QandO

July 02, 2004

Of course, its the media's fault! Doh!
Posted by McQ

Can Krugman get any more assinine in his rantings?

Since it opened, "Fahrenheit 9/11" has been a hit in both blue and red America, even at theaters close to military bases.

Yeah, like the 100 seat Cameo Art theater near Ft. Bragg, NC that Moore breathlessly reported had sold out?

There has been much tut-tutting by pundits who complain that the movie, though it has yet to be caught in any major factual errors, uses association and innuendo to create false impressions.

Does Krugman live in a parallel universe? Or in a bubble which blocks out all inconvenient fact? One would think, by his statement, that he's never heard of Newsweek and the slicing and dicing they did on many of Moore's so-called 'facts'.

And apparently, per Krugman, its kosher for Moore to use "association and innuendo to create false impressions" ... er, that is if the "facts" are not in question, I guess.

Many of these same pundits consider it bad form to make a big fuss about the Bush administration's use of association and innuendo to link the Iraq war to 9/11. Why hold a self-proclaimed polemicist to a higher standard than you hold the president of the United States?

Here Krugman repeats the "Big Lie". Its one of the "facts" the left chooses to believe despite no factual basis for its existence. One supposes that is why Krugman, unlike anyone with real intellectual honesty, is unable to find "factual error" in Moore's flight of fancy.

And for all its flaws, "Fahrenheit 9/11" performs an essential service. It would be a better movie if it didn't promote a few unproven conspiracy theories, but those theories aren't the reason why millions of people who aren't die-hard Bush-haters are flocking to see it. These people see the film to learn true stories they should have heard elsewhere, but didn't. Mr. Moore may not be considered respectable, but his film is a hit because the respectable media haven't been doing their job

Actually if its "die-hard Bush-haters" who are "flocking to see it" they swallowed the conspiracy theories years ago. They aren't learning "true stories" you nincompoop, they're having their beliefs reinforced. As for those who aren't Bush-haters, to pretend they're going to see the "truth" is laughable.

But more interestingly Krugman blames the media for Moore's flight of fantasy. That's right, it appears what Krugman expects the 'respectable media' to do is repeat the left's "association and innuendo" in order "to create false impressions" so he can call it 'the truth'.

For example, audiences are shocked by the now-famous seven minutes, when George Bush knew the nation was under attack but continued reading "My Pet Goat" with a group of children. Nobody had told them that the tales of Mr. Bush's decisiveness and bravery on that day were pure fiction.

Is that so? Since when does "7 minutes" constitute a "day", and where can Krugman produce "facts" which will back his contention that Bush's decisiveness and bravery were "pure fiction" during the rest of the 23 hours and 53 minutes of that day?

No where, of course. Blind to the fact that he looks like a fool, Krugman sticks with the extremist left dogma which says those 7 minutes are the sum of the president's reaction to 9/11 on that day. Its nonsense on a stick, but that's his story and he's sticking with it.

Or consider the Bush family's ties to the Saudis. The film suggests that Mr. Bush and his good friend Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the ambassador known to the family as Bandar Bush, have tried to cover up the extent of Saudi involvement in terrorism. This may or may not be true. But what shocks people, I think, is the fact that nobody told them about this side of Mr. Bush's life.

Uh, in a word, BS. What may actually shock them, after seeing Moore's version, is the reason nobody told them about it is because its a crock of crap, Paul. Again, read the Newsweek article ... please.

But the reality, revealed by Mr. Moore, is that Mr. Bush has always lived in a bubble of privilege. And his family, far from consisting of regular folks with deep roots in the heartland, is deeply enmeshed, financially and personally, with foreign elites — with the Saudis in particular.

Once again, Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball shred the Saudi connection for all to see ... except, obviously, Paul Krugman. When one finishes reading the actual facts as they lay them out, it is clear that Moore not only was factually in error but then used the erroneous facts to associate Bush and the Saudis in a way that was patently false. Krugman, though, is apparently too lazy to seek that out and simply repeats Moore's nonsense as truth.

Mr. Moore's greatest strength is a real empathy with working-class Americans that most journalists lack. Having stripped away Mr. Bush's common-man mask, he uses his film to make the case, in a way statistics never could, that Mr. Bush's policies favor a narrow elite at the expense of less fortunate Americans — sometimes, indeed, at the cost of their lives.

Right. The same guy who tells Europeans how disgustingly dumb Americans are is Mr. Empathy as concerns working class Americans? The same people he has consistently characterized as illiterate, provincial and stupid? Sure, he has empathy, Krugman, sure he does.

The only empathy Mr. Moore has is for his pocket book and enriching it, and he'll ruthlessly use any segment of the population which will advance that cause as witnessed by this fraud of a film.

In a nation where the affluent rarely serve in the military, Mr. Moore follows Marine recruiters as they trawl the malls of depressed communities, where enlistment is the only way for young men and women to escape poverty. He shows corporate executives at a lavish conference on Iraq, nibbling on canapés and exulting over the profit opportunities, then shows the terrible price paid by the soldiers creating those opportunities.

Speaking of exploitation. How do you suppose this makes those in uniform feel? Show me the empathy here, Krugman. Moore creates the impression that only the dumb and poor go into the military. Only the desperate decide to join.

He ignores the fact that every officer in the military is a college graduate ... every one. Or that every enlisted man is required to be a high school grad. He ignores the fact that some people, like Pat Tillman join because they feel a duty and see it as an honor. He ignores the fact that some actually join out of a sense of adventure and a desire to serve. Nope, they're all poor, dumb plow boys, to stupid and poor to ever do anything else.

Viewers may come away from Mr. Moore's movie believing some things that probably aren't true. For example, the film talks a lot about Unocal's plans for a pipeline across Afghanistan, which I doubt had much impact on the course of the Afghan war. Someday, when the crisis of American democracy is over, I'll probably find myself berating Mr. Moore, who supported Ralph Nader in 2000, for his simplistic antiglobalization views.

Here Krugman provides "lie" to his previous contention that the movie "has yet to be caught in any major factual errors" by providing one himself.

Does this guy or his editor ever really read his crap after he writes it?

But not now. "Fahrenheit 9/11" is a tendentious, flawed movie, but it tells essential truths about leaders who exploited a national tragedy for political gain, and the ordinary Americans who paid the price.

Obviously not, or this sort of nonsense would never be allowed to find its way on an editorial page in the guise of responsible commentary.

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