Michael Moore is not your friend
No one likes to be fooled. When Michael Moore’s first film “Roger and Me” came out I was fooled like many people were. I fell for the Michael Moore shtick. Back in 1989 when “Roger and Me” came out it was difficult to do any fact checking. Never having seen Michael Moore I did what most people do and took him at his word. Big mistake. Like the song goes “I won’t be fooled again”.
Michael Moore is not sincere and he is not your friend. So when did I first perceive that Michael Moore was not what he seemed to be? I began to have my doubts when “TV Nation” appeared in the mid nineties on television. There was something formulistic that caught my eye. The way it was edited made me wonder if it was a sham. But the moment of clarity came with “Bowling for Columbine” in 2002. After seeing this film I understood I could not trust Michael Moore. With the advent of the Internet it took little time to verify that Moore will do anything to make money, achieve fame, and seize power. That is job one for Michael Moore. When a filmmaker has teachers guides for his movies you have to wonder how much power will be enough?
It was clear to me in 2002 that Michael Moore was not a leftist, a social democrat, a socialist, or even your regular run of the mill Democrat. He is a sham. Like the CCR song “when the taxman comes, the house looks like a rummage sale”, Moore is 180 degrees not what he appears to be. Don’t let the baseball cap and sneakers fool you, he is a thoroughly dangerous man. I have no doubt he votes straight Democrat but it is just for show. Very little about the urban myth of Michael Moore is true. He is not a “working class boy from Flint, Michigan” as he so often alleges. In reality Moore is from Davison, Michigan an upper middle class suburb 10 miles east of Flint. His father worked at GM in the AC spark pug division and retired at age 53 with a full pension. His mother was a clerk and secretary for GM.
Moore’s early infatuation with himself reached national prominence when he was 16 years old and CBS called to ask him about his views after he had won a local contest for public speaking. In his speech he condemned the Elks Club for barring blacks. Moore claimed it even prompted the Elks to change their policy. At age 18 Moore became the youngest elected city official in America when he won a seat on the City School Board by promoting a platform of “Fire the Principal”. The same principal who had been kind to Moore as a child resigned and died soon thereafter of a heart attack.
The myth that Moore cares about the people of Flint, Michigan has been dispelled many times. With the exception of a $2,000 scholarship to a local Flint school that expired years ago Moore has contributed nothing to the people of Flint, Michigan. Moore made 3 million dollars from “Roger and Me”. “Mike is always out for Mike, Mike is always out for money,” said former high school classmate Kevin Leffler. Leffler is making his own documentary aimed at exposing the truth, called “Shooting Michael Moore”. While Moore could not get elected dog catcher in Flint over 6,000 people have signed a petition for Moore to run for President of the United States. Some people can be so easily fooled. Some of them live in Tennessee.
Moore has not only been shown to be a difficult employer but also an adversary of the Writers Guild, the union for movie and TV writers. Pot, kettle, you know the story. Lowell Ponte writes, “When two of the show’s young writers, who had been given the title Associate Producer, took steps to join the Writers Guild (the powerful union for movie and TV writers), Moore took them aside. “I’m getting a lot of heat from the union to call you guys writers and pay you under the union rules,” Eric Zicklin recounted Moore’s words for MacFarquhar. “I don’t have the budget for that,” Moore threatened them, “But if they keep coming down on me that’ll mean I’ll only be able to afford one of you and the other one’s gotta go.” “We were scared out of our minds,” recalled Zicklin. “It was like a theme from Roger & Me” with Moore as the unfeeling, anti-union boss.”
Mark Twain used to say there were three kind of lies. Lies, damned lies, and statistics. When it comes to Michael Moore there are five kind of lies. Kay S. Hymowitz wrote an excellent article, “Michael Moore, Humbug” that digs deep down into the muck and deceit that is Michael Moore. Hymowitz wrote, “the five Michael Moore lies are, bold-faced lies, lies of omission, artistic lies, slanted insinuating lies, and lies of exaggeration.”
You might ask why should we care?
We should care because Michael Moore’s next project may involve each and every one of us in Tennessee. The film “Sicko” is Michael Moore’s next project and sadly TennCare may be a focal part of this film. At this point it is not clear how much focus will be on TennCare. A thirty-minute documentary on TennCare has recently caused concern by a few observant people. At the end of this documentary when the credits run there is a credit for Michael Moore. What is the credit for? Was Michael Moore a consultant on this documentary?
Will “Sicko” be just another Michael Moore attack on the drugs companies or will it be a push for socialized medicine? What role will TennCare have in this new film? Most importantly, will the people of Tennessee be fairly portrayed in this film?
December 12th, 2005 at 12:24 am
I was never fooled. I recognized his lefty bullshit right from the start.
December 12th, 2005 at 7:14 am
Someone’s pushing for nationalized health care…Peter Jennings is doing a peice on the state of the nation’s health insurance that the network (I forget which one now) is teasing.
Is Bush going to try for nationalized health care? With the Republicans blindly following the Prez through whatever unconstitutional treachery he so decides to enact, and the Dems fully willing to nationalize anything they can see, it would be a good time to do so.
Prediction: Hillary and Bush in a loose but unholy alliance for nationalized health care. *Shivers* I hope I’m wrong, but I’ll be looking into expatriation anyway, just in case.
