Posted on 07/01/2004 9:27:32 AM PDT by pookie18
The TV ads for Michael Moore's "documentary" Fahrenheit 9/11 feature a mocking clip of President Bush on a golf course. Bush declares, "I call upon all nations to do everything they can to stop these terrorists killers," and then Moore jumps to Bush adding, as he prepares to swing at a golf ball, "now watch this drive." Tuesday night on FNC's Special Report with Brit Hume, Brian Wilson noted how "the viewer is left with the misleading impression Mr. Bush is talking about al-Qaeda terrorists." But Wilson disclosed that "a check of the raw tape reveals the President is talking about an attack against Israel, carried out by a Palestinian suicide bomber."
Indeed, Wilson played another part of what Bush said in the remarks to reporters made on August 4, 2002: "For the sake of the Israelis who are under attack, we must stop the terror."
MRC analyst Megan McCormack noticed Wilson's correction of Moore in a piece in which Wilson outlined how Moore's movie better matches the definition of "propaganda" than "documentary."
"The American Heritage Dictionary," Wilson relayed, "defines a documentary film as one that presents facts quote, 'objectively without editorializing or inserting fictional matter.'"
After documenting Moore's distortion of Bush's golf course comments, Wilson moved on to how "in his film, Moore claims that special flights carrying Saudi nationals were allowed to fly within the U.S. at a time when commercial aircraft were grounded due to the 9/11 attacks. Not true. The Saudi flights did not occur until after commercial flight restrictions were lifted on September 14th. Newsweek's top investigative reporter Michael Isikoff took Moore to task on that and other incorrect claims in a recent column, and says of the movie:
Michael Isikoff: "It's one window into some of the facts, but it's certainly not a complete window into all the facts."
Wilson: "Even some news organizations providing clips to Moore for the film argue Fahrenheit 9/11 is not balanced. Bill Wheatley, a Vice President of NBC News, told the LA Times quote, '...the work of filmmakers is much more likely to be pointed in a particular direction...filmmakers tend to avoid balance and pursue a point of view.' So if the word documentary really doesn't fit Michael Moore's film, how about this description? 'Ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one's cause or to damage an opposing cause.' That's how the dictionary defines the word propaganda. In Washington, Brian Wilson, Fox News."
Last Friday night, June 25, the NBC Nightly News ran a fact check on Moore's movie, the MRC's Brad Wilmouth observed, and found it wanting. NBC's Lisa Myers didn't note how the golf course comments were suggested to be about al-Qaeda when they were really about Palestinian terrorists, but she did call it a "cheap shot."
She began her story with a clip of an ad for the movie: "A true story that will make your temperature rise."
Myers asked: "But how true is it? The film's sometimes embarrassing video of Bush administration officials is authentic [clip of Ashcroft singing], though some argue certain shots amount to cheap shots." George W. Bush from movie, on golf course: "I call upon all nations to do everything they can to stop these terrorist killers. Thank you. Now, watch this drive."
Myers: "The powerful story of Lyla Lipscomb, whose son was killed in Iraq, is also undeniable. But on other key points, critics say this so-called documentary is either wrong or deliberately misleading. The war in Iraq: To drive home the point that the children of the powerful aren't dying in Iraq, Moore ambushes politicians on Capitol Hill."
Moore in movie: "Congressman, I'm Michael Moore. How are you doing?"
Rep. Mark Kennedy (R-MN): "Good evening."
Moore: "Good, good. I'm trying to get members of Congress to get their kids to enlist in the Army and go over to Iraq."
Myers: "But Moore left out what Congressman Mark Kennedy went on to say."
Kennedy, in interview with NBC: "My nephew had just gotten called up into service and was told he's heading to Afghanistan. He didn't like that answer, so he didn't include it."
Myers: "Bush and the Saudis: The film traces ties between the Bush family and the bin Laden and Saudi royal families, then suggests the Bushes, quote, 'might be thinking about what's best for the Saudis instead of what's best for you.'"
Roger Cressey, terrorism expert: "The Bush family's relationship with the bin Ladens and the Saudis had nothing to do with our decisions on the war on terrorism. To say so is simply unfair."
Myers: "Finally, Saudi flights after 9/11: The film suggests that plane loads of Saudis, including the bin Laden family, were allowed to leave the U.S. after 9/11 without proper vetting. However, the 9/11 Commission says, 'Nobody was allowed to depart who the FBI wanted to interview.' One character in this film suggests that President Bush is even worse than Osama bin Laden, one of the excesses and distortions that may undermine the credibility of Michael Moore's message. Lisa Myers, NBC News, Washington."
But liberals and much of the media still love it.
"All nations" is boilerplate-speak fercryinoutloud. Did you just fall off a turnip truck?
