The Lincoln Logs

I'm a big fan of history. It's a lot like watching movies without transforming robots or hunky vampires. That's why it's always interesting when somebody somewhere comes up with a new story to tell, even if it doesn't have Optimus Prime in it. It adds to our collective base of knowledge, and gives Steven Spielberg more material for his epic side. Of course, this past weekend's revelations might make the director of the upcoming biopic of Abraham Lincoln flinch. According to a new book by Philip Magness and Sebastian Page, researchers at George Mason University, old Abe may have had less than honorable ideas about resettling freed slaves in foreign countries on the belief that whites and blacks could not coexist in the same nation. "For the sake of your race, you should sacrifice something of your present comfort for the purpose of being as grand in that respect as the white people," Lincoln said. Maybe that's not the version you read back in eighth grade, but professors Magness and Page want us to know a "more interesting" Abe. Instead of the more traditional "honest."
John Kennedy was a womanizer. Ronald Reagan raised taxes. It turns out Richard Nixon was quite the liberal. Given enough time and perspective, up could be down and left will probably be right. That's probably why the ancient Egyptian pharaohs buried all their important papers and most of their staff in their tombs with them. Legacies are what people should remember, not what they can dig up.