The Republican Ministry of Truth

The dishonest attack ads and propaganda from Fox News are only two aspects of the Republican’s propaganda machine. Colorado GOP chairman Dick Wadhams gave away the truth about how his party works when he described the Republican war room to The Denver Post: “Just consider this the Ministry of Truth,” quipped Dick Wadhams, chairman of the Colorado Republican Party.

The Ministry of Truth was a the propaganda arm of the totalitarian government in George Orwell’s classic, 1984:

“The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation. These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from ordinary hypocrisy; they are deliberate exercises in doublethink.”

Steve Benen points out an analogous case when a conservative was unintentionally honest about their ideology. He cites a previous post from Andrew Sullivan which describes how Sean Hannity borrowed the Stalinist term Enemy of the State to attack those he disagrees with.

It is obviously an exaggeration to compare Republicans to the totalitarians of 1984 and the USSR under Stalin but the manner in which they use similar propaganda tools to deceive the voters and attack those who disagree with them is a valid concern as well as a threat to the democratic process.

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