Michael Moore, Hero or Rogue

blatham wrote:

In other words, willful ignorance can point in two directions as regards what a person actually is referring to when he/she makes a generalization.

Sure, but au1929's topic in this thread -- please correct me if I'm wrong, au -- was Mr. Moore's utterances when talking to foreign audiences. It was not about his movies, which are indeed somewhat more differentiated, and it was not about other articles by David Brooks. The topic is how Mr. Moore talks to foreign audiences, as reported in this particular Op-Ed by Mr. Brooks.

On this topic, I am, while you are not, in a position to tell whether Brooks is correct -- and it turns out that he is. You are welcome to evade this subject by talking about something else instead, and you are welcome to try and sugar-coat Moore's rants to foreign audiences as meaning something different than what he actually said. But when you do, bastards like me will accuse you of evasion and willful ignorance. Such is life.

PS: I already read Krugman's Op-Ed, was tempted to start a thread "Paul Krugman writes his first bad article", but refrained. Basically Krugman is saying, 'this is a flawed movie, but I happen to like its conclusions so I support it.' It's not bad enough to change my avatar, but I'm disappointed. This falls short of Krugman's usual standard of intellectual honesty.

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Thanks for the link, LW.

Thomas

If you hold, with Krugman, that the regular media has NOT being doing its job, I'll be happy to discuss with you and anyone else just why that might be.

If you don't hold with Krugman that democracy in America is in crisis, I'll be happy to discuss that with you too.

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It would be nice to read the entire speech, if in fact this was ever in a speech. It's presumably from an interview and although the original article is from November 2003, it doesn't say when the interview took place.

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blatham wrote:

Thanks for the link, LW.

Thomas

If you hold, with Krugman, that the regular media has NOT being doing its job, I'll be happy to discuss with you and anyone else just why that might be.

If you don't hold with Krugman that democracy in America is in crisis, I'll be happy to discuss that with you too.

The last time I checked, Paul Krugman was an Op-Ed columnist for the New York Times. Are you saying the Times isn't part of the regular media?

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thomas

Whether Brooks is correct about what? What or whom is Moore is thinking of when he speaks? Whether he can be snide? I've heard Moore speak likely more often than you or Brooks, so sorry, but I'm not going to accept that your subjective sense of what is communicated as gospel.

And what relevance is there in his audience (in your case) being non-American? And do you assume he speaks (significantly) differently to a European audience than an American audience? Why?

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I'm suspicious of quotes taken out of context and the proliferated around the Interent on every rightwing blog, forum and Website as gospel. Especially since, like any rumor, it's been altered many times, presented as if it was written yesterday (in fact, it's eight months old) and is presented out of context in the first place. If this was an "interview," where is the question and answer text? Sorry, y'all might be fooled but I'm not willing to take this as written in stone. Journalists report inaccuracies too much of the time, especially on the Internet. Believe half of what you read.

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(It's too obvious that this was drudged (sic) up because of the success of F9/11).

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Thomas wrote:

blatham wrote:
Thanks for the link, LW.

Thomas

If you hold, with Krugman, that the regular media has NOT being doing its job, I'll be happy to discuss with you and anyone else just why that might be.

If you don't hold with Krugman that democracy in America is in crisis, I'll be happy to discuss that with you too.

The last time I checked, Paul Krugman was an Op-Ed columnist for the New York Times. Are you saying the Times isn't part of the regular media?

That is either purposefully obtuse or simply contrarian to make a cheap point. If you wish to talk seriously, let me know.

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Lightwizard wrote:

It would be nice to read the entire speech, if in fact this was ever in a speech. It's presumably from an interview and although the original article is from November 2003, it doesn't say when the interview took place.

The Moore performance in Munich happened in mid-November 2003 as part of a book tour. The bit you quoted about Americans being stupid happened at the end of the show, after the actual book-reading. My impression is that this was part of Moore's standard repertoire, though I have no way of knowing. At the end of the book reading, he asked "an intelligent American" and "a stupid German" to come forward, and asked both of them to find some obscure Asian and African countries. The "stupid German" did better than "the intelligent American", which led to a 5-minute speech about the stupidity of Americans, and how important it is for Europeans to keep their school systems the way they are. I'm not sure whether More had set things up to come out that way. The quizz seemed rather spontaneous to me at the time, but I've been having second thoughts since.

