Dean's World

Well said.

So, what exactly are you try to say Dean? ;)

Lileks always runs good stuff. And the suggestion that you forget about the execrable Michael Moore and drop him out of your consciousness, is a good one for you to follow. Otherwise, you help feed a mass fixation which renders him even more popular. And you make yourself a victim of the pathological self-hatred of his own country of man with an obviously sick mind to match his obviously sick body.

I think I may have told you some time in the past couple of days that the popularity of Moore's vile new film is already dying off even in leftist Madison, Wisconsin, where I live near. There, the Marcus Theater chain already moved Fahrenheit 911 from their big westside multiplex to their small art-house. Obviously because they need room for multiple runs of Spidey2. (In business, money wins out over leftist ideology every time; one of the many things I adore about capitalism.)

In any case, I know of nobody who thinks Michael Moore is doing John Kerry much good in his presidential race. All this Moore stuff really amounts to is the equivalent of one more Bill Clinton self-expose to distract everyone's attention from the Democrat candidate for president.

Or does anybody think Clinton published that book this year, or Moore released his latest grotesque film, for the benefit of John Kerry? These two are just using the presidential election to build whatever power bases are available to them under the unique circumstances of American politics.

Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI

Hee. And you've got Moore to thank for it.

In an odd way, you're right.

I remember when I lived in Louisiana, I met a few people who apologized for David Duke.

It helped. I could disassociate myself from those people. It was nice to have them flushed out.

Same thing here.

Wowser, I got in a - well, discussion, I guess - last night with a casual friend. He'd seen that movie and was talking about Bush Lied, blah blah blah and I just had to call him on it.
Man, did we go at it. He finally just quit, as every silly non-factoid he gave up was so easily debunked. It's disheartening, living here in NJ. My neighbor, on the 4th, ended up yelling "RIGHTWINGER!" and flinging a chair across the backyard before storming into the house. Only because I calmly refuted all of the silly claims.
I think I'll give up on discussing politics until after the revolution - I mean election. It's dangerous; these people are really on the edge.

I begin to sense that there is a real divide in American politics, and it works as follows:

People who understand pragmatism and the lack of instant change, and those who don't.

That is one of the best pieces I've read in a long time. I'll bask in the afterglow for a good while, and chuckle to myself periodically throughout the rest of the day when I think about it! Dean, you are forever hooking me on really good sites, it's getting so I don't have time to read them all! BTW, I sent that eMail you suggested;-)

Michael Moore said this:
"The worst that could be said is that, in Cuba, you were in jeopardy of receiving free health care whenever you needed it, an excellent education in one of the few countries that has 100% literacy, and a better chance of your baby sister being born and making it to her first birthday than if she had been born in Washington, DC."

Anybody who says such a thing is a Communist. Yes. That's what I said. Moore is not a liberal, not even just a Leftist. He is a fucking Communist. Period. Anybody who praises or apologizes for Castro or who prefers Castro's Communist system to our free system is a Communist. And I hate Communists.

What good is 100% literacy if all you can read is 100% Communist propaganda? "Free" health care? Poo! Freedom of speech and of the press, freedom of religion, freedom to own your own property, freedom to own the means with which to defend your freedoms -- all those inalienable rights are far more important than any "free" government handouts. They are what make the difference between a free man or woman and a slave. Freedom isn't free, and I'd rather be dead than a slave. Down with Communism and all of its apologists and appeasers.

I think it is reasonable to assume people approach the point where they instinctively draw a line, and Michael Moore has, wittingly or otherwise, defined himself as one of those lines. Once somebody drinks his particular brand of kool-aid they have crossed that line and it can become rather difficult to take them seriously on an intellectual level. On a personal level, the people who defend Moore and his ilk ca appear pathetic in the extreme, and dangerous upon their face, to those who reject his easy form of demagoguery. It is perfectly natural to hold such people in contempt.

The only thing incumbent upon those who make such judgments is to remember that people change, as do politics and circumstances. You are at a very fractious, partisan juncture in American politics and such times are seldom (if ever) settled in reasoned discourse over pot-luck dinners sponsored by the local debating society. There will be anger, invective discord and outrage- this is normal, if frightening. Until there are corpses lining the streets you may take some comfort in the certainty that the American political process is still proceeding apace and there is likely a reasonable outcome in the offing.

Patience.

*applause*