Debunking Orwellian deceptions

by | Jun 29, 2016 | Abortion, Editor's Blog, LGBT Rights, Voting Rights | 19 comments

When the Supreme Court struck down the Texas law designed to shutter abortion clinics across the state, they also exposed the Orwellian deception that the current brand of Republicans uses to deny people’s rights. Texas Republicans said the bill was meant to protect women’s health. The Supreme Court, and everyone, else knew that was false and they called out the Texas lawmakers.

In North Carolina, Republicans use similar arguments to deny people the right to vote. They created voter fraud to justify making access to the ballot box more difficult for people who might vote against them. Nobody heard a word about voter fraud until Barack Obama was elected president and suddenly it was an excuse to require voter IDs, shorten the number of early voting days, end same-day registration, move voting locations, and stop pre-registration of 16 and 17 year-olds. Let’s hope eventually the court lays bare the deception of the voter fraud argument, too.

The GOP also “protected” our women and children by passing House Bill 2 that discriminated against the LGBT community. The bill not only regulates who can use which bathroom, it denies people the right to sue when they are discriminated against in the workplace. Just for good measure, they denied local governments the ability to raise the minimum wage. That really kept women safe.

We see similar arguments when the GOP claims that it’s increasing school funding even though per pupil spending plummets. We’re one of the fastest growing states in the nation and our education funding has failed to keep pace with population growth. As a result, our schools and our kids suffer from a lack of resources. Now, the GOP is using the struggling, underfunded schools as an excuse to turn over entire systems to for-profit charter agencies.

Politicians have always used spin to make their arguments. They exaggerate and use arguments that might appeal to their supporters or detractors. But the GOP has been twisting reality. The Supreme Court called them on it in Texas. Let’s hope they call them on it in North Carolina, too.

19 Comments

  1. Ebrun

    Wow, that’s quite a wordy lecture, Hawkeye. Hope your fellow liberals were able to wade through it, although I doubt they learned anything. Me, I quit reading after the third paragraph. Just more hyper partisan distortion, misinformation and specious comparisons. Effective communication on a political blog like this requires more timely, relevant and concise comment. You should emulate Frank Luntz.

  2. Ebrun

    So now, Hawkeye, you think I am a “far-Right radical,” rather than a “snake-in-the-grass,” “REthug” or “tyrannical brethren.” Good to see you refrain from the juvenile name calling.

    • Hawkeye

      After 25 years of control by the GOP and your fellow travelers , I have nothing left that is good to say about y’all.

      Coming out of thee JFK years , I had hopes for better things , that were smashed on the rocks of ‘Reganomics’ and Dubyas dirty wars (isn’t that in the news today ? A British inquiry?)

      As to name calling , that door swings both ways , although some , like yourself , who have access to better educated ways , couch name calling in dog-whistle codes. Like I said before , I am at least educated enough to know what Semantics is all about , and how it’s used!

      And more about name calling : ‘Crooked Hillary’ Perhaps?
      Following is an item about ‘Crooked Bush’!

      Here is a brief refresher on the White House email scandal:

      http://www.pensitoreview.com/2015/03/18/flashback-rove-erases-22-million-white-house-emails-on-private-server-at-height-of-u-s-attorney-scandal-media-yawns/

      Flashback: Rove Erases 22 Million White House Emails on Private Server at Height of U.S. Attorney Scandal – Media Yawns
      Jon Ponder

      Now that they’ve taken control of Congress, Republicans are wielding power much the same way they did in the Clinton era and for the six years afterward when they controlled the White House and Congress under George W. Bush: ineptly — examples: 1, 2 etc.

      Then as now, it’s clear that the only thing Republicans do very well is inflame the media with bogus scandals — which is a handy way to distract attention from their ineptitude. They are doing this with their usual aplomb, and considerable success, in the matter of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server to send emails.

      Clinton has said she deleted about 50,000 emails that dealt with personal matters, citing her daughter’s wedding and her mother’s funeral as examples. All the correspondence pertaining to official business was turned over to and archived by State.

      The deletion of the emails, though perfectly legal, has excited House Republicans, including Speaker John Boehner, who has announced plans to deploy House committees to investigate what might aptly be called Servergate.

