Over the preceding weeks, the revenge Democrats have expanded their front against the Trump Administration as widely as they possibly can. No half-truth has gone unnoticed or unused in this war. The politics of personal destruction have appeared once again to create distractions from the Democrats stall tactics in the Senate. The latest victim is Attorney General, Jeff Sessions. He is accused of lying to Congress after stating that he had not contacted the Russians about campaign matters from the joke of a senator from Minnesota, Al Franken. Never mind, that Sessions answered accurately the rambling question that was asked. If you can twist the truth to suit your needs, you too can be a Senate Democrat.
In a Washington Post article by Ron Charles – a book reviewer for the newspaper – the author tripped over the words of Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway’s who described “alternative facts” that she would issue in the defense of President Trump’s assertion that he drew the largest audience ever to his inauguration. In elaborating on his point, Charles compared the use of the words, “alternative facts,” to the world created by George Orwell in his elegantly satirical book “1984.” In Charles’ view, “Big Brother’s pronouncements are treated as absolute truth by his acolytes, even when they defy rational thought – so Black is White, 2+2=5, War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength.”
A rational reading on this point would suggest that Conway’s views might equate to the debate on global climate change. Where a Leftist might state that sea levels are rising, the other side might express the alternative fact that the earth has been warming since the last ice age. The defense of a point of view can be stated correctly, but in the aggregate remain wrong. But Charles’ comments were not really about inelegant language and a book. His views were part of a larger effort by the Left in this country to discredit, by any means, the policies of the Trump administration.
Conway is a lightning rod for criticism. More recently she was the target of a crude joke by Rep. Cedric Richardson. During a session in the Whitehouse Oval Office, Conway was sitting on her heals on a sofa in a room and pictured with 60 African American Presidents of historically black universities and President Trump. Richardson commented “ . . . she really looked familiar to me in that position . . . . He later apologized for the derogatory comment. Yet, it is a tribute to her effectiveness as a senior Whitehouse advisor that she continues to draw criticism for even her posture on a couch.
Very simply, there is an all-out attack by the American Left on the government of the United States. They are attacking on every front available. They have already begun to use obstructionist tactics in Congress. Angry women protested against . . . well, they protested against something – can’t figure out what it was. Cities all over America have declared that they are “Sanctuary Cities,” thus harboring criminals. Rioters have damaged property and violated the rights of commuters to travel in their own communities. Madonna has expressed thoughts of blowing up the Whitehouse. A bust of Martin Luther King was falsely reportedly removed from the Whitehouse as a way of substantiating the left-wing narrative that Trump is racist.
The overwhelming number of criticisms come from the same people who have engaged in their own version of Orwellian fascism. It is a form of bullying to attempt to intimidate the countries legally elected officials with verbal threats, civil disobedience – some sanctioned by local inaction – and thinly veiled propaganda from self-important news organizations.
The breadth of control or attempted control by the left stretches over nearly all the educational, social, political, cultural, and some religious institutions of America.
There is no limit to the efforts the left will make in pursuing its objectives. The violence and threats leveled at Milo Yiannopoulos, who had to be escorted by police from the University of California at Berkley, illustrates the lengths to which the left will protect its speech against alternative facts when they threaten to come home to the La La Land of the left coast. There is so much irony here that it deserves a few words.
The University was the home of the famous free speech movement of the sixties. What no one realized at the time was the free speech part only applied to those who agreed with the left. This takes us back to the Orwellian view that 2 + 2 = 5. Also, Mr. Yiannopoulos is gay. It must be disconcerting to the doctrinaire left that a “homophobic” conservative is, well, homo. The violent attention directed towards Mr. Yiannopoulos reminds the observant conservative of the confirmation hearings of Clarence Thomas in which, now, Justice Thomas, was vilified with ad homonym attacks on his personal character. Normally deferential to African Americans, Congressional liberals went after him as if he were the reincarnation of Hitler. Why was this? It wasn’t just that he was conservative, but as with Mr. Yiannopoulos, it upset the narrative contained in identity politics, that we are our race, sex, sexual orientation, etc. So, Black is White.
