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Highly recommend this thread on Stephens. His is the mediocrity of aristocracy, and his disdain for academia is the disdain long shown by those who are "to the manor born" and resent being held to account by "lessors" bearing evidence and better arguments.
As @page88 points out, just that one shoddy reference to "bed bugs" and the Nazis would be grounds for having one's work roundly rejected in academia. And yet, here's Pulitzer Bret using evidence like a high school sophomore writing a paper in 30 minutes...and nothing happens.
@page88 Not only has he not been held to account (other than by the general public), but he got the paper of record to allow him to double down on his ahistorical foolishness.
@page88 First they came for Bernie Madoff, and I didn't say anything, because Bernie Madoff was a fraud. Then they came for the heads of Enron, and I didn't say anything, because they were frauds.
@page88 While we criticize Bret for his mediocre work, it's important that we recognize that his employer also supports phenomenal work like this. nytimes.com/2019/08/30/pod…
@page88 And when I call the work of the #1619Project phenomenal, what I mean by that is that it is journalism grounded in a deep and nuanced understanding of the deep archival research that the past 2 generations of professional historians have done.
@page88 Bret says some made up thing about bed bugs, someone does a desperate google books search to find a shaky basis for it, and he keeps his job. Meanwhile, the folks involved with the #1619Project DID THEIR HOMEWORK. They actually, gasp, read some books by people who know things.
