David Sirota: Democrats Hire George Orwell to Run Their PR Shop

[babylonsister]

Oops! Edit to add link:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/7729


Democrats Hire George Orwell to Run Their PR Shop
by David Sirota | May 27 2007


Apparently, House and Senate Democrats have resurrected George Orwell from the dead and put him on staff as the head of their PR department. Why do I say that? Because House and Senate Democrats are now insisting that this week's votes to give President Bush a blank check to continue the war were, in fact, heroic efforts to stand up against George Bush and stop the war. I kid you not.

Here's a line from the Democratic Party's official radio address this weekend, delivered by Elliot Anderson, a veteran of the Afghanistan War:

"The best way to honor the troops is to responsibly end our involvement in Iraq's civil war. As long as President Bush stays committed to the same policies that aren't working, it won't be easy. But I am proud to see Democrats and now some brave Republicans standing up to him." (emphasis added)

Now look, I have all the respect in the world for those like Anderson who have served or are serving our country in the military. And I think Anderson is absolutely right that "the best way to honor the troops is to responsibly end our involvement in Iraq's civil war." But the claim that "Democrats and now some brave Republicans standing up to" President Bush just a few days after 90 percent of congressional Democrats voted to give Bush a blank check is right out of a George Orwell novel (by the way, I don't blame Anderson for any of this - I'm guessing Harry Reid's people wrote him the speech or at least shaped it accordingly as a condition of him getting to deliver it).

snip//

And, big shocker, there was Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) telling reporters that giving Bush a blank check somehow represents "the beginning of the end of the president’s policy in Iraq."

Again, it's an utterly Orwellian attempt to make the public believe something happened when clearly the opposite happened. We are expected to believe Democrats did everything they possibly could to end the war, just like George Bush would have us believe the war is going swimmingly - because politicians in Washington, to paraphrase Orwell, believe that while all Americans are created equal, some - in particular, the creatures of the Beltway who think they are smarter than everyone and can trick the public - believe they are more equal than others.

The only difference between the Democratic Party's behavior right now and an Orwell novel is that the state-run propaganda in the latter is just a wee bit more convincing. Memo to Democratic politicians and their new political consultant, George Orwell: YOU AREN'T FOOLING ANYONE. WE ALL KNOW WHAT HAPPENED. THE MORE YOU PRETEND THAT YOU HEROICALLY DID EVERYTHING YOU COULD TO STOP THE WAR, THE MORE PATHETIC YOU LOOK.
_______

[dsc]

1. Sirota needs to go back to an elementary math class

We have 50 Democratic Senators. Last I checked 90% of 50 was 45. We had fewer than 40 vote for that bill. In the House, he is even more off. 90% of our House membership is well over 200 and less than 150 voted for. If Sirota can't even manage to honestly report numbers why should we believe anything else he has to say?

[John Q. Citizen]

2. Because Sarota's point is valid, the exact percentages notwithstanding, is

why we should believe him.

[ShortnFiery]

3. On the mark, John Q. Citizen.

:thumbsup:

To date, "I do NOT love Big Brother." --> that includes the Corporate Democrats who are personally invested in the corporations who comprise The Military Industrial Complex and/or depend on these corporate entities to fatten their re-election campaign WAR Chests. :grr:

Can't we see that this surge will only kill more troops and innocent Iraqis?!?

What it succeeds at is giving the lion's share of these billions as a "big wet kiss" to the War Profiteers.

Bravo, Democratic Leaders. <sound of one hand clapping>. :eyes:

[dsc]

4. When you lie little you will lie big

Sirota at best is sloppy at worst is dishonest. The fact is over half of House Democrats voted against that bill. When over half of a group people do something and you claim only 10% did that is funamentally dishonest.

[Dhalgren]

6. And they voted against it because the fix was in. Look at how the vote was

engineered. It allowed all those Democrats to vote "against" when they knew it would pass. This was a dishonest vote...

[dsc]

8. all righty then

I honestly don't know how to argue with such delusional thought.

[Kagemusha]

9. Wasn't that Senate vote 80 Yea, 14 Nay?

So not very many Democrats in the Senate voted against the war funding bill. I'm not defending Sirota's exaggeration. I tend not to like them. But the dismal percentage of Senate Democrats voting 'properly' is the one voting statistic you didn't cite.

[Cronus Protagonist]

5. Sirota needs to actually READ George Orwell

It's clear he either has not, or did not get it as there's nothing in the Democratic statements, however off base they are, that is remotely Orwellian. I think he's referring to the party's claims War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery and Ignorance is Strength, but in the book, these are not propagandistic lies, they are truths that the Party beleives and expects everyone else to believe on pain of being "corrected". The Democratic statement has none of that, but it sure does smack of Neoconservative disregard for reality, I must say. It looks and smells like the same tarry bruch the other politicians, allegedly on the other side of the issues, use and love so much, but it is hardly Orwellian.

[Dhalgren]

7. Maybe someone else needs to re-read the book...

[Cronus Protagonist]

11. Why not just educate me and make a point?

In any case, I will read it again. Couldn't hurt to read it once more... a dozen times is just as good as 11.

