Top Ten Orwellian Moments of 2006

For all the talk about the threat of "Little Brother" this year (youtubers and bloggers ready to distribute celebrity and citizen malfeasance within minutes), Big Brother still got some life in him yet. Here are some of his finest moments from the last year:

1) Fox News airs an infomercial for torture. On the November 3rd Greta Van Susteren show, reporter Steve Harrigan submitted himself to waterboarding, declaring:

As far as torture goes, at least in this controlled experiment, to me, this seemed like a pretty efficient mechanism to get someone to talk and then still have them alive and healthy within minutes.

Download 10 meg video, mpeg format or youtube it.

2) Federal semantics eliminates the hunger problem. In November, The United States Department of Agriculture replaces the word "hunger" with the phrase "low food security" in its annual report on hunger in America. Problem solved! Link.

3) Defending the First Amendment by proposing that we scrap it. At a New Hampshire event dedicated to freedom of speech, Newt Gingrich declares that the United States will have to re-examine that particular constitutional right as it fights terrorism. Link. Said Newt: "This is a serious, long-term war. It will inevitably lead us to want to know what is said in every suspect place in the country.  It will lead us to learn how to close down every Web site that is dangerous."

4) Halliburton contracts to build large detention camps in the US. In January, KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton was awarded a 385 million dollar contract from the Department of Homeland Security to build "Detention and Removal" facilities to help "in the event of an emergency influx of immigrants into the U.S., or to support the rapid development of new programs that require additional detention space." Links:  1   2   3   4

5) The Inexorable Worldwide Rollout of RFID Chips. Although it's not moving as quickly as the RFID industry would like, 2006 saw the addition of electronic ID chips to US passports, Nikes and iPods, Florida pythons, Japanese schoolchildren, German hospital patients and boozing Brits.

6)  Stay What? After years of characterizing US policy in Iraq as "Stay the course," the Bush administration not only drops the phrase, but denies it ever existed. On October 23rd, Bush declared "We've never been 'stay the course.'"

7) Guilty Until Proven Innocent: Carrying Cash is a Crime. In August, a federal court ruled that the government can seize cash from an individual, even if that individual has not been accused of a crime and has no criminal record.  Link to Article  |  Link to Ruling (pdf)

8) The Automated Targeting System. In November, the Federal Register revealed the existence of the Automated Targeting System, a Department of Homeland Security program for identifying terrorists and criminals, which cross references all people entering or leaving the country with a host of personal data which they are not allowed to see or correct. Links: 1  2  3  4

9) NSA Warrantless Surveillance and Crypto-City. Although the NSA's secret spying program broke in late 2005, the controversy took up much of 2006, culminating in the August ruling by Detroit District Court that the program was unconstitutional and illegal under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It continues nonetheless. And yet, through all of this, there's been almost no discussion of the NSA's secret city north of Washington, DC, called Crypto-City. Crypto-City links: 1  2  3

10) You tell me. What did I forget, or what's Orwellian in your neck of the woods? I'll add the tenth item from the best glaring omission suggestions made in the comments section.

Comments

[yragentman]

http://www.regulations.gov/fdmspublic/component/main

Passenger Manifests for Commercial Aircraft Arriving in and
Departing From the United States; Passenger and Crew Manifests for
Commercial Vessels Departing From the United States

19 CFR Parts 4 and 122 [USCBP-2005-0003]

“This rule proposes to amend existing Bureau of Customs and
Border Protection regulations concerning electronic manifest
transmission requirements relative to passengers, crew members, and non-crew members traveling onboard international commercial flights and voyages.

When the initial automated vetting process identifies a match
between an individual passenger's data and data on a terrorist watch list, a close possible match, or an incomplete or inadequate passenger record, CBP would send by electronic return message a ``not-cleared'' instruction to the carrier within minutes of CBP's receipt of the manifest data …
a not-cleared instruction relative to a match or possible match, or an inadequate record, would ensure, in most cases, that the associated passenger will not be allowed to board the aircraft…”

For some comments and discussion,

http://hasbrouck.org/IDP/IDP-APIS-comments.pdf

http://sianews.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3023

[Nicholas]

The war against reality going on in this administration is pretty Orwellian. From banning warnings on Global Warming, to banning funding for studies that could help cure our pains and diseases on the genetic level, our leaders have shown more interest in bombing people and wasting cash in other countries than our own.

