Reply
Fri 8 Sep, 2006 11:57 am
http://www.variety.com/VR1117949675.html
Quote:Pols pound 'Path'
Under fire, ABC mulls yanking mini
By WILLIAM TRIPLETT
Bill Clinton
Clinton
'The Path to 9/11'
Democrats accuse ABC of painting a partisan portrait of events in its miniseries 'The Path to 9/11,' airing Sunday and Monday.
advertisement
Variety Discussions
This week, Variety readers are gabbing about Mel Gibson and "The Prisoner."Join the discussion.
H
"The Path to 9/11" is looking a lot like "The Reagans, Part II."
Bill Clinton loyalists are demanding wholesale changes to the upcoming miniseries -- and while ABC is making some snips, the alterations, insiders say, may not please the Dems.
But a bombshell decision may happen anyway: Sources close to the project say the network, which has been in a media maelstrom over the pic, is mulling the idea of yanking the mini altogether.
As for specific criticisms -- and changes -- the original mini contained a scene in which then-National Security Adviser Sandy Berger declines to give the CIA authority to capture or kill Osama bin Laden, even when CIA operatives know where the al-Qaeda leader is.
"This account has been expressly contradicted by Richard Clarke, a high-ranking counterterrorism official in both the Clinton and Bush administrations," certain lawmakers wrote in a letter to Disney topper Bob Iger.
Or at the very least they should edit it to eliminate the glaring instances of outright falsehood in the movie. Personally, I don't think I will watch it either way. It should be obvious to every thinking American that errors were made by the Clinton and Bush administrations concerning the threat of Bin Laden. I can't imagine the movie being all that interesting.
It started off as a "docu-drama" then wound up as a work of pure fiction. We don't need fictionalized accounts of the tragedy of 9/11.
NickFun wrote:It started off as a "docu-drama" then wound up as a work of pure fiction. We don't need fictionalized accounts of the tragedy of 9/11.
Sure we do, we can just add them to the fictionalized accounts of WoMD.
Maybe I'll write a screenplay about Iraq actually having WMD's. It'll make a great comedy!
I want to rewrite the whole 9/11 thing and blame it on a sexy Russian Lady Spy intent on world domination. However, her plans are foiled after 9/11 when NickFun sleeps with her and discovers her secret thus preventing several other terrorist events from occuring and making everyone love the US.
Maybe that's what they are printing in Orlando (the wholly - owned Disney property.) Here's today's Times of New York
Quote:
ABC Said to Re-Edit Key Parts of 9/11 Show
By PATRICK HEALY and JESSE McKINLEY
Published: September 8, 2006
Under growing pressure from Democrats and aides to former President Bill Clinton, ABC is re-evaluating and in some cases re-editing crucial scenes in its new mini-series "The Path to 9/11" to soften its portrait of the Clinton administration's pursuit of Osama bin Laden, according to people involved in the project.
Among the changes, ABC is altering one scene in which an actor playing Samuel R. Berger, the former national security adviser, abruptly hangs up on a C.I.A. officer during a critical moment in a military operation, according to Thomas H. Kean, a consultant on the ABC project and co-chairman of the federal Sept. 11 commission.
Mr. Berger has said that the scene is a fiction, and Mr. Kean, in an interview, said that he believed Mr. Berger was correct and that ABC was making appropriate changes.
The reassessment came as two Clinton aides mounted an unusual attack last night on the motives of Mr. Kean, a Republican and a former governor of New Jersey. In a letter to Mr. Kean, the two aides, Bruce R. Lindsey and Douglas Band, wrote that his defense of the mini-series "is destroying the bipartisan aura of the 9/11 Commission," on whose findings the project is partly based. They asserted that Mr. Kean was driven by payments from ABC or his own partisan politics.
Mr. Kean, who called Mr. Clinton a good friend, said it was outrageous to suggest he was being swayed by money or politics, and added that any fee he received would be donated to charity. He said he stood by the film because he believed it would draw attention to the commission's security recommendations, many of which have not been put into effect, and because the film did not pretend to be a documentary.