As If the widespread indoctrination of college students were not enough, the following paragraph concerning what is taught in America’s public high schools appeared in National Review in 2014:
“The College Board, the private company that develops the SAT and Advanced Placement (AP) exams, recently ignited a firestorm by releasing, with little public notice, a lengthy, highly directive, and radically revisionist “framework” for teaching AP U.S. history. The new framework replaces brief guidelines that once allowed states school districts, and teachers to present U.S. history as they saw fit.”
To the left, history has become a weapon. To control the minds of the young is to control the future. The NR review also specifies the black listing of the truth, as follows: “In a report for Boston’s Pioneer Institute, American historian Ralph Ketcham, author of a classic biography of James Madison, condemned the College Board’s new history guidelines for “deliberately minimizing or distorting” the story of America’s founding. The redesigned framework’s treatment of more recent developments is no freer of bias than is its handling of early American history. The revised guidelines present New Deal and Great Society liberalism in a positive light, while portraying conservatives as reactive and fearful. Leftist movements of the 1960s are sympathetically featured, while large tracts of modern political and economic history are omitted. Ronald Reagan is called “bellicose,” and his achievements are attributed to a belated willingness to make friends with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev rather than to his determination to hold fast on issues such as the deployment of nuclear missiles in Europe.” As they delete the truth, it is clear that ignorance is strength (for the left).
The control of the youthful mind is only a part of a greater picture of propaganda and thought control. Wherever there is publicity, the left will be found. Movie stars and their affiliated hangers-on – movie moguls, agents, publicists – blacklisted Trump supporters who might have performed at the Trump Inaugural balls. Thef left applauds the pure political correctness of their members, and pounds down the nails that dare to stand up. The movie, “Avatar,” is nothing but one long metaphor painting the evil corporations and their greedy controllers against the simple purity of the nature-bound, local inhabitants of the planet. The blue natives (read Native Americans) and their few enlightened white (read liberal) supporters rewrite history as the natives triumph over their machine driven enemies.
Likewise, in the Lord of the Rings movies we see the local natives as naïve, yet pure, people living simple lives in thatched huts. The message is that the reduced circumstances of the masses can be ennobling. The leftist narrative fits the view that our best days do not involve material success produced by the exploitation of natural resources, but derive from our high moral principles in a quest for a perfect world. If the economic, medical, and scientific advancements of America have rested on the foundation of a strong economic base, it is only coincidence that coal, oil, and iron ore were there at the same time.
Economic development has supported the very home base of the left. That is, the power of the political left as it lies with American colleges and universities where the roots of thought control run deep rests on Capitalist dollars. At college campuses all over America, enforcers of political correctness create Bias Response Teams (BRTs). The job of the BRT is to intimidate students who speak politically incorrect words as defined by the BRTs after the fact. At least at one school – Rutgers – it is not considered acceptable to use the words “illegal aliens.” The job of the BRT is to intimidate students who speak politically incorrect words as defined by the BRTs after the fact. Thus, a word like “fat” cannot be used as it is unprotected speech in referring to a person, unless the word is used derogatorily towards demonized classes of right-thinking opponents such as “fat cats” of the corporate world. The corrective is reminiscent of the “reeducation” camps run by communists in post-war Vietnam designed to punish and propagandize those who opposed the communist side before their totalitarian victory. But there is positive view to this. So far, torture has been ruled out.
The identity politics mantra does not only affect the presentation of Leftist to the outside world, it predictably affects the internal rationing of truth within its own borders. For example, the following appear on the blacklivesmatter.com website. The unknown author writes:
“Rooted in the experiences of Black people in this country who actively resist our dehumanization, #BlackLivesMatter is a call to action and a response to the virulent anti-Black racism that permeates our society. Black Lives Matter is a unique contribution that goes beyond extrajudicial killings of Black people by police and vigilantes.”
