Far Fetched Hype: Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911
July 24, 2004, 09:20 AM
By Mona LugayRon Maxwell is a major Hollywood director/writer and producer. He is one of the few outspoken conservatives in Hollywood. His most recent credits include the two Civil war epics, Gettysburg and Gods and Generals.
We live in an age of dubbing down and hyping up - an age of mush media and mass hysteria. There have been other such times, when civilization declines, when barbarism creeps to ascendancy. Only in such times can charlatans pose as sages, can deceivers pose as deliverers. “Deliver us from evil” goes the prayer. “Deliver us from George Bush” goes the slogan.
So it is, that the deranged teenager of 17th Century Salem becomes the 21st Century's enfant terrible, pointing the accusatory finger at the witch - the witch who must be burned. The screaming adolescent girls have morphed into the cacophonic voices of film critics and columnists, of ranting heads and party hacks. The whole self-righteous chorus baying for blood! The lunatic crowd wanted only its ring master, someone to smartly crack the whip so that they could obediently jump through the fiery box-office ring. This clown, this fop, this slovenly base echo of once more dignified circus tramps has taken his ramshackle carnival wagon on the road. From it he pulls his bag of tricks, his carpet bag of elixirs, his cure-alls and snake oils, his salves and lotions and perfumes. He tosses a little incense here, sprinkles a little fairy dust there, sprays a noxious stream of toxins over all and into this celluloid broth he ladles the poisons of innuendo, of false juxtaposition, of rumor, of conspiracy theory, of outrage tinged lies.
The impresario is none other than Michael Moore, who dazzles the credulous and the ignorant, who inspires the fawning partisans and emboldens the timorous hyena horde.
This modern day Pied-Piper is leading thousands of our children into the abyss of self-loathing, self-doubt and nihilism. His shrill pipes plead the cause of moral equivalency and confusion. In his cinematic song the world is indeed turned upside down - the heroes are the villains, our enemies are merely misunderstood and we have nothing to fear but our own corrupt society. Indeed, Michael Moore's mantra is identical to Osama Bin Laden's and the Ayatollahs of Iran - “America is the great Satan.”
- RF Maxwell, July 20, 2004
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