Yet Mr. Kean, as well as other members of the commission, did say they were concerned that their widely praised investigation of the Sept. 11 attacks might be diminished in some way by the mini-series.
"Mini-series often make things more dramatic by fictionalizing," Mr. Kean said. "I don't think the fictional moments reflect on the work of the commission, but I do hope that the controversy doesn't tarnish it. ABC is trying to be as accurate as possible."
Democrats and allies of Mr. Clinton unleashed full-throated appeals to ABC yesterday to cancel the broadcast, which is scheduled for Sunday and Monday nights. The Senate Democratic leadership sent a letter to Robert A. Iger, the chief executive of the Walt Disney Company, ABC's parent, saying that broadcasting the film "would be a gross miscarriage of your corporate and civic responsibility."
The national Democratic Party drew more than 100,000 signatures in 24 hours to a petition of complaint that it plans to give to ABC today.
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, one of 10 senators at a news conference yesterday where the mini-series came up, left before she could be asked about it. A small throng of reporters who followed her out of the building toward her office were kept at bay by her aides.
The changes to the mini-series are still being made inside an editing suite in Los Angeles, with a variety of creative staff members and executives, including Marc Platt, the executive producer, who has been monitoring the editing from London, and David L. Cunningham, the director, who is being consulted at his home in Hawaii.
Mr. Kean said that two other parts of the film are also under review. One is a scene where an actress playing former Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright is apparently obstructing efforts to capture Mr. bin Laden. The other part suggests that Mr. Clinton was too distracted by impeachment and his marital problems to fully focus on Mr. bin Laden.
Mr. Platt said that he could not offer specifics about what scenes were being examined, but that editing was going on and "will continue to, if needed until we broadcast."
"From Day 1, we've examined any issue or question that's arisen," he said. "And we'll continue to do so until the last possible moment."
Mr. Kean said he was surprised by the outcry, since most of the critics have not seen the film. He said Mr. Clinton had spoken directly to Mr. Iger last Friday; Clinton aides declined to comment.
Several 9/11 commission members said yesterday that they respected Mr. Kean immensely but that they were concerned about the ABC project and his role in it. One of them, Timothy J. Roemer, a Democrat, said he called Mr. Kean yesterday to urge ABC to make changes. Another, Jamie S. Gorelick, a former Clinton administration official, wrote Mr. Iger yesterday that the nation and schoolchildren would be poorly served if they drew lessons from the mini-series that were inaccurate.
Scholastic, the children's publishing company, which had been working with ABC to use "The Path to 9/11" as a teaching tool, said yesterday that it was removing materials related to the film from its Web site. A spokeswoman said a new study guide was being prepared that would explain the difference between a docudrama and a documentary.
Anne E. Kornblut contributed reporting from Washington.
========
I have to tell you, if I was a public figure like Albright or Berger and these ABC rightwingers showed what it purported to be my official actions in an inaccurate manner, perhaps even implying dereliction of duty, I'd sue the crap out of them.
That's probably why you won't see either the scene (completely made up) of Berger hanging up on a CIA agent about to spring a trap on OBL nor the one where Albright is shown saying something about warning the Pakistanis about the missile strikes. Didn't happen.
Joe(What the hell is going on at ABC?)Nation
Suing them would be perfect. Just like the burglar who falls through the skylight.
LORD KNOWS they have enough attorneys in their pocket to do it. Even Clinton could........he was eligible to get his Arkansas law license back in April I believe. Perhaps he needed to take the bar again, in which case he might as well carpetbag it up to NY and get one there, don't you think?
Joe Nation wrote:
I have to tell you, if I was a public figure like Albright or Berger and these ABC rightwingers showed what it purported to be my official actions in an inaccurate manner, perhaps even implying dereliction of duty, I'd sue the crap out of them.
That's probably why you won't see either the scene (completely made up) of Berger hanging up on a CIA agent about to spring a trap on OBL nor the one where Albright is shown saying something about warning the Pakistanis about the missile strikes. Didn't happen.