Many comments could be made about these two sentences, but the first thing that is necessary to do is decode the language. Four ideas need to be noted here:
dehumanization = slavery
extrajudicial killings = lynching
police = sheriff’s posse
vigilantes = Ku Klux Klan
It is as if the author is living in an alternative universe that reverts to the past whenever there is a need to prove victimhood. There is no perfect world, and these complaints, whether valid in the days of Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman or not, evoke a sci-fi vision that sustains the negative belligerence of Black Lives Matters true believers still in denial.
A rational view of the world would weight far more heavily the accomplishments of a Black two-term president, billionaire businesspersons, at least one world-famous doctor who is becoming a member of the current presidential cabinet and following previous similar successful representatives of the same community appointed by previous president s of both parties, many soldiers who have died for their country, and countless others of distinction, large and small, who have added to the welfare of their country. But for the delusion suffering Black Lives Matter folks, the only reality is represented by scattered incidents that ratify the false narrative that nothing has really changed for African Americans. Thus, once again the Orwellian dogma is spelled out by these fantasizing victims in the words, “Freedom is Slavery.”
Probably the most famous area of contention in American politics lately has been the symbiotic relationship of the press and President Trump. Not since Richard Nixon accused Dan Rather of running for political office, has there been such a level of tension between political pundits and the office of President of the United States. Whenever Trump wants to juice his supporters, he merely has to call a press conference. Americas fifth estate, which famously supported Hillary Clinton well into the 90-percentile range, not only slanted the news in her favor, but also sent her campaign donations. Trump wins these confrontations by not losing. His supports see him as their defender. But the press is also winning by broadcasting their antagonism to the like-minded leftists who view the press as a support group. The cold war between these two factions oddly benefits both sides, so it is possible to say that “War is Peace.” The peace that comes from one’s supporters makes the existence of the antagonists possible. Fear increases as one side or the other demonizes the other.
While the press is an expected ally of the left, another player has emerged – the bureaucrat. Since they operate in a sphere of anonymity and concealment, these partisans have emerged as major players in the war against truth. During the Obama administration there were many examples of this. The left advanced its control of government by acts both legal and illegal. The assault included attacks on democracy as well as individuals and culminated in one Obama soldier at the Internal Revenue Service taking the fifth amendment to avoid disclosure, and possibly prosecution, for targeting conservative organizations. The worst in the Obama legacy occurred in the Justice Department where Eric Holder advanced policy decisions contrary to accepted legal practice and justice. His lawyers within the Justice Department were chastised by judges (see Senator Ted Stevens R-Alaska) for their blatantly unprofessional behavior in pursuit of the greater leftist cause of destroying the Senator from Alaska. An excellent book on this topic is Obama’s Enforcer, by John Fund and Hans von Spakovsky. More recently, left-supporting intelligence officers antagonistic to the president, released information that General Flynn had been in contact with the Russian Ambassador. The sin of lying to the vice-president was probably the reason for Flynn’s fall, but the point is the root cause was the active effort of an element, probably in the FBI, that was out to embarrass the administration, even at the risk of violating the Logan Act.
In looking at the comprehensive phalanx of attacking leftist troops, there must be a reason for the viewpoints that motivate their hypocrisy. Among the studies such as Black Studies, Native American Studies, Women’s Studies, etc., another concept should be admitted to the list – Left-Wing Studies. But beware, the left would attempt cooptation of this area of inquiry should it be opened to the rigors of academic scrutiny.
The war on truth has and will be a long-lasting one. The focus of the left is on the Trump administration now and into the future. Orwellian methodologies of propaganda through institutions of government, the press, education, media, bureaucracy, and law enforcement undermine democracy to achieve the ends of dubious control of the American mind and body. The use of violence to achieve political ends continues even as the Trump administration redirects America’s energy toward American achievement and growth. The true Orwellian guides the blue left hand of America as democracy cannot rest or relax.