making a Second Amendment case. But in fact, the British were going out to Concord to seize colonists' arms, the weapons that the Massachusetts Provincial Congress was stockpiling there.

So, yeah, she is right in that. I mean, she may be pushing it too far to say this is a Second Amendment case. Of course, neither the Second Amendment nor the Constitution was in anyone's mind at the time. But the British objective was to get the arms that were stockpiled in Concord.

BLOCK: So you think basically, on the whole, Sarah Palin got her history right.

Prof. ALLISON: Well, yeah, she did. And remember, she is a politician. She's not an historian.

How Accurate Were Palin's Paul Revere Comments? : NPR

[TotalMayhem]

Sara Palin explains American history

And her fans trying to 'rewrite' it...

Days after Sarah Palin was widely mocked for giving a somewhat skewed account of Paul Revere’s famous ride — saying he rode through Boston ringing bells to “warn the British” that “they weren’t going to be taking away our arms” — her supporters and detractors battled it out on the Wikipedia page for the legendary silversmith.

Some fans, it appears, edited the history to make it correspond more closely with Palin’s version — arguing that, hey, the colonists he was warning considered themselves British, and maintaining that bells were rung. Other volunteer editors immediately jumped in to counter those changes or quibble with Palin fans’ assertions (i.e, that “patriot” is not an actual job description).

[5intheface]

American history explains Sarah Palin.

[Andrew49]

[Holly]

We need more women in politics.
There should be a quota thing.

[Slim Buddha]

We need more women in politics.
There should be a quota thing.

Yeah. I really miss Mary Harney.

[Count Bobulescu]

Prior to Sarah's remarks the Paul Revere page on Wiki was receiving 2,000 hits a day. Post Sarah, 140,000. She drives traffic.

[C. Flower]

Well, in her own, folksy, downhome kinda way, she got it wrong.

[Indiana Jones]

Well, in her own, folksy, downhome kinda way, she got it wrong.

According to professor of history Allison, she got pretty much right even in the downhome folksy way she presented her answer.

[Holly]

According to professor of history Allison, she got pretty much right even in the downhome folksy way she presented her answer.

Paul Revere galloped to Lexington and Concord to warn the American rebels that "the British are coming" as every elementary schoolchild in the USA knows.
Sarah Palin got this backwards confusing the British with the rebels as she confuses North Korea with South Korea and the professor was wrong to support her obvious nonsense.

[Indiana Jones]

Paul Revere galloped to Lexington and Concord to warn the American rebels that "the British are coming" as every elementary schoolchild in the USA knows.
Sarah Palin got this backwards confusing the British with the rebels as she confuses North Korea with South Korea and the professor was wrong to support her obvious nonsense.

Read what the professor said; he who was called in by the NPR reporter to critique SP, not affirm her accounting of history. Often what school children learn is different from primary sources, and the professor and SP are going from primary sources. It is you who are not fully informed.

[Holly]

Read what the professor said; he who was called in by the NPR reporter to critique SP, not affirm her accounting of history. Often what school children learn is different from primary sources, and the professor and SP are going from primary sources. It is you who are not fully informed.

There is no source other than Sarah Palin's astonishing ignorance to support her statement that Paul Revere was warning the British of anything.


"The British are coming! The British are coming!