Joe(What the hell is going on at ABC?)Nation
You'd sue and your case would be thrown out so quickly it'd make your head spin. You'd look foolish and the general public would then think that the story IS true. And that's exactly what Albright, Berger, etc won't sue just as other's haven't in the past.
fishin wrote:Joe Nation wrote:
I have to tell you, if I was a public figure like Albright or Berger and these ABC rightwingers showed what it purported to be my official actions in an inaccurate manner, perhaps even implying dereliction of duty, I'd sue the crap out of them.
That's probably why you won't see either the scene (completely made up) of Berger hanging up on a CIA agent about to spring a trap on OBL nor the one where Albright is shown saying something about warning the Pakistanis about the missile strikes. Didn't happen.
Joe(What the hell is going on at ABC?)Nation
You'd sue and your case would be thrown out so quickly it'd make your head spin. You'd look foolish and the general public would then think that the story IS true. And that's exactly what Albright, Berger, etc won't sue just as other's haven't in the past.
Oh you mean like General Westmoreland?
Roxxxanne wrote:fishin wrote:Joe Nation wrote:
I have to tell you, if I was a public figure like Albright or Berger and these ABC rightwingers showed what it purported to be my official actions in an inaccurate manner, perhaps even implying dereliction of duty, I'd sue the crap out of them.
That's probably why you won't see either the scene (completely made up) of Berger hanging up on a CIA agent about to spring a trap on OBL nor the one where Albright is shown saying something about warning the Pakistanis about the missile strikes. Didn't happen.
Joe(What the hell is going on at ABC?)Nation
You'd sue and your case would be thrown out so quickly it'd make your head spin. You'd look foolish and the general public would then think that the story IS true. And that's exactly what Albright, Berger, etc won't sue just as other's haven't in the past.
Oh you mean like General Westmoreland?
Westmoreland sued over a documentary that had no disclaimers stating that any of it had been fictionalized or dramaticized - not a drama or docu-drama. The Westmoreland documentary was presented as absolute truth.
Keep trying though. You continue to demonstrate your inability to grasp any concept of law.
Secret Right-Wing Network Behind ABC's 9/11 Deception
If ABC considers this to be a dramatization, not a documentary, why did it's producer plan to distribute it along with teaching tools to school across the country? ---BBB
Discover the Secret Right-Wing Network Behind ABC's 9/11 Deception
by Max Blumenthal
09.08.2006
Less than 72 hours before ABC's "The Path to 9/11" is scheduled to air, the network is suddenly under siege. On Tuesday, ABC was forced to concede that "The Path to 9/11" is "a dramatization, not a documentary." The film deceptively invents scenes to depict former President Bill Clinton's handling of the Al Qaeda threat.
Now, ABC claims to be is editing those false sequences to satisfy critics so the show can go on -- even if it still remains a gross distortion of history. And as it does so, ABC advances the illusion that the deceptive nature of "The Path to 9/11" is an honest mistake committed by a hardworking but admittedly fumbling team of well-intentioned Hollywood professionals who wanted nothing less than to entertain America. But this is another Big Lie.
In fact, "The Path to 9/11" is produced and promoted by a well-honed propaganda operation consisting of a network of little-known right-wingers working from within Hollywood to counter its supposedly liberal bias. This is the network within the ABC network. Its godfather is far right activist David Horowitz, who has worked for more than a decade to establish a right-wing presence in Hollywood and to discredit mainstream film and TV production. On this project, he is working with a secretive evangelical religious right group founded by The Path to 9/11's director David Cunningham that proclaims its goal to "transform Hollywood" in line with its messianic vision.
Before The Path to 9/11 entered the production stage, Disney/ABC contracted David Cunningham as the film's director. Cunningham is no ordinary Hollywood journeyman. He is in fact the son of Loren Cunningham, founder of the right-wing evangelical group Youth With A Mission (YWAM). The young Cunningham helped found an auxiliary of his father's group called The Film Institute (TFI), which, according to its mission statement, is "dedicated to a Godly transformation and revolution TO and THROUGH the Film and Televisionindustry." As part of TFI's long-term strategy, Cunningham helped place interns from Youth With A Mission's in film industry jobs "so that they can begin to impact and transform Hollywood from the inside out," according to a YWAM report.
