Brilliant review of Michael Moore and his movie

[natedogg]

I love Christopher Hitchens. We need more acerbic critics like him who aren't afraid to take someone to task in print anymore. My favorite all-time piece is his article about the Princess Diana/Mother Theresa deaths/funeral coverage. That was a fine piece of work.

This review of Farenheight 9/11 is a classic in the making however.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2102723/

Of a couple of my favorite lines:

Regarding Moore's quoting of Orwell:
"It's also incautious to remind people of Orwell if you are engaged in a sophomoric celluloid rewriting of recent history."

Regarding Moore's "brave stances":
"(But then, this is the guy who thought it so clever and amusing to catch Charlton Heston, in Bowling for Columbine, at the onset of his senile dementia.) Such courage."

Hitchenss...s..s.s we love him don't we precious?

natedogg

[Zeno]

Good Review and a very enjoyable read.

Some more:

[ QUOTE ]
To describe this film as dishonest and demagogic would almost be to promote those terms to the level of respectability. To describe this film as a piece of crap would be to run the risk of a discourse that would never again rise above the excremental. To describe it as an exercise in facile crowd-pleasing would be too obvious. Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of "dissenting" bravery.



[/ QUOTE ]

Christopher Hitchens frequentely writes columns and articles for 'Free Inquiry Magazine' and they are uniformly well written, witty, and provocative.

-Zeno

[Chris Alger]

I'm beginning to agree with his former friend Alex Cockburn that Hitchens might have some sort of alcoholism-related brain disorder. It's hard to tell, reading this, where Hitchens somes off condemning anyone for playing fast and loose with the facts. Here's a three-sentence bundle:

[ QUOTE ]
Baghdad was for years the official, undisguised home address of Abu Nidal, then the most-wanted gangster in the world, who had been sentenced to death even by the PLO and had blown up airports in Vienna* and Rome. Baghdad was the safe house for the man whose "operation" murdered Leon Klinghoffer. Saddam boasted publicly of his financial sponsorship of suicide bombers in Israel.

[/ QUOTE ]
One doens't need Hitchens to read junk like this in every paper. Indeed, five years ago Hitchens ridiculed the sort of people who used it as their stock in trade.

Every word here by Hitchens is misleading. The "years" when Nidal was operating out of Baghdad coincided with the U.S. courtship of Saddam, before 1984. We pressured Saddam to expel, not capture or prevent him from wreaking havoc (and indeed maybe we didn't want him to, this being the time of tilting against the PLO, one of Nidal's favortie targets). So Nidal went to Damscus, got kicked out of there, and then went to Lebanon and Libya. Nidal only returned to Baghdad in the late 1990's, at which point he seems to have been inactive, reportedly sick with ulcers and alcoholism, only to be murdered by Saddam.

Hitchens knows all this but leaves it out because his new job is to make cheap arguments. If he were honest about Nidal's history, he'd have to explain why it's good that Iraq is now controlled by the power that supported Saddam after and during Saddam's support for Nidal when he really was a threat.

Much of the same applies to Abu Abbas, whom Hitchens merely calls "the man whose 'operation' murdered Leon Klinghofer." Klinghofer was murdered in 1985, during the U.S. embrace of Saddam. He moved to Baghdad only after he received, in effect, a pardon from Israel and after having lived in the Gaza for several years, "harbored" as much by Israel as by Saddam.

As for Saddam's "public boasting" of support for suicide bombers, Saddam did nothing for them that other current U.S. Arab clients did and still do. Namely, he pensioned the family of everyone killed during the intifada, the vast majority of his dollars going to civilians victims of Israeli terror. Hitchens also knows that this practice has little or nothing to do with facilitating suicide bombers (if money had anything to do with it, one would think life insurance fraud would be more lucrative).

None of this, of course, has anything to do with Saddam killing or threatening to kill Americans, which is the point Hitchens is trying to refute. Hitchens' freewheeling juxtaposition of "killing Americans" with "support for terrorism" is the same rhetorical recipe he condemns Moore for following.

