David Barton Claims That 'Biblical Teachings' Have Reduced Violent Crime In Las Vegas By 75 Percent | Right Wing Watch

David Barton's lies never cease to amaze me.  How an "educated" man can so twist the obvious is beyond comparison.

Barton claimed that he could prove this via "double causation," which he later called "double correlation," by showing that just as removing organized prayer from public schools leads to lower test scores, adding the "God factor" to schools increases test scores.

"There appears to be a God factor in this thing," he said, "and we were able to document actually 47 categories of government-kept statistics that plummeted at that point in time when we told God to take a hike. Apparently He did and it hasn't worked out too well for us since then. But when God is reintroduced back into policy, for instance, in Las Vegas, the churches there worked with the police department to teach morals in the city, the violent crime rate has gone down 75 percent in Las Vegas by the reintroduction of biblical teachings back in the city through the police department and the churches."

David Barton Claims That 'Biblical Teachings' Have Reduced Violent Crime In Las Vegas By 75 Percent | Right Wing Watch

The Hollow Earth Is Filled With Giants, Germans, and A Little Sun | Atlas Obscura

Yes, you're reading that correctly, a post concerning "Hollow Earth".  Although not a religiously motivated concept per se, it is an idea that has spawned a deluded cult mind think - ie Koreshan Unity (not to be confused with David Koresh).  A sub-genre of sci-fi literature - think Jules Verne. And even a role in pseudo-history - the supposed secret journal entry of Admiral Richard Byrd.

This article actually lays out a nice basic history of the idea and it is a fun(ny) read amongst all the other battshittery.

Ah, the underworld. From time immemorial, people have believed that there is another world lying just beneath the surface of our planet. To a number of cultures—the ancient Greeks for one—it is a dark place filled with the souls of the dead. But most of these early beliefs were metaphorical or mythological in origin.

Modern science holds that that the Earth is an unbroken series of layers, crusts, and liquid magma surrounding a dense, hot core made primarily of iron and nickel. But not everyone is convinced. In the 17th century, some of the leading scientific minds of the time came up with a new theory—that the planet is actually hollow. This idea has proved incredibly durable.

Even today, there is a small cadre of Hollow Earth believers who are fighting valiantly to validate their ideas through books, websites, meetings and some extremely ambitious travel plans.

“My conception of the Hollow Earth, based on my research is that the shell of the Earth is about 800 miles thick, from the outside to the inner surface,” says Rodney Cluff, author of World Top Secret: Our Earth IS Hollow. He went even further in our phone conversation: half the planet is taken up by surface weight, and then there’s empty space, and then, something else. “Suspended in the center of that hollow is an interior sun that is divided by day and night sides,” he says, “The other part of the Hollow Earth theory is that near the North and South pole are substantial openings that lead into the interior.”

Hollow Earth theory sounds like science fiction, and is often presented as such, but some of history’s greatest scientists have subscribed to it. At one point, it seemed downright logical.

The Hollow Earth Is Filled With Giants, Germans, and A Little Sun | Atlas Obscura

Meet David Barton — the Evangelical Quack “Historian” Exposed as the Fake He Is

Although I have previously posted concerning Julie Ingersoll's book “Building God’s Kingdom: Inside the World of Christian Reconstruction”this excerpt provided by Frank Schaeffer is an eye opener.  Delving into the mind of Barton can be a dangerous thing, but Ingersoll does a wonderful job of explaining how and why Barton thinks the way he does.

My only caveat, while I appreciate the work of Warren Throckmorton and Michael Coulter, they are not the first, nor the only individuals responsible for exposing Barton for the liar he is.  In 2006 Chris Rodda published Liars For Jesus: The Religious Right's Alternate Version of American History, Vol. 1 followed by Debunking David Barton's Jefferson Lies: #2 - Jefferson Founded a Secular University in 2012 and Debunking David Barton's Jefferson Lies: #5 - Jefferson Advocated a Secular Public Square. During that time period, beginning in 2010, Chris also produced a series of videos that countered the crap Barton was spewing on Glen Beck.  Though a bit dated, the information is still relevant as Barton as still regurgitating the same lies. Chris is currently working on a fourth book addressing more of Barton's bullshit

