It was on cable so I watched it with my wife.
I should point out that I am as much a fan of Michael Moore as I am of our current President, holding neither in high regard.
I think Moore over-reached when portraying our President as a moron. The President himself brags about being nothing more than a 'C' student in college, I didn't see the point in reiterating this point over and over again.
I was disturbed by the blatant display of corporate greed by Haliburton, a company that will make billions on the backs of soldiers making $1200 a month and make a bunch of Bush's friends millionaires many times over in the process. Where are the 'outraged' Republicans that just couldn't live with themselves knowing that friends of the Clintons made $117,000 on the Whitewater deal? I am surprised that Moore did not capitalize on this fact.
For the most part, I thought the movie was foolish. Over and over again we saw pictures of Bush with the Saudi's. I am sure there are just as many pictures of Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter and every other modern President with the Saudi's, for no other reason than they were/are our allies.
I also thought it was foolish to ask Senators and Congressmen to volunteer their children for military service. I surmise he would have gotten the same reaction if he stood outside any Fortune 500 company headquarters.
Following the marine recruiters was just plain retarded. These guys are doing their jobs and for a lot of people, the military is a very attractive option. He made a big deal of the recruiters avoiding a suburban mall and going to the hood instead. Did he really think the 'priveleged' kids look forward to a military career?
All in all, the movie was ok, not great, not bad. Too much opinion and not enough facts.
One more thing, I will give $100 to the first person that finds the cunt who claimed that poor woman's grief was staged and punches her in the face and kicks her in the ovaries so she can never procreate. I have never in my life seen such cruelty spew from a human mouth. At that point in the movie I was disgusted to share the same air as my fellow American.
.02
Cypher
XYZ Factor
07/20/05 3:33pm
I'm gonna have to agree with you here Cypher.
I'm not a politics junkie by any means but I know propaganda when I see it. This movie was for entertainment purposes only...and it did entertain me.
This movie was touted as being a documentary. Michael Moore (in my opinion only) does not have the credentials to make a valid documentary. Documentaries are based on facts and PURELY facts. There was way too much of his political agenda thrown in there for it to be considered truely factual. Any bit of information can be skewed based on one's perception.
Remember, we only saw the footage that Michael Moore wanted us to see. Where are all of the other views of people telling the other side of the tale....thats what I would like to see in conjuction.
He did make SOME valid points that I agreed with but if anyone believed EVERYTHING he said in the film, they would have to be pretty weak-minded.
Also my $.02 (or $.01 depending on how you look at it)
holden_caulfield
07/28/05 7:05am
I agree with Factor.
I might add that, there is no such thing as a purely factual documentary, just as there can be no unbiased version of history. Everyone tells a story that, inherently, contains a point of view.
In a lot of cases, however, Moore dips into deception and distortion.
XYZ documentaries, like every other historical examination, have a bias or slant of some sort that mingles with the pure facts. That's just the fact of examining events in certain lights. With that said, I agree much with what cypher said.
Too Exclusive
08/08/05 6:15pm
UGGHH
F911 is a piece of Liberal shit. Michael Moore should be shot for making that. The purpose of Fahrenheit 9/11 is to make Bush look like a moron (which we all know he is) so people will vote for his Skull & Bones cousin, Kerry. Fahrenheit 9/11 does nothing but WHITEWASH 9/11. I saw it in the theatre last summer and at the door people were handing out flyers to vote for Kerry. If anything, Fahrenheit 9/11 makes Bush sleep at night. If anyone has not seen this, I recommend you don't. It's a bunch of shitty Liberal propaganda, and just about the only thing Michael Moore gets right in the movie is the "airlift of evil". A REAL documentary film maker, a man named Alex Jones, went to the GOP convention in New York and asked Michael Moore why he didn't talk about the hardcore 9/11 issues like NORAD standing down, and fatass simply replied, "that would be un-American". Michael Moore is the epitome of someone that should be fucking shot.
QUOTE(Too Exclusive @ 08/08/05 7:15pm)
Michael Moore is the epitome of someone that should be fucking shot.
wow for once i actually agree with a part of your post!
The only moron here is you exclusive. Bush is overall a very good president, not great like a Reagan but good.
