Home » The Obama campaign takes a cue from Orwell: history as palimpsest

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The Obama campaign takes a cue from Orwell: history as palimpsest — 11 Comments

  1. Pingback:Amused Cynic » Blog Archive » The polls, polls, polls, polls, polls, POLLS…the clamor and the clangor of the Polls…

  2. The MSM is indeed the key for Obama in this effort – as it is in all his efforts to hide, obscure, intimidate, bully, and cheat his way to the presidency. It is the ultimate trump card. He can depend on the MSM to do anything he needs to have done to further his aims. We no longer have a free press! If Obama is elected, why wouldn’t we expect this relationship with the media to continue?

    If so, the internet and it’s intrepid bloggers may be all that stands between us and a tyrant.

  3. This country is about to make a mistake of biblical proportions. People who have evaded responsibility for 8 years are about to be put in charge of the whole nine yards. When the reckoning comes it will be ugly.

  4. The parallel with 1984 is even better than one expects. The “proles” in the novel merely consumed the propaganda from The Party without question. In our world the proles are the low-information, Leno/Letterman/Today Show voter. They only know what the MSM tells them. More involved people are like the Outer Party, who, like Winston Smith, probably include many who know the whole society is a sham, but keep their thoughts to themselves. Here I include even many, many Democrats. Obastard and Axelrod are members of the Inner Party, as well as MSM leaders and intellectuals. Those of us like Winston who see the sham but object face a Room 101. But what is the analog for that in our world? I predict this… the new tyranny will not consist of jackboots and truncheons. But it may promise a fate for dissenters more like the hell in Sartre’s “No Exit.” Not with a bang but a whimper.

  5. I know that politicians–even ones I like–shift, spin, fudge, and sometimes even outright lie, but Barack Obama and his campaign have set new records this year.

    I’ve never seen an American political campaign so deserving of the adjective, Orwellian.

  6. Neo,

    As a former art historian w/ a specialty in medieval manuscripts, I haven’t seen the word “palimpsest” in about 20 years, and never in the media or blogosphere. I am impressed!

  7. As this election goes on, I keep wishing someone would remake the Obama-inspired remake of the Apple 1984 commercial (you know, the one with Hillary talking instead of Big Brother), only this time, we would see Obama’s face on the screen.

    The whole Orwellian nature of the Obama campaign is perhaps what worries me so much about the whole enterprise. After all, lately we have heard Obama go on and on and run negative ad after negative ad which point out the supposedly negative nature of the McCain campaign. Why don’t more people pick up on the irony? And then, of course, there are all those news reports about Obama having purchased a half hour of TV time in many markets for next Wednesday night. My heavens, if that doesn’t sound like Obama’s “Big Brother Show” what in the world would?

  8. I just happened onto this site, and hoped I might find clear thinking. Too bad.

    The focus on the tiniest insignificant detail is silly. Why insist that Obama’s career was “launched” by Ayers?

    Why not ask why Ayers was picked by conservatives like Annenberg and U of Chi? Why not incriminate everyone on that board they sat on? Settling on namecalling is classic propaganda — but is that all you got?!

    Thinking outside the box is more interesting. Even Nader and Paul do a better job on actual issues.

  9. Joe: Aside from the fact that you have utterly failed to understand the point of this post—which is the rewriting of history—you might do well to question why it is that Obama and/or his staff and/or his supporters want to hide the “insignificant detail” of whether Obama’s career was launched by Ayers or not. I’ve never focused on the fact of the launch; there are far more important connections between Obama and Ayers to ponder. This one, for example.

    But, rather than merely coming here to be insulting and innapropriately condescending, if you really are interested in how Ayers was picked and why, and why there were conservatives on the Annenberg Board as well, you should go to this site. There are a host of posts there that are relevant, but I’d suggest beginning with this one.

  10. Progressives like to talk about “1984,” but only conservatives seem to be really frightened when it happens. The first 8/10s of the 20th century showed that nothing is more scary than the Left ascendant. I’m afraid that the 21st century is going to need to re-teach the world that same lesson.

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