[nicky g]

Despite finiding Moore more insufferable every day, I agree with Chris that it sounds like Hitchens is losing it. The article is just an overlong vitriolic rant, not remotely good journalism. He does genuinely sound a bit drunk, if that's possible in writing. There are probably some good points in there about the film, which I haven't seen, but they're swimming in a sea of verbal diaohrrea.

[Gamblor]

He moved to Baghdad only after he received, in effect, a pardon from Israel and after having lived in the Gaza for several years, "harbored" as much by Israel as by Saddam.

You're sick. Why would a man leave the country after he'd been pardoned? If he was being harboured by the government, why would he suddenly jump up and leave?

Namely, he pensioned the family of everyone killed during the intifada, the vast majority of his dollars going to civilians victims of Israeli terror.

The figures that have been thrown about are $25,000 USD for suicide bombers, that is, those who deliberately kill themselves in the act of terrorism. The $10,000 payment to the families are for armed gunmen (and armed only) that were killed en route to or in the process of an attack on IDF locations or even civilian locations.

Hitchens also knows that this practice has little or nothing to do with facilitating suicide bombers (if money had anything to do with it, one would think life insurance fraud would be more lucrative).

In relaying the previous story about the man who sent his son to start a possibly booby-trapped car, it should be plainly obvious that money is indeed a far stronger motivator for many people who live in poverty, especially those that believe earthly life is only a conduit to the real heavenly world (assuming you do Allah's work and proselytize non-Muslims across the world - if they refuse, just subjugate them!).

[nicky g]

"You're sick. Why would a man leave the country after he'd been pardoned? If he was being harboured by the government, why would he suddenly jump up and leave?"

Maybe he got sick of the conditions in Gaza.

"Even Israel allowed him in and out of Gaza a few years ago as it accepted that he had given up violence and was supporting the Oslo peace process. "

Abbas: Palestinian throwback (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2952879.stm)

"In April 1996, Abbas visited Gaza for the first time, as part of the amnesty offered by Israel. While in Gaza apologized for the killing of Klinghoffer.

In 1998, he returned to attend a session of the Palestine National Council, the Palestinians' parliament-in-exile, for a crucial vote on abrogating chapters of the PLO founding charter calling for Israel's destruction. In the end, Abbas did not participate in the vote.

At that time, Israeli attorney general Elyakim Rubinstein said Abbas did not pose a threat to Israeli security, and that it would be unreasonable to prosecute him for acts committed before 1993."

Fox story (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,113719,00.html)

[jokerswild]

The fact that the Bush family has immense holdings is Saudi Arabia, and has benefited more by 9-11 than any other single entity in the world must be ridiculed. Probably the treasonous Robert Nowak will write a blistering review. Cheney's office will look for more US assets to betray.

The problem they will have in November will be to convince the public again that Bush won, even though he loses both the popular vote and electoral college a second time.

I fear that the Bush administration will simply announce that it won and not leave office under any circumstances.

[John Cole]

Hitchens, by the way, seems to be unaware that Black soldiers fought before the Civil War. See The First Rhode Island Regiment (http://www.nps.gov/colo/Ythanout/firstri.html)

[Sloats]

I think through his movie, Moore has benefitted more than anyone else from 9/11

[cardcounter0]

Proceeds from his Movie won't even be lunch money compared to the profits the Carlye Group is hauling in.

Couldn't even pay the float on the money Halliburton is getting.

Defense Contractors had a field day with the first day launch of 75+ cruise missles. If I was RAYTHEON, I would be flying some Saudis around the country in my corporate jet for free too. Maybe give them a few tips on what country to steer the terorists to cause trouble in next.
/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

[jcx]

Hitchens is a man of the left. I do not agree with him on much but respect him for not blindly following leftist groupthink. Why do you have to attack the man for having the courage to call crap crap? Is there no room for dissent among liberals?

[craig r]

"leftists" and "liberals" are not the same thing. i really think people need to get past this. it is like saying that all republicans are "rightist." not all liberals are leftists. i am a leftist, and i can't stand liberals. i like hitchens, but from other things i have read by him, i would not take his article on F/911 at face value. there is a lot of sarcasm in it (as in other things he has written).