Too Exclusive
08/08/05 11:59pm
QUOTE(Maddcapp @ 08/08/05 8:01pm)
The only moron here is you exclusive. Bush is overall a very good president, not great like a Reagan but good.
that's a matter of opinion

almost every single person i know (cause they're all liberal) will say that bush will go down in history as one of the WORST presidents.
thought nixon and clinton had that as a tie?
Don't forget about Andrew Johnson and Taft.
Too Exclusive
08/09/05 2:55pm
nixon was prolly the worst as of now. see the whole bullshit wit bill clinton, yea he was a shitty president, 93 WTC bombing, OKC and all that shit was dun by him... but the reason most hate him si the wrong reason. so what he got a blowjob? john f kennedy used to have affairs all the time yet he's regarded highly as being one of the very good presidents.
It's not the BJ, it's that he lied to the nation about it. That's the same reason Nixon was hated: he was a liar. And neither can even blame faulty intelligence for those lies.
LOL! I stay out of most of these arguments regarding politics for two reasons. Firstly, political opinions are just that, opinions. What makes any of you think anybody else wants to hear how you think they should live their lives? Secondly, most of you have no idea what the hell you are talking about.
Reagan was not a good president. While in college I met somebody that worked in the Reagan White House. She told me stories of Reagan walking around talking about movies he had been in as if they were actual events. He was mentally ill long before he left office, most likely before his second term. He lied about trading arms for hostages, was that a worse or better lie than lying about getting a blowjob? Is it a worse or better lie that W lied about Iraq's WMD collection? Bush Sr. was head of the CIA, do you really think he NEVER lied to the American people? If anybody knew how to keep a secret, it was him. Finally, how many people died as a result of Clintons blowjob? How many widows created? How many children forced to grow up without fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers?
Do any of you realize that Bush's right hand man, Karl, was also the man pulling the strings behind the arms for hostages deal during Reagan's presidency? He is guilty of multiple felonies, including treason, do you think he will ever spend a day in jail?
It is a fact that Reagan's ecenomic policies created the largest socio-ecenomical gap in this country since it's inception, a situation that the framers of the constitution expressly wanted to avoid. He created the largest deficit in the history of the modern world until W came along and made it even greater, this after Clinton left the White House with the largest budget surplus ever recorded.
You people really need to stop playing 'follow the leader' and get educated. As Malcolm X once said, "The thing I fear most is ignorance."
Cypher
I have to laugh anytime someone talks about Clinton's budget surplus,
Can you tell me what Clinton did to create the surplus.
I'll tell you nothing, it was a simple result of the decade long bull market and the rate the economy grow during his term, which translates into higher tax revenue.
Also it's the congress that spends the money which had a Republican majority for most if not all of Clinton's 2 terms. History shows the 6 months before he left office the economy was already heading for the tank.
Leave Reagenomics alone.
The figures can be cooked either way depending on how they look at it but Reagen did a fantastic job. The biggest reason we had the deficit we did when Reagen left office was because he lacked the line item veto to cut pork spending added to almost every piece of legislation he had to sign.
Reagen could of done for America what he had just done for California if it wasn't for his inability to cut congressional spending.
When Reagen became Governor of California it's budget deficit was over 30 Billion ( this was more than all other states combined ). Within a few years Reagen changed the deficit to a surplus. This was done in two ways, a temporary tax increase and using the line item veto countless times to cut unneeded spending.
One of my favorite Reagen witticisms that he was so well known for.
When he was campaigning for Governor, his opponent enlisted help from Senator Kennedy who went on the speaking tour. Kennedy would open his speech with ""Reagan has never held any political office before and here he is seeking the top spot in the government of California."
Needless to say Kennedy never said that again after Reagen publicly replied with
"Well, you know, come to think of it, the senator from Massachusetts never held ANY job before he became a senator."
LMAO
All over but the Crying
08/10/05 1:52pm
Laugh about it all you want to but Bush bought peoples vote with the promise of writing everyone a check with the surplusses. Then "Lowered" taxes and proceeded to increase spending. If I ran my personal life like our politicians ran this country. I would be considered a financial failure.
QUOTE(Druid @ 08/10/05 11:07am)
I have to laugh anytime someone talks about Clinton's budget surplus,
Can you tell me what Clinton did to create the surplus.
I'll tell you nothing, it was a simple result of the decade long bull market and the rate the economy grow during his term, which translates into higher tax revenue.
