What I just read
It really is amazing how a book can stand the test of time. Animal Farm is a book that if you haven’t read since highschool you should pick up again. At 138 pages even George Bush could read it in a day. This time taking the time to read the forward and the introduction. One can learn so much from these parts of the book. What I found most shocking and relative to our time is how Napolean when faced with a calamity blamed it on Snowball who was not even around anymore. I likened it to Bush blaming terrorism for what’s happening. The parellels between Orwell’s fable and today are uncanny.
Sadly he was writing about his time in the age of Stalin….
All animals are equal, some more than others
One must never forget that the man who used the pseuedonym George Orwell was a lapsed leftist who had fought on the losing side in the Spanish Civil War.
It appears that the Newspeak he described in 1984 is with us under the guise of political correctness.
I always like Brave New World better. Everyone got laid all the time (not just donviti), and ‘soma’ was plentiful.
good point art
because we all know that Eric Blair was the one leading the troops in spain..
moron
This Art guy is a hoot. He’s really amusing. Very much like ‘beetlejuice’ or ‘gary the retard’ on Stern.
DV – When will you set up my Oxford style debate at the Deer Park. I so want to make this guys curl up into the fetal position.
At 138 pages even George Bush could read it in a day
What? Picture pages?
newspeak is here but not in the guise of politcal correctness, but the dumbed down GOP talking points they try to pass off as genuine communication.
“newspeak is here but not in the guise of politcal correctness, but the dumbed down GOP talking points they try to pass off as genuine communication.”
Nice assertion but not logical. Newspeak was not dumbed down, it was purposeful choices of alternate words to hide rather unpallatable concepts. Political correctness if there ever was a definition.
I saw the German-made movie of the same name. Rather disgusting, I must say ;-]
Okay “death tax” boy.
Or what it is worth, I have always been willing to talk before less than friendly audiences and debate issues openly.
There is little to be gained by preaching to any choir.
While some may attempt to poke some fun at me and the views I express, how many have the courage of their convictions to use their real name as a screen name?
Some treat the Internet as the equivalent of a public toilet wall where they can post anonymous rants reeking of frustration.
There is a lot to say for a dialog.
so discrediting Orwell because he was on the losing side of a war is ok because you use your real name?
Yeah, like we need the wacko Michele Malkin’s of the world showing up at my mansion or tracking me down at work. The extreme (though thoroughly visible in the MSM) Right has been known to do such things. Put it this way….I don’t trust you nutjobs! Simple as that.
And frustration does not equal ignorance or ineptitude, right?
So what’s your point again, Art? Mark Twain’s work is invalid since he didn’t use Samuel Clements? His dialog sucked! 😉
Samuel Clemens, no ‘T’…myapologies….
Don’t let it happen again.
I shan’t!
> At 138 pages even George Bush could read it
> in a day.
I think you are giving him way too much credit. As that Florida school video on September 11th shows, he was struggling with “My Pet Goat.”
Hey jgrab I like your blog.
so discrediting Orwell because he was on the losing side of a war is ok because you use your real name?
Orwell is a hero as well as Mark Twain. Their pseudonyms were literary devices and not the equivalent of a ‘CB handle’.
Some folks seem to have some reading comprehension problems. Perhaps we can blame the cult of mediocrity promoted by the NEA. Isn’t Ennis owned by the radical educrats?
The man known as George Orwell learned of the evil of the Hard Left in Spain during a very nasty war.
David Horowitz had a similar, albeit more recent, awakening.
Arthur Downs is wrong. Orwell wasn’t a lapsed lefty. He was an anti-Stalinist lefty and it was precisely his experience in the Spanish Civil War that he learned Stalin couldn’t be relied upon. But in his work about the Spanish Civil War, one should read the high praise he had for the anarchists, leftists not allied w/ Stalinism or Marxism.
Animal Farm and 1984 were warnings primarily to the left that Stalinism was a menace.
He was an anti-Stalinist lefty and it was precisely his experience in the Spanish Civil War that he learned Stalin couldn’t be relied upon.
Note that the political party that was all powerful in 1984 was “EngSoc”.
Orwell would not have gotten along with modern leftists on issues such as ‘gun control’ (that he found to be ludicrous). H. L. Mencken had similar views.
I remember that Orwell and Mencken both thought that gun control was much better using the two-handed grip, as opposed to the ‘free-lance’ single hand posture.
“While some may attempt to poke some fun at me and the views I express, how many have the courage of their convictions to use their real name as a screen name?”
What does one have to do with the other? Names and handles are labels, not the argument itself. It’s an false correlation.
What does one have to do with the other? Names and handles are labels, not the argument itself. It’s an false correlation.
How many newspapers will publish and unsigned letter or Op-Ed piece? How many believe what they reat on toilet walls?
How may internet rants are filled with gratuious vulgarity as a substitute for logic? I can understand some nurse at a certain mental hospital doing some anonymous whistle blowing when he or she is fighting the establishment and does not want to invite criminal retaliation. Who is afraid of identifying themselves with a political position?
dana,
Arthur Downs is wrong.
don’t wont to offend you (because you use your real name)
….you are sort of being redundant with the above statement