[Boris]

[ QUOTE ]
...i would not take his article on F/911 at face value. there is a lot of sarcasm in it (as in other things he has written).

[/ QUOTE ]

Well it is a movie review after all so I think the sarcasm and general nastiness are well placed.

[Zeno]

I notice this oversight also but this is a movie review and not a research or scholarly paper.

I knew about the blacks that fought in the Revolutionary war. I assume that a few regiments also may have fought in the war of 1812. Do you know?

Information source? (http://www.lva.lib.va.us/whatwehave/mil/rn19_sold.htm)


-Zeno

[Chris Alger]

Groupthink? Courage to dissent?

Hitchens has become part of the crowded field of war supporters found in every insitution and agency of leadership in America. There's nothing he's saying in this article that hasn't already been said by every Bush administration official, every right-war pundit, and every Republican Senator and Congressperson, every centrist Democrat, and every liberal "internationalist" at least half a dozen times. And these are just the explicit endorsers of an enterprise cresting on top of a continuous 24/7 stream of reinforcing references to "war on terror," "mass graves," "liberating Iraq," "supporting the troops" and on and on. Since Hitchens can do all his research by watching TV, his new career doesn't even require him to work, much less have any "courage." Hitchens' enlistment in the anti-terror chorus has about as much to do with dissent as someone who follows the cues of cheerleaders at a football game.

[Gamblor]

You try so hard to be a rebel, I bet you wore a leather jacket in high school.

But in reality, you just repeat the same crap spewn at us by every NPR phone in show, Michael Moore movie, Noam Chomsky article, and Cyrus 2+2 post:

"The Right wing media has a hidden agenda to make me miserable!"

NPR is run by people who have never been in a Bush or Sharon cabinet meeting, Michael Moore is a showboat (although I don't necessarily disagree with some of his arguments), and Chomsky is a linguist, not a historian/philosopher/political scientist. Cyrus, well, is Cyrus.

My question:

Why do you take every word Chomsky says at face value, and call every Israel/Bush supporter a liar and then twist whatever facts you can find to "prove" it?

My answer: all these people vindicate you by telling you that you aren't a free man, but rather are controlled by conspiracies that are necessarily evil because you are not a part of them.

By the way, Michael Moore has yet to condemn the Israeli cause. In fact, he recently suggested that the US hire Israeli forces to hunt down all remaining al-Qaeda members.

Shouldn't you be working for AIPAC?

[andyfox]

I remember when The Trial of Henry Kissinger came out, I posted how much I liked the book, but found I had a hard time reading Hitchens. The first two sentences in the Slate article provide a fine example of why. He write like William F. Buckley speaks.

Has anyone read his book on Orwell?

[natedogg]

He was and is in favor of the Iraq war, yes, but then
again so are/were many Democrats including members of the House and Senate. Are they, too, neocons?

One issue does not a neocon make and Hitchens is an intelligent, complex man who confuses many of his readers, apparently even crafty poker players.


He defies the categorization of neocon by coming out with views that contradict the neocons.


You know that guy the neocons all love and revere?
Here's an article Hitchens wrote about what a terrible
person and president Ronald Reagan
was. http://slate.msn.com/id/2101842
Favorite line; "I was looking at a cruel and stupid
lizard"


Here's an article he wrote excoriating one of the
staunchest hardline American Zionists whom Bush appointed to the board of the United States Institute of Peace. Ask yourself, how many neocons are opposed to Israel's use of force and want to see negotations with Palestinian refugees, and actually even bother to label the Palestinians as refugees?

http://slate.msn.com/id/2086844
Favorite line: "One isn't necessarily obliged to know
the history of discrimination as it has been applied to American security policy—unless, that is, one is proposing a new form of it."


Here's a marvelous tongue-in-cheek yet scathing article about some things most neocons hold dear:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2087621
Favorite line: "...religion is not just incongruent
with morality but in essential ways incompatible with it"


Hitchens is consistent and non-partison in his
politics (he has written negatively about Reagan and Clinton both). He also has a strong conviction of right and wrong and his positions are based on those beliefs,
not politics.

