Infamous address

Richard Luscombe, writing for Scotland on Sunday, reports that developers are looking to build a casino complex close to the Gettysburg battlefield.

It's not a new story - the Associated Press piece on which it was based appeared over a week ago and was carried in the Sun-Sentinel. But what is new in Luscombe's treatment of the story is his reference to Lincoln's "infamous Gettysburg Address".

Infamous? Well, it wasn't applauded in certain quarters at the time - the Chicago Times referred to it as a "silly, flat, and dishwatery utterance". But to calll it "infamous" smacks of either ignorance or a particularly skewed perspective.

Or haste - perhaps Luscombe was just cutting and pasting from some other source. I was surprised to find that Google shows 140 results for ""infamous Gettysburg address" including, astonishingly, The History Channel.

Unbelievable!