Erasing history

| 10:00 pm EDT May 3, 2023
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By an overwhelming margin, most Americans oppose book bans in libraries. But in some places, they’re getting more pervasive, not better. For example, Author Nora Roberts’s books are being targeted in Florida. And this is yet another thing Republicans don’t get about America. Being the land of the free, we also like our literature to be free. Perhaps Republicans didn’t get the memo. President Biden did.

As we move toward the election of 2024, book bans are becoming a campaign topic for Biden. We increasingly hear him talk about them. And like abortion and guns, it’s a winning issue. And it is the Democrats who are on the right side of it.

Book banning is also one of the themes of the new Spiderman book by Jason Reynolds. All around us, we see that this disturbing (and insane) book banning is tilting voters AWAY from the GOP, not towards it.

And that’s because more people honor literature than desecrate it. Books are like roses. You pick one up, inhale its beauty, and then move toward the next one. Republicans are shooting themselves in the foot with all the banning and archaic ideas, and the cracks are strongly showing now.

Biden hinted at his strategy at the White House correspondents dinner where he said:

“The truth buried by lies, and lies living on as truth.”

“A cycle that emboldens history to be buried, books to be banned….”

And Politico has said President Biden wants to add to his political agenda for 2024, whether or not “there is a page to turn.”

Of course, he does. Because unlike Donald Trump, who doesn’t read, our president knows the beauty of the written word. He has likely read some of the greats- maybe all of them. He knows the erasing of history can only lead to calamity. He knows and salutes the masters of literary genius.

He salutes George Orwell and Ernest Hemingway. He raises a glass to Charles Dickens and Jane Austin. He revels in the love and admiration for the poetry of the written word. He knows America needs her history like flowers need water. And he will stand for all of us and ensure history’s importance is not erased.