And this is the biggest difference between Republicans and Democrats. Reagan's ecenomic policies created the S&L problem and the largest population of homeless people ever in this country. Reagan cut tax rates for the rich so the rich got richer. Clinton cut tax rates for the middle class which allowed more people to buy their first home (myself included) and invest for the future, enabling a bigger Bull Run than Reagan could ever imagine.
The core of Reaganomics was that if you gave tax cuts to the richest people in this country, the ecenomic savings would trickle down to the middle class, hence the term trickle-down theory. One political operative termed this "voodoo ecenomics" which of course it turned out to be.
This is not to say that the Democrats have it all figured out. I think NAFTA will turn out to be one of the worst decisions of this country's history. I find it ironic that Clinton took all that money from labor unions then created an environment for them to fail. Up until last year I gave thousands to the CA Democratic party until these bozos decided it was a good idea to give illegal aliens valid drivers licenses. It reminded me of a headline a few years ago on theonion.com, "ACLU defends rights of neo-nazi's to burn down ACLU headquarters."

You gotta love The Onion.
Cypher
Not true...
As much as the term "Reagenomics" is overused it was it was nothing new and it's not what his administration called it the term actually came from the media. Reagan's plan was simply "supply-side" economics dressed up.
Many people talk about Reagan cutting taxes for the rich but thats far from the truth. The Tax plan signed into law in 1981 called for a 25% cut in taxes across the board. Everybody's tax burden was reduced by the same amount. The reason it's so easy for people to portray the tax cut as only for the wealth is a simply but always overlooked situation, the poor don't pay taxes or very little.
BTW the idea behind trickle down economics actually did work and here is why.
Prior to Reagan's tax cuts the tax rate had slowly moved up wards for several years. The effect this had is called the Laffer Curve. The initially raise in taxes causes a temporary raise in tax revenue but as the tax rate goes up revenue actually begins to fall. This is for several reason, economic growth stops, job creation slows, the rich spend their money abroad or in many cases hide their money abroad.
In 1980 the top tax rate was over 70%, by 1988 this had been lowered to around 30%. Did this mean the tax revenue also dropped by 40%, nope just the opposite.
The top 10% of taxpayers contributed 48% of the total in 1981, but 58% in 1988 a 10% increase. Even bigger increases where seen as you go up the money ladder.
The top one 1% paid 17% of all taxes in 1981 but this grew to 27% by 1988. Taxes paid by the super wealthy ( top .1% ) almost doubled in the same period, they went from 17% in 1981 up to 27% in 1989.
Think about that, the top 0.1% paid over 25% of all the taxes in 1989.
I'm always amazed how easily people buy into the rhetoric about how the rich don't pay their share of taxes.
holden_caulfield
08/11/05 5:00am
QUOTE(Druid @ 08/10/05 1:07pm)
I have to laugh anytime someone talks about Clinton's budget surplus,
Can you tell me what Clinton did to create the surplus.
I'll tell you nothing, it was a simple result of the decade long bull market and the rate the economy grow during his term, which translates into higher tax revenue.
Also it's the congress that spends the money which had a Republican majority for most if not all of Clinton's 2 terms. History shows the 6 months before he left office the economy was already heading for the tank.
Conservatives can't have it both ways. They can't say, "Clinton was not responsible for the budget surplus," then, when Bush is cited for a lagging economy, turn around and blame Clinton for the economic downturn which Bush "inherited." Nonsense.
But it also doesn't make sense to suggest that the president, because he does not directly control the budget, is therefore not responsible for the economy. It's like saying that, because Congress has the power to declare war, ratify treaties, etc., the president has no control over foreign policy. In reality, he has the greatest control.
And the same goes for the budget. First, he sets the agenda for his party, and, through public and political influence, works to achieve these means. He can also veto the opposition's legislation, and so he does have a hand in how Congress spends money.
Just look to history as to how a president's influence can shape the economy, and compare the attitudes of Hoover and Roosevelt during the Depression.
EVEN so, if we buy the idea that Congress alone controls what we spend, we've had a solid Republican majority in both the House and the Senate for two terms now, and so far, nothing impressive has come about.
Nice Druid, I doubt most people could spell the Laffer curve correctly, let alone surmise that it's always been the predominate theory in our economic system.
