Democrats Embrace Newspeak — But Talk Is Still Cheap
Three examples of leftists utterly changing meanings to suit their craven agenda.
One of the more brilliant aspects of George Orwell’s 1984 was the introduction of “Newspeak” into the cultural lexicon, accompanied by three outstanding examples: “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; and Ignorance is Strength.” As the 2020 presidential election campaign begins to unwind, it appears that Democrats will employ moral appeals to bring Americans into the party fold. That these same self-appointed stewards of such can completely reverse previously held, ostensibly moral positions in the pursuit of power? As ever, Republicans “flip flop” while Democrats “evolve.” Thus between now and the election, the atmosphere will be thick with Newspeak. The advancement of the “progressive” agenda — by any means necessary — demands nothing less.
We begin with Nancy Pelosi, who evoked God and morality to advance her party’s global warming agenda. “If you do believe, as I do, that this is God’s creation, this planet, we have a moral responsibility to be good stewards of it,” she stated. “But even if you don’t subscribe to that, you know we have a moral responsibility to future generations to pass on this planet in a responsible, responsible way.”
Perhaps the first moral responsibility we have to future generations is to permit their existence. Yet when the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act was introduced in the Senate, “to prohibit a health care practitioner from failing to exercise the proper degree of care in the case of a child who survives an abortion or attempted abortion,” 44 Democrats voted against the measure.
That abortion was the leading cause of death worldwide in 2018? A 2016 article by Snopes — a website created by another faction of self-appointed “progressive” truth-tellers — is indicative. It insisted the stats compiled back then were misleading because they rely on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and “that organization does not record abortion as a cause of death.”
In other words, dead fetuses don’t count as being dead. Moreover, is there any Democrat-supported organization that epitomizes Newspeak better than Planned Parenthood? It promotes itself as a provider of “women’s health services.” Yet as the recently released movie “Unplanned” reveals, Planned Parenthood is really the world’s largest abortion provider. Yet because that’s something the Left prefers to obscure, major TV networks refused to run ads for the movie, and Twitter briefly suspended its account before forcing users to “unfollow” it, precipitating a loss of 99,000 of the movie’s 100,000 followers.
In short, progressives attempted to shove “Unplanned” down Orwell’s “memory hole.”
Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) also evoked morality as it pertains to education. “We can judge a society I think always by the way it treats its children,” Harris declared. “And one of the greatest expressions of love of our children is that we invest in their education.”
Reality check? In 2014 (the most recent stats available), America spent an average of $16,268 per year per student from kindergarten through college, well above the global average of $10,759. Nonetheless, in global assessments of mathematics, reading, and science skills, America’s students are consistently outclassed by other nations.
A devastating essay on the subject of education by former NYC teacher Mary Hudson further explodes the Democrat “truth” that money is the problem. Discipline is virtually nonexistent, and administrators embrace the “soft bigotry of low expectations,” convinced a large percentage of children are inherently incapable of learning. In addition, these same “educrats” have precipitated a complete devaluation of tried and true educational techniques, while embracing an unambiguous preference for social justice indoctrination over the development of critical — and independent — thinking skills.
This odious status quo has existed for 50 years, due in large part to school unions that overwhelmingly prioritize the needs of their members over those of students and their parents. That those same unions, American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and the National Education Association (NEA), respectively contribute 100% and 98.6% of their campaign donations to Democrats reveals a great deal about how that party “loves” children: its members despise school choice, relegating millions of inner city kids to educational wastelands — even as many Democrats educate their own children in private schools.
What does de facto educational apartheid, and the deliberate dumbing down of students to create a reliable constituency of dependent Americans really say about Democrats commitment to education?
As Orwell might say, the importance of some students is “more equal” than that of other students.
And then there’s Donald Trump. No Democrat expression of morality would be complete without the requisite bashing of the current president, whom 2020 hopeful Sen. Kirstin Gillibrand (D-NY) insists is “tearing the apart the moral fabric of this country.” And like many of her fellow Democrats who were for border security before they were against it, Gillibrand has asserted that a border wall is a “picture of division and hate and derision.”
Perhaps Gillbrand might explain how Trump is tearing apart our moral fabric, even as she votes against protecting newborns from being murdered. Or perhaps she might explain how her party wants to secure the border, while its House speaker is filing a lawsuit to prevent a wall from being built. Or why her party, when it had complete power for two years, including a filibuster-proof 60-seat Senate majority, never approved the “real immigration reform” and “path to citizenship” she claims her party favors.
The bigger picture is even more Orwellian. This is a party that embraces the pernicious concept of “my truth,” believes a viable political coalition consists of institutionalizing a hierarchy of intersectional victimization, and embraces “settled science” without realizing the term is an oxymoron — even as it applies it not only to global warming but to transgenderism, in complete defiance of chromosomal reality.
Yet the ultimate example of Democrat Party Newspeak occurs on a daily basis. This is the party that calls for unity and healing, even as it labels various factions of Americans who don’t march in lockstep with its agenda as privileged, toxic, racist, sexist, nativist, trans-, homo- and Islamophobic bitter-clinging deplorables.
Americans who aren’t dying off fast enough to suit progressive sensibilities.
Will the electorate buy into this Orwellian approach to presidential campaigning? If the 2016 election was indicative, labeling a large portion of Americans “deplorable” and “irredeemable” — while campaigning under the slogan of “Stronger Together,” no less — didn’t exactly accrue to Hillary Clinton’s interests. And because she lost, the entire facade of carefully nurtured progressive “tolerance” and “inclusion” was destroyed, and replaced by unrelenting chorus of hate and hysteria. As a result, it’s going to take a mountain of Newspeak to recast a Democrat Party whose unbridled contempt for “unenlightened” Americans has become impossible to hide.
Fortunately, talk is cheap, and a lot of Americans know what rank hypocrisy looks like. Right now, it looks exactly like the Democrat Party.