There is perhaps no better example of Christian Reconstructionist influence on the broader culture than the work of Tea Party “historian” David Barton. Barton does not explicitly identify as a Christian Reconstructionist, and Christian Reconstructionists would not claim him as one of their own.Barton does have ties to several Reconstructionist groups, including the Providence Foundation; he occasionally cites the work of Rousas Rushdoony and promotes views on race and slavery that are rooted in Rushdoony. While Barton doesn’t use the language of theonomy or postmillennialism, as we will see, he speaks of dominion, biblical law, the necessity of bringing every area of life under the lordship of Christ, and sphere sovereignty of biblically ordained institutions. He embraces the whole range of political views advocated by Reconstructionists from the right-to-life and creationism to more narrowly held positions on issues such as the history of slavery and opposition to the Federal Reserve System. As we shall see, the approach to history that has made Barton famous is rooted in Rushdoony’s biblical philosophy of history.
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Barton’s work has been the subject of extensive critique by bloggers, reporters, and other critics, some of whom are scholars publishing peer-reviewed critiques, but, for the most part, scholars have not devoted a lot of attention to debunking his claims. Beginning in about 2011, two conservative Christian professors from Grove City College, Warren Throckmorton, professor of psychology, and Michael Coulter, professor of humanities and political science, published a critique of Barton’s The Jefferson Lies entitled Getting Jefferson Right: Fact Checking Claims about Our Third President. The book was received well by scholars, and the authors’ credentials as conservative Christians undermined Barton’s defense that criticism of his work was ideological rather than factual. The Jefferson Lies was withdrawn by its publisher. One might expect under the weight of such resounding rejection, Barton would disappear into obscurity. Yet Barton’s supporters remain as devoted as before. Criticism from scholars (whether Christian or not) is dismissed as liberal, socialist, and even pagan. Discredited in the larger culture, Barton remains influential in the conservative Christian subculture.
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Many look at the US Constitution and see little mention of religion and wonder how conservative Christians can insist that it is a template for a Christian nation. But Barton is careful to speak, instead, of our “original national founding documents.” For Barton and his followers, the Declaration of Independence, though never ratified and carrying no legal authority, has the same status as the Constitution.   [<--a point I have a tendency to harp on]
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For him the Constitution represents a consensus—as though there is a singular view that can be attributed to “the founders.” Barton’s style of reading the Constitution is modeled on his style of reading the Bible, which he also treats as a coherent document that can be read from start to finish to yield a clear, undisputed, objective meaning, instead of a collection of fragmented texts written over a very long period of time in different cultures, assembled into larger texts, then chosen from an even larger collection of texts in a political process, translated from ancient languages, and finally interpreted in different ways by different communities. Every stage of that process continues to be profoundly disputed by scholars, and there is always an interpretative framework (albeit all too often an unrecognized one) underlying any reading of it. While the US Constitution is a newer document, and it is therefore somewhat less difficult to discern its meaning(s), the fact remains that it is the product of hard-fought compromise among leaders, bound in time and culture, who profoundly disagreed with each other. There is no reason to believe they thought they were writing a sacred text to which all subsequent generations of Americans were bound by a process that amounts to divining a singular “intent.”

Meet David Barton — the Evangelical Quack “Historian” Exposed as the Fake He Is

Show Notes:: History, it is important

The original post this is taken from.

But why is this important,,,

The notion that America was founded as a Christian nation is a central animating element of the ideology of the Christian Right. It touches every aspect of life and culture in this, one of the most successful and powerful political movements in American history. The idea that America's supposed Christian identity has somehow been wrongly taken, and must somehow be restored, permeates the psychology and vision of the entire movement. No understanding of the Christian Right is remotely adequate without this foundational concept.

But the Christian nationalist narrative has a fatal flaw: it is based on revisionist history that does not stand up under scrutiny. The bad news is that to true believers, it does not have to stand up to the facts of history to be a powerful and animating part of the once and future Christian nation. Indeed, through a growing cottage industry of Christian revisionist books and lectures now dominating the curricula of home schools and many private Christian academies, Christian nationalism becomes a central feature of the political identity of children growing up in the movement. The contest for control of the narrative of American history is well underway.

Other stuff to explore,,,

• Writings of William Bradford Guests examined the history of the early Colonial period through the life and writings of William Bradford. Bradford was governor of the Massachusetts Colony and the author of the Mayflower Compact and Of Plymouth Plantation. The guests and “Governor Bradford” responded to audience comments and questions. 
• Deconstructing History: Mayflower
• On This Day: Mayflower Compact

One final thought,,,

It is important, no critical, that every American understands that a theocracy is the greatest form of tyranny founded on destroying liberty, and for Americans it begins by suspending the Constitution and replacing it with religious edicts. One of the beautiful features of our Constitution was that it used to guarantee freedoms that all Americans were required to comply with, but over the years politicians granted religious groups power to  dictate to the nation which aspects of the Constitution they will comply with, and which parts of the Christian bible they will impose on the population. It is a harsh enough reality to learn the Constitution does not protect all Americans’ freedoms, and supremely disheartening that despite the Founding Fathers’ intent to protect the people from theocratic tyranny, evangelical Christians are imposing theocratic fascism on the people while “wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”

'New Avenues Of Misrepresentation And Overstatement': A Devastating Review Of David Barton's Pseudo-History​ | Right Wing Watch

Back in 2012, Religious Right pseudo-historian David Barton published his book "The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You've Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson," through which he sought to portray Jefferson as someone who would make today's Religious Right seem moderate by comparison.

In response to Barton's book, Warren Throckmorton, a professor at Grove City College, began to expose Barton's long track record of producing shoddy works of "history" and, with a fellow Grove City professor, co-authored a response to Barton's book called "Getting Jefferson Right: Fact Checking Claims about Our Third President."

As a result, Barton's work came under increasing scrutiny and Thomas Nelson Publishing pulled his book from publication. Jay Richards, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, a Creationist think tank, emerged as a top critic of Barton's disreputable scholarship within the Religious Right and was so alarmed by it that he asked Gregg Frazer, a history professor at Master's College, a Christian university in California, to review some of Barton's work, most notably his popular DVD "America’s Godly Heritage."

After viewing it, Frazer wrote an utterly scathing review of Barton's work for Richards, which Richards then reportedly used in making the case to others in the Religious Right movement that Barton's historical scholarship cannot and should not be trusted.

Today, with Frazer's permission, Throckmorton posted a copy of his review of Barton's DVD on his website and it is absolutely devastating.


'New Avenues Of Misrepresentation And Overstatement': A Devastating Review Of David Barton's Pseudo-History​ | Right Wing Watch