This Week in Review: 1984, Meet Soviet America

The only good thing I can say about the terror bombshell dropped on US voters last week is that it was an "August Surprise" and not an "October Surprise." But don't think for a minute that Karl isn’t planning a “September Surprise," an "October Surprise" and even a "November "Surprise."

My thought above dramatizes the mental state the Bushoviks have created over time to provide themselves with Election Insurance. Dramatic disclosures dropped during election cycles smell bad because they've used them shamelessly and repeatedly in the past. And we’ve all heard the tale of the boy who cried wolf, right?

But the reality is far worse. It's time we acknowledge the stark truth of US politics: This country is in the grip of a clique with aggressive ambitions and with a propaganda machine whose only purpose is self-preservation and self-propagation.

Welcome to the merger of 1984 with Soviet America.


Ned Lamont's victory over Joe Lieberman highlighted a glaring truth: The US has moved decisively from speaking Standard English to Orwellian Newspeak.

War is peace. Lies are truth. And we are so there.

Lamont's victory as a "tragedy" for the Democratic Party has been plastered across cable and broadcast news and trumpeted by everyone from Lieberman himself, to Mehlman, Cheney and Bush. The Party has fallen into the hands of dangerous "left wing fanatics" who hate America and want to “cut and run” from Iraq.

These are only the latest and most egregious examples of a ruling class willing to say and do anything to stay in power. And their ambitions clearly run beyond staying in power. They are entrenching themselves deeply into American government, American society and above all into American culture to install their agenda permanently into American history. Since their hateful agenda requires self-propagation, it is not an easy sell, so they must lie, spin, and exaggerate to candy coat the bitter pill.

This is reminiscent of the Russian press during the Soviet era. State-run organs like Izvestia , Pravda and the Tass News Service unabashedly and shamelessly spouted the party line, however counter-intuitive and transparent the lie. The problem was that everywhere one looked there were obvious signs the ideology had failed. Therefore the “truth” had to be “sanitized” to maintain dogmatic purity. The result was that after a while no one took Soviet "journalism" seriously. Soviet citizens shrugged and rolled their eyes a lot when they read a newspaper or watched TV.

Soviet Realism should be very familiar to Americans in the Bush era. The whole reign of Bush II has been the World Series of incompetence and cluelessness. The only reason it has eluded exposure has been the compliant and complicit US press. With the near total collapse of American journalism and it’s metamorphosis into a mouthpiece for the corporate elites (aka Republican Party et al), any hope of everyday citizens getting unbiased news has nearly evaporated.

The only near-term remedy for Newspeak in the press, is the same aggressive hostility with which the Right has so successfully neutered the MSM. Now even mild critical mention of a Republican coming from journalists is met with a thermonuclear email dump, foaming mouths with teeth bared across talk radio and outraged fulminations from False (Fox) News.

So, folks, are we in for a penny, or in for a pound?

Until and unless the left begins to grow some backbone, show some outrage and make itself feared, then I suspect we are going to continue drifting in the political doldrums much as we have since Bush II’s accession.

It’s near impossible for individuals to become effective agents of change without affiliating themselves with a group. The groups are out there and they need to aggressively recruit citizens to fill out their ranks. Just as concerned citizens need to find a group and join up. And then they need to join the battle.

I wrote a suggestion to MoveOn.org recently (viewable here). I urged MoveOn to launch an intensive media watch, much like the right has done and perhaps modeled on the very effective NRA model. When media outlets tilt against progressive interests, they should be instantly and intensely enlightened. Should that not work, should the outlet continue to undermine progressive interests, then start a drive to cancel subscriptions and avoid advertisers. Progressives who are part of Nielsen and Arbitron surveys should avoid cable news channels and broadcast news throughout the survey period.

Only by hitting in the profit center will any impact be felt, will any changes result.

Over the long term, a Democratic Congress and a Democratic President need to restore the “fairness doctrine.”

The policy of the United States Federal Communications Commission that became known as the "Fairness Doctrine" is an attempt to ensure that all coverage of controversial issues by a broadcast station be balanced and fair.

Airwaves in the United States are the property of the people. They are leased out on the condition that the lessee serve the public interest and not become a political tool. If political viewpoints are to be presented through the electronic media, they should either be balanced by alternative viewpoints, or be paid for by those wishing to express that opinion. One-sided advocacy must stop.

Finally, and this could be the subject of an entire posting of its own, we simply must find a way to separate money from politics. We must implement campaign finance reform. Otherwise, the rich will always win and the rest of us will always dine on their crumbs.