Tom Ault
Jefferson City
Dear Editor:
I have been an ardent reader of the Cal Thomas commentary for some time. He appears to be well read and forward thinking. His recent article, "Whatever happened to teaching history," was not only interesting but also to the point regarding our reading situation today. The information from Rubenstein's new book "The American Story; Conversations with Master Historians," as described by Mr. Thomas sounds like a book that has "hit it on the head" with respect to the loss of history.
For some time now the school systems, the media, and with the government leading the way have gone beyond common sense with their bungled efforts to make the United States a better country.
We, as a country, have overlooked some very important things, some of which I will list for you to scrutinize:
1. We have allowed our people to obliterate national and historical monuments, calling it "Freedom of Speech." (Nearly 60 percent of millennials believe the Constitution "goes too far in allowing hate speech in America." (Forty-eight percent of Generation X and 47 percent of Baby Boomers agreed)
2. We have history repeating itself worldwide and many of our younger people think the situations are brand new. (We used to use swords, now we use hi-tech murdering devices.)
3. We have allowed the banning of books based on nothing more than some influential person's whim. (The practice of banning books is a form of censorship, from political, legal, religious, moral or (less often) commercial motives.)
4. We have eliminated God from everywhere possible today, and who knows how far that will go tomorrow. (Read about our Founding Fathers and their view on this subject.)
5. George Santayana wrote, "History is a pack of lies about events that never happened, told by people who weren't there." Sadly, too many students today are being led to believe this.
I don't pretend to be wise enough to have considered these things when I was in my youth. I wish I had been a better student of history so I could have planned for a better future. Too often we dash about in a hurry to get somewhere we probably should not have gone. The future, like the past, will always be there, and we need to accept both as a natural phenomenon.
Refer to recent "Veltrop" LTE.