Here's a perfect example of Dear Leader's war on science:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122906P.shtml

[James K]

What about the "John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007" that allows the president to take control of the National Guard away from the states? Or the Military Commissions Act that allows the Prez or Sec't of Defense to declare ANYONE an enemy combatant and be jailed indefinitely with no rights? These to me are more important than Newt and Fox blathering their love of the Police State. These ARE the building blocks of the Police State.

Both are discussed here in one of Ted Rall's columns:
http://www.uexpress.com/tedrall/?uc_full_date=20061107

[bartelby]

Close to home I had an argument with a family member who claims "they" are against christmas. When I asked who this "they" was I was told "K-mart is telling their employees to say 'happy holidays' rather than 'merry christmas,'" I pointed out that christmas is K-mart's biggest money making event of the year-So why would they be anti-christmas? Further christmas, each year outstrips every previous propaganda campaign in human history, including all mass media, postal messages, postage stamps, lawn displays, door to door singing, appeals from the pulpit and the lighting on the empire state building, it puts the Chinese cultural revolution to shame many times over and yet people claim it is "under attack." Once I'd pointed out this logical fallacy things got creepy and I decided to move Wilhelm Reich a few places forward in my "to be read" stack.

[Albion Tourgee]

How about, the persecution of Jim Bensman who testified that some locks on the Mississippi at Alton Ill. should be removed on environmental grounds at an Army Corps of Engineers hearing, and got a visit from the FBI because the agency accused him of being a terrorist for wanting the locks removed? See "A Man, A Plan, A Dam, then An FBI Call" NY Times Aug 22, 2006.

[scott pilutik]

This late entry might top everything on this list: Via Crooks and Liars comes Homeland Security Department Adviser Fran Townsend on CNN, explaining away the failure to catch Osama bin Laden:

"It's a success that hasn't occurred yet."

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/12/29/denial-aint-just-a-river-in-egypt-folks/

[DanO]

if they find Osama Bin Laden, its going to take decades. i can't help but laugh at the people who are so stupid that they are outraged that we haven't done it yet because its amazing that there is such a fundamental inability to graps the situation.

OBL is insulated from any forces retrieving him by an entire REGION. a region with its own culture and its own loyalties.

the head of the Cosa Nostra was captured last sprin and they looked for him for nearly 40 years! the man lived in an apartment in a town in Italy. he had people run errands for him and he orchestrated hits for his many many years in power and NONE of the Interpol forces or elite Italian police teasm could get to him - because he was insulated by an entire region. this is a guy that was activiely having politicians and judges murdered and no one could get to him - because he was insulated by an entire society of people. at one point Italian police raided an apartment he had recently vacated and he had his name on his letter box. he was protected by everyone.

Osama Bin Laden is the same situation but even worse. he is hidden among a people that don't even have the most tertiary conact with the government in Pakistan. they will keep him hidden from forces for years and years because there is not even a fundamental infrastructure to work with. barring an incredible stroke of luck, when that region starts to change is when he will be revealed and it will take a long time for that to happen.

forty times as many forces could look for OBL in that region and what you would have is a mountainous area occupied by military forces - and then terrorist tactics used against those forces by the people who live there. and we all know the deep affinity people have for that sort of situation. its that ugly reality or a long search - one or the other.

OBL is not a free man because of a lack of effort. he is not a free man at all. he is hidden behind a region of people who are protecting him and any forces tyrying to get him immediately will have to kill hundreds or thousands of people to do so.

the catterwalling about OBL not being captured always comes from those who have absolutely no grasp of police or military situations.

and its usually followed by the ridiculous argument of using criminal courts to try terrorists. it can't be done. look to all of the judges and winesses murdered and coerced by the mafia in Italy and you will see what will happen when you engage an entire network one person at a time. violent secret organizations were coordinated to operate the way they do because of criminal proceedings not in spite of them.

[bartleby]

I would hasten to add that Bin Laden has a steady income of royalties from the TV and DVD distribution of Rambo III and of course those royalties from Pear Jam for those hats. I think he splits those with the Taliban. I guess in the mid '80s if I had any grasp of military or police situations I'd be in favor of arming the Afghan "freedom fighters" which prominently included Bin Laden and folks who would become the Taliban. It's not as though some time between then and 9-11-01 those people changed their tune, religious fanatics generally don't. If Bin Laden has any influence on Pashtun peasants it is largely a result of the actions of the Reagan administration. The history of the "Afghani Arabs" does not go back much further than the Soviet invasion, considerably shorter than that of the Cosa Nostra in Italy. Even so, the idea that we could or should swap due process for Bin Laden is so morally bankrupt that it's going to wait 7 years and declare bankruptcy again. Are you saying all the people you claim helped to conceal this Cosa Nostra figure should have a trial without due process?
If you are arguing that due process should not be observed in cases involving organized crime of any kind then you are arguing for the denial of due process to huge numbers of people. How often are "gang" charges used against people in the judicial or penal system? It's got to be a 6 digit figure just in the U.S. penal system alone.
Just because someone wears a uniform it does not mean the world revolves around them, that they should be judge, jury, counsel and executioner. That feeling is a by-product of the systematic desensitization to the commission of murder that was the lion's share of their training.

