"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. lt was their final, most essential command."

PERSONALLY,,, l'm not 100 percent pessimistic about our future because the Left, like the Pharaoh of Egypt when he began to enslave the children of Israel, not only overplays it but shows us every card in its hand. And George Orwell predicted all this in 1948, just before China fell.

When I was in high school, l had farm chores to do every night, no time for homework, so I came later in life to literature and Western Civ. I still haven't read "God and Man at Yale" or 1984, but l've gleaned the gist of them and others through the habit of voracious reading of a wide-variety of topics. This year l came across an article, "The Prescience of George Orwell" by Norbert Kuk in the Wisconsin Christian News, vol. 22, #1.

Orwell's novel predicted a time of endless overseas wars against an arch-villain named Emmanuel Goldstein, perhaps emblematic of our Immanuel and the Judeo-Christion culture. Whether that was his intent or not, the 21st century fulfillments abound in the language of eternal war on the West, language, and Liberty:

• "memory hole" = history discarded and replaced (1619 Project, statues removed, etc.)

• "goodthink" = state-approved science and political correctness

• "crimethink" = un-PC opinions contrary to "conventional" wisdom

• "oldthink' = traditional views held by the deplorable elderly, etc.

• "doublethink" = new, contradictory terms (Build Back Better, "For the people Act, etc.)

• "ministry of truth" = official spokesman for Big Brother

• "minisry of love" = reeducation of Deplorables by torture

Winston (as in Churchill) is thought to be a spy for Goldstein in 1984, and O'Brien tells him::

"You are here because you have failed in humility. You would not make the act of submission, which is the price of sanity. You believe that reality is something objective, existing in its own right, that the nature of reality is SELF-EVIDENT . .

"Reality exists not in the individual mind but only in the mind of the Party, which is collective and immortal . . "

O'Brien holds up four fingers and Winston finally says "five" after being tortured. Today there are two sexes but 31 flavors of "gender," which is supposedly something else. O'Brien says:

"We have cut the links between child and parent, between man and woman. In the future there will be no wives and no friends. Children will be taken from their mothers at birth. There will be no love except the love of Big Brother . . .

"The old civilizations (think Western Civ) were founded on love. Ours is founded on hatred. In our world there will be no emotions except FEAR, RAGE AND SELF-ABASEMENT."

Think wimpy corporations and people apologizing for micro-aggressions that trigger even wimpier snowflakes, or apologizing for our history, wrong pronouns, or banned words such as "mother." Think social media getting us used to censorship of our "thought crimes," fear (think virus and virus variants),,and collectivism over rugged individualism. It now takes a village (and public schools) to raise your child.

P.S. We are almost there – 1984. BACK TO THE FUTURE?

PPS: Are you "woke" yet (REALLY WOKE)?