The 2005 George Orwell Award
By Bob Burnett*
huffingtonpost.com
01.06.2006
This is the time of year when "best of" awards are given in categories such as news stories and movies. In the propaganda classification, there is no doubt that Karl Rove, Bush guru and head of the White House bureau of mind control, is once again the runaway winner - the recipient of the 2005 Orwell award.
In "1984" George Orwell described a diabolical "Ministry of Truth. " The organization operated a system of mind control, "Newspeak," to keep citizens under the thumb of a totalitarian regime headed by the ubiquitous "Big Brother." Orwell's ideas about mind control found a home in the Bush White House. Under the direction of Karl Rove, the Administration developed their version of newspeak, "Bushspeak." They paraded a series of illusions before a gullible public. The same George Bush who was asleep at the wheel before 9/11 and who responded to the threat of Al Qaeda by diverting our resources into a Iraqi quagmire, is portrayed as a strong leader who would keep America safe.
Bushspeak worked: The 2004 Presidential exit polls revealed that Bush supporters believed that Iraq supported the 9/11 attacks (75%) and had weapons of mass destruction (73%). They saw the war in Iraq as directly connected to the war on terror, and they trusted President Bush to do the right thing to win. In The New York Review of Books , Mark Danner observed that in the election Bush voters, "faced a stark choice: either discard the facts, or give up the clear and comforting worldview that they contradicted. They chose to disregard the facts."
In 2005, Bushspeak refined its message: Conservatives were portrayed as the true defenders of the country and liberals as spineless appeasers. In June, Karl Rove spoke to the New York Conservative Party . "Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 and the attacks and prepared for war; liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers." "Conservatives saw what happened to us on 9/11 and said: we will defeat our enemies. Liberals saw what happened to us and said: we must understand our enemies." Classifying most Democrats as liberals, Rove depicted them as gutless. Advocates of a "cut and run" solution in Iraq.
In November, Democratic Congressman John Murtha, a hawk and a decorated veteran, called for a swift withdrawal from Iraq. "The United States and coalition troops have done all they can in Iraq, but it is time for a change in direction. Our military is suffering. The future of our country is at risk." Bushspeak fired back. White House press secretary, Scott McClellan, accused Murtha of advocating, "surrender to the terrorists." "Endorsing the policy positions of Michael Moore and the extreme liberal wing of the Democratic party."
Bushspeak is a key ingredient in all Administration speeches. December 18, Bush spoke to the Nation on the Iraq war. He observed that there are only two positions on terrorists: One is to continue to fight them in Iraq. The other is to "leave them alone." According to the President, the choice is between "victory" and "defeat." He characterized his opponents as defeatists.
When it was revealed that Bush had secretly authorized domestic eavesdropping, in violation of the law, The President argued that he had special powers as commander-in-chief. He claimed that his actions had kept America safe, although he offered no proof for this.
Under Karl Rove's direction, the Bush Ministry of Truth is constantly in attack mode. Ready to pillory anyone who disagrees with the Administration, to question a critic's sanity, patriotism, and manhood. The President persistently attacks his critics from the basis of his fundamentalist belief, "Since I am aligned with God, I am superior and my beliefs should prevail, and anyone who disagrees with me is inherently wrong." [To quote Jimmy Carter.]
Many Americans are unaware of the Rove propaganda machine, and fall under the spell of its relentless assault. Unfortunately, "a lie repeated often enough becomes the truth." Many voters don't know what to believe. They hear passionate arguments for and against the war in Iraq, for and against the Bush national security "strategy."
Fortunately, there is an authoritative, independent voice they can turn to. The 9/11 Commission, as the "9/11 Public Discourse Project," recently issued report on the efforts of the Bush Administration to prevent another attack on the homeland. The Project concluded, "We are not as safe as we need to be... there is so much more to be done." "Many obvious steps that the American people assume have been completed, have not been... Some of these failures are shocking." The 9/11 Project observed, "Our leadership is distracted."
While 57 percent of Americans disapprove of "the way the President is handling the situation in Iraq," 56 percent approve of "the way Bush is handling the U.S. campaign against terrorism." The relentless onslaught of Bushspeak accounts for this paradox: Despite his many missteps, Americans continue to see George W. Bush as strong on national security. They have faith that he will lead them to "victory," although they don't know what that is.
For skillfully constructing this oxymoron and continuing to delude Americans into believing that "ignorance is strength" and "war is peace," the 2005 George Orwell award goes to Karl Rove.
________________________________
*Bob Burnett is a Berkeley writer, activist, and Quaker. Before starting a second career as a journalist, he was a technologist and one of the founding executives at Cisco Systems. Bob can be reached at boburnett@comcast.net. |
