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Things Reconsidered
April
2, 2003
by
Alexander Washburn
Michael
Moore is a big fat idiot
Bowling
for Columbine was by far the best movie I saw last
year. It is a good documentary, not a great one like Hoop
Dreams or Stephanie Black's Life and Debt,
but very deserving of the Oscar it received. However,
Michael Moore is as a despicable person as anyone
– liberal or conservative. Moore left the hourly
wage lifestyle years ago and probably has his assistant
break in his baseball hats to give them that 'everyman
feel.'
As disgusting as the Limousine Liberal Moore has been
up to this point, it was nothing compared to his pointless
rant about Bush being a "fictitious" President
at the Oscar's. It's nice to see Moore, like the Congressional
Black Caucus, still hasn't gotten over the 2000 Election.
(You'd think that the shellacking in 2002 would be wake-up
call enough.) Moore's attacks on Bush play to the lowest
common denominator of conspiracy theorist. The same ones
that say the Supreme Court handed Bush the election –
the same ones that warn of the influence of the Carlyle
Group. What makes Moore even more out-of-touch with reality
is that he was out shilling for Ralph Nader in 2000 –
holding strong to the company line that: "Gore and
Bush Make Me Want to Ralph." For one who swore a
vote for Nader wasn't a vote for Bush, Moore must now
see the error in his ways. Instead of honing up to that
fact and that he abandoned the Democratic Party, he reaches
into his pocket for old Katherine Harris jokes. Truth
is, it was people like Michael Moore, slamming Al Gore
as being of basically the same creature as Bush, that
drove traditional Florida Democrats voters away from their
nominee.
Moore's rant was treated with the normal disgust that
Oscar outbursts, not perpetrated by Jack Nicholson, are
received. It was clear that most of Hollywood left their
values at home and let the real Americans in the cheap
seats almost boo Moore off-stage. These people were not
afraid to voice their opinion but Hollywood, which has
griped and moaned about this war, chose to let Moore crash
and burn on his own. In the Weekly Standard, Jonathan
Last pinpointed Hollywood's true intentions, writing:
"So who was booing Michael Moore? The people in the
balconies. At the Oscars, the orchestra level is reserved
for the glitterati and the upper tier for the riff-raff.
So only 'normal' people were booing Moore. Which begs
the question, why didn't the stars boo him? Why simply
sit there – the equivalent of voting 'present' on
a resolution in Congress? Clearly, the answer is that
they wanted to cheer. Just not as much as they want that
seventh house in Maui." When Michael Moore can't
voice a reasonable opinion on world events and when people
like John Cusack are running away from "agendas"
like campaign finance reform and grassroots politics,
it's time to rethink our love affair with celebrity activism.
A Few Small Repairs
We're almost a fortnight into Operation Iraqi Freedom
and even though here at ATR we're in a little 'shock &
awe' ourselves over the questionable progress of the war,
it's far from reaching colossal failure status as some
in the media would have you believe. From the New York
Times which screamed headlines like 'Varying Views of
the War' to Brokaw's overly dramatic teasers that warn
of "second-guessing" among Pentagon brass, you'd
think the Republican Guard were taking BP at Shea Stadium
or chatting up CBS' Bonnie Bernstein at The Final Four.
Guiltier than Jayson Williams was The Nation –
whose introduction of the lame Rapid Response Weblogs
is a clear sign that Katrina and the Gang have signaled
Jihad against all the right. When the Daily Outrage
wasn't whining about the Defense Department seeking environmental
exemptions in the time of war (Mon Dieu!), David Corn
was in full 'British are coming' mode. Corn finds cracks
in the armor saying: "The point was that the collapse
of Iraqi forces and dancing in the streets would happen
early. Shortly before the war was launched, Vice President
Dick Cheney predicted Saddam Hussein's troops would 'step
aside' and that victory would take 'weeks rather than
months.'"
Corn is correct that Cheney did utter those words but
his analysis of their meaning is rather simplistic for
a veteran pundit like Corn. It was clear that Cheney,
along with military brass, were planting the seeds for
defection among Iraqi military – it has openly been
a part of the strategy from the beginning. Dissention
and disarray among the ranks was Cheney's intent and the
fact that Allied forces repeatedly target Iraqi communications
facilities furthers the point. Plus, when was the last
time anyone on the left gave any credence to what Dick
Cheney says?
And
its not as if the administration hasn't given us more
legitimate targets than 'we need more time.' Turkey was
harmful, and the Pentagon underestimated the ramifications
on its planning. Our failure to work out a diplomatic
solution in Turkey raises more serious concerns about
the effectiveness of the State Department that started
with UN Security Council madness. Certainly, comments
by Lt. Gen. William C. Wallace saying, "the
enemy we're fighting is different from the one we'd war-gamed
against," and this one from Robert Hill, defense
minister of Australia which has 2,000 troops in the Gulf
who says the Pentagon "underestimated the role of
the militias within the small cities and towns,"
are discomforting to a nation that has been given a steady
diet of how ready and prepared our troops were.
Corn
lives inside the Beltway where every subway station has
bomb-stiffing dogs so perhaps he's not aware that the
Bush administration has reneged on Homeland Security funds
at the expense of strapped local governments. Cities nationwide
are spending about $70 million per week on additional
homeland security measures due to the war with Iraq and,
well, just the reality of 'Life Under Orange.' Los Angeles
is spending $1.7 million a week. The $6.6 million Seattle
spent last year is expected to rise, and this year we've
thrown in a $63 budget gap to make things more entertaining.
Rising star Mayor of Baltimore Martin O'Malley
heads the U.S. Conference of Mayors Homeland Security
Task Force told the White House: "Mayors need direct
homeland security funding and we needed it 18 months ago.
Our domestic troops - police, fire and emergency medical
personnel – must be well funded just as our troops
in Iraq must be."
(Alexander Washburn is a volunteer staff writer for 2 Walls Webzine.)
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