Ministry of Truth

This was a good article I just read on Salon.com by Michael Massing

In his reflections on politics and language, Orwell operated on the assumption that people want to know the truth. Often, though, they don't. In the case of Iraq, the many instruments Orwell felt would be needed to keep people passive and uninformed -- the nonstop propaganda messages, the memory holes, the rewriting of history, Room 101 -- have proved unnecessary. The public has become its own collective Ministry of Truth -- a reality that, in many ways, is even more chilling than the one Orwell envisioned.

Several books were mentioned in the article that I've added to my To-Read list... stories from soldiers and journalists who have been there and see the profound damage to the civilian Iraqi population. I feel sorry for the soldiers too -first having to deal with this extremely stressful situation of kill or maybe be killed, but also that nobody pays attention to the psychological damage they're going through when they get back home.