Letters to the Editor: William Barr isn’t trying to write history, he’s rewriting reality right now

To the editor: Jonah Goldberg’s intellectual legerdemain is in fine fettle in this week’s column, focusing on the debate over whether history is written by the winners, as Atty. Gen. William Barr recently said in an interview.

In fact, the real problem is that President Trump and Barr are attempting to rewrite not history, but reality itself in real time.

Michael Flynn, Trump’s first national security advisor, admitted he lied to the FBI. The Russians interfered on Trump’s behalf in the 2016 election, and the Trump campaign accepted this help.

Trump and Barr deny these proven facts by casting doubt on the loyalty and patriotism of the FBI, claiming that the investigation was politically motivated.

This is the dangerous lie that Goldberg would have us believe, and which allows Russian President Vladimir Putin’s minions to do it again for Trump’s reelection in 2020.

Stevens Weller III, Encinitas

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To the editor: Goldberg provides examples of “losers” writing history — American Indians, Hollywood writers targeted during the McCarthy era, and the New York Times’ “1619 Project.”

But these are not examples of the losers of history writing about their past. American Indians are not writing history, nor are slaves.

Beginning in the 1970s, American history has been interpreted mostly by progressive academics. They replaced a too “heroic” narrative of America’s past with their catalog of selfishness and crime. Today, this view of America’s past ideologically bolsters the progressive view of society and politics.

The “winners” are in fact writing history, Mr. Goldberg.

Jack Kaczorowski, Los Angeles