If It’s 2008, It Must Be 1984

“All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary. In no case would it have been possible, once the deed was done, to prove that any falsification had taken place… Even the written instructions which Winston received, and which he invariably got rid of as soon as he had dealt with them, never stated or implied that an act of forgery was to be committed: always the reference was to slips, errors, misprints, or misquotations which it was necessary to put right in the interests of accuracy.” - George Orwell, 1984, chapter four

Ron Suskind has a new book coming out today , entitled The Way of the World.

The biggest highlight, according to Politico.com, which obtained a copy last night, is that the White House had ordered the CIA to forge and backdate a letter allegedly written by Iraq’s head of intelligence to Saddam Hussein that “proved” a link between the dictator and the al Qaeda network. Obviously, this is in violation of a longstanding federal law that prohibits the CIA in engaging in activities to sway public opinion, among other things.

This, coupled with Seymour Hersh’s recent admission of a Dick Cheney-led WH meeting in which a false flag operation that would’ve resulted in the murder of Navy SEALs through friendly fire in order to instigate a war with Iran was seriously floated, further shows that this government, either knowingly or unknowingly, is using George Orwell’s 1984 as a template in both their foreign and domestic policies.

Disappearing emails by the millions. The State Department’s annual terrorism report suddenly kept under wraps, with numbers being redacted in copies given to Congress. The Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherfording of Valerie Plame and Susan Lindauer. The suppression of vital environmental information at the EPA. The use, once again, of the CIA to heavily censor op-eds to be published in the NY Times. The suppression of scientific, peer-reviewed science at NASA, the NOAA, the Surgeon General’s Office, and other government organizations, all the way up to the censorship of Congressional testimony of CDC officials. The list goes on.

And yet Bush is rebuking China for reneging on a promise to allow journalists Internet access during the Olympics.

Don’t make me laugh.

Much of this was taking place long before right wingers tried to turn the draft-dodging Bush into another Comrade Ogilvy at the same exact time they were Swiftboating an actual Vietnam War veteran and hero.

Then I think of what Ron Suskind quoted a senior Bush administration official (almost surely Karl Rove) back in 2004:

We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.

Into this Orwellian age of censorship on steroids dodders and shuffles John McCain, a guy who’d be best employed hanging around an all-night convenience store at the crack of dawn, hoping to catch the attention of the manager and being offered a job sweeping the floor.

And this man is actually leading Obama, according to the latest Zogby poll. A man who's never felt passionate enough about censorship and propaganda to speak out against it and would surely continue it were he to get elected.

A man who thinks so little of our intelligence that he blatantly lies time and again about telling lies and talking bullshit even though he's on videotape. A man who rewrites history with the industry of a Newt Gingrich alternate history novel. You deadender, racist, brain-damaged lemming/sheep hybrids think this man will get us back on the right path that 80% of us do not believe we are on?

One way or the other, we deserve the government we vote for.

(Tip o’ the tinfoil hat to Jill at Brilliant at Breakfast.)