Always at war with Eastasia

Here's a bit of a new trick from the Fair 'n' Balanced Network (top example's from Thursday, lower one from Monday). Do you notice a theme emerging?

First -- well, stop press. What a novel way for the media to Support The Troops: describing our assorted foreign adventures in terms of their cost to The Taxpayer!

If that looks strange in Fox terms, it's probably because it looks strange in almost anyone's terms. News about conflict tends to sound more or less the way Evelyn Waugh said it should:*

Remember that the Patriots are in the right and are going to win. The Beast stands by them four-square. But they must win quickly. The British public has no interest in a war which drags on indecisively. A few sharp victories, some conspicuous acts of personal bravery on the Patriot side and a triumphant entry into the capital. That is The Beast policy for the war.
So going against the official narrative of a conflict is a bad idea, unless ...

The White House is calling on NBC News to declare whether the network still believes Iraq is mired in a “civil war,” escalating a fight that began when NBC aired an interview with President Bush that the White House called the product of “deceitful editing.” (May 20, 2008)

And it raises the question: Can an American network decide when the U.S. surrenders in Iraq? Can that network decide when the U.S. leaves Iraq and under what conditions? Is NBC covering the news or creating the news? (Nov. 29, 2006)

Glad we have that straightened out. But, of course, there's more: The scary Kenyan Muslim socialist colored guy in the White House is going to steal even more of your money (the lower photo), and he's going to waste in on children: "even with no link between student performance and spending"!

Which is, more or less, kinda-sorta true --- at least, to the degree it's been true since presidents started trying to scare up political support by declaring themselves For Education. Which seems to be at least as long as they've sought to make points by dropping large amounts of high-tech munitions into conflicts in which we have only a vague idea of which side we like, let alone which side we're likely to have to deal with when it's in charge.

In other words, spending-wise, the executive branch sort of wanders around doing whatever seems like a good idea at the time. That's not an especially smart way to run a government, but it hasn't been a major problem for the Fair 'n' Balanced Network so far.

So why, all of a sudden, do we hate spending money on kids and tangential militarized interstate disputes? Because, to drag another English novelist into the fray, we've always been at war with Eastasia.

* If you haven't read "Scoop," go forth and do so now. At once, do you hear? And get me a gin while you're up.