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Cannes' Palme d'Or goes to Michael Moore
An anonymous reader writes "The Palme d'Or of the Festival de Cannes was presented this year by Charlize Theron to Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore. I don't know if it's the first time this prize is awarded to a documentary, but I guess it's rare enough to be mentioned, especially given the problems this film encounters."
Is it a "documentary" like Bowling for Columbine?
His movies would be more credible if he didn't try to present them as documentaries. They're not documentaries. They're commentaries.
Nothing wrong with that at all, but let's just be clear about it. Up front.
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
Its the second documentary to get it...
Jaques Coustau got one to.
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
Last time Charlize Theron presented me with something it was a restraining order.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Aside from pushing somebody's political agenda ... why is this being posted on Slashdot? It doesn't seem to fit into the normal type of news that gets accepted to the site. Your site, your rules ... it just seems out of place.
Do you mean a documentary or a "documentary"?
A genuine question for Moore fans: doesn't it bother you even slightly that Moore expects you not to independently verify what he presents as fact? You're supposed to be geeks, people who're capable of thinking "out of the box". And doesn't it bother you that Michael Moore is personally getting very, very rich out of September 11th?
I haven't seen the thing and I am sure it is politically biased, but certainly I would like to make that determination myself rather then seeing Buena Vista kiss presidential ass and decide that it is not gonna distribute it for fear of losing tax breaks in Florida...
--- "I didn't think anyone would understand it" -Prof. Bob Muller
Finally we know step #2 of the formula:
1. Steal underpants.
2. Paint anti-bush slogan on underpants, sell to Hollywood/Indie industry.
3. Profit!
You have a real low user ID, you should figure its not just "tech" news.
Michael Moore is what Opensource means against Microsoft (or any closed source giant)
Will it be aired in (sorry, foreigner here) in ABC for instance? It should be in theaters already but Miramax/Disney blocked it.
If you are a Bush supporter and got mad to the documentary itself, please tell so. Don't hide behind "news for nerds" slogan validity.
I mean...Jacque didn't set up the fish so that they would present the image he desired.....or did he??
Blar.
This is beautiful, really beautiful.
The French were a bit apprehensive because it looked like the US seemed to be taking over the prestigeous festival with their blockbusters and the like, leaving the "other" movies (or what you Americans would call "Foreign Film" movies) largely unnoticed.
Well the Americans did, even awarding an anti-Bush movie top merits. It looks like they were finally able to say the things that they've wanted to for a long time now, but were afraid to back home (look at Moore's reception at the Oscars) and used the Cannes Film Festival for that purpose.
This is history in the making. I'm really curious to see what the American public is going to make of this movie and what they will do next.
Yuioup
It's probably not even the message on it's own that won it for him. Rather, Disney's unwillingness to distribute the film with that message.
Gosh, how do you post to this thread without looking like a troll?
I know the topic of censorship is near and dear to the Slashdot community. I hope people can see that the right wing has a history of using money to censor media outlets in this country. This is a good example of that as is the holy war the FCC has declared on broadcasters.
The liberals in this country want open and free discussion. the conservatives think that they can get away with censoring the liberals by labeling everything opposed to them as indecent.
Want more information on the republican campaign to quiet the liberal voice check out howardstern.com. (warning, site may be offensive to compassionate conservatives).
Remember... ZG9uJ3QgZm9yZ2V0IHRvIGRyaW5rIHlvdXIgb3ZhbHRpbmU=
four of the nine jurors were American: Mr. Tarantino, Kathleen Turner, the director Jerry Schatzberg, and the Haitian-born novelist Edwidge Danticat. one juror, the actress Emanuelle Béart, is a French citizen, British actress Tilda Swinton, Benoit Poelvoode, a Belgian actor; Peter von Bagh, a Finnish critic; and the Hong Kong director Tsui Hark made up the rest of the jury. taken from here
I really hope that this is a good documentary, because I'd really hate it if the Cannes festival has become nothing more than a vehicle for politics.
Fuck that. Until the rest of the 150 million or so people who haven't been utterly brainwashed by this administration find the gonads to say something more than, "But, he has no exit plan..", Moore is the mouthpiece of the home of the brave, as far as I'm concerned.
Tarentino told Moore exactly the opposite: "It's not only for the message: it's a good movie".
What never ceases to amaze me is how, in America, we pay so much to hear and endorse other people's opinions. We give virtually no creedance to those who verify and contradict the supposed facts on which the opinions of politicians, movie makers, and anyone who controls the information flow are based.
Who mediates your information?
Michael Moore
In particular,
Just curious, have you seen the film?
I don't have to do a damn thing to verify his movie - I just sit back and see who sues him. I mean, the gun lobby alone is very, very large, and determined... if there was a single thing in Bowling that could even be remotely picked apart by a lawyer, it would happen. But it hasn't.
By the way, I'd like to make another point to the Slashdot crowd at large - Documentaries are NOT supposed to be "objective". News reporting is supposed to be objective. You have never, ever seen an 'objective' documentary that wasn't trying to inform you of some plight, or problem, or point of view. Ever.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
Hopefully this movie will open in the US and will cause some people to open their eyes.
But even more than Moore's documentary, I hope more and more images and video keeps coming out of Iraq in regards to the abuse, torture, rape and slaughter of Iraqi citizens, most of whom are guilty of no crime. That more than anything is Bush's legacy, his mark upon the world and truly the images that best define our Fascist Leader and his doctrines.
The truth is a very scary place in a world run by Bush and the big end of the US war machine. I welcome MM's film.
Trouble with Michael Moore's films is that they hit close to home, and people don't like it. Just because it's uncomfortable, doesn't mean we should ignore it.
Mike.
Moore currently doesn't have a US distributor because of the Disney/Miramax situation, but Moore feels so strongly about the the content of Farenheit 911 and that American voters especially need to see the movie before the November election.
I'm personally not a fan of Michael Moore at all, but I will give Moore a lot of credit if he does what seems to be the best option right now: release the movie online, for free. If he does that, he shows that he isn't being a hypocritical war profiteer - he cares more about people hearing the message than the paycheck.
The petition to release the movie is here.
http://www.talknerdy.org
Well, he's kind of like SCO. He makes a claim, has no real evidence to back it up, and then twists facts to make it seem like he was right all along
Now that sounds like WMD and Iraq.
Mielipiteet omiani - Opinions personal, facts suspect.
This has happened before with Disney & Miramax, most recently with the Kevin Smith film "Dogma."
It probably would not be in theaters already even if Disney had not blocked it. Moore wants to add new content to the film prior to release to incorporate more recent events.
this sig deleted by another sig
Miramax own a partial stake in the success of the film at the box office. If a decision were to be made for the film to be released onto the interweb as gratas, it would have to include the approval of the Weinsteins.
