Here is the column that ran in the Albuquerque Tribune Oct. 24, 2007:
THE LIES THAT BIND
We must stay alert, because politicans’s words often mask the truth and get us into hot water
By Arthur Alpert
"Mistakes have been made," said Sheriff Darren White about the Bush Administration’s war on Iraq as he announced for Rep. Heather Wilson’s seat. But our troops, he said, "must return in victory."
Thanks, Sheriff, for helping me write about words and politics.
Take "Mistakes have been made." By using the passive verb, White avoided naming those who made the mistakes. Or detailing the errors.
He also neglected to define "victory." Perfectly understandable; why invite questions like, "How do we win? How long? How many more Americans and Iraqis must die? For what?"
Mind you, White’s borrowing from the White House lexicon of deception is, well, human. Pleistocene hominids probably figured out words are tools for manipulation. In my mind’s eye, I see a hulk perched on a rock, grunting (selectively) about how he alone can protect the tribe against those savages three caves down. Pick up your cudgels and attack, he tells younger men. Then he bellies up, first, at the mastodon barbecue.
George Orwell understood. This is from1946: "Political language – and with variations this is true of all political parties from conservative to Anarchists – is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."
In his novel, "1984", Orwell tied that political language to dictatorship. The ruler, Big Brother employed Newspeak, where words meant their opposite.
"War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength."
If you doubt he was prophetic, re-read White House speeches and releases since 2001. Also review what the NSA, CIA, FBI, US Attorney General and Supreme Court have done to the Constitution in the same period.
Orwell’s foresight is awe-inspiring, given that at his death in 1950 television had not yet pulled images over our minds. News in the 1940s was a discrete cottage industry – mostly for readers. Today it’s a global information business, primarily broadcast, owned by a few Titans whose employees slice and dice dots of data for optimum marketing, not comprehension.
Radio comedian Fred Allen once predicted that TV would "replace entertainment." In fact, TV has reconfigured politics into an entertainment.
Broadcasting itself rarely promotes a political agenda; Rupert Murdoch’s Fox is exceptional. Networks and cable prefer to celebrity-monger, pushing the opiate of distraction, something Aldous Huxley ("Brave New World") grasped better than Orwell.
Bottom line? When politicians use words that mislead, our information mediums either convey the blather respectfully or pay no attention, airing Roman circuses instead.
So there’s no questioning and the Establishment escapes accountability.
Imagine if Orwell returned He’d be a blogger, of course, because the Internet is inexpensive and uncensored, if not unrecorded.
Having once skewered the deceptive prose of Marxist True Believers, Orwell would love cutting up today’s worshippers of the almighty Market.
First, he would compliment them on their unapologetic cynicism. How else explain the way they tar any action benefiting most Americans as socialistic while defending corporate welfare?
For Liberals (and other innocents) who think the Democratic Party differs from the Republican, Orwell might recommend eye exams. Following the money, he would recognize that corporate America owns our "two-party system."
Orwell, however, is still dead and mainstream mediums aren’t in the business of questioning Power. So forgive me for shouting: The strategists who led us into the Iraq debacle are setting us up for a sequel – war on Iran. Please watch and listen to their words carefully. Just in case it’s pure wind.
Alpert is a semi-retired newsman in Albuquerque. Reach him at aatruth@swcp.com. His column appears the fourth Wednesday of the month.