Paul Krugman's editorial this week about Florida 2000 -- "Don't Prettify Our History" -- reminds us that Bush didn't win and that we'd better not let it go. "Bush didn't win" of course is a red flag to conservatives who think we're making it all up, but that's because, as Krugman points out, the members of media either deliberately misled us or fell into a echo chamber believing "that what everyone they talk to says must be true." The general, unsubstantiated belief was that Bush won.
Too many truths have gotten buried in our history and we should not be the sort of nation which cavalierly lets the gravediggers in the cemeteries of unpopular truths continue to bury difficult facts.
...The story of the 2000 election remains deeply disturbing - not just the fact that a man the voters tried to reject ended up as president, but the ugliness of the fight itself. There was an understandable urge to put the story behind us.
But we aren't doing the country a favor when we present recent history in a way that makes our system look better than it is. Sometimes the public needs to hear unpleasant truths, even if those truths make them feel worse about their country.
Not to be coy: election 2000 may be receding into the past, but the Iraq war isn't. As the truth about the origins of that war comes out, there may be a temptation, once again, to prettify the story. The American people deserve better.
And if we aren't getting it, we need to demand it. Starting, of course, for the very paper Professor Krugman writes for.
