Robbins slams Bush 'lies'
Oscar-winner Tim Robbins blasted US President George W Bush's invasion of Iraq yesterday, and challenged the American media to stand up and criticise their leader.
The 47-year-old made his outspoken comments at a press conference promoting his stage adaptation of George Orwell's classic book 1984 in Atlanta, Georgia - and he drew comparisons between the Republican administration and the prophetic novel.
He said: "We have right now a media that is willfully ignoring the high crimes and misdemeanours of the President of the United States. Clinton lied about a blowjob, and got impeached by the media and Congress.
"(Bush) got us into (the Iraq) war based on lies that he knew were lies. His war has recruited more al-Qaida members than Osama Bin Laden could ever have dreamed for, yet no one in the media is calling for impeachment.
"Unfortunately, the book and the play is more relevant now than it ever has been. In my country we seem to be sanctioning renditioning of innocent people without trial … put them in jail without telling anyone… and torture them out of suspicion of what we think they might do.
"This is exactly what Orwell was talking about when he spoke of thought crimes."
Orwell's novel, first published in 1949, centres around a futuristic society run by a government known as Big Brother, which spies on citizens, and tortures those believed to harbour anti-establishment thoughts.
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