Please forgive the following, early morning, professional historian's bile:

The formula works no matter what field you substitute: "Most of what JOURNALISTS/ DOCTORS / DOCKWORKERS / PSYCHOLOGISTS do has been twisted to suit someone's needs." It's called politics, people, and it's an inevitable part of human life and operation. Anything is inflected by personal and collective commitments. That's why, if you're serious about history, or anything else, you don't read ONE book, and then get disappointed when someone tells you it isn't TRUE TRUE TRUE! Rather, you read lots of books and then the history you have is the history you put together for yourself, based on a good faith survey of what other people have put out there. The search for the "good history textbook" that doesn't engage in nasty political lies isn't so much foiled by biased historians, but rather represents a naive approach to learning. Of course, in my opinion (as in anyone's) there are better as well as worse books in this regard. But, as in science, our search for knowledge about the past is just a hypothesis, until something better comes along with more fidelity and explanatory power.

"History" has always been one part fairy tail, one part myth and one part propaganda. That's why the right is so obsessed with it. Like religion, it makes the world simpler than it really is. Americans are probably the most superstitious people outside of the third world and therefore needs myths and legends packaged in to "history" to create a collective sense of self and purpose. Without the cult of America this country would tear itself apart (which is not a bad thing).

I vote Green or Libertarian whenever I can.

Did the MSM report THEIR election results?

Do the History Books report on any of them except for Perot and Anderson, both pretend third party candidates?

Sorry, but it was the Treay of Versaille that lead to WWII. The measures placed on the German people WERE draconian. Had the author taken the time to do any research they would never had included a claim otherwise. I will agree that history is of course written by the victors, but this is just another case of an author saying things are not the way they seem just for the sake of doing so.

I have to agree with exhumedatbirth's observation. I agree with the thesis that history is usually spun to advance someone's interest. But in this case, MacMillan is trying to insert her own spin. The Treaty of Versailles not only led directly to WWII, it led directly to our making war on Serbia just ten years ago, and continuing to station troops in Kosovo now, 90 years after the treaty.

Why not mention more globally damaging 'historical truths,' such as the Book of Mormon, the Quran, New Testament and Torah all being historical fictions?

There are thousands of history PhDs (and political science PhDs who do some history) out there in academic jobs, plus even more grad students writing publishable work. The problem is not lack of material on a particular subject (if anything, there's too much). The way this article is presented goes to show it - the "surprises" that MacMillan and Miller note are all items that are reasonably well known (or at least points of view that are well known - the idea that Versailles didn't contribute to WWII is out there, but hardly mainstream even among academics). Historians have already researched them.

What MacMillan is upset about isn't that historians aren't doing the work (although she muddies the water somewhat by complaining about cultural studies, this doesn't appear to be the main part of her thesis), but rather that they aren't out there educating the public about their theories. There are two problems with this. The first being that they are busy educating - their students. Even the worst college level History 101 will generally include some discussion of revisionist history, and any history department worth its certification will turn out BAs well versed in all these things. The second problem is that, well, history is political. If academics start doing the talk show circuit and get out of the ivory tower, they instantly begin to lose credibility. Instead of being an unbiased academic, they become just another talking head. To do what MacMillan wants would instantly open up the profession to being discredited / accused of having a political agenda. Even if this was a step that made sense, I don't think it's one most academic historians would welcome. They aren't cut out for that job - if that's what they wanted they would have gone into politics or journalism.

My solution? I think the bigger problem is not with historians, but rather with politicians and journalists. Politicians, because they're the ones for who the lessons of history are most important, and journalists, because they tend to be the gatekeepers / arbiters of what becomes "popular" history (although, increasingly less so these days). These are the folks that need to develop a critical eye towards reading history and a better ability to synthesize the lessons out there about what's come before.

Even so, there are limits. Another thing MacMillan ignores or glosses over is that all history is political - she seems to imply that most of it is politically motivated, but that there is some sort of objectively "right" viewpoint out there that can be discovered. In the abstract there may be a "correct" point of view, but in reality history is always ambiguous enough that it will be open to interpretation and argument, no matter how many "facts" you have to prove your point. At worst, people will simply willfully misbelieve if something contradicts a view that they've strongly internalized (how else do you explain all the holocaust deniers, or moon landing deniers, "birthers", 9/11 truthers, etc. etc.).

The very fact that history can be so easily invented should show that the forces in the opposite direction from "reality" are actually much more powerful - a fiction that fits the popular mood is far more likely to gain traction than a fact that goes against it. The idea that if historians just worked hard enough to get out the "right" history, that everything would be better, is unfortunately a naive fantasy.