House of Pain watches a film by a Pain in the Ass

Perhaps I've been influenced by the propagandist named Michael Moore, whose movie I watched last night.

It was interesting to finally see the techniques he used in this film, which to me looked an awful lot like the way he presented 'Bowling for Columbine'. What particularly struck me about this film? Several things. I will comment on some of them below:

1. The film seems to be geared to three types of people: The uninformed, the anti-Bush crowd (the majority of whom may call themselves anti-Bush, but they really are uninformed), and the foreigners. Why could this not be geared towards people like me? The B.S. flag was raised a total of 5 times within the first three minutes of the film. And from that point on, Moore got a most incredulous eye from me, and I caught myself quite a few times shaking my head at the way Moore insults the intelligence of most Americans.

2. Military personnel should watch this film. I can guarantee you they would be incensed with the low esteem he places on our military. On one hand, Moore coddles the poor young enlisted, along with their families, for being "drafted into the military machine", and on the other, he slaps them in the face by portraying them as killers of the innocent. This REALLY pissed me off.

Perhaps Moore couldn't be in the military because he was too much of a fat ass. Moore's focus on class struggle about who actually enlists in the military? Well, I can't deny that. Just remember that the military is a way for the have-nots to become the have's. In my eight years (including NROTC) in the Navy, I have personally seen and heard stories of people turning their lives around because of the US military. Some of the brightest people I have met were in the military.

This is how an all-volunteer force works. You need to have recruiters; it would be irresponsible/impossible to have a military otherwise. And Moore going to Washington to recruit the sons and daughters of Congressmen? Give me a break--I've got two big problems with this recruiting stunt. First, the two Marine soldiers he follows in Flint, MI are trained recruiters. That's how they get people to sign on. It's salesmanship, and they're good at it. Finally, in Washington D.C. where Moore pulls his recruiting stunt along with a disgruntled Marine, not only do more people in Congress have sons, daughters, nieces and nephews in the military than is stated by Moore, but Congressmen also know Moore's agenda. If I was a Congressman, I wouldn't listen to this guy, and he obviously doesn't have the professional sales technique of the two marines in Flint, MI. Besides, if he actually recruited some Congressman or Woman's son or daughter, the entire segment would be ruined. Moore is also not a have-not. Did you know that his daughter attends an expensive private school? Perhaps he should go to Germany where the government requires that all citizens do a term of military service, and then his daughter can go into the military for a country whose people are much smarter than Americans. But that's enough of that.

3. Moore's vendetta against the Fox News Channel. Michael, Michael, Michael...the reason why people watch the Fox News Channel is because they're already familiar with the alternatives. And despite your belief that Fox News caused Gore to lose the election, I didn't know that news channels were the end-all be-all with determining elections. And aren't you disenfranchising the voters that actually voted for and elected Bush for president in Florida?? Yup, I think so. And guess what--just as you claim that 'numerous independent investigations' say that Gore won Florida, I know that there are other independent investigations conducted not only just after the election, but a year afterwards when the time was taken to say that Bush would have won in Florida anyways. Yeah, maybe there were invalid ballots. Maybe next time people will take the time to not be lazy about how they punch their ballot.

4. I noticed that Moore leads the people he interviews, much like lawyers sometimes lead witnesses on a witness stand. What does that mean?
leading
1) v. short for "leading the witness," in which the attorney during a trial or deposition asks questions in a form in which he/she puts words in the mouth of the witness or suggests the answer. Leading is improper if the attorney is questioning a witness called by that attorney and presumably friendly to the attorney's side of the case. Thus, the opposing attorney will object that a question is "leading," and if so the judge will sustain (uphold) the objection and prohibit the question in that form...

Watch the movie, and you will notice this happening a couple of times. It can certainly help you make your case, that's for sure. I'm suprised I haven't heard of anyone else picking this up.

5. Moore for some reason does not even mention Bush's religious conviction. It puzzles me because it would seem to me to be a divisive issue for Moore to criticize. Perhaps that will come in a future film...or maybe he skips this issue altogether because he doesn't want to alienate the people on the fence he could pull to his side

6. If President Bush is so stupid, how on earth could he organize such a grand conspiracy against the American people? It's reminiscent of the mid-to-late 90's obsession with UFO conspiracy theories and all the made-for-TV crap to go along with it.

7. I find myself recalling Occam's Razor (http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/OCCAMRAZ.html) when I think about Moore's film, and I ask you to remember this logical principle when you see F911 and the ridiculous relationships he makes between President Bush and Osama Bin Laden. You will no doubt find it applicable to other parts of the film as well.

8. The film is a hit in foreign countries because it supposedly confirms the beliefs that the United States is a place full of stereotypical "fat, ugly Americans" -- overbearing to people of different cultures, oblivious to the world around them, unsophisticated, greedy, and arrogant. Isn't it ironic that they've found and befriended in Michael Moore the stereotypical American they've come to hate?

I will use a quote from F9/11 to wrap this up. It was stated by Lila Lipscomb in the final minutes of the movie, a mother exploited by Michael Moore because her son died in Iraq. "Ignorance...that's we're dealing with [in] every-day people, 'cause they think they know, but people don't know..."

The world is not an easy place. If you want to be sure you're doing the right thing and are sitting on the fence about which way to vote, be sure you know the facts, and don't be misled by believing what you see on the silver screen.