I promised myself I'd refrain from saying anything more about Fahrenheit 9/11 until I'd seen it, but want to archive this positive review, By Way of Deception, written by Stuart Klawans, the film critic for The Nation.
In response to my post regarding Hitchens' attack, a friend (y'all will know who immediately, but I'll keep the name anonymous) wrote me the following: "I really dug that piece by Christopher Hitchens from your blog. I saw him on Dennis Miller a few years back and thought he was just about spot on. He was smoking and drinking scotch the whole time too like a true journaliste'. I haven't seen the film yet either, but Moore has long bothered me and Hitchens nails the reasons why. Michael Moore is really a paddy cake and should stick to paddy cake subjects. No wonder the French love him."
Regarding those remarks, I have a few comments... One is that of the three political commentators mentioned above, Hitchens is the only true journalist and writer; Moore is a skilled provocateur, and Dennis Miller is the true paddy cake. I lost my HBO, but as of about 9 months ago I found that Dennis just isn't funny any more, unless you find smarmy frat-boy humor (e.g., jokes about turning the Middle East into a parking lot and other allegedly 'patriotic' statements) to be clever. Dennis ain't anywhere near as smart as he wants to believe, and his rightward turn and subsequent defense of the Bushies and the civil-rights violations and constitutional attacks authorized under Homeland Security just proves that he sees the world in black and white--them (those A-rabs) against us (the US of A). Moore, on the other hand, can be reductive, but at least he does do work that qualifes as, or at least draws from, investigative journalism.
Moore should definitely not stay away from the Iraq War or other difficult topics. In fact, part of what let us into the mess we're currently in is that the mainstream media i.e., the big TV networks, e.g., ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, and newspapers such as The New York Times) refrained from asking the hard questions about the Bush Administration's reasons for invading Iraq. Either the journalists were intimidated by the right-wing pundits into thinking that rigorous questioning of Bush and co. would tag them as the "liberal media" or their corporate handlers silenced them either indirectly or directly. In any case, the Bushies got a pass. The amount of attention paid to Whitewater or Monica Lewinski with Bubba's administration paled in comparison to the attention that should've been devoted to asking the hard questions about Iraq.
I don't know whether Moore asks or answers these questions in his film, but since our media failed to do so, more power to Moore for making an effort before the election to alert the American public to why the Bushies' really wanted this war with Iraq (sorry, Hitch, but helping the Kurds has nothing to do with it) and how our democracy is taking a beating as a result.
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I've seen both the film and Hitchens so I'll weigh in. Michael Moore oversimplifies, makes some pretty outrageous claims and is a blowhard. So what? Yes, parts of the film are ridiculous, many scenes are exploitative and many sections were an enormous letdown. Mr. Hitchens expects his opponents to engage in politics as if they were in a 19th century salon, with a rarefied air of men in white suits, dropping names and having a chuckle at the expense of the hoi polloi. He seems to think we're both too stupid to realize that Congresspersons cannot enlist their own children and we're also so smart that we all know that our wars are fought by the lower classes. (I would question whether this is really "common knowledge" in America, and if it is, doesn't it bother Hitchens that no one is doing anything about it?) Yes, Moore uses a stunt to make this point but politics is theater. Unless Hitchens would like to adopt Plato's position that artists and poets should be expelled from the Republic lest we be corrupted by their sophistry, persuasion comes in a variety of forms. Moore himself has admitted his movie is "Unfahrenheit." What seems far more unfair is that both Bush and Blair fudged the truth in order to gain support for the war (15 minutes to an attack, Tony?). Bush's rallying around Ground Zero seems muchg more manipulative than Moore.
Hitchens has always struck me as a bit of a media whore, now slipping into the persona of the ex-liberal gadfly (which, interestingly, Miller has also adopted, though with no trace of knowledge or, anymore, humor). He certainly has done his best to capitalize on the film, making the rounds of the talk shows to give his dignified opinion. And, take comfort Hitch, even when people stop talking about this film and aren't interested in your rants against Mother Theresa, you could always have a chair at Fox News where they would be dazzled by your stupid swipes at the French.
Anyway, if the movie isn't perfect,it does show some pretty remarkable stuff that has never and probably will never make it onto mainstream media--the scenes of the wounded soldiers (this war has generated an unusually high number of casualties--serious injuries--because body armour protects people from death, but not necessarily from serious maiming), dead Iraqi civilians, soldiers scared shitless. The best scenes have no commentary. In one, soldiers go out on a mission on Christmas Eve to find an Iraqi suspected of working with the resistance. They enter a house with no electricity (common at night in Iraq) and what results is pure pandemonium--the Iraqis are screaming and crying and the Americans are yelling and waving around flashlights and guns because they have NO TRANSLATOR with them. In another, an embedded reporter practically squeals with excitement about being in a plane and parachuting down with the troops, his voice reflecting the rapture of war and a complete loss of "journalistic objectivity". And some of the scenes have nothing to do with Iraq but are equally troubling. I, a professional political scientist, was unaware that the Congressional Black Caucus had organized a petition to challenge the 2000 election on the grounds that minorities were illegally and disproportionately barred from voting in many districts. While minority members in the House stand up to to support the petition, they do not have the ONE signature of a Senator they need for the election to be officially reviewed. It goes a long way toward explaining why minorities end up in disproportionately on the rolls of dead soldiers. But I guess since we know that racism exists, major media outlets didn't need to cover this?
Propaganda is intended to shut down discussion, debate, and democracy. It seems to me this film has done quite the opposite. I think the film ought to be discussed for both its strengths and weaknesses, and we ought to be continuing the debate about the war, the media, and the tone of political debate. However, I worry about an impulse on the left to be ultracritical of our own positions, engaging in endless handwringing, while the right continues to spew out dittoheads, Ann Coulter and Faux News. So, I read reviews (including Hitchens), I watched the film, I talked about the film with its fans and foes, and then, I went home and gave more money to the Kerry campaign.
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