Posted by
Catmman on Thursday, June 18, 2009 5:50:27 PM
First, the definition of Newspeak:
Newspeak is a fictional language in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.
In the novel, it is described as being "the only language in the world
whose vocabulary gets smaller every year". Orwell included an essay
about it in the form of an appendix in which the basic principles of the language are explained. Newspeak is closely based on English but has a greatly reduced and simplified vocabulary and grammar. This suits the totalitarian regime of the Party, whose aim is to make any alternative thinking — "thoughtcrime",
or "crimethink" in the newest edition of Newspeak — impossible by
removing any words or possible constructs which describe the ideas of
freedom, rebellion and so on. One character says admiringly of the
shrinking volume of the new dictionary: "It's a beautiful thing, the
destruction of words."
More succinctly:
Generically, Newspeak has come to mean any attempt to restrict disapproved language by a government or other powerful entity.
Now for the meat and potatoes (
posted from AoS):
Now, the WSJ poll I linked last night. The NYT poll I hadn't heard of, so I clicked on it. The headline...
Obama Poll Sees Doubt on Budget and Health Care
...instantly said "snoozer" to me and I navigated away. I didn't
bother to read it. The headline successfully dissuaded me from reading
or linking the poll.
But the article originally ran with a more interesting headline, as the Rhetorican notes.
In Poll, Obama Is Seen as Ineffective on the Economy
Now that is a headline that demands you read the article.
Similarly, the WSJ article on their own poll went from...
Rising Doubts Threaten to Overshadow Obama’s Agenda
to...
Public Wary of Deficit, Economic Intervention
Two newspapers published a poll finding growing doubts about Obama.
Both started the day with strong, punchy, grabby headlines that
suggested strongly that Obama was approaching serious trouble. And
both, within a night, changed their headlines to be bland and
protective of Obama.
Add this to how Obama is getting
all three broadcast networks to air some version of his Obamacare stuff this weekend and you'll obviously come to the conclusion that there is indeed no media bias, whatsoever.
(Note: For some reason my browser isn't letting me change the font style and color to highlight the attributable material. For the sake of this post, that material in italics is attributable to the blogs/sites linked to.)