Michael Moore claims to have an interview with Nick Berg before his tragic death...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3757665.stm ^

[Jivana108]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3757665.stm

[monkeywrench]

I see Michael Moore listed , here, on an ANSWER promotional type page. (Trying to sell a cd) http://www.iacenter.org/nowar_shine.html

CD Contents

1. PEACE ANTHEM (4:46)

2. Pacifica Radio Archives' VOICES FOR PEACE (14:30) with Lord Bertrand Russell, G.W. Bush, Angela Davis, Amber Thompson, Howard Zinn, Gore Vidal, Thic Nhat Hahn, Michael Moore, June Jordan, Michael Parenti, Barbara Ehrenreich, Curtis Bennett, Stephen Rohde, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Maxine Waters, Germaine Greer, Native American Voice, Johann Galtung, Senator Dennis Kucinich

3. I HAVE A DREAM (16:10) M.L. King, Jr.

4. VOICES OF HOPE (4:56) Cesar Chavez - Boycott; M. L. King, Jr. -Faith; Mother Teresa - Love; M. K. Gandhi - Light Persists; Nelson Mandela - The Vote, Hope; "Not in Our Name" refrain

[TheSpottedOwl]

I agree that there is more to this story than we know about. Of course I could never make sense of of leftists and their ideology, but this is really weird.

[elbucko]

"It said the interview took place in the United States late last year, before Berg, a radio-tower technician, made the first of two trips to Iraq seeking work there as a private contractor."

If what Moore claims is true, there is conspiracy afoot.

[Condor51]

How's this?

[johnnycap]

"Michael Moore claims to have an interview with Nick Berg before his tragic death..."

Well, at least he had the good sense to do the interview before...

[elbucko]

This suit was filed prior to Nick's death (April 5th).

I noticed the dates. I think a number of suits were in prior planning in expectation of young Nick Berg's "Iraqi Adventures".

[Howlin]

Try to calm down a little bit; RGSpincich knows what he's doing. If he says it's restricted, you can bet it is.

[lonevoice]

Berg's father.
He's worse. That was his boy, and he's using his murder for his own agenda. Moore just uses anybody he can.

Exactly. It's a perfect marriage made in hell. My strong hunch is that no such interview video exists, but the two Michaels (Berg and Moore) have figured out a way to use Nick Berg as a prop to advance their shared agenda.

[An American In Dairyland]

>> Try to calm down a little bit; RGSpincich knows what he's doing. If he says it's restricted, you can bet it is. <<

I followed the link now and looked at it once before. You have to register and pay for the information. I wasn't willing to do that but that might be what was meant by the info being "restricted."

[nuffsenuff]

Can you crank up a little higher and add some smoke?

LOL!

[RGSpincich]

A little FYI. I didn't make up the name "restricted". You went to the site, you know the first thing they say is THIS IS A RESTRICTED SITE. If you are accepted, access is delayed a week or so for processing.

Howlin, thanks, CINYC and I got it squared away. I could not find any time stamps or log-in information on the case BUT I found an interesting notation that may help explain why the case is now accessible. A supplemental filing on May 20th, I haven't figured out what exactly they filed. Maybe they just rewrote the original to a better legal form. I don't know. Below is the Docket Record.

Filing Date # Docket Text

04/05/2004 1 PETITION for Writ of Habeas Corpus ( Filing fee $ 5 receipt number 903782.), filed by MICHAEL S. BERG, NICHOLAS EVAN BERG, SUZANNE CAROL BERG.(ss, ) Additional attachment(s) added on 5/20/2004 (jl, ). (Entered: 04/05/2004)

04/09/2004 2 NOTICE TO MARK MATTER DISCONTINUED AS MOOT by MICHAEL S. BERG, NICHOLAS EVAN BERG, SUZANNE CAROL BERG As To HONORABLE DONALD RUMSFELD, CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE. (jl, ) (Entered: 04/09/2004)

[TheSpottedOwl]

If any video footage comes out, it will be altered. I don't think that Moore interviewed Nick Berg. What I do think, is that Michael Berg and Michael Moore are cooking something up. How hard would it be to piece together home videos for someone as dishonest as Moore?

I've never been sympathetic to people like Rachel Corrie, or the human shields. This goes beyond politics for me, however. This is just sick all the way around.

[virgil]

Maybe Berg had a death wish?

