I once again take issue with the lies by omission that are in abundant display in Mr. Balentine’s recent column about the Pilgrims (Here’s Something: “Rekindle Pilgrims’ pride this Thanksgiving,” Nov. 17).
Critical race theory is not something being taught at Maine K-12 public schools, and Balentine admits this, as he must. But he raises the issue anyway because he thinks it’s a winning wedge issue in the 2022 Maine gubernatorial election.
It is now common practice for Mr. Balentine to exploit American history for partisan purposes, especially around the holidays, when he thinks we’re more susceptible to his pieces’ ensemble. His unskeptical adoption of right-wing propaganda betrays a lack of critical thinking and evidences the logic of the sophist which, once disentangled, abruptly falls apart.
Other omissions in his recent Pilgrim rant include the sources of the revisionist Pilgrim history. Balentine hints that he is using anti-Soviet propaganda from the 1950s and 1960s (“The potential of losing our prized freedom to the forces of communism had a way of bringing us together to appreciate the core of the American experiment: freedom from tyrannical government.”). He also omits that, according to Salon, Harry Hazlitt, a libertarian who worked in the Reagan administration, authored a similar revisionist history about the Pilgrims that was picked up by Rush Limbaugh. The first time this piece appeared on the Rush Limbaugh program was 1994.
In my opinion, Mr. Balentine is eroding his credibility as a critical thinker by being susceptible to ideological talking points. He apparently is, we aren’t, and we demand better from The Forecaster.
Ryan Evans
Portland
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