Last June, Cunningham's TFI announced it was producing its first film, mysteriously titled "Untitled History Project." "TFI's first project is a doozy," a newsletter to YWAM members read. "Simply being referred to as: The Untitled History Project, it is already being called the television event of the decade and not one second has been put to film yet. Talk about great expectations!" (A web edition of the newsletter was mysteriously deleted yesterday but has been cached on Google at the link above).
The following month, on July 28, the New York Post reported that ABC was filming a mini-series "under a shroud of secrecy" about the 9/11 attacks. "At the moment, ABC officials are calling the miniseries 'Untitled Commission Report' and producers refer to it as the 'Untitled History Project,'" the Post noted.
Early on, Cunningham had recruited a young Iranian-American screenwriter named Cyrus Nowrasteh to
write the script of his secretive "Untitled" film. Not only is Nowrasteh an outspoken conservative, he is also a fervent member of the emerging network of right-wing people burrowing into the film industry with ulterior sectarian political and religious agendas, like Cunningham.
Nowrasteh's conservatism was on display when he appeared as a featured speaker at the Liberty Film Festival (LFF), an annual event founded in 2004 to premier and promote conservative-themed films supposedly too "politically incorrect" to gain acceptance at mainstream film festivals. This June, while The Path to 9/11 was being filmed, LFF founders Govindini Murty and Jason Apuzzo -- both friends of Nowrasteh -- announced they were "partnering" with right-wing activist David Horowitz. Indeed, the 2006 LFF is listed as "A Program of the David Horowitz Freedom Center."
Since the inauguration of Bill Clinton in 1992, Horowitz has labored to create a network of politically active conservatives in Hollywood. His Hollywood nest centers around his Wednesday Morning Club, a
weekly meet-and-greet session for Left Coast conservatives that has been graced with speeches by
the likes of Newt Gingrich, Victor Davis Hanson and Christopher Hitchens. The group's headquarters are at the offices of Horowitz's Center for the Study of Popular Culture, a "think tank" bankrolled for years with millions by right-wing sugardaddies like eccentric far right billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife. (Scaife
financed the Arkansas Project, a $2.3 million dirty tricks operation that included paying sources for
negative stories about Bill Clinton that turned out to be false.)
With the LFF now under Horowitz's control, his political machine began drumming up support for Cunningham and Nowrasteh's "Untitled" project, which finally was revealed in late summer as "The Path to 9/11." Horowitz's PR blitz began with an August 16 interview with Nowrasteh on his FrontPageMag webzine. In the interview, Nowrasteh foreshadowed the film's assault on Clinton's record on fighting terror. "The 9/11 report details the Clinton's administration's response -- or lack of response -- to Al Qaeda and how this emboldened Bin Laden to keep attacking American interests," Nowrasteh told FrontPageMag's Jamie Glazov. "There simply was no response. Nothing."
A week later, ABC hosted LFF co-founder Murty and several other conservative operatives at an advance
screening of The Path to 9/11. (While ABC provided 900 DVDs of the film to conservatives, Clinton administration officials and objective reviewers from mainstream outlets were denied them.) Murty returned with a glowing review for FrontPageMag that emphasized the film's partisan nature. "'The Path to 9/11' is one of the best, most intelligent, most pro-American miniseries I've ever seen on TV, and conservatives should support
it and promote it as vigorously as possible," Murty wrote. As a result of the special access granted by ABC, Murty's article was the first published review of The Path to 9/11, preceding those by the New York Times and LA Times by more than a week.
Murty followed her review with a blast email to conservative websites such as Liberty Post and Free Republic on September 1 urging their readers to throw their weight behind ABC's mini-series. "Please do everything you can to spread the word about this excellent miniseries," Murty wrote, "so that 'The Path to 9/11' gets the highest ratings possible when it airs on September 10 & 11! If this show gets huge ratings, then ABC will be more likely to produce pro-American movies and TV shows in the future!"