I will be last to say the rich don't pay their fair share in taxes, quite the opposite. Depending on their situation, they usually pay 25 to 50 times their share in taxes. As a matter of proportion however they pay far less than the middle class. It's not rhetoric, it's fact. It's also fact that during Reagan's terms in office there were far more tax shelters created for the Uber wealthy, bringing their taxable income down considerably, thus resulting in them paying actually less taxes than before.
Is it fair? I don't know. It costs me $750k for a 3 bedroom house in Orange County, should I pay the same taxes as someone who could pay $75k for the same house in North Dakota? 'Fair Share' is a concept and it is completely subjective. It goes to my previous post, what makes anybody think anybody else wants you to tell them how they should live their lives?
Economics is one of those things where everybody can be right and wrong at the same time.
To address Holden's point, I happened to be finishing college during Clinton's first term and I took all my Poly Sci and Econ classes at that time. There was a wine maker in CA that was given HUGE tax breaks by a loophole created by the Clinton tax code, somewhere in the neighborhood of 10-15 million. That is how the President is able to repay his friends and it's been part of the process since the inception of politics.
Cypher
I found this site regarding Reagan and his economic policies. Like I said, with econ, everybody can be right, and everybody can be wrong at the same time.
ReaganomicsCypher
I happen to find that link a while back.
This would be my single biggest reason why Reagan's plan didn't work as it should of
PRO 5.2
But those military budgets were not significantly larger than during the 70s, and were smaller than in the Kennedy and Johnson years. No, it was domestic spending, and particularly entitlement spending, that grew enormously under the Democrat congress.
Reagan used the exact same economic plan as president as he did as Governor in California. The only real difference is in California he was able to use the line item veto to cut unneeded spending, where he lacked the same tool as president.
holden_caulfield
When I was talking about congress spending the money, I was mainly talking about the differences between the democratic and Republican majorities between the Reagan and Clinton terms.
Normally the budget deceit left by Reagan is blamed on military spending. The truth is although military spending was way up compared to Carters years, it wasn't excessive as it's normally made out to be. Entitlement spending attached to every piece of legislation during Reagan's terms was way up and was a large part of the deficit Reagan left.
BTW I agree with people can't have it both ways. People always give to much credit or blame to this president or that president regarding the economy, it's cyclic in nature and will always have it's ups and downs. At best the government can only give it a budge this way or that way.
If the person giving credit to Clinton for the economy or blaming Bush for it, if they don't give specific example of policies that caused what they are talking about they are simply talking out the side of their mouth.
QUOTE(cypher @ 08/11/05 6:53am)
3 bedroom house in Orange County
im comming to live with you!
QUOTE(Silver @ 08/11/05 10:42pm)
QUOTE(cypher @ 08/11/05 6:53am)
3 bedroom house in Orange County
im comming to live with you!
heh, it's actually a 4 bedroom house but one room is my office and the other two are for the incoming twins. Sorry Silver, ur too late.
Cypher
I just need to meet some rich women.... Ill just tell them I live there!!!
BTW congrats on the twins!
UltraViolence
08/12/05 10:49am
Michael Moore is a total hack. He is totally biased, which doesn't make you a documentarian. He is so bereft of ideas he has to lift the titles of other works and incorporate them into his titles. He is championed by Hollywood, and that says it all, the residents of re-make land. Can't wait for the "Punky Brewster" movie to come out.
QUOTE(Silver @ 08/12/05 8:39am)
I just need to meet some rich women.... Ill just tell them I live there!!!
BTW congrats on the twins!
Thanks for the congrats. The only rich women around here are the ones living off divorce settlements.

sok, a little nip here, tuck there, everybody is back to the showroom shine.
Cypher
The line-item veto is unconstitutional, whether it's used in good nature or not. As for Reagonomics, I think it was the combination of spending that was so foolish, especially acknowledging the fact that the economy, as Druid said, goes in cycles. Wasn't the U.S. just coming out of a major recession when Reagon took office. I'm just not that old...or should I say ancient.
Yep big depression partly brought on by the 2nd oil crisis during the 70's.
When Reagan took office inflation was over 12% and unemployment was over 7%
Too Exclusive
08/12/05 2:11pm
this got off topic fast!
Ah thanks Druid. Reagan was a dipshit.
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