Here’s a classy and highly unbiased paragraph from the Chicago Tribune:
“Bellesiles first came under scrutiny from a non-academic quarter: the gun lobby and right-wingers. His findings were attacked in the National Review and other conservative publications, where he was accused of making up the data to fit an anti-gun bias. Liberal publications were equally strong in praise of his book. Garry Wills, writing in the New York Times, said: ‘Bellesiles has dispersed the darkness that covered the gun’s early history in America.’ The New York Review of Books gushed: ‘Bellesiles will have done us all a service if his book reduces the credibility of the fanatics who endow the Founding Fathers with posthumous membership in what has become a cult of the gun.'”
There’s hope yet, isn’t there?
The Dish 