Of course, Moore could always just do it himself without approval - meaning he'd be liable for every cent Miramax put up to pay for the filming of it.
I swear, if I see another Slashdot comment with "It will be interesting to see"...
Alot of americans hate american politics and love the idea of Bush bashing....
The darkness... controls the music. The music... controls the soul.
Movies, by nature, are not scholarly works. The power of movies is that they can appeal to a wider audience and more directly manipulate emotions. How often do you see citations in a movie? It's just not common practice.
:::did::: raise a number of excellent questions.
That being said, I'd say bowling for columbine was rather good. Yes parts of it exploited sensationalism and there were some factual errors, but it
Also...give one of Moore's books a skim sometimes. I wouldn't have expected it, but Moore does a better job providing evidence for his claims then the supposedly more prestigious Noam Chomsky. Noam likes to make wild claims while assuming you'll take his word for it...Moore at least cites his sources.
-Chris
--an unbreakable toy is useful for breaking other toys--
yes, art almost never mixes with politics.
moron.
US Citizen living abroad? Register to vote!
Yeah, I know what you mean...
Guns are good. The more, and the bigger, the better.
Corporate dominance of the working class is good, more is better. Besides, one day, I'll be rich too, so screw 'em!
Invasion of other nations (the biggest guns under corporate dominance) is the ultimate expression of what America is all about.
How dare anyone attempt to question any of this, let alone try to allow access to another's opinion?
Moore must be lying anyway, because he's kind of fat and sloppy.
Me? I'm embracing my inner reptile.
I believe everything the neocon media feeds me without question. It's so much easier that way.
Go team Bush! Go USA!
First, as much as I like Stern, he only is qualified to discuss the proper techniques for tossing bologna at a stripper's butt. His political views are based on whatever pads his pocketbook.
Second, there is not an active "campaign" to censor or quiet Michael Moore -- or at least I didn't get the e-mail or fax. He could only wish that the US Government would try to censor him. It would be even more $$$ in his pocket. Moore and his slavish followers claim that disagreeing with him is the same as trying to silence him.As a part of my civil liberties, I have the freedom to not pay to watch his "documentaries", buy his books, view his TV shows or wear his t-shirts. Or do I have to spend my money supporting the companies that support him. That's not an effort to quiet him, its an effort to make sure my money doesn't make it into his pocket. He is already a rich, union busting fat cat.
The liberals in this country want open and free discussion.
As long as you ignore all the campaigns against Fox News and talk radio hosts plus speech codes on college campuses, I would agree.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
Even if Moore wanted to release the film for free online it's by no means certain that he could, given that it's owned by Miramax, not Moore himself.
While it's made by Moore's company, Dog Eat Dog Productions, the actual copyright resides with Miramax who are effectively paying Moore to produce a film for them.
and, by God, America needs more of them.
Michael Moore is what Opensource means against Microsoft (or any closed source giant)
Good crap people. Why does everybody feel this incessant fucking need to classify everything as an EPIC FUCKING STRUGGLE. Guess what?
Open source is a damn ideology. Not an attack.
You are not an insurgent for using linux. You are not sticking it to the man when you release an OSS program.
You are not. And I repeat -- you are not -- keeping Bill Gates awake at night.
ARGH!
At least, now that it has this award, US distributors won't be so reluctant to distribute it. This is the reason behind this award I believe.
:)
And the beautiful line M. Moore told aftewards, about him waiting for his invitation to the White House, since it's a kind of tradition for the USA presidents to invite his award winners citizens for a chat : I'm just waiting for Bush reaction
The film has footage of independent 'embedded' cameramen in Iraq, showing pictures that the corporate US networks won't show for fear of upsetting their sponsors. Read the revievs and watch the film before you judge.
Warning: The file doing the rounds on P2P networks "Fahrenheit.911.Michael_Moore.LIMITED.(CANNES_'04) .XviD.SCREENER.-NOX.txt" is a fake.
Personally, I place Moore in the same category as Nazi propagandist Leni Riefenstahl.
there are 3 kinds of people:
* those who can count
* those who can't
A lot of people claimed that movie was very anti-gun, but it was hard for me to conclude that. I'm basically kind of neutral on guns, and I didn't feel like the movie really said anything one way or the other on that part of it. I think it did try to make the point that Americans were too violent, even fond of violence, and that guns allow for more serious consequences, but I think we all know that. He clearly didn't like the NRA's political activism, but he didn't really go after the Second Amendment. At least I didn't notice it, and I certainly should have. (I think the Second Amendment was exactly what the Civil War was about--and it lost. Thanks and a tip of the hat to that great Republican Abraham Lincoln.)
It's going to be interesting to see how BushCo tries to spin their way out of this one. It sounds like he's just collected the facts and shown them in an ugly light--but very artistically. Dubya was probably not amused. Maybe it contributed to his little accident over the weekend? If so, BushCo better watch out for the klutz label. It certainly didn't help Ford in his campaign. (Interestingly enough, I never bought it at the time, and still don't. I don't know how a couple of clumsy stumbles got taken so far out of proportion.)
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
The linked article was a little slim on details, but I found the AP article that says that Tarantino was the president of the jury for Palme d'Or, and actress Kathleen Tuner (of Baby Geniuses fame) sits on the panel as well. Plus in other cool news, the AP article says that an edited-together 4-hour complete version of Kill Bill was shown. Can't wait for the special edition DVD on that one.
A few years ago, Moore had an ex-employee arrested, when said employee tried to get an interview with him.
http://partners.nytimes.com/library/national/regio nal/061700ny-col-tierney.html
Disney made a decision as a private company and business that they will not produce and distribute a film.
The film is obviously already produced and they are ordering a company they bought to not distribute it. Their decision is motivated by political pressure, and they are willing to abandon profit in order to appease their Bush overlords (Jeb and Dubya).
a private company should not be able to pick and chose what it stands behind
Miramax picked it, Buena Vista, who bought Miramax some time ago, told 'em no.
I wonder what the shareholders will think of this. They invested in a company who decides to refuse profits, that isn't kosher. Of course, Eisner might be doing the only profitable thing: Protecting the theme park tax credits, in which case this is an instance of political censorship.
Either way, it is censorship, because no matter what your deficient education led you to believe, censorship is not something that only governments can do, nor is it only evil when governments do it.
You can't take the sky from me...
Bush & Co are certainly to be blamed for the appalling lack of planning of this entire operation. The behavior in the prison is a direct result of the intense pressure the Bush administration is under to "solve" the Iraqi problem; it's basically trickled down to military intelligence to get as much out of the prisoners as possible, using whatever means necessary.
As bad as the stuff in prison was, at least we don't resort to live decapitations, like Bergs or Pearl's in Pakistan. There's something about ANY political or religious movement that can endorse that kind of medieval behavior that's sickening, in the same way Nazism is.
