Counterfeit Nation

 

To counterfeit means to imitate something authentic, with the intent to steal, destroy, or replace the original, for use in illegal transactions, or otherwise to deceive individuals into believing that the fake is of equal or greater value than the real thing. —Wikipedia

What if the reason so many of us feel like we don’t know our country any more is because it isn’t?

Following current government-approved stories feels like reading something out of George Orwell’s 1984 and the NewSpeak dictionary. “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength.”

On December 9, 2021, there was the first “Summit for Democracy” hosted by the White House. Included in pResident Biden’s remarks were the following:

We have to stand for justice and the rule of law, for free speech, free assembly, a free press, freedom of religion, and for all the inherent human rights of every individual.

Where is justice and the rule of law in the persecution of the J6 defendants, President Trump and his allies while Biden corruption and election irregularities go unpunished? Where is free speech when conservative voices are silenced or shadow-banned? Where is free assembly and freedom of religion when the state imposes lockdowns on everything except BLM riots? Where is freedom of the press when government can label and limit “disinformation”? Where are all inherent human rights when experimental drugs are mandated?

The only way to square these things is to realize that our understanding of these words is no longer the correct understanding and meaning. In other words, an Orwellian world is no longer a philosophical construct, it has become reality. The problem is not how to keep America from becoming Airstrip One, within Oceania, but how to transform it again into something that we knew before. And the task is all the more difficult because we never changed our name, the letterhead remained, but it ceased to operate as it had before.

The powers that be demand that we do not see that they are replacing before with a counterfeit.  Continuing the pResident’s remarks  —

[W]e immediately passed what we call the American Rescue Plan to get shots in people’s arms as fast as possible at home and around the world to help get this pandemic under control, and to stimulate inclusive and lasting economic recovery that’s also helping to drive global growth.

* * *
On my first day in office, I signed an executive order to advance racial justice and equality.  And my administration recently released our first National Strategy on Gender Equality and Equity.

*  *  *
We’re making it easy for Americans to register to vote, and we’ve doubled the number of attorneys defending and enforcing voting rights laws through our Department of Justice.

And my administration is going to keep fighting to pass two critical pieces of legislation that will shore up the very foundation of American democracy: the sacred right of every person to make their voice heard through free, fair, and secure elections.

*  *  *
We should be making it easy for people to vote, not harder.  And that’s going to remain a priority for my administration until we get it done.

Inaction is not an option.

* *  *

     I released the first U.S. government Strategy on Countering Corruption, which elevates our fight against transnational corruption — a crime that drains public resources and hollows out the ability of governments to deliver for the people and just evaporates confidence that the people much need to have in their government.

The strategy includes working with other partners — all of you around the world — to improve transparency, hold corrupt actors accountable, reduce their ability to use the United States and international financial systems to hide assets and to launder money.

*  *  *

Working with our Congress, we’re planning to commit as much as $224 million [$424 million] in the next year to shore up transparent and accountable governance, including supporting media freedom, fighting international corruption, standing with democratic reformers, promoting technology that advances democracy, and defining and defending what a fair election is.

*  *  *

To ensure that our democracies are strengthening by the voice — are strengthened by the voice of all citizens, this Presidential Initiative includes programs to advance women and girls and civic engagement and political leadership, empowering the LGBTQL [sic] community — plus community — individuals to participate in democratic institutions, promote labor law reform, working or — and worker organizations.

It includes new lines of efforts with our partners to address online harassment and abuse, and reduce the potential for countries to abuse new technologies, including surveillance technologies, to suppress the rights of their people to express their views.

*  *  *

My fellow leaders, members of civil society, activists, advocates, citizens: We stand at an inflection point in our history, in my view.  The choices we make, in my view, in the next — in this moment are going to fundamentally determine the direction our world is going to take in the coming decades.

Will we allow the backward slide of rights and democracy to continue unchecked?  Or will we together — together — have a vision and the vision — not just “a” vision, “the” vision — and courage to once more lead the march of human progress and human freedom forward?  

