Okay guys, here's some backstory to provide some perspective about just how bad my situation is:
Back in high school, I really enjoyed my AP US History class, obtained a 5 on the exam, yada yada. The problem is, I cannot really remember a damn thing about US history. (I can't remember pretty much anything I ever learned in 17 years of K-college, actually.) Off the top of my head, I cannot even name the years that wars started or ended, let alone recall important details.
Part of this may have to do with becoming stupider over the years due to lack of exercise. Part of it is because I always gloss over details anyway without even attempting to memorize them for the long term. I'll read an article and literally ignore names, dates, etc. without the slightest thought, because on some subconscious level, I know they're irrelevant to the bigger picture and I'll forget them anyway. I come across relevant details and specifics, process them, analyze them with my strengths (which are not memorization but logic, insight, etc.), digest them to form conclusions about the bigger picture, and then absent-mindedly toss them away. Over time, even some of the big picture fades, and I'll use context clues as a crutch.
The first time I remember having this problem was some years back, when I was transforming from a neocon into a liberal, and I was trying to explain to neocon family members WHY the Patriot Act is so bad, what specific provisions violate the Fourth Amendment, etc. I realized that, while I was totally confident in my conclusion - since I had looked into the material so thoroughly - I couldn't readily recall anything off the top of my head to support my conclusion in argument. It's like I've taken Einstein's quote, "Never memorize what you can look up in books," to the literal extreme. For the record, I just Googled to get the exact wording, and - seriously, I'm not joking here - I already forgot it one sentence later. Apparently, I didn't consider the wording important enough to matter, only the main idea.
In any case, forgetting why I've come to certain conclusions makes it kind of difficult to substantiate them to myself, let alone to others. I'm supposedly an educated person, but I can't remember anything I was supposed to have learned. I've meant to make this post for perhaps a year or more, but only tonight have I gathered the courage to openly flaunt my sketchy historical memory.
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Basically, I need to educate myself in US history again, literally from the ground up...and I want to do it right. That means I want a comprehensive resource that's as unbiased as possible. What books do you guys recommend, and why?
Obviously, I have some mental hurdles and awful study habits to overcome, but I won't be able to do this if I can't find material worth straining to really absorb. If I'm going to make the effort, I want material that's factual, scholarly, and actually worth the effort. I need something as comprehensive as a high school or college textbook should be, but for obvious reasons, I'm not going to bother hanging on every word of actual biased high school or college textbooks. Most historical accounts are unreasonably theme-based and selectively include/omit details based on the shape of history that corresponds with a political agenda. I'm not looking for propaganda here, even of the libertarian kind...although it would still be immensely helpful if the author is in fact a libertarian, because I want a resource that honestly covers historical controversies instead of pretending they don't exist. I don't want only the official account, and I don't want only the revisionist account (and in cases where the official account is a revisionist account itself, you know what I mean ). For instance, my ideal history book [series] should include reasons why FDR probably knew about Pearl Harbor in advance, but it should not cherry-pick and omit counterarguments just to convince the reader to adopt that viewpoint.
Sorry for the length of this post. I considered omitting the top section, but I wanted to stress just how much I need to relearn everything from the colonial era (or even beforehand) up to last week. All of US history will obviously not fit into a single volume, and I don't care about Thomas Jefferson's favorite color, but I'm kind of hoping for a nice multi-volume collection from the same set of authors that covers all of the highlights and serves as a serious adult-level alternative to high school/college texts. I guess I should provide bonus points for similar books on world history, as well.
Note: By the way, I looked through the book list in the History section of this thread, but from the titles, I'm not sure if any really fit my needs. This one looks somewhat promising, but I obviously can't limit myself to a history ending in 1828, either.
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