Thursday, July 01, 2004
Michael Moore
Moore is obviously not a great "documentary" film maker. His bias is clear and his many critics do a good job in pointing this fact out. His movie "Bowling For Columbine" was pack full of errors, deception and downright meanness in its treatment of the Alzheimers afflicted Charlton Heston, yet much of the movie posed very good questions that needed to be asked. In the next few weeks many will take shots at some of the more wild innuendo presented in Moore's latest film. I still stand by my strong recommendation for people to go see it for themselves.
Why do I still think it is worth seeing and discussing? Mainly because the truth lies somewhere between Moore's conspiracy theories and the major networks complete silence on most of the issues that he brings up and the fact that our mainstream press has utterly failed to inform the American public that many controversies exist in Bush's handling of the so called War on Terror.
In this piece by Christopher Hitchens in Slate he tears Moore a new rearend for some of his more outrageous suggestions in the film and for his flip flopping on the issues. Nevermind that Hitchens wrote a book and made a documentary in which he calls Mother Teresa and evil ghoul and until fairly recently was a savage critic of the neo-cons. For a counterpoint to Hitchens angry diatribe read Paul Krugman:
There has been much tut-tutting by pundits who complain that the movie, though it has yet to be caught in any major factual errors, uses association and innuendo to create false impressions. Many of these same pundits consider it bad form to make a big fuss about the Bush administration's use of association and innuendo to link the Iraq war to 9/11. Why hold a self-proclaimed polemicist to a higher standard than you hold the president of the United States.
Yes, I wish that Moore was better at presenting a more evenhanded critique of the Bush administration. Yes it is embarrassing to me when light is shined on some of his more outrageous suggestions - such as we may have attacked Afghanistan for Unocal so they could build a pipeline.
But what we have seen in the mainstream press in the last 3 and 1/2 years is no light being shined on any policy of the Bush Junta. Lower taxes on the rich equals economic growth. OK. Massive deficits as far into the future as the eye can see. Ok. Global warming is controversial and not a big problem. OK. Al Quaeda and Saddam connected. Ok. Iraq a great and gathering menace that cannot be contained other than by invasion and occupation. OK. The Iraqi's will welcome us with open arms and reconstruction will not cost us more than $1.8 billion. Ok. Torture openly discussed as an acceptable instrument of national security. OK.
Not until images of torture were forced before our eyes, not by the major media but by amateurs threatening to "irresponsibly", in the mind of Donald Rumsfeld, present this kind of information on the internet did the major media pick up the story. This is Michael Moore's roll, to be "irresponsible" so others know that their is another side to the story. The danger of course is that by knocking down one of Moore's strawmen critics may convince large numbers of people that nothing Moore presents is credible. How credible is Bush?
Images matter more than words and arguments for a great deal of people. Critics say of the images of carnage in Iraq prsented in F-911 that we don't need Michael Moore to tell us people get hurt in war. Wrong. Yes we do. It is too easy for many of us to forget and deny what is done in our name. When our government presents the media with a story that our smart bombs and pinpoint attacks are incredibly good at reducing civilian casualties someone needs to question that. Especially given the long history of all governments lying about such things. A careful count is taken of the dead on our side but their coffins are hidden from view. Very few Americans are aware that there have been over 22,000 medical evacuations from Iraq of our troops. The cost in civilian lives has not been taken into account at all. It is not enough to say that Saddam was an evil man and then ignore the costs associated with his removal.
The film is worth seeing and discussing. It is not perfect, fair or balanced and doesn't claim to be.
Moore is obviously not a great "documentary" film maker. His bias is clear and his many critics do a good job in pointing this fact out. His movie "Bowling For Columbine" was pack full of errors, deception and downright meanness in its treatment of the Alzheimers afflicted Charlton Heston, yet much of the movie posed very good questions that needed to be asked. In the next few weeks many will take shots at some of the more wild innuendo presented in Moore's latest film. I still stand by my strong recommendation for people to go see it for themselves.
Why do I still think it is worth seeing and discussing? Mainly because the truth lies somewhere between Moore's conspiracy theories and the major networks complete silence on most of the issues that he brings up and the fact that our mainstream press has utterly failed to inform the American public that many controversies exist in Bush's handling of the so called War on Terror.
In this piece by Christopher Hitchens in Slate he tears Moore a new rearend for some of his more outrageous suggestions in the film and for his flip flopping on the issues. Nevermind that Hitchens wrote a book and made a documentary in which he calls Mother Teresa and evil ghoul and until fairly recently was a savage critic of the neo-cons. For a counterpoint to Hitchens angry diatribe read Paul Krugman:
There has been much tut-tutting by pundits who complain that the movie, though it has yet to be caught in any major factual errors, uses association and innuendo to create false impressions. Many of these same pundits consider it bad form to make a big fuss about the Bush administration's use of association and innuendo to link the Iraq war to 9/11. Why hold a self-proclaimed polemicist to a higher standard than you hold the president of the United States.
Yes, I wish that Moore was better at presenting a more evenhanded critique of the Bush administration. Yes it is embarrassing to me when light is shined on some of his more outrageous suggestions - such as we may have attacked Afghanistan for Unocal so they could build a pipeline.
But what we have seen in the mainstream press in the last 3 and 1/2 years is no light being shined on any policy of the Bush Junta. Lower taxes on the rich equals economic growth. OK. Massive deficits as far into the future as the eye can see. Ok. Global warming is controversial and not a big problem. OK. Al Quaeda and Saddam connected. Ok. Iraq a great and gathering menace that cannot be contained other than by invasion and occupation. OK. The Iraqi's will welcome us with open arms and reconstruction will not cost us more than $1.8 billion. Ok. Torture openly discussed as an acceptable instrument of national security. OK.
Not until images of torture were forced before our eyes, not by the major media but by amateurs threatening to "irresponsibly", in the mind of Donald Rumsfeld, present this kind of information on the internet did the major media pick up the story. This is Michael Moore's roll, to be "irresponsible" so others know that their is another side to the story. The danger of course is that by knocking down one of Moore's strawmen critics may convince large numbers of people that nothing Moore presents is credible. How credible is Bush?
Images matter more than words and arguments for a great deal of people. Critics say of the images of carnage in Iraq prsented in F-911 that we don't need Michael Moore to tell us people get hurt in war. Wrong. Yes we do. It is too easy for many of us to forget and deny what is done in our name. When our government presents the media with a story that our smart bombs and pinpoint attacks are incredibly good at reducing civilian casualties someone needs to question that. Especially given the long history of all governments lying about such things. A careful count is taken of the dead on our side but their coffins are hidden from view. Very few Americans are aware that there have been over 22,000 medical evacuations from Iraq of our troops. The cost in civilian lives has not been taken into account at all. It is not enough to say that Saddam was an evil man and then ignore the costs associated with his removal.
The film is worth seeing and discussing. It is not perfect, fair or balanced and doesn't claim to be.
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