Ref that story on Bellesiles new book and the claim that the NRA

'swiftboated' him, Jim Lindgren takes that bullshit apart. Including this:
Just what is it that the NRA is supposed to have done when it wouldn’t fund — even modestly – Clayton Cramer’s researching sources in the book?

And what is the process by which the NRA influenced the History Chair at Emory and Emory’s Provost to institute a formal investigation, or influenced Bellesiles’s colleagues at Emory to find against him, or influenced the outside panel to find against him, including Laurel Ulrich and Stanley Katz (a signatory to Bellesiles’ anti-NRA letter), or influenced the Provost at Columbia to instigate a review of the Bancroft Prize, or influenced me, or influenced Robert Churchill, or influenced Eric Monkkonen, or influenced the Wm & Mary Q. reviewers, including Randy Roth and Gloria Main?
...
Spreading patently ridiculous NRA conspiracy stories, as the New Press editor is doing, is irresponsible and frankly ahistorical. If the editor is honest, he or she will look into the basis for her claim and correct her misstatement.

It is ironic that a historian whose book spread unsupported and untrue stories about early America is now defended by an editor at the New Press who is spreading unsupported and untrue stories about the dispute over that book.

As we discovered in 2000, some people are incredibly gullible when they really, really want to believe.