      Never mind that former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a Republican, has said he used a system similar to Clinton’s — and never mind that in 2007 Karl Rove deleted 22 million emails from a private server in the Bush White House — a matter about which the Beltway media said little and Republicans in Congress, like Rep. John Boehner, said nothing.

      Here is a brief refresher on the White House email scandal:

      Not long after George W. Bush assumed the presidency in 2001, Rove, his top political aide, set up a private email server for use in the White House. The stated purpose of the system — the primary domain name on which was gwb43.com — was that it would be used exclusively for the sort of political correspondence that Bush and Rove were not permitted to do on the taxpayer’s dime.

      Seven years later, Bush and Rove were embroiled in two competing scandals — the Valerie Plame scandal, in which operatives for Vice Pres. Dick Cheney, including Rove and Scooter Libby, were accused of unmasking Valerie Plame, a CIA specialist in the black market for weapons of mass destruction, for purely partisan reasons, and the U.S. Attorney purge, in which Rove’s political operation in the White House was accused of ordering Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to purge eight U.S. attorneys who were qualified prosecutors and replace them with political hacks with little or no prosecutorial experience.

      Rove escaped prosecution in the Libby case, but Libby was convicted (Bush quickly commuted the sentence) on March 6, 2007, at the same time Bush and Rove were under fire for purging the U.S. attorneys.

      During the investigation, it came to light that Rove’s server had been used to send official, non-political emails — correspondence that was required by law to be preserved under the Presidential Records Act.

      On April 12, 2007, Rove’s operation admitted that it had deleted at least 5 million emails from the server. In December 2009, technicians who had examined the server reported that the number of emails that had been deleted was far greater — 22 million.

      What was in the emails?

      No one will ever know. It’s likely as not that there was incriminating evidence in the correspondence that tied Rove and others to the treasonous exposure of Agent Plame (which, at a minimum, was a violation of government security), the U.S. attorneys’ purge and perhaps other scandals, including the inquiry into charges that Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff had used his entre with others in the GOP to bribe government officials.

      Abramoff was in prison serving the first year of his sentence when the email scandal broke.

      If nothing else, this appears to be a prima facie case (or, rather, 22 million cases) of obstruction of justice. How serious is obstruction of justice? It’s the crime Pres. Richard Nixon was charged with by the House of Representatives in 1974 that prompted him to resign rather than face impeachment.

      But what sort of evidence might have been lost in the 50,000 emails Hillary Clinton deleted?

      The insinuation from Republicans is that something dispositive about the Benghazi scandal might have been erased.

      It’s hard to guess what that might have been. What the GOP seems to be looking for in its eight investigations into Benghazi, so far, is a stand-down order issued by the State Department or the White House to the military that left the Benghazi consulate vulnerable to the attack that ensued.

      These Republicans know, of course, that the Secretary of State doesn’t have the authority to issue orders to the military.

      Given that, there’s no question that the coverage of the Clinton email “scandal” is out of scale, but how does the incessant media coverage today stack up against the scandal seven years ago when Rove’s political operation in the White House erased 22 million emails many of which likely included evidence of serious crimes?

      Last week, the fact-checking organization Politifact, which tends to skew to the right, compared coverage of the two scandals. Here’s it’s verdict:

      We did a search through Lexis-Nexis, a research service that tracks news articles and transcripts, between March and May 2007. We found more than 125 transcripts from the major cable networks and National Public Radio that include “Republican National Committee” and “email” within 10 words of each other.

      The Lexis-Nexis search also yielded more than 200 related newspaper articles across the country within the same time frame.

      Let’s compare that to coverage of the Clinton controversy.

      Since the story broke March 3, 2015 — two weeks ago — we found 204 cable and public radio transcripts that include “Clinton” and “email.” We also found 1,700 newspaper articles across the country.

      That’s several times as many articles and transcripts about Clinton than there were about the Bush email controversy in a quarter of the time. It’s a rough measurement, but clearly there has been more media attention on Clinton’s use of private email than that of the White House staffers.

      Even so, Politifact rated the claim that coverage of Clinton’s email deletions is out of scale compared with coverage of Rove’s in 2007 is “mostly false.”

      Wait. What?

