Shouldn't President Obama be honest and call his new department "The Ministry of Truth"?

It is not designed for propaganda or for misinformation as implied by your cynical question. It has to deal with the kind of lies spread by Andrew Breitbart and his ilk, similar to what happened to Rep. Weiner and the fake twitter scandal over the weekend.

Um, this seems a waste to me. The point of the internet seems to be that there is no accountability, no expectation of accuracy, no proof, no counterargument that has any effect on the internet and what people will believe. People that buy into propaganda, conspiracy theories, and slurs aren’t the sort to search out a balanced argument or contrasting views. Seems like pissing on a wildfire to me.

It would be presumptuous to call it the Ministry of Truth even if that is what it is.What he has called it is what it is. What’s wrong with that?

Is this you?

This seems to be the orders of the day and the announcement you cite certainly falls in line with this (the original story isn’t available as far as I can tell) and this, which hilariously claims that none of the shenanigans will be conducted in English.

We all see things through our own distorted filter.

Political organizations try to control media narratives?

OMG how scandalous. It’s just like 1984!

I like it. They may as well call it MoveOn.gov

Are they controlling things, or are they simply pointing out inaccuracies and false-hoods?

There’s a huge difference.

I think when lunatics stop touting lies about things like his birthplace and religious background he might chill out about things like, I don’t know, facts and accuracy.

It’s about damn time the Democrats did this. Republicans have been massaging the “truth” for years, and making great headway doing so. If they didn’t implement such self-defeating policies, they could set up a monarchy. Where’s Bush the third?

@johnpowell You mean the guy in the outfit, or the guy writing the post on the site?
If the former, maybe.
If the latter, no but they clearly are on the ball.

@wundayatta Not until 2016; W’s daughters are only 30, which is too young to be eligible.

@jerv Thank God for small favors.

Now having read a few news items about this, it’s obvious that this is partly about groundwork for the 2012 election. Some peanut gallery commenters are offering up a seemingly legitimate concern about creating a White House staff position to help Obama get reelected.

The reporting on this seems a little slippery, because some sources (such as HuffPo) characterize it as an effort to engage “progressive” (meaning “left wing”) media and others as “progressive” (meaning “new”) media. That’s obviously consistent with Obama’s 2008 campaign with the texting database and all that, but again have they created a staff position to connect with progressives?

Beyond all of that, one other item of interest is the image Jesse Lee used to launch his Twitter account. Odd choice for a progressive.

Just to be clear, this isn’t about calling out the left. I would expect this kind of activity from either side of the aisle.

I agree with @wundayatta .

If it was called “The Ministry of Truth” this thread wouldn’t even exist.

@jerv You are forgetting Jeb.

The government is the LAST place I would look for anything even remotely resembling the “truth!”

Its not going to do BO any good one way or the other. His ship is sunk.

Really. What;s wrong with this President. Democrats are supposed to just lay there and take the lies folks like Jerome Corsi, Michael Savage, Andrew Brietbart and Fox News spread daily. The right-wing must think that fascism (a far right movement) had some good ideas wtih that Big Lie method of grabbing absolute power—iand they are quite willing to label any resistance as resorting to their own devious ways.

Sorry, but you are going to need to demonstrate that this news office is using falsehoods, slurs and propaganda to make your charge stick. You can’t get there simply because a press outreach has been opened.

@WestRiverrat I was thinking a bit too literally, and not enough laterally. I mean, W got the job from his father (well, after Clinton spent a few years there). However, thinking about presidencies going from father to child reminds me of a T-shirt I used to have

@CaptainHarley Honestly, I think that government is the best place for the truth to hide since that is the last place any sane person would look :D

@jerv

LOL! True! : D