(emphasis added)

What is “the” vision? How does it square? How does “my body, my choice” work for abortion but not for experimental drugs? How does central law enforcement against local efforts to ensure that only eligible voters cast votes support a republican form of government? Is vote integrity an example of “the backward slide of rights and democracy”? What is “corruption,” and is denial of the use of financial systems to engage in it the reason why government needs to know all your transactions of $600 or more? How is “TQ+” an empowerment of women and girls? How does government-corporate coordinated surveillance and suppression of “disinformation” promote “the rights of people to express their views”?

America is under the sway of George Orwell’s  Doublethink:

To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again, and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself—that was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word—doublethink—involved the use of doublethink.[2][4]: 32, 220 

Worse, at some level, we know it —

The rules are simple: they lie to us, we know they’re lying, they know we know they’re lying, but they keep lying to us, and we keep pretending to believe them.

― Elena Gorokhova, A Mountain of Crumbs

If it is ever to be otherwise, we must stop pretending.

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  1. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

     A powerful post. The evidence is overwhelming. And yet, how to turn it around, this late in the game . . . 

    • #1
  2. Mark Alexander Inactive
    Mark Alexander
    @MarkAlexander

    Rowan Atkinson is attempting to raise the issue, although he fails to understand Obama.

    • #2
  3. namlliT noD Member
    namlliT noD
    @DonTillman

    There are two separate things going on here:

    Rodin: Following current government-approved stories feels like reading something out of George Orwell’s 1984 and the NewSpeak dictionary. “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength.” 

    Yes, redefining language is a weapon of tyranny.  Changing the meanings of words effectively changes the meaning of anything written using those words.  

    We saw the word “liberal” first.  And “democracy”.   And more recently “gender”, “phobia”, “tolerance”, “racist”, “woman”, and so forth.  

     

    RodinOn December 9, 2021 there was the first “Summit for Democracy” hosted by the White House. Included in pResident Biden’s remarks were the following:

    “We have to stand for justice and the rule of law, for free speech, free assembly, a free press, freedom of religion, and for all the inherent human rights of every individual.”

    This is different.  This is just spewing text that is disconnected from reality for an intended effect.

    Obama was the master at this; he had left and right stereo teleprompters loaded up with lovely aspirational words from his writers, and he simply read them aloud.  And if he ever thought about the meaning of what he was saying, he would trip and loose the rhythm he had established, bopping hypnotically to the words and back and forth between the teleprompters.

     

    My point is that there is a difference between changing the meanings of words, and believing that the words being used have any meaning at all.

    • #3
  4. Rodin Member
    Rodin
    @Rodin

    namlliT noD (View Comment):

    There are two separate things going on here:

    Rodin: Following current government-approved stories feels like reading something out of George Orwell’s 1984 and the NewSpeak dictionary. “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength.”

    Yes, redefining language is a weapon of tyranny. Changing the meanings of words effectively changes the meaning of anything written using those words.

    We saw the word “liberal” first. And “democracy”. And more recently “gender”, “phobia”, “tolerance”, “racist”, “woman”, and so forth.

     

    Rodin: On December 9, 2021 there was the first “Summit for Democracy” hosted by the White House. Included in pResident Biden’s remarks were the following:

    “We have to stand for justice and the rule of law, for free speech, free assembly, a free press, freedom of religion, and for all the inherent human rights of every individual.”

    This is different. This is just spewing text that is disconnected from reality for an intended effect.

    Obama was the master at this; he had left and right stereo teleprompters loaded up with lovely aspirational words from his writers, and he simply read them aloud. And if he ever thought about the meaning of what he was saying, he would trip and loose the rhythm he had established, bopping hypnotically to the words and back and forth between the teleprompters.

     

    My point is that there is a difference between changing the meanings of words, and believing that the words being used have any meaning at all.

