QandO

July 04, 2004

Moore questions the patriotism of those on the right
Posted by McQ

Michael Moore asks the following questions in an LA Times editorial today:

If you are one of those who love what President Bush has done for this country and believe you must blindly follow the president to deserve to fly the flag, you should ask yourself some difficult questions about just how proud you are of the America we now inhabit:

Note that anyone who believes in anything President Bush does or has done means they think they "must blindly follow the president to deserve to fly the flag". This is the sort of shabby thinking which makes Moore's nonsense so laughable. Moore will accuse the right of black and white thinking while not even realizing he's a master of it.

Are you proud that one in six children lives in poverty in America?

As compared to what? As Bruce Bawer tells us in "Hating America": "Poverty? An American at the poverty level has about the same standard of living as the average citizen of Greece or Portugal. (Indeed, according to a recent study by the Swedish Trade Research Institute, Swedes have a slightly lower standard of living than black Americans—a devastating statistic for Scandinavians, for whom both the unparalleled success of their own welfare economies and the pitiable poverty of blacks in the racist U.S. are articles of faith."

Poverty is a serious subject. If you want to see real poverty try going to some third world nation and actually seeing what it looks like. The term poor is a relative one and it certainly would be laughable to compare our poor to the poor of Sudan or Niger or the Congo.

Are you proud that 40 million adult Americans are functional illiterates?

Michael, Michael, Michael, you should know better than to ask this question of anyone but the NEA. That's right, the teacher's union which is peopled by those who've made the classroom anything but a place for the teaching of reading, writing and arithmetic. The same teacher's union which decries and fights testing students and themselves for competence. The same teacher's union which demands incompetent teachers be kept. Tired of illiteracy? Tell the NEA. They're as much a reason for "functional illiteracy" as anything you can cite.

Are you proud that the bulk of the jobs being created these days are low- and minimum-wage jobs?

But they're not. And to say so is simply wrong. It may be what you want to believe, and it certainly would support your agenda, but the fact is you're simply blowing hot air.

For instance:

According to statistics released Friday by the U.S. Department of Labor, the seasonally adjusted number of payroll employees in computer systems design and related services rose by 6,300 from May, while workers in "management and technical consulting services" climbed by 4,700.

Interested in a high paying aerospace industry job? Go here. Perfer being a process engineer? Go here.

Get out on the net sometime Michael and take a look at the number and type of jobs being offered.

Low paying? Not at all. Its a myth and you know it. Rises in consumer spending of the likes we're seeing aren't produced by low paying jobs.

One problem though ... the NEA is responsible for turning out functional illiterates, and thanks to them, those "graduates" of the NEA's hard fought education 'system' aren't qualified for a lot of those jobs.

Are you proud of asking your fellow Americans to live on $5.15 an hour?

No one is asking anyone to live on $5.15 an hour. That's why we live in America. Here you have the opportunity to earn more than that. But that's the key, Michael ... earning it. That's the difference between you and the right. They prefer a person earn their way in the world and are all for giving them that opportunity.

You, on the other hand, prefer to take money from some and give it to others based on your arbitrary determination of what's "fair". Well guess what? Your way gives us the stagnation and high unemployment of those brilliant Europeans you're always playing up too. Yup, we dumb, illiterate and provincial Americans enjoy a lifestyle many times better than any of those countries of the "European Elite" you're always sucking up too.

Are you proud that, according to a National Geographic Society survey, 85% of young adult Americans cannot find Iraq on the map (and 11% cannot find the United States!)?

Again, ask the NEA ... it is the members of the leftish teacher's union who have the responsibliity for the classroom and what is taught. Education department heads come and go, and they can only try to get done in the classroom what needs to be done, but until the NEA gets out of the way and quits protecting incompetent teachers and quits encouraging social promotion, you can bet it won't get any better ... but as with your other questions, the answer is on the left with the union that won't budge.

Are you proud that the rest of the world, which poured out its heart to us after Sept. 11, now looks at us with disdain and disgust?

Are you so naive and ignorant as to believe that we were 'loved' by the rest of the world before 9/11? If so, you're not at all as informed and "worldly" as you'd have everyone believe. America has never been 'loved' and it most likely never will. You folks on the left need to understand that and get over it.

Here, take a look at what Bruce Bawer points out in his article "Hating America". Unlike you he spent years in Europe. And his observation is spot on:

Then came September 11. Briefly, Western European hostility toward the U.S. yielded to sincere, if shallow, solidarity (“We are all Americans”). But the enmity soon re-established itself (a fact confirmed for me daily on the websites of the many Western European newspapers I had begun reading online). With the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, it intensified. Yet the endlessly reiterated claim that George W. Bush “squandered” Western Europe’s post-9/11 sympathy is nonsense. The sympathy was a blip; the anti-Americanism is chronic.

If you were actually as well traveled as you like to pretend or as knowledgable of Europe and the rest of the world as you like to infer, you'd know that. Its never been a secret. But it is a fact that is totally inconvenient to your assertion, isn't it?

Are you proud that nearly 3 billion people on this planet do not have access to clean drinking water when we have the resources and technology to remedy this immediately?

Where's the UN on this Michael? Isn't that one of the reasons for its existance? Seems the third world debating club would be perfect for this sort of project. Instead they're wrapped up in an extortion scam with a middle eastern dictator who's feeding his people through shredders.

Meanwhile, mean old George Bush and the boys have liberated over 40 million people who now have a chance at a life of liberty.

And yet you still bitch.

Are you proud of the fact that our president sent our soldiers off to a war that had nothing to do with the self-defense of this country?

Terror isn't just the weapon of the stateless, Michael. In case you missed it we were attacked by terrorists on 9/11. I know that's really a minor point to you, but it shook the rest of us up pretty badly. It was then and there that the current administration decided they just weren't going to wait for the "next time" before they did anything and declared war on "terrorists, terrorist organizations, and states that sponsored terror", because you see, they want no more 9/11s.

I say bully for them.

And, like Afghanistan, Iraq was a state that sponsored terrorism. So to answer your question, yes, I'm quite proud of the fact that we used our military to destroy two supporters of terror and liberate over 40 million people from their clutches. Its easy to pretend this prevented nothing, but then we've not had another attack on the US since 9/11 have we?

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