Flat-out phony

Have you seen it? what are your own thoughts?

"that huge, and corrupt, war profiteer". . .whoa. . you mean Halliburton, right? Or is a business that fleeces American taxpayers just part of doing business and rebuilding Iraq?

Haven't seen it, won't see it. Moore is clearly a pathological liar and from the reviews (I've read them from the left and right) it seems obvious that this latest work is as incoherent and dishonest as his two prior works. There are reasonable and truthful points to be made in opposition to Bush and the war, but is an embarrasment to rational discourse when otherwise thoughtful people, blinded by hatred for Bush, accept Moore's bull uncritically and gloss over the distortions and ommissions. Sometimes people of intellectual courage need to stand up to the messenger when he is corrupt, even though they may agree with the message. As one anti-war reviewer wrote quoting another leftish reviewer: "He infuriates me because he makes my arguments badly."

Moore has made millions with his dishonesty, a petty hukster preying on peoples emotions during this difficult time in the world. I find that despicable--like the fraud of John Edward, who cares not for integrity or truth, just making a buck off of people's heart break.

While I cannot but be embarrassed by Moore's glibness, cruelty, and ingorance, I am astonished by how many conservatives--including Chris!--are willing to hazard an opinion about the movie without having seen it. It strikes me as a little intellectually fatuous. Why not see it? Or rather: if you can be bothered to engage with Moore, at least engage with him from a position of knowledge.

I am going to see it this evening, at the Grand Lake Theater in Oakland, where (I have been told) an animated audience likes to talk back to the screen. As in: "You tell them, Michael" or "That's right!" or "Hmmm-mmm!" I will report back.

What an absurd charge to make. Plenty, if not most, of the events we discuss and debate in life we learn about second hand--through reporting. The reporting on what's in the Moore film has been quite thorough. I don't need to give Moore my money and waste two hours of my life just too see the garbage that has already been so well documented elsewhere.

I agree with Jason: see it before you blast it as falsehood. The opportunity is there (unlike being in Iraq and Blogging about it). Suit yourself, but all it sounds like is that your are parroting every other argument against Moore and his movie without seeing it yourself. Maybe you can wait until it comes out on DVD and it might be a bit cheaper...

If this is your arguement: "Sometimes people of intellectual courage need to stand up to the messenger when he is corrupt, even though they may agree with the message", then why arent you vehemently opposed to many of the Bush Admin policies yourself?

It sounds like you can't even handle the truths (whatever they may be) in the movie because of your "blind hatred" for Moore in your own argument for not seeing it. Too much hatred from everywhere these days.

ps. why no post on Reagan and his legacy? or did I just miss it on the website?

Thanks for the pop-psycology Mike. Though we've never met, apparently you've peered deeply into my soul and discovered that the obvious, often reported, rarely defended, lies and distortion in Michael Moore's film aren't the real reason I won't see this mocumentary, but in fact it's because I "can't handle the truth." How very "A Few Good Men" of you! Again it seems you find it easier to disparage my motives than to actually address my content.

Believe what you will--how can I argue with a POV not rationally arrived at? Let me remind you that Hitchens is no conservative, and hardly an uncritcal supporter of Bush. Here's another pan of the movie by a Democrat: http://www.buzzmachine.com/archives/20040629.html#007402

And even the corrupt Paul Krugman (http://www.iht.com/articles/527698.html), scion of the left, admits that "Viewers may come away from Moore's movie believing some things that probably aren't true" though apparently actual truth and statistical truth (which are lacking in this movie) are not as important as "essential truths," which as far as I can tell are anecdotes that support a particular political agenda.

There is so much to do in life--so much to read, so much to experience--that I think life is just too short to waste on Michael Moore. The fact that good hearted, thoughtful leftists have wasted so much time with this fraud is very disheartening. But even worse, since it is taken as gospel from the left that Bush lied (you cite it yourself and I hear it over and over. I don't buy it personally, but it is certainly a cornerstone of the liberal critique) how valid is that critique from a community that cared not one wit when Clinton was proven to have lied under oath, and when pillars of the left wing, like Krugman, have to engage in newsspeak to explain why Moore's lies don't really matter. Either you care about lying or you don't. But the notion that while the FACTS of the movie are untrue, the IMPRESSION that the faulty facts portray is essentially true seems oxymoronic to me.

I don't believe even the "essential" truths of this movie, as reported repeatedly from the left and the right, that the Bush administration, not Islamic facism and jihadism, are the real villians here. Dispute that if you will, but how about some facts?

Finally, I never said I hate Moore, though I admit to no fondness for him. Any nothing about my dislike for this guy is "blind"--I've done a fair amount of reading on this. I respect anyone who wants to make a thoughtful critique of Bush policy, but I think it is a fraud to make an emotional critique, based on disortion and lies, and that this deserves condemnation. One can be intellectually consistent by condemning both Moore and Bush, but I don't see how it's intellectually consistent to condemn the "lies" of Bush but to brush aside the lies of Moore.

I agree 100% with Chris's last post on this topic (what has happened to me?).

Without reiterating (too much) the criticisms of Moore that Chris, Mr. Hitchins, Mr. Krugman and others so elequently laid out, at a minimum shouldn't reviewers/supporters of the film hold Mr. Moore to the same level of scrutiny that President Bush is held? To do less is intellectually dishonest and reveals one as a mere partisan rather than a proponent.