    I understand why you say this and I prefer your interpretation. It is understandable because I think the majority of Americans think more of less as we do. But if it were true, then what explains 2022? What explains Annheiser-Busch, Target, Chick Fil-A, Bank of America, and on and on. They know that “before” Americans do not support what they are doing. But they do it anyway. 

    • #4
  5. namlliT noD Member
    namlliT noD
    @DonTillman

    Rodin (View Comment):

    namlliT noD (View Comment):

    My point is that there is a difference between changing the meanings of words, and believing that the words being used have any meaning at all.

    I understand why you say this and I prefer your interpretation. It is understandable because I think the majority of Americans think more of less as we do. But if it were true, then what explains 2022? What explains Annheiser-Busch, Target, Chick Fil-A, Bank of America, and on and on. They know that “before” Americans do not support what they are doing. But they do it anyway.

    Different topic, but sure…

    Probably some combination of rogue marketing people in the company, the demands of woke investors such as BlackRock, or bribes from the Pritzker Family  or the Chinese Communist Party, all with the excuse that “Hey, it’s a popular trend with the young people.  Check out this TikTok video.”

    • #5
  6. namlliT noD Member
    namlliT noD
    @DonTillman

    namlliT noD (View Comment):
    This is different.  This is just spewing text that is disconnected from reality for an intended effect.

    And here’s a perfect example that just showed up in my Twitter feed:

     

     

    • #6
  7. Mad Gerald Coolidge
    Mad Gerald
    @Jose

    namlliT noD (View Comment):
    …believing that the words being used have any meaning at all.

    Duckspeak:

    Etymology
    duck +‎ speak, coined by George Orwell in 1949 as part of the Newspeak in his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.

    Noun
    duckspeak

    Thoughtless or formulaic speech.

     

    • #7
  8. Mad Gerald Coolidge
    Mad Gerald
    @Jose

    ‘There is a word in Newspeak,’ said Syme, ‘I don’t know
    whether you know it: DUCKSPEAK, to quack like a duck. It
    is one of those interesting words that have two contradic-
    tory meanings. Applied to an opponent, it is abuse, applied
    to someone you agree with, it is praise.’

    Unquestionably Syme will be vaporized, Winston
    thought again.

    • #8
  9. Addiction Is A Choice Member
    Addiction Is A Choice
    @AddictionIsAChoice

    Mad Gerald (View Comment):
    Unquestionably Syme will be vaporized,

    “So the Revolution will be complete when the language is perfect …. It’s encouraging to think that by…not a single person will be able to have a conversation like this.”

    • #9
  10. CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill Coolidge
    CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill
    @CarolJoy

    namlliT noD (View Comment):

    There are two separate things going on here:

    Rodin: Following current government-approved stories feels like reading something out of George Orwell’s 1984 and the NewSpeak dictionary. “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength.”

    Yes, redefining language is a weapon of tyranny. Changing the meanings of words effectively changes the meaning of anything written using those words.

    We saw the word “liberal” first. And “democracy”. And more recently “gender”, “phobia”, “tolerance”, “racist”, “woman”, and so forth.

     

    Rodin: On December 9, 2021 there was the first “Summit for Democracy” hosted by the White House. Included in pResident Biden’s remarks were the following:

    “We have to stand for justice and the rule of law, for free speech, free assembly, a free press, freedom of religion, and for all the inherent human rights of every individual.”

    This is different. This is just spewing text that is disconnected from reality for an intended effect.

    Obama was the master at this; he had left and right stereo teleprompters loaded up with lovely aspirational words from his writers, and he simply read them aloud. And if he ever thought about the meaning of what he was saying, he would trip and loose the rhythm he had established, bopping hypnotically to the words and back and forth between the teleprompters.

     

    My point is that there is a difference between changing the meanings of words, and believing that the words being used have any meaning at all.

    Yes!

    And one reason that Obama was practiced at  not paying attention to what he was saying and the meaning behind the words in his mouth is because about every six moths or so he would give a speech that contradicted an earlier speech.