No, but it would take someone who did fall off of a turnip truck to be "misled" by this bit.
To say "all nations" is just a sappy way to avoid saying anything specific, or naming any specific country, the kind of phrase statesmen, diplomats and politicians have used for centuries. Such phrases are the bread and butter rhetoric of the political class. There is no greater meaning to be gleaned from it.
And, if he meant exactly what he said, there is nothing at all misleading about the clip.
Brit Hume said it best. Roughly "This movie will reinforce the Bush haters and futher convince the rest that the left has gone insane."
Moore's point was to make the president look uncaring about terror, to make him look like a hardhearted lighweight who amuses himself by showing off his golf drive while sloshing through the blood of innocents.
Now that we know the president was talking about an act of terror in another country, and that the event was not a grave matter for an American president, Moore's entire sneaky tactic falls apart.
Are you trying to say that the clip is "misleading" because it makes it look like the President is being callous about an attack on Americans when in fact he is merely being callous about an attack on Israelis? Is that really what you are trying to say?
My point was provided by your reply. We all have an obligation to point out errors and promote our viewpoint.
Right. Nothing whatsoever. Except that it is exactly what the President says in the clip. Other than that, it has nothing to do with it. Nothing whatsoever.
He's not being callous! I've already covered this in an earlier post. We don't pay our president to get all broken up about every tragedy that happens in the world. He made a boilerplate denunciation of terror, as he is called upon to do almost every day, and then he went back to what he was doing, playing golf. Nothing callous about it.
Michael Moore is a disgusting puke.
I think I'll make this my last post to you. Since the tenor of your remarks makes me guess that you're the type who will take that as an indication that you won the point, let me just say, knock yourself out. Enjoy.
If you find it misleading, it is obviously because you are expending way too much effort deconstructing it. I tend to think the President meant exactly what he said - as he usually does in that context. Is it a funny clip? Sure. Does it make him "uncaring"? No.
Nothing mysterious about it, except to you. He was making a statement of general application. In order to make it appear "misleading", you want to restrict his statement of general application and limit it to a single incident. The question was about a single incident. The answer was not. It is neither difficult nor mysterious.
Bingo. Lugsoul can spin all he wants, but that's what makes the viewer's assumption about which terrorists Bush was talking about critical to how they take the clip. And Moore clearly did everything he could to imply that Bush was being cavalier about the terrorists who caused 9/11, or goofing off on the golf course while asking all other countries to do something about the 9/11 terrorists, in a "fiddling while Rome burns" way.
It's propaganda, and it's utterly indefensible. Not that lugsoul doesn't keep trying for some reason...
Lugsoul has said, "There are so many valid criticisms of Moore that it is a wonder people will grab so tight to crap like this", but the whole point of the current thread is that Moore's trying to mislead viewers into thinking that Bush was "a frat boy" about *9/11* -- if he actually has a case for that, why did Moore have to "grab so tight to crap like this" golf course comment that was only remotely related, if at all, to the 9/11 issue, and then pretend that it *was* about 9/11? If Moore has to dig *this* far afield to get "ammunition" -- *and* mislead the viewer at the same time by not leaving in the sentence which came immediately before ("For the sake of humanity, for the sake of the Palestinians who suffer, for the sake of the Israelis who are under attack, we must stop the terror.") which makes clear that it's about the Palestinian/Israel terrorism, then Moore's case must be so extremely thin that he has to throw in the kitchen sink and try to call it evidence.
Furthermore, he has to do it in an enormously juvenile fashion -- only people whose understanding of national events is on the level of Beavis and Butthead would go "huh huh" at the perfectly ordinary event of a President making a policy statement when asked a question while on vacation, or returning to his vacation activities after concluding the statement.
Moore seems to think this is funny or outrageous somehow. What I find funny -- but sad -- is that anyone would find it funny or significant somehow.
Save your fingers, no one's buying it.
Watch out your Mac is showing :)
I've asked the question before - Moore plays the clip in the ad. I haven't seen the movie. Does he do something in the movie beyond editing the clip the way it is in the ad?
We can all think of dozens of instances where clips are edited for effect. Here is a perfect example: "I voted for the $87 billion before I voted against it." It is a terribly funny comment standing alone. Anyone who has heard the entire comment, in context, knows it is not so funny that way - listening to that mundane explanation about this provision or that protection not being in the bill. So it is edited down to the funny part, and gets played over and over. Out of context? Of course. Dishonest? No way.
You folks must be really scared of this lardbag if you think you have to make up crap like this. I would think that the easy shots - like the fact that most of the money he ties to Carlyle was from before GHWB was on the board - would be easy pickin' for you. But that's okay - waste your time on the stupid ones.
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pdxer
Since Jul 1, 2004
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