[winterbear]

Orwellian moments tend to involve newspeak and doubletalk...

But the number one thing that the Bush Administration did that moved us closer to the world described in 1984 was the passage of the Military Commissions Act in September. It puts the powers of a king into the hands of a president (or Sec Def).

If they can suspend your rights to habious corpus they can make you disapear. Without this right, none of your other rights matter at all. From the ratification of the constitution until this year, there was nothing that you could do that would cause your rights to know what your being charged with to be suspended as long as the country was not in a rebellion or an invasion. Now all they have to do is declare you an "enemy combatant" and you can be held forever without trial.

[Rich]

This only confirms my belief that we've been living under "Big Brother's Orwellian World of 1984" for quite some time! AND,, in time, only be more refined with our "home computers" that will someday, be mandatory in every home (with active video cameras & mics) that CAN'T be turned off!

[Tikay]

10. A president that seems to me to be, more aware of the potential reach of his new gangster/rocker image where he throws the "goat" symbolic of the devil/satan, and talks jive like any good thug in Los Angeles, as if he might have some good crack to sell you, is a worry and a fear to the serious minded person like myself who no longer wishes to know where the good $#!+ is, I just want someone in office who actually cares about the political mess the country seems to be in.
~And as to the carrying cash thing, well....I am not going to change that, credit is for the rest of the world. I like to pay for things when i have the money, not way before, just call me traditional.

[Stan Pictureframe]

Several New Pentagon Video Tapes Released, None Show Plane Hitting, Hoped To Quell Conspiracy Theories

Yeah, well show us one with a plane in it and maybe the quelling shall begin.

Particularly loathsome was CNN's embedded Pentagon flack, Jamie McIntyre. McIntyre claimed up and down that he was at the Pentagon and saw the plane wreckage, that it was everywhere. Of course, his report filed on 9/11 said exactly the opposite -- and video of that report has been archived all over the web and transcribed by Total911.info, Later in the day, McIntyre attacked "conspiracy theorists" on the web, and took some of his own 9/11 report out of context in order to attack Internet researchers of taking his report out of context. McIntyre was sweaty, jumpy, and nervous -- as well he should be, given that the scope of his lies may impeach him as a war criminal.

Like Winston in Orwell's 1984, a boot beating down on his head until he agreed 2+2=5, the television showed us, between reports on the NSA spying on your phone calls, pictures of no Boeing 757 while .insisting they were showing you a Boeing airliner.

How much longer will this continue?

[celtron]

"I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility to any form of tyranny over the minds of man." - Jefferson

In accepting my role in the drama that unfolds I have begun a project of vast proportions. I intend to show the outlined plan of martial law and the dictatorial takeover of America. Starting with REX 84 and the inception of FEMA to the passing what I refer to as The Acts ,the USA PATRIOT ACT, the Military Commissions Act and the J.W. Defense Authorization Act. Feedback is welcomed and appreciated. I pray there is enough time.

NO NWO NOW!

[Comrade O'Brien]

Attention Comrades,
Please visit http://ministryoflove.wordpress.com to learn about our Orwellian protest of the Military Commissions Act.
Regards,
O'Brien

[uzir]

I nominate Dan O's comment regarding the impossibility of corralling OBL for number 10. He rails about the protection of the people of the region in Pakistan where OBL is presumed to be, but neglects to mention the 1000 car convoy conveniently allowed to take him, and his forces, there, while US forces bombed steadily the two other passes - the ones the convoy wasn't using.

Not to mention the string of C130's swooping in and out of Afghanistan at that time bearing thousands of Taleban and Al Qaeda fighters to Pakistan, and freedom, all under the watchful eye of Northcom, and our allied forces.

A truer and more egregious example of doublespeak could hardly be found, save for the quote from the British woman who declared "I think we should give up our liberty for freedom." on Alex Jones' broadcast regarding the 7/7 bombings in London.