    He either avoided paying attention to what he as saying or else he was a very accomplished liar. (Or both.) His facial expression and demeanor looked like he was in total agreement with the words of his speech.

     

    • #10
  11. Misthiocracy has never Member
    Misthiocracy has never
    @Misthiocracy

    Mark Alexander (View Comment):

    Rowan Atkinson is attempting to raise the issue, although he fails to understand Obama.

    Note: Rowan Atkinson’s free speech press conference happened way back in 2012.

    • #11
  12. CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill Coolidge
    CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill
    @CarolJoy

    All of this happened slowly over decades.

    Biden as Chief Executive of Speeches has to promote the fascist alliance of corporations with governing forces by his being sure of using  the traditional value-embedded vocabulary.

    He also has to hope that most Americans do not question whether his speeches remove all meaning from words that once represented great traditions like freedom and democracy.

    Yes this insidious change of America life has been happening  slowly over the decades.

    In the 1990’s,as  we remodeled our homes to have 70,000 dollar kitchens, as in the 2000’s we became foodies and travel experts, the insidious corporate/government bureaucracy came for the American way.

    The health system is no longer a health system.

    Once a yearly physical meant the patient had a possibility of explaining some real health concerns, with the doctor listening and making recommendations. If that took ten minutes or 30 minutes, that was the way it was supposed to be. Now all semblance of a visit to have our health truly  examined  is gone.

    A doctor visit is now something you wait six weeks for. Then you are chided at reception for not arriving ten minutes early, as there is zero tolerance for arriving 7 mins early rather than the full ten.

    The nurse weighs you, does your blood pressure and asks about why you did not get your yearly flu vaccine.

    Then the doctor comes in,  and begins a huge sales pitch for the patient getting statins.

    Then the patient’s  ten minutes is up.

    With this whole chain of structured interactions becoming the new version of a health appointment, it is no wonder it took so little effort on the part of Gates/Fauci and Birx to convince so many  medical personnel to medically kidnap and murder COVID patients throughout 2020 and 2021.

    The education system has become  a propaganda machine that allows our kids to flunk at math, as well as  reading and writing. Instead, starting as early as first grade, teachers  encourage their young students  to understand what each and every possibility of a male or female genitalia might conceivably look like.

    The legal system?

    Fuhgettabout it! After a switch from common law and an understanding of innate legal principles in the 1800’s,  the courts now rely on precedents established over the very decades when agency decisions were sacrosanct. This means the law has devolved into a system protecting the government  bureaucrats. These bureaucrats are actually  working for corporations.

    So even our laws cannot protect us from Corporate fascism.

    And the economic system is also seriously compromised. Whether the middle class has been systemically destroyed, or this destruction was only collateral damage, while Big Banks became even bigger, I really can’t say.

     

    • #12
  13. Mark Alexander Inactive
    Mark Alexander
    @MarkAlexander

    Misthiocracy has never (View Comment):

    Mark Alexander (View Comment):

    Rowan Atkinson is attempting to raise the issue, although he fails to understand Obama.

    Note: Rowan Atkinson’s free speech press conference happened way back in 2012.

    Rowan feels duped by electric cars.

    Electric motoring is, in theory, a subject about which I should know something. My first university degree was in electrical and electronic engineering, with a subsequent master’s in control systems. Combine this, perhaps surprising, academic pathway with a lifelong passion for the motorcar, and you can see why I was drawn into an early adoption of electric vehicles. I bought my first electric hybrid 18 years ago and my first pure electric car nine years ago and (notwithstanding our poor electric charging infrastructure) have enjoyed my time with both very much. Electric vehicles may be a bit soulless, but they’re wonderful mechanisms: fast, quiet and, until recently, very cheap to run. But increasingly, I feel a little duped. When you start to drill into the facts, electric motoring doesn’t seem to be quite the environmental panacea it is claimed to be.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jun/03/electric-vehicles-early-adopter-petrol-car-ev-environment-rowan-atkinson

    • #13
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