The president's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani: "Truth isn't truth."  (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

They've been flirting with it for a while, but they've finally crossed the Rubicon and moved firmly into 1984 territory.

I'm referring of course to the dark classic novel by George Orwell, which was written in 1949 and describes "Big Brother" and a future dystopian state characterized by, as Wikipedia accurately describes it, "official deception...brazenly misleading terminology, and manipulation of recorded history." Yep, sound familiar? 'Fraid it does.

What pushed me (and our administration) over the line, I'm sorry to say, and into truly Orwellian territory, was this little exchange today between Rudy Giuliani and NBC's Chuck Todd, as reported by CNN, on Meet The Press.

"When you tell me that, you know, he [Mr. Trump] should testify because he's going to tell the truth and he shouldn't worry, well, that's so silly because it's somebody's version of the truth. Not the truth..."

"Truth is truth," Todd said in response.

"No, no, it isn't truth," Giuliani said. "Truth isn't truth. The president of the United States says, 'I didn't...'"

"Truth isn't truth," Todd interjected. "Mr. Mayor, do you realize, what... I think this is going to become a bad meme."

Got that right. A really bad meme.

The lure of alternative reality 

In a way, though, Mr. Giuliani's verbal truth-stretching isn't surprising. No, not surprising at all. Anyone who's watched our president push the boundaries of veracity for the last couple of years has seen an Administration that regards facts mostly as inconvenient data points to be molded as the mood suits.

There's the ever-convenient whipping boy fake news (loosely defined as any news coverage the president dislikes).

There's Kellyanne Conway's now-classic reference to alternative facts.

There's the Washington's Post's ongoing meticulous documentation of the president's "false or misleading claims" (4,229 as of August 1).

There's the president's own recent seriously Orwellian quote, "Stick with us," he told the crowd at a speech in Kansas City, "Don't believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news... What you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening."

Think about it. What you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening. Sound anything like 1984's "official deception, brazenly misleading terminology, and manipulation of recorded history"?

I could go on and on about this madness but too much alternative reality makes my head start to hurt. Which I guess is sort of the point. Doublespeak disturbs people. It confuses them. If you're not paying too close attention (which is my problem and why my head is hurting), it wears you down.

4,229 lies (call them what they are) by the Washington Post's careful count, and that was 18 days ago. I usually write about management and I can say with 100% certainty that no CEO of a public company could lie 4,229 times to his or her shareholders and remain in the role. No way, no how, not even close.

But at the end of the day the fact that our president lies frequently doesn't even any longer surprise me, nor does the fact that Mr. Giuliani clownishly enables his client by muddying the waters and publicly confusing these lies. No, what's more disturbing is that in the face of all this Orwellian doublespeak so many normally decent Republicans in Congress who surely know better remain silent as amoebas and slugs.

Oh well, guess I shouldn't be surprised by such silence. After all, amoebas and slugs don't have any backbone, they lack a spine.