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Dan Willingham

sucky

In the map, it says that the U.S. prevented Communist expansion in Chile in 1973. However, it doesn't mention anything else on the subject other than make it look to the reader that the people of Chile were saved from a brutal totalitarian regime. As it turned out, the truth was far more sinister.

at least one parent complained about the assignment.

Not only are all of his cited text sources from western periodicals, meaning that they are all probably written with western perspectives of the topic (BIASED), he use any of his cited sources in his article. His main source of evidence, or so he states, is the People's Almanac which he doesn't even cite in his bibliography, which, by the way, is no where near a correctly formatted bibliography, it doesn't even give the authors or article titles! How are we supposed to credit him or his sources if he failed to properly credit his sources, perhaps his evidence didn't even come from these sources.

He makes Mao seem almost like a villainous leader when he talks about Mao being carried the 6,000 miles while reading a book. He also talks about Mao wasn’t thinking of the people, by spending his time with poetry and having his advisors take ballroom dancing lessons, yet there is a lack of citing for this information.

his last paragraph, as Ryan pointed out, has absolutely nothing to do with what he is talking about (the Long March). To summarize the last paragraph he is saying Mao relaxed and flirted with others. How does this fact relates to the Long March? A passage that I actually said "So What!?" out loud was when he says, "Mao spent his time reading and relaxing, discussing poetry and plans of equality between the sexes with attractive women...". This is information about how Mao spent his time after the Long March is, in my opinion, biased.

Also, when Jeff includes a quote in his fact/opinion, he doesnt say where he got that quote from, except the last paragraph about some random fact about Mao. He should have done so since quotes from the actual person are probably one of the most important source or fact to rely on. Also by putting source next to the quote, it would give evidence to the text than a lack of credibility.

Through research, I found a best-seller book, Mao: The Untold Story, that stated these controversies. This is also the only source I've found through some minutes of research that backs up these two points. The author obviously relied these two opposing points in just one single book. Ironically and coincidentally, this book is criticized for "selection of details" by many professors.



On the first point, a report from the Guardian website: "The academic critics have focused on around 20 specific events where the book provides a fresh account of events, including its sensational claim that the Chinese Nationalist leader, Chiang Kai-shek, intentionally let the Red Army escape on the historic Long March of 1934-5 when Mao led his communist forces across China to a safe haven in the north. In their defence of their book, the authors point to their detailed references, such as the 26 sources for the claim about the Long March.



[Andrew] Nathan [of Columbia] replies in a response below their letter: 'Of these 26 items, which one, two or three unequivocally support the improbable claim that Chiang let the Reds escape intentionally?""



This contradicts the author's sentence, "many historians think the Chiang Kai-shek allowed the Communist to escape", because in reality, many are against. The author thought just because this book is a best-seller means everybody agrees with it. Hell, just because Twilight is a best-seller doesn't mean we guys love it too.



The Luding Bridge controversy critique was also covered in the Guardian: "Dispute also surrounds the book's account of the battle of Luding Bridge, during the March, celebrated in communist lore as a heroic feat by the Red Army. Chang and Halliday say it never took place, basing themselves on the lack of casualty reports, evidence from the curator of a museum, and testimony from a 93-year-old woman they met at the scene in 1997 who had lived there at the time. In their letter to the LRB, they point to seven written sources for their account."



This is a pretty big step for an inference (and even bigger if you include Nathan's response). Although many academics do think the battle is exaggerated, I doubt the "the lack of casualty reports, evidence from the curator of a museum, and testimony from a 93-year-old woman they met at the scene in 1997 who had lived there at the time" can qualify as 7 written sources, lest sufficient evidence.



The author of the site just blatantly used this source without actually researching the book. A simple look at the Wikipedia article, especially its controversies, and its references might have helped the author out a lot. He's trying to hammer down evidence to prove his case that the Long March sucked.

Through research, I found a best-seller book, Mao: The Untold Story, that stated these controversies. This is also the only source I've found through some minutes of research that backs up these two points. The author obviously relied these two opposing points in just one single book. Ironically and coincidentally, this book is criticized for "selection of details" by many professors.



On the first point, a report from the Guardian website: "The academic critics have focused on around 20 specific events where the book provides a fresh account of events, including its sensational claim that the Chinese Nationalist leader, Chiang Kai-shek, intentionally let the Red Army escape on the historic Long March of 1934-5 when Mao led his communist forces across China to a safe haven in the north. In their defence of their book, the authors point to their detailed references, such as the 26 sources for the claim about the Long March.



[Andrew] Nathan [of Columbia] replies in a response below their letter: 'Of these 26 items, which one, two or three unequivocally support the improbable claim that Chiang let the Reds escape intentionally?""



This contradicts the author's sentence, "many historians think the Chiang Kai-shek allowed the Communist to escape", because in reality, many are against. The author thought just because this book is a best-seller means everybody agrees with it. Hell, just because Twilight is a best-seller doesn't mean we guys love it too.

Paragraph Four of "Long March": "It is difficult to determine fact from fiction. " The fact that this "author" decides to assume that none of the documentaries- which almost always include first-hand accounts- are unreliable is utterly ironic; he himself uses second-hand documents to assert his claims.

Reading further into the biography of the authors, neither one has actually credibility in history. Irving Wallace is a professional scriptwriter, and David Wallechinsky is a commentator for sports.

He also uses certain words and phrases to create bad connotations about Mao. He says: "Mao fine tuned many methods of political terror—purging real and imagined enemies—that would serve him well when he was leader of China.", a fact that can't be substantiated by any of his sources. He also made Mao look bad through comments such as "[he spent his ] time reading and relaxing, discussing poetry and plans of equality between the sexes with attractive women, and encouraging revolutionaries such as Zhu De and Zhou Enlai to take up ballroom dancing." These phrases made you think that Mao was lazy.

The New York Times, Washington Post, and Newsweek aren’t what I would call pop culture magazines, and present no bias – even if the sources were biased, it would likely be about liberalism and not China.

I think I can speak for everyone when I say that Mao probably did more than just "flirt and wait" after the Long March. Heck, that's like saying he went to the bathroom and ate after the Long March. You might say that this headline was only to get the attention of readers, but if somebody was doing research and wanted to know the history of Mao's reign after the Long March, this source wouldn't be reliable at all. Majority of the writing in this section is of Mao's flirting.