Style points

You don't often hear anyone say "Great googly-moogly" anymore, but it certainly fits this context (which is astonishment at the ideological blindness and willful error of a professor of history at Harvard University).

In an ill-advised tweet, one Joyce E. Chaplin (professor) declared that "The USA, created by int'l community in Treaty of Paris in 1783, betrays int'l community by withdrawing from #parisclimateagreement today."

Non-historians with more common sense were quick to point out the several things wrong with that assertion. In no particular order, here are my favorite rebuttals, as culled from the original post and comments on it:

• Her dates are wrong."The United States wasn't founded in 1783, but rather 1776. July 4th, 1776, to be precise. I believe we have a document floating around from that time period with that specific date on it."
• The Treaty of Paris "wasn't some sort of international, multi-lateral agreement that created a new country, it was just a peace treaty between two sovereign nations."
• There was no "int'l community" in 1783. "There was no UN or EU or League of Nations. None of that globaloney crap had been invented yet."
• The French "gave us a nice statue, not a nation, thank you very much."
• "That's not stupidity...that's just another blatant attempt to re-write history to push the current agenda."
• "The U.S. was one of the parties that signed the Treaty of Paris, so we've got some seriously messed-up causality if a country can sign a treaty creating itself."
• "The first country to recognize the United States of America was Holland, on November 16, 1776."
• "Our founders were still referring to THESE United States. THE United States wasn't completely settled upon until another war some four score and seven years later."
• "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the International Community, and to the kleptocracy for which it stands, one Community, under despots, with misery and bloodshed for all."
• "The comparison breaks down because the climate accord was never a treaty. This is how her intended irony falls flat."
• "So the International Community okayed slavery in the country they formed?"
• "If there was anything approaching the 'international community' in 1783, it was Britain and all its colonies and possessions, so yeah we got the okay from the international community because we kicked its ass for our freedom."