Right Wing Watch has a post about the source of Michele Bachmann’s odd views of American history: religious right theocrat and pseudo-historian David Barton. For decades the religious right has been indoctrinating an entire generation with a fantasy version of US history, and Barton is one of the main proponents of this fundamentalist revisionism. Michele Bachmann is a big fan, and even invited Barton to address members of Congress.

Here’s Barton explaining that the War of Independence was actually fought to end slavery. Yes, that’s really what he says. There are so many distortions in this minute-long clip you may develop a headache.