[earlyamerican]

Why is it that Mooron is always cashing in on horrific events. Isn't that ghoulish?

[conservative in nyc]

Let me see if I can explain this more. Some U.S. federal courts, including the Pennsylvania court the Berg petition was filed in, use a case management system called PACER. The documents from most civil cases are open to search by anyone, as long as they get a PACER user ID and password. If you're willing to provide a credit card number, you can get a user ID and password within minutes, as I did on the night the Berg beheading became public. I became aware of the system by doing a google search for the Philadelphia federal court.

You are charged a nominal fee (generally 7 cents a page) to access the documents. The types of documents available in PACER vary according to the rules of federal court district the case is filed in. Some include only decisions; others include some decisions and some petitions; others include everything. I don't know this from experience with the system. I have very little. I only know this from the message the system gave me when I signed up on the night after the Berg beheading became public.

When I performed a search that night, I found a reference to the petition but no link to it, and the short two-page notice dismissing the case as moot. In other words, I couldn't download the actual habeas petition containing Michael Berg's claims about why he thought Nicholas Berg was in U.S. government custody. I'm not the only one who conducted a search. At least one of the DUmmies did too. I'm sure the media was looking for the petition there as well. I was thinking of posting the results of my search then, but waited until it was clear that the press had it on May 14, and posted it here. I didn't want to fuel any needless speculation that something may have been amiss because the petition was not there. More on that later.

At some point after May 12, the petition was put up on PACER. RGSpincich's PACER information suggests this happened on May 20.

There may be a fairly simple explanation for this. Even if the petition is not available on PACER, journalists and others could have easily obtained a copy by faxing the court or asking Michael Berg's lawyers. It was clear to me that the Times and Philly papers had a copy of the petition by May 14. They quoted from it. While I don't know for sure, I suspect that the Eastern District of Pennsylvania normally doesn't post petitions on their PACER site because of storage capacity issues. Believe it or not, this is the conclusion some of the DUmmies came to on May 12. I also suspect that the clerk of the court received a lot of inquiries from the press for the petition and probably posted it on PACER to quell the inquiries.

This is admittedly speculation, but it makes the most sense. I can't see the government putting a rewritten or altered petition on the PACER site. Michael Berg's lawyers also have a copy of it, and Michael Berg likely would have raised a stink if the versions were different.

[RGSpincich]

If you're willing to provide a credit card number, you can get a user ID and password within minutes, as I did on the night the Berg beheading became public.

When I signed up a couple of years ago they just offered a billing option. Guess that's why I had to wait a week or so.

[conservative in nyc]

When I signed up a couple of years ago they just offered a billing option. Guess that's why I had to wait a week or so.

They still give you a week-long wait as a billing option today. I don't know why anyone would take it unless they don't have a credit card.

[RGSpincich]

I can't see the government putting a rewritten or altered petition on the PACER site.

I was thinking more like Berg's attorney cleaned up his paperwork with an amended petition. The petition that finally got posted is very complete and well researched. Not something that would have got tossed together by some panicked parents and their attorney. The first petition may have been flawed in some legal respects.

[conservative in nyc]

I was thinking more like Berg's attorney cleaned up his paperwork with an amended petition. The petition that finally got posted is very complete and well researched. Not something that would have got tossed together by some panicked parents and their attorney. The first petition may have been flawed in some legal respects.

Possible, but I doubt it --- at least on May 20. NPR posted the Berg habeas petition on their website on or before May 16. The FreeRepublic post is here.

The quality of their pdf file is poor. It was definitely faxed to NPR. It's theoretically still on NPR's website (the page timed out when I tried to open it), and I saved a copy to my hard drive. While I haven't compared it word-for-word, both had 48 numbered paragraphs and the paragraphs with the case citations appear identical.

If you want a copy, please FReepmail me with an e-mail address.

[RGSpincich]

http://www.npr.org/iraq/berg-petition.pdf -NPR

https://ecf.paed.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show_case_doc?1,164145,,,,1 _PACER

The NPR document is the original, for "Internal Use Only" stamped on it (and a time stamp, Howlin) and a hand written case number. The document at the PACER site is different in it's looks. No signatures, dates, etc. I think it's the same otherwise.

BIG uh-oh. Surprised nobody caught it. Looks like the suit was actually filed on April 6 at A10:00.