[Dante Ryel]

How about the animal enterprise terrorism act

"The Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) is ... is described by the author as being intended to "provide the Department of Justice the necessary authority to apprehend, prosecute, and convict individuals committing animal enterprise terror." [2]

The intended targets are animal rights activists and environmental activists, sometimes called eco-terrorists, who engage in acts of "force, violence, and threats involving animal enterprises" [3] by penalizing damage or interference to animal enterprises or conspiring or attempting to damage or interfere with an animal enterprise [4]. The law does not "prohibit any expressive conduct (including peaceful picketing or other peaceful demonstration) protected from legal prohibition by the First Amendment to the Constitution," [5]"

Speaking for its members, the Equal Justice Alliance states the law is "excessively broad and vague," "imposes disproportionate punishment," "brands as ‘terrorists’ and denies equal protection under the law to animal advocates," "brands as ‘terrorism’ and imposes severe penalties on civil disobedience," "has a chilling effect on all forms of protest by endangering free speech and assembly," "sets back investigation of federal law violations by animal enterprises," and "detracts from prosecution of real terrorism against the American people," [7].

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Enterprise_Terrorism_Act

[Thought-crime]

10 should be the Military Commissions Act. I love the other 9, BTW!

[bifemmefatale]

"We don't torture people, but if we do, it's a state secret, so detainees can't tell their lawyers how they were tortured, because it's a matter of national security."

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=2628673&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312

[Brian Carnell]

The item about food security is just stupid. "Food security" is the term that is typically used in FAO and other documents by NGOs who report on hunger-related issues, which is why the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies defends the term in the article you link to.

[Max-1]

And to end the year...

http://img510.imageshack.us/my.php?image=saddaexxxhn5.jpg

[Fliesen]

They will keep him hidden from forces for years and years because there is not even a fundamental infrastructure to work with. barring an incredible stroke of luck, when that region starts to change is when he will be revealed and it will take a long time for that to happen

[Enlightenment]

Stan Pictureframe is correct.

10.The mass media continuing to give lip service to an easily-disproven myth.