      In the Rove scandal, there were 125 broadcast reports and 200 newspaper articles over three months about the millions of deleted emails. Today, in just two weeks there have been 200 broadcast reports and 1,700 newspaper articles about the 50,000 deleted emails.

      And yet Politifact finds the assertion that there’s been more coverage of Clinton than there was of Rove to be “mostly false.” How did they do that?

      Simple. Politifact keyed its verdict to a Fox pundit’s hyperbolic statement there was “zero coverage” of Rove’s scandal when it broke. So, yeah, it’s “mostly false” that there was “zero coverage.”

      Republicans’ objective in using its lapdogs in the “liberal media” to exaggerate the Clinton emails controversy is to damage her image in advance of her run for the presidency. Polls show that their strategy is working — while Hillary Clinton remains the odds-on favorite among Democratic voters, her approval rating has slipped among all voters in polls released since the email deletions came to light.

      At least Republicans are good at something.

  3. Ebrun

    It is a partisan lie that per pupil education funding in NC has plummeted under the GOP. The opposite is the case according to the latest information from the NC Department of Public Instruction. Current per pupil funding is $5881, which represents all state money. It was $5615 in 2010-11 and a substantial portion of that was from federal support. See the graph for NC DOI:

    http://www.ncpublicschools.org/docs/fbs/budget/spendingtrends.pdf

    • Jay Ligon

      Inflation-adjusted per pupil spending from Governing:
      2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008
      New York $19,818 $19,879 $19,965 $19,873 $19,538 $18,770
      North Carolina $8,390 $8,337 $8,700 $8,976 $9,256 $8,740

      Spending per pupil has declined by nearly $1,000 since 2009. North Carolina is near the bottom in per pupil spending. The governor is bragging about his pay hike without mentioning that our teachers are among the worst paid.

      • Ebrun

        “Spending per pupil has declined by nearly $1,000 since 2009.” Not true for NC state level funding for K-12 public education. Per pupil spending was $5779 in 2008-09 from state appropriations and federal grants compared to $5881 per pupil in 2015-16, according to data from the NC Dept of Public Instruction, Business and Financial Services office. It will be even higher once the latest budget adjustment is passed by the NCGA.

        • Jay Ligon

          The failed to adjust for inflation.

        • Hawkeye

          Well gowlee and shazam!

          $102 in 6 years. Does that account for inflation and population growth?

          I could sure use that kind of increase on my Social Security (oh , that’s right , the GOP calls it an ‘entitlement’ , even though I paid for it my entire working life – so I deserve nothing , eh?)

          • Ebrun

            The per pupil spending stats obviously take into account increased enrollment. Inflation rate is currently one percent, was 0.7 percent last year, 0.8 percent in 2014, 1.5% in 2013. Any large scale operation, even public schools, should see their average cost decrease as output increases due to economies of scale.

          • Hawkeye

            Truly Orwellian : the GOP talks about getting government ‘off your back’….
            I’ve lived in many other states in my lifetime, seen some dysfunctional legislatures , but nothing like this.
            The following came from my state Rep’s newsletter.

            Editorial: Maybe legislators should follow their hearts? Abolish city government and local school boards
            Posted 5:38 a.m. Monday
            June 27 , 2016

            — Legislators appear intent on trying to meddle in the minute details of local government.
            — From bathrooms to classrooms, there is a dictate or mandate from Raleigh.
            — Why wouldn’t it be better to give local officials, who are closest to those they govern, more authority and accountability?

            * * *

            A CBC Editorial
            ​The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company

            It is about time for the General Assembly to stop nibbling around the edges. We know they want to do it, so just chomp down and take a big bite of the huge government enchilada. Abolish city government and local school boards and let the legislature run things.

            So there. The words have finally been uttered. The evidence that they really want to run their cities, counties and schools is overwhelming, so why pretend?

            The latest bit of proof comes courtesy of state Sen. Norman Sanderson, R-Pamlico. Fearful that some communities might be too lenient on the state’s efforts to restrict and regulate refugees and immigrants, Sanderson and the Senate Judiciary II Committee concocted legislation that threatens cities with loss of road repair aid and school district funding cuts if they don’t strictly adhere to state immigration laws.

            Sanderson says that some communities – most notably Greensboro – are ignoring legislation passed in 2015 that banned state and local agencies from recognizing consular documents and prevents police and other government agencies from accepting IDs issued by foreign governments.