Do yourself a favor and read up on what was thought to be "the militia" at the time the second amendment was written. (Hint: all able-bodied men within a certain age range.) Then perhaps you actually will understand the second amendment.
I agree this (sic). I want to believe that Moore wants to crusade for the little guy, but he seems to benifit quite a bit from the corrupt system that he says he hates.
Yeah, his message has always been "its wrong to get paid for work you did", it sure wasn't "its wrong to destroy people's lives to make more money".
He also conviently forgets about the places he's exploited, like Flynt Michigan.
And its also wrong to move.
You should never move to another town, especially not if your hometown is an economic wasteland ever since the company that employed most people moved out. Also, never ever go live near where you will find the talent you need for your company. New York is no place for a filmaker to live, Flint has plenty of cameramen and editors and everything a film company needs...
Sheesh.
You can't take the sky from me...
The real issue here is that companies get special tax breaks if the government likes them!? and you all think thats perfectly normal?!? WTF IS EVERYONE SMOKING??
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
See how the left can NEVER offer anything constructive? The only thing they know how to do is start with name calling. I heard one a few weeks ago that called Rush a big fatso. I asked them have you ever listened to him? No they didn't. Then how could you base your OPINION on something you've never listened to? Because of what others said about him. LOL....typical. I listen to BOTH sides. I listend to Air America a few hours of the "O Franken factor" to see what it was about. Unlike those on the left, I form my opinion AFTER I listen to something, not before....
OK, let's dismiss Michael Moore entirely because he has some baggage. - sarcasm Sounds like Mr. Edelstein couldn't take being fired like a man. Firing someone is no easy task, and having to do it to a camera is asking a little much. I'm sure if Edelstein walked into Moore's office, and asked for a straight up reason for his firing, sans camera, he'd get it. Edelstein is obviously vengeful. Moore uses his camera when he doesn't get an answer. Edelstein has his: he's obsessive, and he scares his boss, and apparently his public antics aren't helping. Do that to your boss and try staying employed.
He selectively chooses material to illustrate his extreme leftist views
You mean just like you selectively choose comments to illustrate YOUR extreme anti-moore views? How about this line from the Washington Post?
What's remarkable here isn't Moore's political animosity or ticklish wit. It's the well-argued, heartfelt power of his persuasion. Even though there are many things here that we have already learned, Moore puts it all together.
Its real easy to point fingers, isn't it?
This movie looks interesting. Where's the bittorrent?
InstaPundit.com has been posting links to other prison abuse stories. For some reason, these aren't getting as much attention in the mainstream media ("all Abu Ghraib, all the time").
Maybe the French, Germans, Arabs, public employees unions, California Attorney General, and their apologists should take note.
May 22, 2004
PRISON MANAGEMENT PROBLEMS AND A DYSFUNCTIONAL CULTURE OF ABUSE in the California prison guards' union.
posted at 03:53 PM by Glenn Reynolds
May 21, 2004
SOMEONE TELL 60 MINUTES about this secret underground prison:
'It starts off by being stripped naked in front of 10 police officers including two women, gratutious humiliation is used to break you down.' '... worst jail that you can possibly imagine.' 'Not even a hole to go to the bathroom. You have to piss against a wall and you sleep in piss on the concrete floor.' The torture victim demands 'the immediate shutdown of this secret underground prison'. It's not at Abu Ghraib, it's in Marseille, France.
No doubt Ted Kennedy will be condemning it soon.
posted at 07:41 PM by Glenn Reynolds
May 21, 2004
MORE STORIES OF ARAB PRISONERS BEING ABUSED:
ARAB prisoners beaten and tortured, innocent bystanders killed by gunfire - another damning human rights report.
But the difference this time is that the violence is being perpetrated not by coalition forces in Iraq, but by the Palestinian Authority, and the victims are its own people.
The report, partly funded by the Finnish government, claims Palestinian cities are in a state of near anarchy, with people on the payroll of Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority (PA) blamed for 90 per cent of gangland violence.
It highlights numerous incidents of torture of prisoners and refers to the killing of civilians in gunbattles between Palestinian factions.
It is another blow for Mr Arafat's organisation, which was recently accused of misusing 134 million of European Union funds. Mr Arafat was accused of signing cheques to people linked with terrorist activity.
I'm sure Ted Kennedy will have comments.
posted at 09:55 AM by Glenn Reynolds
May 18, 2004
IRAQI EMIGRES ON ABU GHRAIB: This is interesting:
Hadi Kazwini is an Iraqi engineer who moved to Australia in 1997 and lives in Sydney with his wife and three children. He is amazed at the gullibility of those Australians who have taken the Arab response to the photos at face value.
This sort of brutality goes on all the time, it is happening now in jails right through the Middle East, he says. But of course there are no photos. This is selective outrage.
Kazwini believes that the behaviour revealed by the photos is awful and the US soldiers involved should be punished. But he says some of the Iraqi prisoners shown were Saddam's killers and torturers. They have been responsible for far worse violations of human rights than the Americans.
Where is the outrage about this, he asks. I haven't seen
The World's Smallest Political Quiz
The site is biased towards libertarianism, and the "quiz" is overly simplified, but the concept is quite sound IMO.
As Michael Eisner has said before, we are a company that is founded on ideals of the American family backbone
Not "is founded", but only was founded. Huge Corporations are driven by the bottom line and dreams of ultimate control. Disney has recently been behind so many things that undermine the rights and values of the American Family, this is simply no longer a credible position for Disney.
It is not just groups at one end of the spectrum that feel that Disney is the enemy.
And for slashdot context, what does Disney have against free software that I should be forbidden from playing the DVDs I purchase using free software? And why do they think their shallow mutations of the rich public domain from which they drew their stories should never fall back into public domain, as it was supposed to occur in American society. Is control of all computing and content by monopoly corporations a Disney value, too? How is it not censorship? Most corporations have done something from time to time to show they actually are aware of community and consumer issues and concerns, but clearly not Disney. Why acknowledge the consumer when you can control the market?
It makes the same ad hominem attacks that it accuses Moore of making, does not back up it's cliams with references and is clearly as much of a "no-spin zone" as any ultra right wing conservative crack pot media outlet such as Rush Limbaugh's "no spin" talk shows.
And yes, I will leave it at that because thats my informed opinion on the matter and this is a web site whos foundation is opinion. If you want to know how I can reach the above conclusion, please go read the website you linked to and then attempt to map it's statements back onto the actual reality we live in.
Kind regards
"A few great minds are enough to endow humanity with monstrous power, but a few great hearts are not enough to make us w
I've met many Americans and they are all nice people. However its American introspectiveness that's the problem. How can America expect the rest of the world to like it when it only take an interest when it is thretened ? For instance, the coverage on the accession of 10 new states to the European Union barely got a mention on the American news sites - despite this affecting millions of people and making the EU the world biggest economic entity. Would you expect you husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend to like you if you decided to ignore them As for WWI & WWII thanks - truly, I guess Americans in their 70's and older get it. But the younger ones don't.
