David Barton's Legend Grows to Include Supreme Court Winner

David Barton was given a PhD by Glenn Beck and was sorta called “America’s Historian” in a World Net Daily article and speaks for over 400 (600?) groups per year.  Barton has also added NCAA Division One basketball player and translator for the Russian gymnastics team. Now, he can add winner of cases at the Supreme Court. Watch this invitation to hear Barton speak at an Assembly of God church in Texarkana, TX (full video here):

Barton has filed some amicus briefs (friend of the court) which anyone can do (e.g., here) but he is not an attorney and hasn’t argued before the court.  Of course, I realize Barton didn’t say this but I wonder if he will correct it. He has some responsibility for it since he says in his bio that he has “participated” in Supreme Court cases. The minister took the word “participated” and made it into “argued and won.” He also made Barton into a “Constitutional scholar.”
My point isn’t that Barton is responsible for the false things people say about him (although in Beck’s case, he should have corrected the misinformation). Rather, I am focusing my attention more on the social and cognitive factors that operate in the evangelical environment that elevate Barton to expert status. Here is one. This minister gave Barton a superhuman build up, using false information to do it. Since the minister wants Barton to motivate his congregation, he fails to tell his people about Barton’s misleading stories, his disgraced book about Jefferson and the general negative associations Barton has among actual experts, Christian and otherwise. And this minister, who probably did not intend to speak falsely, adds the stuff of legends.