Hyperbole thy name is the History Channel

You just can't make this stuff up.

I just watched a few minutes of a History Channel show on Ben Franklin. They did a pretty good job of the first part, his pre-revolutionary days. Amazing stuff, and arguably his contributions to science/engineering (which were pretty closely tied together in those days), home heating, postal delivery, music....It's really breath-taking all the areas that he was active in, really do live up to the importance attributed to it by the shows writers.

But then they do the lead-in for the next phase of his career; the Revolution.

Why, they way they told it there was really no need for those other bumpkins; Washington, Paine, Revere, Jones, Adams, Jefferson, Swift, Smith*, to be involved in the American Revolution. Ben took care of everything. They could have stayed home.

I like the History Channel but I'd like to see them adopt more of a "keep it real" policy.

*I count Adam Smith in this group as, while not generally associated with the American Revolution, he was an active part of a flourishing intellectual movement; the Scottish Enlightenment, much of which was well known by the founders. When his book, The Wealth of Nations (OK, OK, "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations") came out in 1776 much of the economic basics of that book were well known and informed the thinking of at least some of the founders. Heck, he'd been teaching for years so there were probably several hundred of his students scattered around the British empire, and they may well have a connection to one or more of the founders.