            Over the last two legislative sessions, unprompted, legislators have imposed redistricting and other changes on city councils, county commissions and school boards in Wake, Guilford, Buncombe and Randolph counties.

            If they aren’t looking to change the forms of government and representations locally, they want to require local landfills to accept hazardous waste, override the ability of local governments to limit mineral exploration, further restrict municipal annexation authority, tamper with local building codes, impose specific courses and teaching methods in schools and overturn local ordinances, most recently Charlotte’s attempt to make their city more accommodating to the LGBT community.

            That effort was met with the notorious HB2, a sweeping law that has legalized discrimination against people based on sexual preference or identity.

            So, why not just drop the charade? The legislature should simply make all city charters void, abolish local school boards and have the General Assembly run things.

            Got a problem or concern? From Main Street to Jones Street, the legislature will handle it. Law enforcement – just add a few more officers to the Highway Patrol. You get the idea.

            Think of the savings. Abolishing those councils and school boards alone would provide millions that could be put to other uses – say adding funds go pet projects like the “Opportunity” school vouchers program or more “solar bees” to clean up polluted lakes and ponds.

            Did your house get bypassed in the week’s trash collection? Call the legislature – we’re sure they can handle it. Is a neighbor’s dog howling late at night? There’s a House or Senate member who surely is as accessible as that city council member who gets those 2 a.m. calls, who knows just how to handle mindless yammering.

            State House Majority Leader Mike Hager, a Republican from small-town Rutherfordton who has never served as a locally elected official, says legislators have the authority and responsibility to impose uniformity on local governments.

            He doesn’t want North Carolina to become a patchwork of rules, depending on the city. “By law we have that responsibility to make sure that the cities and counties do what they’re supposed to be doing.”

            What better way to fulfill that responsibility than by taking over those cities and school boards, having direct responsibility for the day-to-day needs of constituents, and running things from Raleigh?

            Then again, a better way might be to recognize that not all knowledge and understanding resides under the glass pyramids of the state Legislative Building. While local agencies are far from perfect, a little less recreational meddling from the state capital would enable local communities to address and resolve their challenges even more effectively.

            Credits
            Reporter
            CBC Opinion Staff
            Copyright 2016 by Capitol Broadcasting Company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

            http://www.wral.com/editorial-maybe-legislators-should-follow-their-hearts-abolish-cityl-government-and-local-school-boards/15804583/

          • Ebrun

            “So , Republicans continue to get in step with hysterical talking points about problems that don’t exist. I call that telling LIES ( and spreading semantically tweaked propaganda , just as they did in the USSR).”

            Sure, Hawkeye, from your language here anyone can tell your an example of the quintessential moderate. “Snake-in-the-grass,” “Rethugs,” “tyrannical brethren.” Vitriol is acceptable as long as it is proffered by those on the left. Nothing extreme about that, right?

          • Hawkeye

            Totalitarianism and dictatorship are the results of extremism either on the Left or the Right.
            I don’t see any communists in power anywhere in North Carolina or the USA in general.
            What I DO see is radical Rightists in power from Washington to the statehouses , with a visible tendency towards tyranny and misleading propaganda.
            There used to be Republicans that engaged in true democracy , without pushing unproven ideologies.
            They don’t exist anymore , having been exiled by the radicals.
            My guess is that you are also a far-Right radical , thus you wouldn’t be here, supporting these GOP talking points , Ebrun.

  4. Yojji

    Thanks for a great analysis, Thomas!

    I always laugh at Republicans when they say they advocate “small” government while they’re busy writing legislation to fix problems that don’t exist (and, as a sort of by-product, wreaking havoc for anyone who doesn’t belong to their rich, old, white guys club).

  5. Hawkeye

    A word of thanks , Jay, for a fine reply.

    There should be a spotlight on Frank Luntz everywhere he goes! I Can’t forget his phony ‘focus groups’ in the ’90’s about Pres. Clinton on CNN.

    By the way , this twisting of language is actually a very sophisticated science known as Semantics , which investigates the physical and emotional effects of words beyond actual definitions. Sometimes , those so trained can be spotted by their overly smooth image of ‘reasonableness’!

