wAsHInTuhN/ http://www.michaelmoore.com/ --This is getting pretty interesting, and we all knew it was just going to feed-into the publicity of the film "Sicko." Well, everybody knew it except "dry-drunks" Dick Cheney and George W. Bush, our two co-presidents. It's mind-boggling to imagine how stupid or chemically-impaired one has to be to miss this fact: you never respond to the request by Michael Moore to get permission to go shooting his footage in Cuba (Spielberg was granted his right-away, while Oliver Stone had to pay a minimal-fine), then you wait to "bust" him the month before the release of the film with an absurd letter you direct the Secretary of the Department of the Treasury (Henry Paulson) to write and send to Moore with no specific charges or penalties listed in them.
It just doesn't even make any sense. CNN and Fox were chiming-in that "Moore could expect fines up to one million per-violation," which is a lie. A lie is a lie. Not one American filmmaker has ever been fined in such a fashion, and certainly not in the ballpark CNN was claiming. Bizarre, but when you don't have the truth on your side, lies are all you have. I'm proud of Michael Moore for defending himself and confronting this stupid attack on his integrity, and of his film. Nobody has even seen it yet, and we get this. What they want to do is create the appearance of criminality where it simply doesn't exist. Did the Bush administration kill Oliver Stone's "Comandante"? It's a question worth asking.
It all reminds me of the controversies surrounding The Last Temptation of Christ and Apocalypto, only this time the volleys are coming from: the media/press, Big Pharma, the insurance companies, and the White House and their allies in Congress. It's going to be a fine, we all know this. It's unlikely that the Treasury Department are going to want to confiscate the footage of the 9/11 first-responders getting health care they couldn't afford in the United States, that's like shitting on the flag. Moore hit them hard in his open letter to Secretary Paulson:
I believe that the decision to conduct this investigation represents the latest example of the Bush Administration abusing the federal government for raw, crass, political purposes. Over the last seven years of the Bush Presidency, we have seen the abuse of government to promote a political agenda designed to benefit the conservative base of the Republican Party, special interests and major financial contributors. From holding secret meetings for the energy industry to re-writing science findings to cooking the books on intelligence to the firing of U.S. Attorneys, this Administration has shown time and time again that it will abuse its power and authority.
(michaelmoore.com, 05.11.2007)
When you're right, you're right, and Michael Moore is right about this. It's been obvious even before they took-office that this was a bunch of criminals, and now they're trying to create the impression that others are. This is typical criminal behavior, and it's not going to wash in the current political environment. Perhaps because they don't share any of the traditional values the public does, they're just completely unaware of how horrible they truly are.
Even so, the coordinated campaign against "Sicko" is like giving the Weinsteins, Lionsgate, and Michael Moore the best free-advertising one could ever hope for. The stunning thing about all this is that this is the GOP's and the Bush administration's second clumsy attempt at sinking a Moore documentary, only insuring that a critical-mass of publicity comes out of it. It will also insure record box-office for the film, making a wider-release for Moore's next documentary inevitable. After this, Michael Moore is a household name, all thanks to the blundering of dumb CEOs and corrupt politicians. It's been fun watching his work grow since 1989, and I think he's on the right course.
He's not a Father Coughlin or a Huey Long--he's much better than that, and he comes from a solidly blue-collar background. Technology--just as it did with radio in the 1930s--is transmitting the next wave of progressivism, and there will be pratfalls. That's life. I applaud Michael Moore for his activities, he's hitting the right targets, and we all know it. The time has come to bite back, and to never forget that you never let-go. That's the rule of the jungle, you have to do some hitting-back, and you have to defend yourself. It's time that the working-class did just that.
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