Artistic License

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This evening, toward the end of the powerful HBO miniseries John Adams, the aging former president is brought to view a magnificent wall-sized rendering of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Adams castigates the artist Trumble for his work, pointing out that there was never an occasion when all the signers came together in such a fashion, signing one by one. There was a war on already, and the signers came when they could, quickly signing the document and hurrying away over the summer.

Artistic license, asserts Trumble, it makes for a better picture. And thus was propaganda given one of its "grander" moments.

There's a lot of artistic license going on these days, too, what Adams decried as the fiction of modern history in HBO's narrative.

Artistic license played by media who call themselves tough but fair when they are little more than stenographers and tools of one-party rule. Or diggers into the same ol' garbage long after it's been debunked, like smelly rotted russet potatoes.

Artistic license by those who pose as respectable consultants or opinionizers only to be revealed as paid shills for special interests.

Artistic license on such a grand scale as done by Faux that it is breathtaking in its sheer audacity...as befits the propaganda arm of this most corrupt and fabricated of administrations.

There are a few, a very few who still remember what it is to be responsible reporters of modern history, the first telling as some call journalism. And they are worthy of noting...Moyers, Schieffer. You may know of others not weighted down by the corruption of their integrity in the name of "access" or "off the record...." or willful disregard.

The series ends with a soft-voiced notation by Paul Giamatti, in his magnificent Adams role, saying he hopes he doesn't repent in heaven the effort he put into establishing this democracy.

There is much to be learned from history, from understanding the Founding Fathers not as flat images clustered on a contrived wall portrait or selectively skewed for political policy partisanship, but as humans with their frailties and imperfections....and yes, accomplishments.

For if we fail to learn from history, then we, in this age, indeed give Adams cause to repent in heaven.