    We have one in Asheville ; his name is Carl Mumpower. I’m hoping for the day he finally loses it , and we can see the wolf inside the woolen suit!

    • Ebrun

      Wow, Frank Luntz is the new bogyman for the radical left. I guess those poor hayseeds just don’t realize how he twists the language to con them into supporting Republicans. But now that his “mind bending…lexicon” is being exposed, no doubt NC voters will that into account when they go the polls this fall. LOL

      • Hawkeye

        You assume too much , Ebrun.
        Luntz is no bogyman, he’s a smooth, educated and well directed snake-in -the grass.
        He , as well as the rest of you REthugs , know very well that the ‘hayseeds ‘ as you call them, are as easily misled as in PT Barnum’s day.
        After all , it’s on the record that , the fewer people vote, the better the Republican chances.
        Thus , voter ID and the LIE about voter fraud.
        Thus , Donald Trump.
        So , you can downplay Luntz’s Semantics as much as you like , But I , at least , know what it’s about.
        I suppose that won’t win an election; it’s too much information to the average Joe.
        But , when you and your tyrannical brethren grab even more in your greed, there will still be folk like me to trip you up whenever the opportunity presents itself .
        By the way , I don’t know if this is true , but I’ve always heard it attributed to Joe Stalin: It’s not who votes that counts , it’s who counts the votes.
        Who counts the votes in those easily hacked digital voting machines?
        You , maybe?

        • Ebrun

          Right, comrade, it’s who votes that count. We need to keep those hayseeds down on the farm and away from polling stations. That way we won’t have to indulge in mythical fantasies about hacked voting machines. The proletariat just doesn’t realize they’re being conned by the likes of Frank Luntz. LOL

          • Hawkeye

            ‘Right, comrade, it’s who votes that count. We need to keep those hayseeds down on the farm and away from polling stations. That way we won’t have to indulge in mythical fantasies about hacked voting machines. The proletariat just doesn’t realize they’re being conned by the likes of Frank Luntz. LOL’

            Sure , Ebrun
            By the language used here , your snark assumes I’m in jack-booted step with the RCP.
            Actually , both the Left and Right extremes are tyrannical. We’ve seen that from Sen Apodaca and others in in Raleigh .
            As to voter suppression ,there is plenty of documentation concerning racist gerrymandering , stripping voters from the roll unjustly (see: Florida , Ohio), vote machine ‘malfunctions , closed polling sites (Arizona , wasn’t it?)
            and most glaringly , the ‘mythical fantasies’ of voter fraud , for which there are no real statistics, pushed by GOP controlled statehouses nationwide .

            Voter fraud is similar to that other wasteful claim : that those who get assistance from the state must be tested for drug use. Less than 1% tested positive in those states where this program existed , making the $$$millions spent on testing very expensive indeed.

            So , Republicans continue to get in step with hysterical talking points about problems that don’t exist. I call that telling LIES ( and spreading semantically tweaked propaganda , just as they did in the USSR).

  6. Jay Ligon

    The Republican Party uses distorted language as a primary tool of governance. Consultant Frank Luntz has made a living out of twisting language into grotesque forms on behalf of the GOP. It was Luntz who coined the phony mandate called “Contract for America” for Knut Gingrich when there was no such thing. “Family Values” sounded like something but didn’t mean anything to the proponents of it. The famous phrase “a thousand points of light” was a feel-good expression which pleased a focus group. “Estate taxes” which only affect couples with net worths exceeding $10 million became known as “Death Taxes.” Death affects everyone equally except for vampires and Betty White. Mind-bending Orwellian lexicon makes legislation sound as if it would solve a particular problem when, in fact, it makes it worse. The “Deficit-Reduction Act” only made tax cuts deeper and deficits larger.

    During the Bush II years, you could count any legislation doing exactly the opposite of the title. The “clean air” bill would have the effect of ridding the air of birds and oxygen.

    The Republicans have won the battle of perception, and an alchemist’s approach to words has conjured up public support for things the public really doesn’t want. “Women’s health” has come to mean the denial of essential services which protect women.

    We should rejoice that the 8 justices of the Supreme Court consult the dictionary.

Related Posts

GET UPDATES

Get the latest posts from PoliticsNC delivered right to your inbox!

You have Successfully Subscribed!