He certainly does not advocate in toto the views and
policies of the so-called neocons who are a select group of right-wing American hawks that promote U.S. imperialistic
nation-building and cavalier use of our military to keep in line those nations who defy us. That's not Hitchens by any stretch. Yes, he and neocons agree on Iraq. This
doesn't make Hitchens one of them.

Most people can't comprehend complexity of any sort.
That's why hollywood movie characters are so one-dimensional. Good guy. Bad guy. Some people
see everything in black and white. This is typical of
college-student type thinking where another word for "totally evil and stupid" is "Republican". Others lack
the mental faculties to differentiate between neocons and
anyone else who happened to support the Iraq war.

To label Hitchens a neocon betrays a flat, simplistic mindset. Either that or ignorance. If it's ignorance, it is forgivable and can be remedied if one is willing to actually read.

natedogg

[Cyrus]

"You try so hard to be a rebel, I bet you wore a leather jacket in high school."

Better than wearing that brown shirt of yours, any day.

"Chomsky is a linguist, not a historian/philosopher/political scientist."

He is actually all three, and in a most accomplished way too, but you would not know that. Your "philosophy" ends at the end of your gun; your "history" is written by fanatic non-historians; and your "politics" are those of an avowed terrorist-supporting fascist (viz. your text).

"In fact, [Moore] recently suggested that the US hire Israeli forces to hunt down all remaining al-Qaeda members."

Which would be the first sensible step towards a correctly fought "war on terror". The way it is currently conducted, with behemoth tactics, is simply wrong. (But it provides jobs for the American military, business for the arms contractors, power posturing for the power mad at Washington and fodder for the cannons. But not much in the way of "fighting terror".)

I wholly agree with Moore on this. In fact, I had a post along these lines some time after 9/11, on twoplustwo (and some 21 sites). Got flamed for it, too.

"Cyrus, well, is Cyrus."

About the only thing you got right.

[Chris Alger]

In other words, Hitchens tackles the tough questions: Was Reagan smart? Is Daniel Pipes an Arab-hater? Should we adorn the public hallways with scripture? Don't forget his book on whether Clinton was a liar.

Really complex stuff, this is.

Hitchens wastes his talent on simple topics because he enjoys attacking people whom he takes to be fools. He's obsessed with attacking people, letting fly after defining them as operating on the intellectual or moral margins. Interesting writers, on the other hand, tend to look for new arguments and evidence that illuminate in some novel fashion powerful institutions and ideas. It's easy for Hitchens to point out how Reagan is a dope with an unpopular, half-crazed worldview, a bit harder to explain the creation of "Reagan" in the public mind and mass media. (On CSPAN-2 recently he conceded that he no longer embraced any political faction or held any particular ideology. My guess is that he no longer remembers what these words mean.)

It was only after his take on 9-11 was greeted with ridicule among those he purported to admire that he siwtched sides, suddenly discovering Saddam's "ties to terror," intolerable WMD, and so forth. He's always been a maverick of sorts, but this was the first time that everyone who otherwise sided with him on Vietnam, Central America and Israel-Palestine told him he was absolutely and unequivocally wrong.

He seems to have snapped, insisting that he holds most of his old views but runs around campaigning for President Bush. Someone recently called him a "neoneocon," whatever that is. Maybe he's just on the make. Whatever he's up to, he's making less sense. This is the guy, recall, that incorporated into his arsenal of arguments for overthrowing Saddam that it would be opposed by Ariel Sharon!

[Chris Alger]

Ineresting. I always liked Hitchens' columns in The Nation, and a compendium of various short pieces. Christmas before last, however, Mom bought me his Orwell book and I read about half of it but couldn't seem to get to the part where he laid out "Why Orwell Matters." I think Orwell matters a lot, so it should be easy, but most of it seemed to be a history of internecine debates among the UK left and why the people who disagreed with Orwell were weak-minded or mean. But I'm actually not much of a reader.

[Gamblor]

Is Daniel Pipes an Arab-hater?

Quite difficult for someone to hate something they spent their University careers researching - he has a Ph.D in Islamic Studies.

His knowledge of the roots and history of Islam and the current Islamic world makes him an excellent candidate to speak about what it takes to deal with it.