Saturday, September 04, 2010

WrongO

Jamie Stiehm - Oval Office rug gets history wrong: "Yet somehow a mistake was made and magnified in our culture to the point that a New England antebellum abolitionist's words have been enshrined in the Oval Office while attributed to a major 20th-century figure. That is a shame, because the slain civil rights leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate [MLK -ed] was so eloquent in his own right. Obama, who is known for his rhetorical skills, is likely to feel the slight to King -- and Parker.

My investigation into this error led me to David Remnick's biography of Obama, 'The Bridge,' published this year. Early in the narrative, Remnick, the editor of the New Yorker, presents this as 'Barack Obama's favorite quotation.' It appears that neither Remnick nor Obama has traced the language to its true source.

Parker said in 1853: 'I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one. . . . But from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.'"
Obama's fact checking machine seems to be down. Actually, it would more likely seem that it's never been up wouldn't it?