Gore Vidal’s ‘Burr’ Is Antidote to Tea Party Myths

[xchrom]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-14/gore-vidal-s-burr-is-antidote-to-tea-party-myths.html



After winning control of the House in 2010, Republicans opened the next session of Congress by reading the Constitution. They were drawing on the widespread conservative sense that the U.S. under President Barack Obama was drifting from the principles of its founding leaders and documents.

The Tea Party, named for the most famous anti-tax revolt in American history, was the clearest expression of this Revolutionary nostalgia, and for many voters this year, 2012 will be an election about returning to what they see as the values of 1787.

In “All the King’s Men,” however, Willie Stark learns to dismiss the idealized portraits of the Founding Fathers in American history textbooks: “I bet things were just like they are now. A lot of folks wrassling round,” he scoffs. That line could serve as the epigraph to one of the most entertaining novels ever written about American politics, Gore Vidal’s “Burr.” Vidal, who died July 31 at the age of 86, published what many regard as his best novel in 1973, when Vietnam and Watergate were dealing Americans’ confidence in their government a series of blows from which it has yet to recover.

Exceptionalism Debunked

“Burr” delights in subverting everything we think we know about how the country was built. With his characteristic patrician sarcasm, Vidal casually scraps the enduring notion of American exceptionalism, the idea that our politics, unlike those of the corrupt Old World, are founded on ideals of democratic equality and public virtue. If the Tea Party today looks back to the founders with reverence, “Burr” suggests, that is only because they did such a good job mythologizing themselves and mesmerizing posterity.

[Iggy]

1. I've Read "Burr" Twice.. It's Amazing

love the way Vidal paints our first President with credible detail... LOL.. def. not what we
learned in so called "history" class.

I need to read Lincoln and Messiah next.

[enough]

2. It's also very amusing and entertaining. An all-round good read. (nt)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

3. His "1876," another book in the American history series, is about the OTHER

time that the winner of the popular vote was cheated out of the presidency through rigging of the Electoral College.

It would make a great movie for some Hollywood leftist to produce.

[Myrina]

4. Sux, my library only has it as an e-book ...

... and I'm not a Kindle/whatever geek.

I want a REAL book, dammit!