If you try saying that Alan Colmes isn't liberal (besides brilliant), then you either have your head up your ass, have never heard of Alan Colmes, or simply have blind hatred of Fox News
Alan Colmes is the Sean Hannity's equivalent of the Washington Generals. He's a punching bag who's put up there to make it look like a contest. Al Franken skewered Colmes in his book Lie and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them. I suggest that you read that before trotting out Colmes as evidence that Fox is not biased.
For example, in Bowling for Columbine, Moore wasn't including the scenes about the bank that awards shotguns to its depositers as an indication of how easy it is to get a gun. He was making a point about the absurd prevalence of gun ownership in the USA. Yet at the bowlingfortruth website, their point is that he misrepresented the amount of paperwork and legal checks necessary to obtain the actual firearm.
Sorry, but that just WASN'T the point. And NRA fanatics are probably not able to grasp the point of the film because their judgement is clouded by their unwillingness for any restrictions on gun ownership. I'm not saying NRA members, mind you; I'm referring to the fanatical portion of their membership, a minority I'm sure.
So don't be afraid that your opinion of Moore will drop after visiting these sites. If you liked Moore before, you will still like him; if you hated him as a commie liberal, you'll just have some cookie cutter arguments neatly packaged for you next time someone mentions him at work.
By Stuart Chase.
It's a rather old book. But it covers this situation extremely well.
He defines "blab words" which have no set definitions and are used to trigger emotional responses instead of intellectual ones.
Of course "left/right|liberal/conservative" are part of those. They are words that mean different things to different people. Just like "patriotism" and "good" and "evil".
The trick is to identify all the "blab words" in a political speech or whatever and then then re-read the speech with those words replaced by "blab". Most of the time you'll find that the speech is 100% content free.
The majority (90%+?) of "political discussion" in the US is "blab words". There is no "discussion". There are only emotionally charged diatribes.
Here is the Kuro5him link referred to.
This is enormous. This is politics going inside the Cannes palmares. A political move to ensure americans will talk about the movie and release it. Not saying that this is not a great movie, I'm very much looking forward to seing it ; but they were fantastic movies featured in Cannes.
This is really an important move from Cannes, the cinema culture, or the society in general.
Even Moore said "Jesus, what have you done ?" to the Jury when he came to receive his prize.
Cannes, the most pedantic cinema club, gave the Palme to a movie that is mostly a work made to make sure Bush won't be president anymore.
This is one of the most important socio-political event this year !
theefer
I'll assume you're being serious, although it seems more likely you're trolling.
...) to people who had comitted a felony, but were felony-free themselves. That's illegal, and it made the difference in deciding who became president. And guess what, They (Jeb Bush's cabinet) are doing it again for the 2004 elections.
First things first: paragraphs. Learn what they are, use them, more people will read what you type and actually take you seriously.
Secondly, go read mediamatters.org and see how biased towards the neocon view all of the mainstream tv is. The reality is that neocons are not just plain wrong on many issues (their economic theories, like trickle-down economics, have long since been disproven, and their military policies are outright failures, e.g. the war in iraq). Yet somehow they manage to get their voice not just mentioned on mainstream news, but presented as having equal value to the truth. It's not biased when you don't report lies. Take a skeptical look at the actual facts that people like Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly and Anne Coulter say (go look up the actual quotes and the actual statistics they cite), and you'll see they lie and distort to serve their own wrongheaded worldview.
Additionally, the reality is that the "liberal" voices you hear on mainstream tv are people cherry-picked to make a poor argument, like Alan Colmes. The left has much better arguments, but the good arguments don't end up on the tv screen. It's a well known strategy to discredit your political opponent, and the right has practiced it with much success.
Now, as for specific responses to what you typed:
Their idea of "balance" is to have a commetator, 3 panelist (all of which spout liberal garbage), and one somewhat moderate conservative. That is their idea of balance. Air America, the so far disappointing attempt by the left to "get their message out" will fail. Why? simple. They are not entertaining. I listened to it a few times on XM, and all it was was whinning, name calling about what is wrong with the conservatives. Did they offer any constructive ideas? No.
You should read your own post. First you accuse the mainstream media of left-wing bias, then you say air america is the left's attempt to get their message out. Why would the left need air america if the mainstream media was biased towards the liberal view? Additionally, I have listened to air america, and I've heard a lot of constructive ideas. My guess is you haven't listened for more than a few hours at best. Try listening for a week.
Why do you think they are working to allow convicted felons, and prisoners the "right" to vote?
Are you talking about the scrubbing of the voter rolls in the 2000 florida elections? You should read up on that. They didn't just remove people who had comitted a felony, they removed people with similarities (names, locations,
It's a valid point to say that people convicted of a felony shouldn't be allowed to vote. But you should look into how racist the US judicial system is. Black people get convicted of a lot more crimes, and sent away for much longer terms. That by the very definition is racism, and the only way you can say it is fair is by taking the position that black people are subhuman (naturally commit more and worse crimes than white people). As a result, the system is rigged to ensure people who would vote democratic (the disenfranchised and the poor) don't get to vote because they get locked away more than middle-class white people.
I also invite you to follow the money. Look at how the entire media industry has been making record profits from bush being in the whitehouse (and the matching media deregulation), and how they donate primarily to the right. If they really had a liberal bias, why would they be republican donors, and why would they be biting the hand that feeds them?
Mind you, I'm not opposed to the classical conservative worldview, of small government, sane fiscal policies, and maintaining t
It's retards like you that make me glad I don't believe in this society.
Once convicted of a felony, you have LOST your right to vote. Period
Let me tell you something, you fucking retard. The government decides what is and isn't a felony. The government decides what laws are and aren't enforced and who to investigate. By disenfranchising felons, the government decides who can't remove them from power.
Lets put it to example. Tomorrow, fair use is overturned, copyright becomes (even more) criminalized penalty-wise and the government finds an effective means of identifying any and all copyright infringers.
Bang. Instantly, we're looking at the ability to arrest anyone (75%+ of the populous) and charge them with a felony. As already pointed out, selective enforcement is a reality, so the government will only round up the people unlikely to vote for them in the future. Felons can't vote, and will never again be able to change the path of government.
Before I go any further, I want to say that both the Left and the Right would abuse this, depending on who was in power.
Now, to put it in more realistic terms, look at the Farce, er, War on Drugs. Millions of Americans go to jail for having a fucking joint. Many of them will never be able to effectively change the laws that they don't agree with. You lay it out like the Law of Man == the Law of God.
"We live by the rules". What naivety. I am willing to wager that you don't know the rules of the land you live in. Every rule, from city to county to state to nation. And they accuse the leftys of being politically naive..