Maybe Sirota and you could too. He points to a few quotations put out by politicians regarding a current event, and they're somehow Orwellian? Just putting a positive spin on a current event is now Orwellian?

Maybe I missed something, but as far as I can see there are more and better comparisons that could be made than one to a utopian novel. How about comparing the Democratic spin to the Bush & co's spin machine? Neither of which are Orwellian, as far as I can see,yet both are strikingly similar.

Is it Orwellian to have a divergent opinion, or merely a disagreement? Is it Orwellian to simply put a positive spin on something that could be embarrassing? We're not talking about state sponsored and enforced propaganda coming from a squawk box in the wall, just a few quotations from pandering politicians in a news article.

Educate me as to where that's Orwellian, because apparently there's something there that you see that I don't.

[Morgana LaFey]

15. Oh, good God. I should've read this first.

Just putting a positive spin on a current event is now Orwellian?

Uh, only if the remarks bear no resemblance to REALITY, such as these.

Maybe I missed something, but as far as I can see there are more and better comparisons that could be made than one to a utopian novel.

There certainly are. How 'bout to a DYSTOPIAN novel, such as 1984???

Is it Orwellian to simply put a positive spin on something that could be embarrassing?

See my first paragraph above.

We're not talking about state sponsored and enforced propaganda coming from a squawk box in the wall, just a few quotations from pandering politicians in a news article.

Oh, an extreme literalist. If there's anything about the analogy that is less than precise and total adherence to that analogy, you have to try to dismiss it entirely. Sorry, the analogy holds even if not 100% equivalent. This is symbolism, art, subjective experience, etc.

[Morgana LaFey]

14. Thanks -- I read it again not all that long ago and was beginning

to think I'd gotten a pirated copy that someone had rewritten because I didn't get THAT out of it. :shrug:

[Kagemusha]

10. Maybe it wasn't in Orwell's book but, how about "Defeat is Victory"?

And again, I don't go around defending Sirota. On behalf of the base, he anointed the people who are 'looking pathetic' now. But "Defeat is Victory" sure sounds Orwellian to me.

Though I usually view this through the lens of Republican propaganda, where peace brings war but war brings peace, where freedom brings slavery but slavery brings freedom, and where submission is a sign of strength, and questioning authority, a sign of weakness.

[Cronus Protagonist]

12. As I pointed out,...

War is Strength
Freedom is Slavery
Ignorance is Strength

Are the usual Orwellian references. These are Party slogans pummelled into people all day long from screens in every room, and if one reads the book deeply, these are not lies at all. They are what the Party believes to be true. The Party expects every citizen (except the proles) to believe it too. These are not propaganda. If Sirota is instead referring to the alteration of history in the Department of Truth, again, this is not anywhere near what he witnessed from the Democratic spin doctors - no one is cutting stuff out of books, newspapers, etc..

I think he stretched too far to make his hatchet job sound good when a better comparison could have been made to the Soviet Union, the GOP and Fox News.... I understand his desperation to tar the Democratic party with such a nasty metaphor when clearly they're so poor at propaganda that Sirota thinks they sound like "Big Brother" when the reality is that Big Brother Bush has been fucking us all up the ass for the last 6 years and the Democratics, while sending out a ludicrously poor spin job, are hardly equivalent to The Party in 1984.

The only other reference I can consider he might have meant is to the fact that the state propaganda machine in 1984 constantly points out surplusses, winning events, etc., no matter what's going on in the war, and again, that reference could easily be made against Bush and the neocon cabal MUCH more than against the Democratics.

In short, IMHO, he missed the mark widely.

[Kagemusha]

13. Well, he's expressing anger and disgust.

And perhaps not in small part because of the role he himself played in setting this result up. His credibility's not my problem.

I think the party should be concerned about its spin machine, completely independent of Sirota's CYA maneuver.

[Cronus Protagonist]

16. Agreed n/t

[Polemicist]

17. Sirota paraphrased "Animal Farm", not "1984"....

In his latest diatribe directed toward the Democratic Congressional Leadership. The part about "all citizens being created equal, but some are created more equal than others", came from Orwell's book, "Animal Farm", not "1984".

I didn't see any direct paraphrases or quotations from "1984", but there was an insinuation that the Democratic Leadership was utilizing doublespeak in their proclamations of victory when it's obvious that they capitulated to Bush. And if we were truly "Orwellian" we would have to process the doublespeak in our minds, by utilizing doublethink, which is the ability to hold in your mind at the same time, two contradictory ideas, while believing both to be true. These concepts did come from the book "1984", and it's been 25 years since I read it. I saw the movie a few years ago for a refresher course.

While the Democratic Party leadership may be attempting Orwellian doublespeak, we the consumers of the rhetoric, are obviously not applying the necessary Orwellian doublethink to correctly process their nonsense. No body's buying the "Democratic victory" meme and it just makes them look stupid, not Orwellian.

I'm more curious at how many consecutive days will Sirota bash the Democrats, before he tires and moves on to more productive pursuits. He's got three straight days (maybe four) at present. He should go see a movie and get his mind on other matters. I recommend Pirates of the Caribbean.