Believable George

Two points to make here:

1. Trying to understand the Iraqi War in particular, and the overall American situation in general, one cannot perhaps do better than to read some quotes of George Orwell writing in 1940-50.

2. How silly and naive of us to imagine that our times and our circumstances are so unique, that there are no precedents for the situations we are facing, et boring cetera.

Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.

In our time political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.

All the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.

But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.

Political language... is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.

War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it.

Nationalism is power hunger tempered by self-deception.

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.

We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men.

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.

In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

Orwell lived from 1903 to 1950, and most of his writing—including, presumably, all or most of these quotes—occured between 1940 and his death.

I found these quotes when I stumbled across a website called America in Crisis, which I hereby acknowledge with gratitude but definitely without recommendation.

Note that although Orwell was arguably a great writer and was certainly a great observer of the political scene, there's no way he could have known, and therefore have written about, the specific political activities of the Bush Administration. I mention this in case unwary readers conclude from the above remarks that Orwell had been talking specifically about the Bush Administration and America in the 21st century.