Do you have any facts to back up your accusations?
I can't believe how many slashdotters are crying foul (or fowl!) over the Mike Moore story. This is not just a story about Moore's take on Bush, but a story on Disneys attempt at shutting the movie down; you know that censorship topic!
e ff erson_quotes.html
As an American, a poli sci major, and a history freak, what Bush & friends are doing is unprecedented. Sure we have started false wars, or adventures as bombastic William Buckley callously refers to them, but never on this scale.
Bush & friends are at war not just profiteering in Afghanistan and Iraq, but are celebrating major victories on their war on people. Health care, over time, education, pollution and the environment, civil liberties, have all taken major blows by this oligarchy.
"I know no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power."
--Thomas Jefferson to W. Jarvis, 1820.
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/6529/notebook/j
The previous poster who brought up Operation Northwoods should be acknowledged too. At the same time we have the Gulf of Tonkin, the burning of the Reichstag etc. etc.
Well I feel better now. What Bush is doing is truly the "stuff that matters" and considering how little opposition we have to his reign of terror, Mike Moore's movie will be something I will watch, even if I have to fly to China to see it!
Don't worry, Fox and CNN are just there for your kind. 1 second of news. 20 minutes of non-news. 9.59 minutes of commercials. All easy and no thinking required. The nurse will be along shortly to give you your shot and tuck you in.
Sleep well Mr. President.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
You know, the land of the free, home of the brave, etc.
GeeDubya, just keep repeating to yourself: "It's only a movie, it's only a movie, it's...."
Mockmentaries refers to those scripted comedy films that take documentary style (handheld, talking-head interviews, bad lighting/framing). Many of Christopher Guest's films are good examples:
Spinal Tap
Waiting for Guffman
" A Mighty Wind"
See the difference. These are all staged and scripted(act/performance). Moore's films are anything but mockumentaries. They are neither staged nor scripted!!! (except for narrations, which is necessary)
The parent post is rated completely wrong and/or overrated. I can't belive that people are swallowing this horse sh*t without a doubt...
So much of the disucssion about this new movie is about left this or right that, that I have to reply to the main topic and not individual threads. What is it about left vs right? Each side treats the other like it has the plague. But afterall, we all know that 'left' in other languages is sinister or gauche while 'right' is adroit. Why is liberal equated with the left? I think there are, or at least must be, liberal righties. The Bush administration has definately taken us to where we haven't been before. This was kind of liberal interpretations of the constitution. But wasn't this country founded on some very liberal, forward thinking ideas? Lets wake up and engage in real discussion and debate rather name name calling or labeling.
"Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!" -- Dr. Strangelove
IIRC, the reason the film is not being released is because Disney refused to release it in an election year (a move I agree with) - not with the distributors. The timing on the attempted release by Moore of this movie is as politically suspect as the timing and direction of the 9-11 commission.
If I also recall correctly, Moore was told as early as the summer of 2003 that the movie was not going to be released by Disney. He waited until the election year to scream 'censorship'.
While I've got your eye here, I want to take a moment to bitch about Michael Moore's use of the word 'censorship'. The guy repeatedly complains that Disney is 'censoring' his work. It seems to me, anyway, that Disney should have final say in what they do and don't release - they're not a government agency, they're a freakin company. Moore has the right to say what he wants to say, but where does he get the idea that he can force companies into distributing his ideas for him? I might as well call the Today show and demand that Katie Couric interview me so that I can go off on her about her liberal bias! Why can't some people (yes, read: liberals) tell the difference between the government telling you that you can't say something and a company telling you they're not going to spend their money to broadcast your ideas?
(Yeah, I have Karma to burn)
Denver Isuzu Suzuki
FYI, if you read through the responses below, you'll find that four of the nine jurors were Americans. Only one was French.
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
Persons outside the U.S. regularly try to influence U.S. politics. Kerry even publicly acknowledged his support outside the U.S. (note to Kerry: you need support inside the U.S. to win the election). And I can understand why, seeing as we're the current lone superpower. Check out this site, for example.
It does remind me, though, of Cringely's article on "how to compete with Microsoft." Other countries should turn their focus to living their own lives and improving their own nations, rather than focusing on America. Hating America, blaming America, trying to influence American elections, killing Americans, financing folks who kill Americans, toadying to America, etc. won't improve their lives. And it puts the U.S. in a catch-22. We get blamed for everything: for fixing it, for not fixing it, for ignoring it, for not ignoring it, etc. The U.S. is a convenient distraction for many countries' and movements' leaders. Think how much they could accomplish if they focused on being for something, rather than against America.
I didn't vote for Bush in the last election. I would rather vote for Lieberman or Hillary than Kerry. Dean was a disaster. Why? Hillary and Joe are for something, and have specific ideas and goals in mind. Dean was only against Bush. Kerry is a pathetic waffler, and is primarily anti-Bush, rather than pro-anything.
So, maybe this is "one of the most important socio-political events this yeat" -- but the Euros politicizing a film festival to influence U.S. elections is... pathetic.
Come on! No one needs America to fail in order for them to succeed. That's such horrible, negative, zero-sum, defeatist thinking!
Succeed! Form a new, powerful EU nation! We Americans will be cheering you!
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
Oh, wait, we can't show the torture and murders that went on back then, that's not fair.
Once a brutal dictator like Saddam Hussein becomes your moral compass, you have lost. Completely. Finito.
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
I try to follow the policy of that anytime I see anyone using the words "liberal", "conservative", "left" or "right" in anything but an incredibly clearly defined context, I just stop paying attention to the person using them. The words just don't mean anything. And yet people try to reason about them like they're the key to understanding everything that happens in politics.
The problem is that since there's no commonly defined clear demarcation for "left" or "right", this means that people can play the neat trick of constantly reassigning those words to whatever is most convenient at the moment. A favorite tactic seems to be to "prove" something in a piece where you mostly talk about "left" vs "right" while constantly tweaking the definitions of both terms. For example, in one paragraph the word "right" might be used to refer to the current presidential administrators and its followers, in the next paragraph the Coulter/Limbaugh set, in the next libertarians; or in one paragraph the word "left" might refer to extremist feminists, in the next paragraph people who oppose the WTO, in the next current congressional Democrats. The neat thing about this trick is that if you're careful about how you skew your use of these terms, you can (for example) make a flat-out statement about separatist lesbian feminists and then trick the reader into thinking you've shown it applies to Bill Clinton.
Another favorite tactic, and the most common one, seems to be to define "conservative" to be "anyone I agree with" and "liberal" to be "anyone I disagree with", or vice versa...
I personally suspect that anyone that I can catch playing these linguistic games doesn't have anything worthwhile to say, since they're hiding behind ambiguous labels rather than actually arguing in concrete terms. So I try to ignore anyone who talks about "left" vs "right" without clearly identifying which groups they mean by those labels.