Murty's efforts were supported by Appuzo, who handles LFF's heavily-trafficked blog, Libertas. Appuzo was instrumental in marketing The Path to 9/11 to conservatives, writing in a blog post on September 2, "Make no mistake about what this film does, among other things: it places the question of the Clinton Administration's culpability for the 9/11 attacks front and center... Bravo to Cyrus Nowrasteh and David
Cunningham for creating this gritty, stylish and gripping piece of entertainment."
When a group of leading Senate Democrats sent a letter to ABC CEO Robert Iger urging him to cancel The Path to 9/11 because of its glaring factual errors and distortions, Apuzzo launched a retaliatory campaign to paint the Democrats as foes of free speech. "Here at LIBERTAS we urge the public to make noise over this, and to demand that Democrats back down," he wrote on September 7th. "What is at stake is nothing short of the 1st Amendment."
At FrontPageMag, Horowitz singled out Nowrasteh as the victim. "The attacks by former president Bill Clinton, former Clinton Administration officials and Democratic US senators on Cyrus Nowrasteh's ABC
mini-series "The Path to 9/11" are easily the gravest and most brazen and damaging governmental attacks on the civil liberties of ordinary Americans since 9/11," Horowitz declared.
Now, as discussion grows over the false character of The Path to 9/11, the right-wing network that brought it to fruition is ratcheting up its PR efforts. Murty will appear tonight on CNN's Glenn Beck
show and The Situation Room, according to Libertas in order to respond to "the major disinformation campaign now being run by Democrats to block the truth about what actually happened during the Clinton years."
While this network claims its success and postures as the true victims, the ABC network suffers a PR catastrophe. It's almost as though it was complacent about an attack on its reputation by a band of political terrorists.
fishin wrote:Roxxxanne wrote:fishin wrote:Joe Nation wrote:
I have to tell you, if I was a public figure like Albright or Berger and these ABC rightwingers showed what it purported to be my official actions in an inaccurate manner, perhaps even implying dereliction of duty, I'd sue the crap out of them.
That's probably why you won't see either the scene (completely made up) of Berger hanging up on a CIA agent about to spring a trap on OBL nor the one where Albright is shown saying something about warning the Pakistanis about the missile strikes. Didn't happen.
Joe(What the hell is going on at ABC?)Nation
You'd sue and your case would be thrown out so quickly it'd make your head spin. You'd look foolish and the general public would then think that the story IS true. And that's exactly what Albright, Berger, etc won't sue just as other's haven't in the past.
Oh you mean like General Westmoreland?
Westmoreland sued over a documentary that had no disclaimers stating that any of it had been fictionalized or dramaticized - not a drama or docu-drama. The Westmoreland documentary was presented as absolute truth.
Keep trying though. You continue to demonstrate your inability to grasp any concept of law.
You keep demonstating your inability to grasp English. I never said that ABC should be sued. What I have said is that ABC is violating its FCC mandate to broadcast in the public interest.
Historians' Open Letter to ABC
Historians' Open Letter to ABC
by Rick Perlstein
09.08.2006
A group of leading American historians today sent the following letter to Mr. Robert Iger of ABC. Stressing the significance of the "traumatic" events of 9/11, the signers of this letter are calling on Mr. Iger to stand up for responsible media treatments of such important historical moments and withdraw the program from circulation.
The growing list of signatories will be updated at openlettertoabc.blogspot.com.
The text of the letter follows.
Dear Robert Iger:
We write as professional historians, who are deeply concerned by the continuing reports about ABC's scheduled broadcast of "The Path to 9/11." These reports document that this drama contains numerous flagrant falsehoods about critical events in recent American history. The key participants and eyewitnesses to these events state that the script distorts and even fabricates evidence into order to mislead viewers about the responsibility of numerous American officials for allegedly ignoring the terrorist threat before 2000.