December 12th, 2005 at 7:18 am
#9,
I have asked you to stop misrepresenting me, and was very clear that Michael Moore has NOTHING to do with my documentary. I thank him in the credits because the ONE time I met him, he was really encouraging. I thanked a lot of people who have encouraged me in the credits.
I have indeed emailed him updates on TennCare (though not in months), which anyone can get from the paper everyday. Once again, you’ve posted complete speculation about me via my film. You know how to reach me, yet you didn’t bother to try to verify anything you’ve stated in your story. I clearly stated to the owner of this site that Michael Moore has NOTHING to do with my documentary, yet you went ahead and posted “information” you know to be false. The owener of this site told me he sent you a copy of my email stating the facts, yet you chose to mislead your readers about my film/me.
As I made clear in my email, and have to now state again publicly because of your misrepresentation, Michael Moore has NOTHING to do with my documentary, I was not paid one penny by anyone to make this documentary, and no one has made a profit from it. I made that perfectly clear over the weekend. I thought that was the end of it.
It’s one thing to disagree with me on TennCare. It’s another to continue to print false information. (Libel=reckless disregard for the truth and/or malicious intent) Your posts fit about me and/or my film represent both.
I don’t know why you keep trying to assasinate my character and or misrepresent me, but I am asking, yet again, to stop it. I thought the emails between SayUncle and me cleared this matter up, but apparently you’re spitting in my face and a “gentleman’s” agreement.
You know I am recovering from surgery for ovarian cancer, yet you continue to force me to check what you are writing instead of resting at my doctors orders because you won’t stop harrassing me and misrepresenting me. What a friggin bully you are.
I am requesting the owner of this site verify that I explicitly explained to him that Michael Moore was in no way involved in my film, that No one was profiting from it,etc., and yet you went ahead and wrote this inspite of the facts.
I have tried to deal with this privately. I don’t know why you insist on doing this, but it has to stop. You can’t continue to do this.
December 12th, 2005 at 9:51 am
Pot, kettle, etc.
His name is in the credits, which is all that was said here.
You’re doing a fine job of that yourself. No one misrepresented anything.
December 12th, 2005 at 9:59 am
“I was not paid one penny by anyone to make this documentary, and no one has made a profit from it.”
In the above post #9 never claimed you did. Your correction takes the form of making corrections to mistakes that weren’t made.
December 12th, 2005 at 11:11 am
Miss Cobb,
There is NO agreement of any kind. Your unilateral threats did not move me. Just because you threaten someone that does not mean there is an agreement.
I read the email you sent to SayUncle. I was surprised to be accused of bullying someone who was in fact trying to bully, threaten, manipulate, and censor me. Libel and slander are serious issues and it is clear you have no concept of either term. I wonder if your referring to Governor Bredesen as a “killer” could be considered libel. Pot, kettle, you know the story.
Last week I thought about posting on your website. You still allowed comments last week; I see this week that comments are no longer permitted. But I thought to myself that would not be very smart because you would just post my IP address and email and encourage the few people that support your cause to hassle me. Kind of like the way you are hassling SayUncle now.
I considered responding to your email but I also rejected that idea. After your behavior with the “Hitman” I felt a neutral territory would be required to communicate with you since you have proven you should not be trusted. I notice that you are safely hidden behind an AOL Proxy Server. Pretty smart, if you are going to throw rocks don’t live in a glass house.
I don’t like it when people try to censor or shout down people. You are aggressive in your behavior but require others to extend a certain deference to you because of your childhood and recent surgery. Sorry, it does not work that way. Perhaps you should take a few weeks off. Listen to your Doctor.
I ask you three times on three blogs where the BIG story about the “Hitman” was. I ask you why it was a BIG story to begin with. I wondered if it was just a rationalization to cover your over the top inappropriate actions. It may surprise you to learn that outing anonymous bloggers and trying to get them fired from their job is reprehensible behavior in the blogging community.
There are questions about your story about Michael Moore. From what you, Katherine, and egalia had written it seemed that you might have more of a relationship than the one time meeting with Moore you wrote about in your first threatening email to SayUncle. Keep in mind that Katherine wrote that Michael Moore was a consultant for your film in a comment at SayUncle. Katherine wrote, “With regard to the film, my understanding is that Michael Moore consulted on it and will be using portions of it in his film “Sicko”. ” So how am I to know what is true?
I am unclear about this. If you support and admire Michael Moore so much why do you suddenly treat him as if he is radioactive now?
As I researched your positions it became clear that you want more than just fixing TennCare. It appears that you want Tennessee to have “socialized medicine”. So since we have a neutral territory to discuss this I will ask you, is it your desire that TennCare becomes the first “socialized medicine” in America?
December 12th, 2005 at 11:39 am
Michael Moore should at the very least been smart enough to divest himself of his Halliburton and Lilly stocks. Wow.
December 12th, 2005 at 7:17 pm
Screw the rest of this stuff, I want to know how the hell Peter Jennings is doing a piece about the nation’s health insurance from the grave!
December 12th, 2005 at 8:32 pm
I forgot he was deceased–it was the last piece he did before he died.
My mistake.
December 13th, 2005 at 2:05 pm
hey what are u afraid of, that tenncare is screwing up patients health.me thinks you are afraid of the truth,i know i know truth hurts deal with it.