Unfortunately the false "liberal"/"conservative" dichotomy has saturated our culture so completely that this policy is very difficult to follow.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Perhaps they can create a "Politics" topic, so you and others with your tastes can just not see it?
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
Why do you think they are working to allow convicted felons, and prisoners the "right" to vote? Are you talking about the scrubbing of the voter rolls in the 2000 florida elections? You should read up on that. They didn't just remove people who had comitted a felony, they removed people with similarities (names, locations, ...) to people who had comitted a felony, but were
felony-free themselves. That's illegal, and it made the difference in deciding who became president. And guess what, They (Jeb Bush's cabinet) are doing it again for the 2004 elections.
NO, I'm talking about allowing people who are in prison to vote.
Here is a list of political quizzes, to help you determine where you really stand. Most of these are sponsored by libertarian groups.
This quote (from The Political Compass FAQ) is instructive.
"Some of the questions are slanted
Most of them are slanted ! Some right-wingers accuse us of a leftward slant. Some left-wingers accuse us of a rightward slant. But it's important to realise that this isn't a survey, and these aren't questions. They're propositions - an altogether different proposition. To question the logic of individual ones that irritate you is to miss the point. Some propositions are extreme, and some are more moderate. That's how we can show you whether you lean towards extremism or moderation on the Compass.
Some of the propositions are intentionally vague. Their purpose is to trigger buzzwords in the mind of the user, measuring feelings and prejudices rather than detailed opinions on policy.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
> > He won not because of his movie, but because of his message.
> It's probably not even the message on it's own that won it for him. Rather, Disney's unwillingness to distribute the film with that message.
Heck, it's not even because of that. It's because of Moore creating a false scandal, when he knew all along (and he even admits this) that Disney would not distribute his film.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
No one in the thread has mentioned it so far, but there is a rumor that Disney pulled out of distribution of Moore's film because they feared losing tax breaks for its theme parks (Disney World) and hotels in Florida, where GWB's brother, Jeb Bush, is governor. Have a look here, for example.
According to Michael Moore, Michael Eisner expressed precisely this concern to his agent, Ari Emmanuel. The Disney corporation has denied it.
If this is true, it would be the worst kind of corporate and government malfeasance. If Disney made its decision for that reason, it would be a corporate cave-ins on par with CBS when it pulled the 60 Minutes report on Brown & Williamson (remember that movie with Pacino and Russell Crowe?). If someone in the Florida government made a threat of that kind, however subtly, it would be a severe case of corruption. If brother Jeb knew about it, it would warrant his impeachment, and if George W. Himself knew it, it would warrant his impeachment as well. In a democracy we cannot tolerate the abuse of government power, especially its power to tax, in order to stifle critical statements about political leaders.
A lot of ifs, I know, and maybe none of them will turn out to be true, but this accusation is so grave that it certainly calls for independent investigation. God knows, the Republicans clamored for special prosecutors during the Clinton era for a lot less than this. This question has to be fully cleared up, and let's not wait until after the election to do it.
Always keep a sapphire in your mind
Hollywood? Why? This is the Canne film festival. What does Hollywood have to do with it? Did you even read the article?
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
Because in the rest of the world murders are committed with rocks and knifes. I'm pretty sure there are parts of the world were people simply go missing and are never heard from again. Look into archangel and what it is they do to protect the world. The question you should ask is, "Are murders more prominent in the United States than in other parts of the world per capita?" I'm sure there is a reason that fat troglodyte doesn't want to put things into more of a real perspective because it doesn't suit his socialist make everyone feel the pain agenda. You see people are much easier to brain wash if you appeal to their emotional side tempering it wit just enough logic to lul them into a false sense of reality. So to counter that I simply say go educate yourself and try and carry around more than your emotions as your guide. Irrational people with rationalized support are very dangerous just ask a recovering alcoholic.
While Michael Moore may be guilty of "creatively editing" various bits for his films (and yes, I agree with someone else who said his films were commentaries, and not documentaries), I think it's still important to recognize that his films do invoke discussion about some serious issues. He brings to light things that some would rather us not bother ourselves with, and gets the debate going. And he does it in an entertaining way.
In looking around at various web sites concerning Michael Moore, I found this interesting account. If you follow it, you'll note that the author is very definitely of the left-wing "progressive" persuasion, and the tone is "more in sorrow than in anger."
Why should I think that Mr. Moore's films are any more accurate than his version of the events that the web page's author recounts?
I give a rat's ass as well.
These days politics has more of an impact over technology than anything else.
If more people were politically active and aware, instead of playing computer games all day, maybe we wouldn't be in the mess we're in.
I'm not a flaming liberal that thinks Michael Moore and Noam Chomsky necessarily have their finger on the dynamics of our society by any means. But if anything, the unbridaled vitriol he elicits from factions of the populace should warrant careful consideration of his work.
I have seen all his movies and some parts I think are incredibly illuminating and others are obviously embellished or distorted, but one thing is for sure: Debate on these issues is productive and there aren't enough outlets for the types of messages he's promoting in our media today, and even if you don't like what he stands for, it's probably incredibly important, even if you disagree with him, that you support his right to express himself. That you recognize that he is passionate about what he believes in and shouldn't be cut down by pedantic, ignorant, sweeping judgements. Otherwise, you will inevitably find at some point, you'll be in his situation as well.
The fact of the matter is that Moore documents his work exponentially better than his ideological rivals in most cases. His underdog status necessitates this, and that's good for everybody. It's also worth noting that the majority of Moore's critics prefer to criticize Moore, the fallible, sometimes-inconsistent MAN (as if any of us are standards by which others should be judged), and completely disregard his work and the issues he raises.
To dismiss him is to bury your head in the sand whether you agree with his agenda or not.
I think this just prove how truly corrupt Hollywood has become that a person like that could win an award for simply being a fat, hypocritical, low life, scum bag, with a camera. I'm guessing he has about 5 years left on that cholesterol train before his heart explodes like refried beans left in a microwave to long. I can't wait for Mr. Moore to be making those headlines.
CLASSIC ignorant, mean-spirited response.
Don't address the issues he raises. He's FAT, therefore his work has abstolutely no integrity or relevance.
If anything, Moore is a litmus test to identify the free thinkers from the brain dead. Thank you for so efficiently demonstrating this.
Seriously, does anyone believe this movie received the Palm d'Or on its merits? The judges at Cannes were making a slap at Bush, nothing more.
Anonymous Kev
Proudly posting as AC since 1997
(Finally got a dang account in 2004)
Moore's prominent presence in the news brings to light some serious questions, such as 'Can't he at least try to look presentable?
-Colin
No, the campaign to censor dissenting views is not overt, it's very much sub-rosa. And it has a great deal more to do with the carrot than the stick.
