Spend an Hour in DiLorenzo’s “Church of Lincoln”?

[Hat-Tip to Sam Wheeler at Lincoln Studies]

I tried to watch this interview when it first aired a few weeks back.  After 20 minutes of Thomas DiLorenzo babbling on about scholars who he characterizes as members of a "Church of Lincoln", along with other vague references to history and historians, I lost interest.  I have a great deal of respect for Brian Lamb, but it would have been nice to see someone with a bit more insight into Civil War history and historiography challenge some of DiLorenzo's more outlandish claims.   Lamb seems to be more interested in DiLorenzo's background than with what he has written. 

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2 comments… add one
  • Robert Moore Oct 9, 2008 @ 13:14

    Hi Kevin,

    Considering the subject matter of this post, I thought I would pass some additional words of wisdom from DiLorenzo… Enjoy!

    http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo59.html

  • toby Jun 13, 2008 @ 12:05

    I watched almost all of this before I gave up in disgust.

    I was very disappointed in Brian Lamb because I have seen many C-Span videos where he interviewed leading Lincoln scholars like Harold Holzer. Yet here he never once drew on those interviews and let Dilorenzo go unchallenged in everything he said.

    Maybe, Mr Lamb sees himself as the “man in the street” drawing out the assertions from his “expert”, leaving it to the viewer to make up his mind. But, in that case, he should have invited a Lincoln scholar to debate Dilorenzo’s statements. The difficulty there is that by bringing in someone like Holzer, it is giving Dilorenzo much more respect than he deserves. Perhaps a young and ambitious teacher or grad student with nothing to lose might have enjoyed taking him on.

    The problem is that this will go up on websites that are already neo-Confederate and have no interest in presenting counter-arguments. I did not watch until the end, but I hope Lamb drew attention to other C-Span videos on aspects of Lincoln, including many lectures by leading Lincoln and Civil War scholars. My favourite is Sam Waterson’s re-enactment of the Cooper Union speech.

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