Here he is again! Associate professor of History Saul Cornell of Ohio State University and its “Second Amendment Research Center at the John Glenn Institute” has published a new tome on the topic of just what the Second Amendment doesn’t protect. Unsurprisingly, it’s getting rave reviews (I seem to remember that Michael Bellisile’s Arming America got glowing reviews, too….) Entitled A Well Regulated Militia: The Founding Fathers and the Origins of Gun Control in America (working title, Armed in the Holy Cause of Liberty: Guns and the American Constitution – but I guess that one was a little too… provocative?) Associate professor Cornell attempts to shed just a little unbiased light on the subject.
Or, at least, that’s what he wants you to believe.
Clayton Cramer does his typical masterful job of dissecting the Minneapolis Star-Tribune’s laudatory op-ed/book review with, you know, facts and citations that indicate just how far off in never-never-land Associate professor Cornell really is.
Clayton opens:
Saul Cornell Is Suddenly No Longer a Partisan on Gun Control
At least, that’s what this editorial from the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star-Tribune claims…
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Any of you who are familiar with Professor Cornell’s work can start the insane giggling right now–yeah, he’s not really on one side or the other, nor is he trying to disarm the masses.
Numerous other bloggers have noted that the “Second Amendment Research Center at the John Glenn Institute” is largely funded by the extremely anti-gun Joyce Foundation (see this post, and this post, and this one.)
But Associate professor Cornell? “He’s neither antigun nor progun. He really isn’t a gun guy at all. His thing is history.”
Right. Cue hysterical laughter.
But as I said in my first response to the good Associate professor,
He doesn’t have to be right, he just has to be convincing. The ill-informed who read this piece think “Hey, he’s an authority, he must be right.” That’s why his side has to keep repeating the big lies.
Clayton notes the same thing I did:
It just gets more and more “alternate universe” the deeper I read
As I said in my reply to Associate professor Cornell’s email:
You, an historian, have taken it upon yourself to distort history – something that you yourself claim is unacceptable. You claim that the Justice department’s recognition of the “standard model” of the Second Amendment is somehow “well beyond” a “living document” re-interpretation. I’m sorry, Professor, but if you actually believe that you’re delusional, and if you know better you’re a bald-faced liar. I honestly cannot tell which.
I think I have a better handle on that question now.
I think we all do, at least those of us who are paying attention.
But what about the general readership of the Strib?
THAT is the fight we have to fight each and every day.