What Orwell Didn't Know
Propaganda and the New Face of American Politics

Manipulation. Bias. Spin. Dishonesty. Half a century after George Orwell’s death and six decades after his classic essay “Politics and the English Language” — in which he tied the corrosion of language to the corruption of politics — American public life is riddled with the symptoms of obfuscation and doublespeak Orwell so vividly diagnosed. A Big Brother–style dystopia has not come to pass, but tools are available to spinmeisters and image-makers that allow them to detach politics from reality on a daily basis.

Twenty prominent voices consider the outlooks for reality-based politics in this anthology. From the use of deceptively murky jargon, to the emotional pull of phrases like "The War on Terror," to the rise of infotainment and pseudo-science, to the disinclination of big media to provide real news, these writers address unsettling developments in today's public discourse. Reflecting on Orwell, they shed new light on the power of politicians and the media to deceive and to repair, to fracture and to unite American democracy.