Large US media companies have billions, even hundreds of billions, riding on various expansion efforts that must be approved by government regulators-- government regulators who are currently under the control of a conservative administration and Congress. It's difficult for you and I to appreciate the sheer pressure that those billions put on corporate executives, but a dispassionate view of the situation should make it apparent: as the leader of a large media corporation, you can't afford to make enemies of the people who determine your company's financial future. You don't have the liberty to think about what's right and wrong, or care about free speech-- your mandate is simply to insure your investors the highest possible return.
So what are you supposed to do when some tiny, insignificant portion of your corporate empire puts the entire company at risk? You do exactly what Disney has done to Moore's film: you squash it like a bug. Not because the film is bad, incorrect, or unlikely to sell tickets. You do it because, as Disney has said up front, it's simply not worth it to piss off the people who will be ruling on your next merger or expansion plan. The very fact that Disney has admitted this and cited it as the reason for ditching the film takes these sentiments out of the hypothetical. This really is happening, and a firm as large as Disney is actually concerned that publishing this film will cause them political difficulties.
And in the end, that's the issue here. All your talk about not paying to watch Moore is irrelevant-- you won't even get the opportunity to protest his film, because the decision has already been made. For you, for me, for all of us. And it's entirely and unabashedly political.
One more thing: I do personally believe that the Democratic party is less likely to operate in this fashion than the Republicans are, if only due to disogranization and the lingering presence of a few idealists. But when one side plays dirty, it's only a matter of time before their opponents learn the game too. So by looking the other way now, you insure that the next slimy liberal president will be the one determining what's ok for you to read, see and hear.
Having seen this film it was obvious that Moore was implying that public policy sending the single mother to work and public policy making firearms readily available were the cause of or significant contributing factors to the shooting. People who disagree with Moore point to other contributing environmental factors, like running an illegal-drugs business and poor parenting. It is likely that a more thorough analysis could show several troubling factors in this kid's life that all contributed to him shooting another child. I don't see any evidence that a single change in welfare laws, gun laws, drug laws, or parenting laws could have guaranteed that this shooting never would have occurred. Many of us seem to suffer from the fallacy that we can prevent every tragedy with a new law or government program. Whether these laws or programs are conservative or liberal in nature, it doesn't seem to matter. Not every social problem can be solved with law. Some have to be solved by society.
Stuart Eichert
I haven't seen the thing and I am sure it is politically biased
:)
Everything you see is biased. From the choice of what to put in and leave out, the angles the subjects are shot at, the way they're lit, the juxtapositions they use.
At least Moore is OBVIOUS about it. He's not changing ads in the background and making the goal of so many movies to obtain financial and a hot girlfriend that you don't even think about it any more.
Moore generates DEBATES, just like this one. Which in the end is much more valuable than a boring movie that no one sees or talks about. Trolls are annoying when they bring up the same argument, but NOT when they incite debate on topics that people really NEED TO THINK ABOUT. Voter apathy is at an all time high. The candidates all try to sound alike to avoid offending anybody. We NEED blatantly biased opinions back in our society, so people can have real discussions about real issues.
But I agree that we should have the chance to see it before we argue any more.
http://www.themoviebox.net/movies/2004/DEFGH/Fahre nheit_9-11/trailer.html
Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity
Bush and his team, with his isolationist, imperial attitude squandered all that.
The is not such a thing as anti-US sentiment anywhere, it is simply that the US is too unruly to just sit down and say nothing about it.
Heck, surely you would say that somebody complaining because you are beating him with a baseball bat harbours unfounded anti-you sentiments....
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
They don't hate our freedom, they don't hate our religion, they wouldn't care at all about us if we weren't a.) Screwing them over continually, and b.) bragging about what Champions of Justice we are.
Look at our record, in the Middle East, Africa, Central and South America. How many freely elected governments have we toppled in the last 30 years? Dozens. How many corrupt dictators have we installed? Dozens. How many evil bastards have we ignored because they were our 'friends?' Dozens again. If anyone is really misinformed enough to debate the facts on this, I'll find some links, it's not hard to do.
Fear will never solve the problem. Aggression leads to aggresion, always. That is the primary reason we still have war and the primary reason most religions teach tolerance and forgivness.
You can't bully humanity into not producing bullies.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
One drop can kill, yes. But only if it enters through the eyes or bloodstream. To kill 3,000+ people with 1 gallon of Sarin, you'd have to inject each one or spray it in their eyes.
s iy ah_ii_refs/n15en156/970409_cia_72668_72668_13.html
And Iraq did have binary shells. Here's a report from then that shows it.
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/khamisiyah_ii/khami
And a shell that old would not be "worthless". That's the whole reason for making them "binary". Sarin is very fragile. But in a binary round, it can last many years.
Show me one place in Franken's book where he claims, without the slightest hint of sarcasm, to be an unbiased political commentator. Show me one place where the grandparent claims Franken to be such. ... ...
...
I'm waiting.
Fact is, you won't find one. Franken is refreshingly honest when compared with, "Fair and Balanced! We Report, You Decide!"
Now, if you don't grasp the fact that even people with agendas which disagree with your own might be sources of factual information, there's nothing I can do to help you. Otherwise, why not pick up the book and read what Franken actually says regarding Alan Colmes? Or are you afraid of getting liberal cooties?
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
I've blogged a couple of entries about Michael Moore. Needless to say, I despise the guy. And I am a democrat who has financially contributed to John Kerry's campaign since day 1 and will continue to do so until I reach my $2000 limit.
My problem with Michael Moore is that he epitomizes the campaign that was being run by Howard Dean: ride the wave of American frustration and self-loathing to blame absolutely all of the world's woes on one person: George Bush. Because it is far more appealing to address complex issues with very simple rants. In my eyes, such rhetoric belongs in stand-up comedy acts, Dennis Miller Live, and Bill Maher. NOT IN A DEMOCRATIC POLITICAL PLATFORM.
Details about what I mean at my blog URL ... that is if someone actually gives a shit what i think.
Extraordinary Vacations. Exceptional Prices
Incidentally, I am for cooperation and integration with Europe. I am also for the end of Middle-Eastern Islamo-fascist dictatorships. I'm not really convinced Europe is interested in that, however. I hope things turn around.
I don't see "The Palestine problem" as the root cause of the "middle east unrest." That's naive, and buys into the typical propaganda from Middle-Eastern leaders seeking to keep attention away from themselves. I think the root cause of the "middle-east unrest" is the panoply of theocratic dictatorships in the Middle East who oppress and torture their citizens, in combination with extremist strains of Islam -- the Wahabbism, for example, that the Saudi dictatorship subsidizes and exports.
Instead of believing the tripe on CNN, NBC, etc, I've been looking for the opinions of actual Iraqis. You may find this blog entry interesting; it's written by an Iraqi. In fact, I will copy the text of it here.
