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Miles from the Mainstream
D. R. ZUKERMAN, proprietor

The “1984” Impact on the Monolithic Media, Post November 8, 2016

May 5, 2017 --

George Orwell’s vision of totalitarian society, “1984,” has been seized upon by the Trump Resistance as a source for use in anti-Trump polemics.

LPR, however, sees the novel as providing insight into the performance of the media, after November 8, 2016. The media has been anti-Trumpeting (sorry, but pun indeed is intentional) the assertion that but for the Russians – alternatively, but for James Comey, Hillary ClInton would now be at the hundred says’ point of her presidency.

The fault, indeed the blame, is not with Hillary Clinton but with whatever notions artful minds can construct.

Early in the novel, howevr, Orwell, discussing Winston Smith’s work at the Ministry of Truth (actually a ministry of deceit) referred to the “process of continuous alteration” applicable to all forms of communication, including newspapers, books and films. The past would be “brought up to date” to prove the wisdom of the Party.

And so, while The New York Times noted, in front page headlines, June 3, 2016, that Hillary Clionton’s “core argument” against Donald J. Trump would his unfitness for the presidency, the Times, with the rest of the monolithic media, ignores the flawed campaign conducted by Hillary Clinton for unfounded assertions attributed to sources external to the Clinton campaign.

The “continuous alteration” process practiced by the monolithic media is consistent with this statement made by O’Brien, while he was torturing Winston Smith: “Whatever the Party holds to be truth is truth.” The New York Times, clearly, would have its readers believe that whatever the Times prints is the truth, when, if the paper were honest, the clogan on its masthead would read: All the leftist propaganda we deem to print>”

By the way-- whatever opinion polls say about confidence in President Trump, the polls indicate that the confidence of the American people in the monolithic media is even lower.”