Ministry of Truth

I made a reference to George Orwell’s 1984 and the Ministry of Truth in my blog post Over the Top.  Today I feel is an important one in the history of our democracy because I actually witnessed the government altering the facts.  I should clarify that I don’t think it is the government as a whole or even the Republican party.  This one I put squarely on the White House staff.  I won’t use the common “unnamed sources”.  This is purely speculation on my part.  Okay, I’ll get to the point.  The statement in question is, “I probably have a good relationship with Kim Jong Un.”  That is what the Wall Street Journal stated in an article based on an interview which was published on Thursday, January 11th.  On Sunday, January 14th, our illustrious leader tweets out, “The Wall Street Journal stated falsely that I said to them “I have a good relationship with Kim Jong Un” (of N. Korea). Obviously, I didn’t say that. I said “I’d have a good relationship with Kim Jong Un,” a big difference. Fortunately, we now record conversations with reporters…” and in the tweet right after that, “and they knew exactly what I said and meant. They just wanted a story. FAKE NEWS!”  Yep, we all know that the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) is right up there with The National Enquirer and Star Magazine struggling for space in the check out counter at your local grocery store.  The WSJ is always posting something about three-headed babies or alien landings…NOT.   On Sunday, after the President accused the WSJ of lying, they put online a perfectly clear recording of him saying the exact words he denied.   The White House releases the “official” version of the recording, which sounds like it was recorded on a static and garbled toy from down the hall.  In the White House version, you can’t tell if Trump said I or I’d.  It is a shame the government’s recording was so hard to understand, while the Journal’s was crystal clear.

It isn’t a huge step. It probably isn’t the first and is probably far from the most important change perpetrated by our government.  It was just so obvious and so poorly done.  Plus there is the fact that the President waited for three days before he disputed what was printed.  The official reason is that the White House called for a retraction from the Wall Street Journal, which they refused.  Gee, why print a retraction, when you reported exactly what the man in the oval office said.  This wasn’t a critically important treaty.  It wasn’t even a statement that affected a segment of the population that was disenfranchised.  It was egg on the President’s face.  Let’s alter the truth so the President looks a little less foolish.  That seems to be a losing battle, when every morning when he goes on a tweet storm, he cements what we already know.  We have a senile old man with no filter between his mouth and his brain, as our President.