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Harvey discovered and promoted Tarentino. Harvey is producing the movie. Tarentino gets to chair the festival, Harvey's latest project wins. Coincidence?
Probably not. And I love Moore. I think it's important that this movie gets seen. However, he probably did not deserve to win one of the most prestigious awards in cinema for it. His movies make you think, they are more factual than Fox News, and they are fairly amusing. Great cinema? Not quite.
What this really shows is that anti American sentiments have reached such a feverd pitch that the rest of the world is willing to award a film that doesn't really deserve it, just to make sure the message is heard.
And in case any of you are confused, it is Weinstein that got rich of off Moore's films, not Mike. Moore is probably fairly comfortable now, but certainly not rich.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I watched Michael Moore's "Roger and Me" about the devastation of Flint, Michigan because of General Motors closure of factories.
It was a good movie, raising very valid points.
However, from what I read in the media about Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore used the wrong tactics.
For example, he emphasizes the Bush Family / Bin Laden Family business connections. So what? Bin Laden's family are big time construction businessmen, with huge projects all over the region. Bin Laden's father established this business a long time before Osama was born.
Bin Laden's family disowned him a long time ago (early 90s). This is not like Bush was a friend of Osama or something.
The throwing of irrelevant but sensational bits of data into the debate never helps, and if the neo-cons and their apologists do it, there is no need for those trying to be objectives to mimic this tactic.
This is very much like the other "quasi facts" that are drummed up against Saudi Arabia for example, and etched into the collective psyche of Americans. For example: the allegations that the royal family or officials or the people knowingly funded Bin Laden. Or that Bin Laden was paid "protection money" by the Saudi government (nice Mafia reference there!). These are presented to the American people as undisputed facts. The fact is: the Saudis stripped him of his citizenship very early in the 90s, before he declared any kind of war on America! As for the alleged "funding", it is never stated that this was mismanagement by some charity officials that lead to some money making its way to Bin Laden, and not that royal family/officials/Saudis intentionally funded him against America. Nor does it mention when this happened. It may have happened in the 80s when he was in a jihad against the USSR, something that America wholeheartedly supported.
I am against Bush's ill conceived policies all the way, but using these tactics will not help confront those stupid policies.
Nevertheless, it raises some good points that Americans need to think about.
P.S. Another good documentary that features Michael Moore, Noam Chomsky and others, is "The Corporation". Really worth a look by all readers of Slashdot.
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His so called movies are an insult to people who make real documantaries. His work is so full of crap it's unreal. Why doesn't this fat clown go to a real documentary, oh yes he is to lazy to do so. It's to much work to get off his ass and do anything but edit his diatribes. I have an idea for his next movie "Travels of a Turd" Michael follows a turd from it's birth to the waste treatment plant. Along they why he talks with other turds. http://www.gobpl.com
http://www.gobpl.com
Moore is a clown, granted. There is a difference between a clown and a fool, however. One "who wouldn't know a fact..." you refer to would be a fool. And, in the context of Fahrenheit 911, I would leave naming the examples of wilful and persistent ignorance of facts to the reader.
The whole idea of a chemical artillery shell is that it is fired from a standard gun. Therefore it has to have the same dimentions and mechanical properties as a regular shell. Add to this the fact that the shell is 20 years old (the production runs of the Iraqi "binary" type sarin shells occured in the 1980's), it was stored in unknown conditions (possibly even fired and found in fields) and you will get yourself a piece of rusted junk that would require an expert to recognise.
In the 1990's, before leaving, UNSCOM said there were over 500 such shells filled with sarin they couldn't account for.
The actual number of the "binary" type sarin shells produced was 170 and this production run was experimental. According to UNSCOM, they were all accounted for and believed to be used as follows: 10 filled with mock chemicals, 10 filled with real stuff but tested (exploded) in the lab and remaining 150 fired at a gunnery range. The current theory as far as I know is that the shell might have been misplaced in that process, or more likely, it was actually fired on the test range and turned out a dud and subsequently dug out after all these years by some ammo-scavenging guerrilla. The examination of the shell would determine if it was inded the case.
I'll agre it's important to maintain his right to continue to make his films. I do not agree that all his films are important, nor do I believe he backs up his claims with unbiased research or good sources.
Roger and Me was funny, but in the end, Moore was taking potshots at a CEO for killing his home town's economy, not because of his care for the noble common worker. He destroys that image of nobility by finding the most embarassing people in the town and editing them to look like idiots.
Every corporation has the right to do their business as they see fit. Hacking at GM won't fix Ford, Mercedes, Chrysler, Honda , Toyota, or any other car maker deciding to outsource.
Columbine completely ignored the responsible gun owner. It completely ignored the real 2nd amendment debate. It completely ignored the REAL reasons behind Columbine. All it did was make fun of rural folks and make trite commentary about the 2nd Amendment. Here's a hint, you can't sum up this issue in an hour if the framers and Supreme Court have been analyzing it for 200 years without a conclusion.
Now, of course, we have 9/11. Where Moore takes many disparate bits of half-truths and puts them together to form a path to a delusional conclusion that Bush knew about, and aided and abetted those that caused 9/11. When I got to watch this in rough cut, it felt like the psuedo-science used on Fox for their Moon Landing hoax and their Alien Autopsy "documentaries".Using Occham's razor, consider this RATIONALLY....What is more likely;
A: President and his staff miscalculate the determination of some Islamic radicals and get caught with their pants down in a modern Pearl Harbor. After the fact, they do some favors for their closest Arabic Middle East ally to get their help in tracking down the bad guys. They also kick out bin Laden's extended family because they may become targets of hatred, and the bin Laden family is close to the Saud Royals.
or B: The President decided that there is no way American citizens would ever discover his hand in a huge plot requiring 100+ operatives to pull off and KNOWINGLY decides to kill 10,000 + (remember, he would have had NO idea how many would die in a structure holding 40k) Americans so he could go to war in Iraq. In addition, he rewards the peple who helped him. Even though everyone would KNOW he helped them and it would increase his chances of being caught. Further, this President would have to assume these terrorists would only hit the targets they promise to hit, and that the terrorists would still do this if Bush asked them.
Yeah, B does sound a lot more like f-ing fiction when you put it in context. Moore is a once- entertaining filmmaker who has become angry and bitter. I would vigorously defend his right to make and show his films, but I won't go see them in theaters. They aren't MUST SEE, and he certainly isn't making "important" work anymore. He's a Netflix rental for me. One of about 20 programs I will see in a month. That's about the respect and value he deserves.
"Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect."- Steven Wright
1600 Slahsdot posts, countless othe discussions and commentry, all on democracy, freedom, news coverage and the war in Iraq.
Love the film or hate it, it has generated more free speech, comment and thought than any thing else in the media in a long time.
For that alone what a great movie.