Wednesday, September 10, 2008

quote of the day (Orwellian version)

From a story in today's Washington Post, "As Campaign Heats Up, Untruths Can Become Facts Before They're Undone":
John Feehery, a Republican strategist, said the campaign is entering a stage in which skirmishes over the facts are less important than the dominant themes that are forming voters' opinions of the candidates.

"The more the New York Times and The Washington Post go after Sarah Palin, the better off she is, because there's a bigger truth out there and the bigger truths are she's new, she's popular in Alaska and she is an insurgent," Feehery said. "As long as those are out there, these little facts don't really matter."
Remember, children: "little facts" don't matter; "big truths" do.

1 comment:

William Keckler said...

Mark, I caught your great example of Newspeak in my Blogger feed.

It instantly made me think of something I read yesterday, which made me laugh in a very nervous manner.

While, it isn't Newspeak, it would fall under the same category of serious grammatical glitches.

One of the channels that runs true crime stories (pretty much 24/7) did a story yesterday on convicted patricide Christopher Porco. (He also used the ax on his mother, but apparently he wasn't on his top game for matricide that day.)

Anyway, this statement was made by one of Porco's grandparents during his trial, or possibly at his sentencing:

"I don't know what happened to my grandson, but until he is cured, he must not be allowed to kill again," the letter read.

It was posted in an online feature on the case, with no attempt to qualify the speaker's statement or point out the obvious derailment in the intended meaning. But that freight train went off the tracks somethin' awful!

I wonder how the courtroom reacted.