The claim by the show's producers, broadcaster, and defenders, that these falsehoods are permissible because the show is merely a dramatization, is disingenuous and dangerous given their assertions that the show is also based on authoritative historical evidence. Whatever ABC's motivations might be, broadcasting these falsehoods, connected to the most traumatic historical event of our times, would be a gross disservice to the public. A responsible broadcast network should have nothing to do with the falsification of history, except to expose it. We strongly urge you to halt the show's broadcast and prevent misinforming Americans about their history.
Sincerely,
Arthur Schlesinger
Sean Wilentz, Princeton University
Michael Kazin, Georgetown University
Lizbeth Cohen, Harvard University,
Nicholas Salvatore, Cornell University;
Ted Widmer, Brown University;
Rick Perlstein, Independent Scholar;
David Blight, Yale University;
Eric Alterman, City University of New York.
Maurice Isserman, Hamilton College
(List in formation)
Roxxxanne wrote:fishin wrote:Roxxxanne wrote:fishin wrote:Joe Nation wrote:
I have to tell you, if I was a public figure like Albright or Berger and these ABC rightwingers showed what it purported to be my official actions in an inaccurate manner, perhaps even implying dereliction of duty, I'd sue the crap out of them.
That's probably why you won't see either the scene (completely made up) of Berger hanging up on a CIA agent about to spring a trap on OBL nor the one where Albright is shown saying something about warning the Pakistanis about the missile strikes. Didn't happen.
Joe(What the hell is going on at ABC?)Nation
You'd sue and your case would be thrown out so quickly it'd make your head spin. You'd look foolish and the general public would then think that the story IS true. And that's exactly what Albright, Berger, etc won't sue just as other's haven't in the past.
Oh you mean like General Westmoreland?
Westmoreland sued over a documentary that had no disclaimers stating that any of it had been fictionalized or dramaticized - not a drama or docu-drama. The Westmoreland documentary was presented as absolute truth.
Keep trying though. You continue to demonstrate your inability to grasp any concept of law.
You keep demonstating your inability to grasp English. I never said that ABC should be sued. What I have said is that ABC is violating its FCC mandate to broadcast in the public interest.
And yet you threw the Westmoreland comment out there which refers to a libel lawsuit - it had nothing to do with the FCC at all...
Maybe you should reread the posts you've been quoting here. Apparently it's you with the reading comprehension problem since the comments you first quoted and remarked on specifically referred to quotes from Joe Nation stating he would sue if he were in their shoes.
There hasn't been a single mention of the FCC in this thread up until your last post there. Oh my... don't you look foolish - not that this would be unusual for you.
Re: Historians' Open Letter to ABC
BumbleBeeBoogie wrote:Historians' Open Letter to ABC
by Rick Perlstein
09.08.2006
A group of leading American historians today sent the following letter to Mr. Robert Iger of ABC. Stressing the significance of the "traumatic" events of 9/11, the signers of this letter are calling on Mr. Iger to stand up for responsible media treatments of such important historical moments and withdraw the program from circulation.
<<<<snip>>>>>
Sincerely,
Arthur Schlesinger
Sean Wilentz, Princeton University
Michael Kazin, Georgetown University
Lizbeth Cohen, Harvard University,
Nicholas Salvatore, Cornell University;
Ted Widmer, Brown University;
Rick Perlstein, Independent Scholar;
David Blight, Yale University;
Eric Alterman, City University of New York.
Maurice Isserman, Hamilton College
(List in formation)
If these historians really were impartial and concerned primarly for historical accuracy, we should give their letter some credence. However, each and every one of these particular historians are unabashedly liberal and many are longtime apologists for Clinton. The very fact that there are no signatories that are conservative (nor even any whose political views remain hidden from even a cursory google search) demonstrate that the letter is driven by partisan political agendas and not concerns for historical accuracy. It should be ignored by both ABC, the media, and the general public.
Their are no liberals in higher education, hadn't you heard?
Quote:....historians are unabashedly liberal and many are longtime apologists for Clinton.
Clinton doesn't require apologists. Just people who are acauainted with the history of the American Presidency.
Stumble It!
Tweet This
Bookmark on Delicious
Share on Facebook
Share on MySpace