I write in response to Michael Barone’s piece on July 29 regarding the historical relationships between sitting and former presidents. His primary objective seems to be to put President Barack Obama on a level with President Donald Trump in their respective approaches to guiding the nation through the constitutional change of presidential administrations.

In this attempt, he conflates the efforts of federal intelligence agencies working to find out if and how a foreign government tried to influence our national elections with the completely separate actions of Hillary Clinton’s election campaign, writing as if they were all a combined effort.

The Steele dossier was a piece of opposition research conducted by a presidential campaign; it was not the product of federal agencies working at the direction of the president. The agencies did find, however, that Russia tried, illegally, to influence our election — very important information, I would contend, for our nation to understand and react to, no matter who the intended beneficiary.

Comparing the legitimate work of the agencies that are charged with keeping our country safe and free with Trump’s efforts to try to retain power after clearly losing the 2020 election is insulting and does a disservice to the newspaper’s readers.

While this may seem like a minor example of the current trend in historical revisionism, it is critical to our country’s future that we call out every example as we work to reverse that trend.

PAT FORBES

Baton Rouge