Renée Lafferty-Salhany, Associate Professor of History at Brock, wrote a piece recently published in The Conversation about U.S. President Donald Trump’s recent comments on the War of 1812.

Lafferty-Salhany writes:

President Donald Trump has defended his position that protective trade measures against Canada are necessary for reasons of national security and, in a phone call with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leading up to what became a contentious G7 meeting in Quebec, told his Canadian counterpart: “Didn’t you guys burn down the White House?”

After details of the May 25 phone call were leaked, the War of 1812 was actually trending on social media. I was oddly giddy. Millions of dollars spent for bicentennial celebrations in Canada in 2012 had been incapable of achieving such attention for this little-understood war.

The trouble is, the attention hasn’t been (for the most part) paid to the things historians like me consider significant. Instead, the incident has become yet another opportunity to lambaste Trump’s depressing lack of historical knowledge.

Continue reading the full article here.