One thing that struck me as odd in the days after 9/11 was Bush saying "We will not tolerate conspiracy theories [regarding 9/11]". Sure enough there have been some wacky conspiracy theories surrounding the events of that day. The most far-fetched and patently ridiculous one that I've ever heard goes like this: Nineteen hijackers who claimed to be devout Muslims but yet were so un-Muslim as to be getting drunk all the time, doing cocaine and frequenting strip clubs decided to hijack four airliners and fly them into buildings in the northeastern U.S., the area of the country that is the most thick with fighter bases. After leaving a Koran on a barstool at a strip bar after getting shitfaced drunk on the night before, then writing a suicide note/inspirational letter that sounded like it was written by someone with next to no knowledge of Islam, they went to bed and got up the next morning hung over and carried out their devious plan. Nevermind the fact that of the four "pilots" among them there was not a one that could handle a Cessna or a Piper Cub let alone fly a jumbo jet, and the one assigned the most difficult task of all, Hani Hanjour, was so laughably incompetent that he was the worst fake "pilot" of the bunch, with someone who was there when he was attempting to fly a small airplane saying that Hanjour was so clumsy that he was unsure if he had driven a car before. Nevermind the fact that they received very rudimentary flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station, making them more likely to have been C.I.A. assets than Islamic fundamentalist terrorists. So on to the airports after Mohammed Atta supposedly leaves two rental cars at two impossibly far-removed locations. So they hijack all four airliners and at this time passengers on United 93 start making a bunch of cell phone calls from 35,000 feet in the air to tell people what was going on. Nevermind the fact that cell phones wouldn't work very well above 4,000 feet, and wouldn't work at ALL above 8,000 feet. But the conspiracy theorists won't let that fact get in the way of a good fantasy. That is one of the little things you "aren't supposed to think about". Nevermind that one of the callers called his mom and said his first and last name ("Hi mom, this is Mark Bingham"), more like he was reading from a list than calling his own mom. Anyway, when these airliners each deviated from their flight plan and didn't respond to ground control, NORAD would any other time have followed standard operating procedure (and did NOT have to be told by F.A.A. that there were hijackings because they were watching the same events unfold on their own radar) which means fighter jets would be scrambled from the nearest base where they were available on standby within a few minutes, just like every other time when airliners stray off course. But of course on 9/11 this didn't happen, not even close. Somehow these "hijackers" must have used magical powers to cause NORAD to stand down, as ridiculous as this sounds because total inaction from the most high-tech and professional Air Force in the world would be necessary to carry out their tasks. So on the most important day in its history the Air Force was totally worthless. Then they had to make one of the airliners look like a smaller plane, because unknown to them the Naudet brothers had a videocamera to capture the only known footage of the North Tower crash, and this footage shows something that doesn't look like a jumbo jet, but didn't have to bother with the South Tower jet disguising itself because that was the one we were "supposed to see". Anyway, as for the Pentagon they had to have Hani Hanjour fly his airliner like it was a fighter plane, making a high G-force corkscrew turn that no real airliner can do, in making its descent to strike the Pentagon. But these "hijackers" wanted to make sure Rumsfeld survived so they went out of their way to hit the farthest point in the building from where Rumsfeld and the top brass are located. And this worked out rather well for the military personnel in the Pentagon, since the side that was hit was the part that was under renovation at the time with few military personnel present compared to construction workers. Still more fortuitous for the Pentagon, the side that was hit had just before 9/11 been structurally reinforced to prevent a large fire there from spreading elsewhere in the building. Awful nice of them to pick that part to hit, huh? Then the airliner vaporized itself into nothing but tiny unidentifiable pieces most no bigger than a fist, unlike the crash of a real airliner when you will be able to see at least some identifiable parts, like crumpled wings, broken tail section etc. Why, Hani Hanjour the terrible pilot flew that airliner so good that even though he hit the Pentagon on the ground floor the engines didn't even drag the ground!! Imagine that!! Though the airliner vaporized itself on impact it only made a tiny 16 foot hole in the building. Amazing. Meanwhile, though the planes hitting the Twin Towers caused fires small enough for the firefighters to be heard on their radios saying "We just need 2 hoses and we can knock this fire down" attesting to the small size of it, somehow they must have used magical powers from beyond the grave to make this morph into a raging inferno capable of making the steel on all forty-seven main support columns (not to mention the over 100 smaller support columns) soften and buckle, then all fail at once. Hmmm. Then still more magic was used to make the building totally defy physics as well as common sense in having the uppermost floors pass through the remainder of the building as quickly, meaning as effortlessly, as falling through air, a feat that without magic could only be done with explosives. Then exactly 30 minutes later the North Tower collapses in precisely the same freefall physics-defying manner. Incredible. Not to mention the fact that both collapsed at a uniform rate too, not slowing down, which also defies physics because as the uppermost floors crash into and through each successive floor beneath them they would shed more and more energy each time, thus slowing itself down. Common sense tells you this is not possible without either the hijackers' magical powers or explosives. To emphasize their telekinetic prowess, later in the day they made a third building, WTC # 7, collapse also at freefall rate though no plane or any major debris hit it. Amazing guys these magical hijackers. But we know it had to be "Muslim hijackers" the conspiracy theorist will tell you because (now don't laugh) one of their passports was "found" a couple days later near Ground Zero, miraculously "surviving" the fire that we were told incinerated planes, passengers and black boxes, and also "survived" the collapse of the building it was in. When common sense tells you if that were true then they should start making buildings and airliners out of heavy paper and plastic so as to be "indestructable" like that magic passport. The hijackers even used their magical powers to bring at least seven of their number back to life, to appear at american embassies outraged at being blamed for 9/11!! BBC reported on that and it is still online. Nevertheless, they also used magical powers to make the american government look like it was covering something up in the aftermath of this, what with the hasty removal of the steel debris and having it driven to ports in trucks with GPS locators on them, to be shipped overseas to China and India to be melted down. When common sense again tells you that this is paradoxical in that if the steel was so unimportant that they didn't bother saving some for analysis but so important as to require GPS locators on the trucks with one driver losing his job because he stopped to get lunch. Hmmmm. Further making themselves look guilty, the Bush administration steadfastly refused for over a year to allow a commission to investigate 9/11 to even be formed, only agreeing to it on the conditions that they get to dictate its scope, meaning it was based on the false pretense of the "official story" being true with no other alternatives allowed to be considered, handpicked all its members making sure the ones picked had vested interests in the truth remaining buried, and with Bush and Cheney only "testifying" together, only for an hour, behind closed doors, with their attorneys present and with their "testimonies" not being recorded by tape or even written down in notes. Yes, this whole story smacks of the utmost idiocy and fantastic far-fetched lying, but it is amazingly enough what some people believe. Even now, five years later, the provably false fairy tale of the "nineteen hijackers" is heard repeated again and again, and is accepted without question by so many Americans. Which is itself a testament to the innate psychological cowardice of the American sheeple, i mean people, and their abject willingness to believe something, ANYTHING, no matter how ridiculous in order to avoid facing a scary uncomfortable truth. Time to wake up America.