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LW

Indeed. There's a full court press on from the right wing media to attempt to discredit Moore and the film.

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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5335853/site/newsweek

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I am dubious of the press, especially how reputable the online journals are according to their credentials (more often nearly non-existent). There are many sites who characterize it as a major speech. Now we are beginning to see that it is hearsay with little or no verification. Sorry, no cigar (and it's not one of Bill's cigars).

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blatham wrote:

That is either purposefully obtuse or simply contrarian to make a cheap point. If you wish to talk seriously, let me know.

The "cheap point", if you want to call it that, is that the statement you want me to agree to is void of content unless you define "the regular media" and what "doing its job" means. As far as I am concerned, I have seen plenty of good reporting in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post. Commentators of these newspapers disagreed on whether the war on Iraq was worth fighting, and whether Bush's budgets were sound, but I didn't get the impression that these three newspapers had failed to do their jobs. I don't watch American TV in Germany so can't comment on that part of the media, but I disagree with Krugman's statement when phrased as rigorously as he phrased it.

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McG

Thanks for that link. The criticisms in it seem those of Krugman. Agreed?

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Thomas

Quote:

Sure, but au1929's topic in this thread -- please correct me if I'm wrong, au -- was Mr. Moore's utterances when talking to foreign audiences. It was not about his movies,

You are correct that was indeed the basis for the thread. I made that, at least I thought I did, very clear at the outset. However, as we all know, these threads often meander off topic.

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Moore has disputed Isikoff's distortions on his distortions.

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This is from Michael Reagan, the "sainted" Ronald's son.

Quote:

Face it, Michael Moore hates America. He goes abroad and tells the people in Europe that we are the dumbest people on earth. ''We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance," he told the British press. "We don't know about anything that's happening outside our country. Our stupidity is embarrassing.''

He explained 9/11 by blaming the United States: ''We, the United States of America, are culpable in committing so many acts of terror and bloodshed that we had better get a clue about the culture of violence in which we have been active participants.''

Quote:

This goes beyond hate crime - it is nothing less than treason. And the Democrats by aiding and abetting and praising this traitorous person, share his guilt.

I wonder, can you argue against Michael Moore's contention and say that Americans are not insulated from world news?

<(I had to laugh, Thomas, that you bring up the NYT, WA Post, & WSJ... haha... like you think a lot of Americans read them... hahaha.)

I doubt it, or else you've never seen American television news. I doubt it if you knew that most Americans don't even read their local newspapers and only get their news from teevee. They have willingly accepted this administration's clever bait & switch that Saddam Hussein somehow caused the terrorism acts at the WTC and the Pentagon. Most don't even know (or forgot if they did know) that we supported Hussein; indeed, that we supported bin Laden with their tax dollars.>

Can you argue against Michael Moore's contention that Americans willfully refuse to acknowledge the horrible things we have done or that have been done so we can live our sheep-like lives?

<I doubt it. America is in the midst of a pompous national mourning for a president who supported violence in Central America, Africa and Asia, all the while smiling and glad-handing people like the glib actor he was. Ronald Reagan is being called the person who single-handedly tore down the Berlin Wall. How can any German stand for that?>

And what really gets my blood boiling is that I am called a traitor if I question the motives of the administration. I am supposedly committing treason if I want to know the real news. I repeat, Americans are stupid and are very likely to stupidly vote for this administration again.

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au1929 wrote:

Thomas

Quote:
Sure, but au1929's topic in this thread -- please correct me if I'm wrong, au -- was Mr. Moore's utterances when talking to foreign audiences. It was not about his movies,

You are correct that was indeed the basis for the thread. I made that, at least I thought I did, very clear at the outset. However, as we all know, these threads often meander off topic.

I know, and that's perfectly fine with me. I've been known to meander threads off-topic myself. But when I say something on-topic, and someone who meandered off-topic reacts as if I had missed the point and ought to stick off the topic, that annoys me. Hence my reaction to Blatham's first post today.

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Why isn't "fat dumba$$" one of the options in the title of this thread?

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I always appreciate your self-deprecating humor.

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Michael Moore, Hero or Rogue

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