Orwell, You Should Be Here Now

            In 1946 George Orwell published one of the most famous essays of the past century.  Entitled “Politics and the English Language,” it contained sentences such as “In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.” It also prefigured the slogans of his 1984 Big Brother:

War is Peace

Freedom is Slavery

Ignorance is Strength

            It would be impossible to list all the ways these statements prefigure the events of 2015-16, and I don’t intent to try.  Instead I want to focus on the ways those who should have been, and should still be, standing against the indefensible and the contradictory have fallen into the traps Orwell described.

            One of the first was New York Times Public Editor Liz Spade’ s September 10 piece arguing that journalists should not exercise any degree of judgment between positions and candidates, no matter how clear the issues might be.  (At that time I cancelled my subscription to the Times.)  Had we not had innumerable articles that presented the Republican’s and Hillary Clinton’s positions without comment, who knows how many minds might have been changed.

            Now that the unthinkable has happens, I  see an even more depressing example of what might be called diplomacy, but is really Orwellian doublespeak, coming from two of my all-time favorite politicians (and people).  In the last week, President Obama and former Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick has each made parallel statements that shock me.  Obama said to the Republican, “If you succeed then the country succeeds.”  Deval Patrick almost paraphrased this in the Boston Globe, “I will pray for the President’s success and the success of the country.” 

            Did they actually say that?  If the Republican succeeds in deporting millions of undocumented workers, splitting families, eviscerating environmental protections, repealing the Affordable Care Act, weakening our relations with our European allies, closing our country to foreigners whose views of America don’t square with his, abolishing the Department of Education, defunding Planned Parenthood, and on and on, then the country succeeds?

            In fact, if either of them believes this, then they should be perfectly indifferent to who won the election.   Because the theory that presidential success the national success, besides being complete nonsense, means there’s no point in campaigning.  Just give someone the job and pray for their success.  (We probably cold have done just as well if we did that, and saved months of torment and billions of dollars.)

            I’m with Elizabeth Warren, who said "You start every fight by being clear so the people on the other side understand: These are the places I’ll help you, these are the places I’ll do everything I can to block you. We are not turning this country over to what Donald Trump has sold. We’re just not.” As John  Oliver said on Sunday, the worst thing we can do is normalize this state of affairs.
            As John  Oliver said on Sunday, the worst thing we can do is normalize this state of affairs.  Keep the words “not normal” on your refrigerator, your screen saver, or wherever else you’ll see them.  This is Vietnam, it’s Germany 1933.  Don’t sit back.