...and how it affects their perceptions of world events. Check out the poll on where Americans get their news and how it compares to their belief of three common misperceptions about the Iraq war. If you hate PDF, essential the pollsters found that people who use FOX news as a primary news source are 80% likely to hold a misconception about the war, whereas people who use NPR/PBS for news have a rate of about 23%. (Misconceptions include solid Iraq/AL Qaeda link, That WMDs have been found in Iraq, and that there was widespread international support for the war)

i bet you could figure out some misconceptions about something else (environmental issues?) and find a similarly high rate for NPR/PBS and a similarly low rate with FOX. then you'd have to ask yourself, is this a result of the reporting delivered or a result of the culture of the demographics at hand? it seems to me, more and more, that people are no longer thinking about anything. that the division is set in america and that you filter everything that comes into your head based on your predetermined reality. which is fine when the mental objects of your reality are things like "i can't walk through brick walls," but problematic when you're talking about concepts of which human understanding is still evolving.

I would be genuinely interested to see that.

Blackout on progress in Iraq? By Jack Kelly The commentary by Doug Saunders of Toronto's Globe and Mail began in a fashion familiar to readers and viewers of the Western news media: "Six months before, the world had cheered as the statues of the dictator came crashing down. The Americans had seemed heroic. But now things were going very badly. The occupation was chaotic, the American soldiers were hated and they were facing threats from the surviving supporters of the dictator, whose whereabouts were uncertain. "Washington seemed unwilling to pay the enormous bill for reconstruction, and the president didn't appear to have any kind of workable plan to manage the transition to democracy. European allies, distrustful of the arrogant American outlook, were wary of cooperating." Doug Saunders was writing not of Iraq in September, 2003. He was writing about Germany in November 1945. His article provided something rare in the news media today: perspective. Biased, unbalanced news accounts are giving Americans a false picture of what is going on in Iraq, and are harming our prospects of creating a democracy there, said Georgia's Rep. Jim Marshall, after a visit to that country. The news media "are dwelling upon the mistakes, the ambushes, the soldiers killed, the wounded," Mr. Marshall said. "Fair enough. But it is not balancing this bad news with the rest of the story, the progress made daily, the good news. The falsely bleak picture weakens our national resolve, discourages Iraqi cooperation and emboldens our enemy." Mr. Marshall's comments could be written off as just another Republican defense of the embattled president. Except Mr. Marshall is a Democrat, one of the few in the Copperhead party to put the welfare of the country ahead of short-term partisan advantage. "Outside of Baghdad, things really aren't as bad as they look on the news," said UPI defense correspondent Pamela Hess in an interview last week with CSPAN upon her return from Iraq. "Now, naturally on the news, we're gonna focus on where the troubles are, because that's what makes news. But there are places in Iraq where things are going pretty well. You can't say 'just fine' because the power is down, there is no phone service. But things are pretty peaceful. People are patient and are slowly rebuilding things back together." Last week, I covered the return to Pittsburgh from Iraq of a Marine reserve military police company. These Marines made the march of Baghdad with the 1st Marine Division, and spent the bulk of the postwar period escorting convoys between Basra and Najaf. Each of the seven Marines I interviewed said that more than 90 percent of the Iraqis they encountered were friendly. The accounts of these Marines square with those of most other servicemen returned from Iraq, and with my own experiences as a reporter embedded with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in western Iraq, and with the 1st Armored Division in Baghdad. But it's a story you hardly ever hear on the evening news. Iraq is a dangerous place. Saddam Hussein is still at large, as are thousands of his diehard supporters. They've been joined by hundreds, perhaps thousands of foreign terrorists. Though these "insurgents" cannot challenge the U.S. military for control of any part of the country, they'll be able to conduct remote ambushes and terror bombings for months to come. But viewed in historical perspective, things in Iraq are pretty good, and getting better. The insurgents are a tiny — and dwindling — minority. Most of the country is at peace. Nobody is starving. Signs of reviving economic activity are everywhere. In no country in the Arab world are Americans as popular as they are in Iraq. Contrast this with Germany in November 1945: "Six months after VE Day, the New York Times reported that Germany was awash in unrest and lawlessness," Saunders wrote. "More than a million displaced persons roamed the country, many of them subsisting on criminal activities." Iraq hasn't been transformed into Switzerland in less than six months. No reasonable person ever expected that it could be. But an unrealizable ideal should not obscure the significant progress that has been made. Wahington Times. This are hardly ever really what they appear to be on the news, US News or otherwise. I read a middle east based news report last week that was baffled by the gloom and doom news about Iraq that was coming out of the American Media... But like the author in this piece wrote, Sex and Bad News sells, good news is dull.

This=Things

speaking of NPR and FOX, the Bill O'Reilly interview here is interesting... http://freshair.npr.org/

go bill. terry gross is the epitome of brainless intellectual. she can research and she can pander to academia but she sure as hell has trouble with comprehension. i like o'reilly. he's a fairly straight shooter and i believe he is geniunely dedicated to balance.

i'll fuck bill o'reilly up. i like molly ivins. a cut-n-paste only because chi-times requires registration. A menu of political follies Trash-talkin' ironies courtesy of the GOP Molly Ivins, Creators Syndicate. Molly Ivins is a syndicated columnist based in Austin, Texas Published October 9, 2003 AUSTIN, Texas -- Not that any of us is in a position to criticize the Great Scriptwriter in the Sky, but don't you think she's been going a little heavy on the irony lately? All those folks who had conniption fits over Bill Clinton's affairs are now pooh-poohing Arnold Schwarzenegger's sexual misconduct--and vice versa. The right-wingers who are always griping about Hollywood stars who express political opinions--"Shut up and sing!"--suddenly find an actor perfectly fit for high political office based on his experience as The Terminator. Professional patriots who would have been screaming with horror had the Clinton White House ever leaked the name of an undercover CIA agent now struggle to justify or minimize such a thing. President Bush has spent $300 million trying to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and come up with zip, so now he wants to spend $600 million more. And let's mention the president's interesting theory that not finding any weapons of mass destruction means the Iraq war was fully justified. (Hello?) Connoisseurs of political folly who have been enjoying the antics in California should not overlook the doings in the Great State, where Texas Republicans have achieved such a pluperfect snafu that the state's primary will be delayed next year. The Iraqi Governing Council is complaining because the United States is wasting so much money in Iraq. Rush Limbaugh is apparently facing a drug investigation. U.S. Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft demanded that federal prosecutors seek the maximum penalty in every case just before some perp(s) in the White House apparently broke the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, which carries a maximum of 10 years in prison. All in all, a fine fall Irony Fest. Less ironic and more in the sickening vein is the naked profiteering by various Bushies on the Iraq war. Former U.S. Sen. Bob Dole used to wander around the country demanding, "Where is the outrage?" Where's Dole when we need him? Joe Allbaugh, who was one of Bush's "Iron Triangle" when he was governor of Texas and later as his presidential campaign manager and head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is now in the Baghdad biz. Already the head of one consulting firm, Allbaugh and two partners, both lobbyists and former aides to Poppy Bush, have formed a new firm. "The opportunities evolving in Iraq are of such an unprecedented nature and scope that no other existing firm has the necessary skills and experience to be effective both in the United States and on the ground." Salivating over unprecedented booty and swag while American soldiers are getting killed every day is considered kind of tacky, in some circles. A former partner of Douglas Feith, undersecretary of defense for policy and a major player in pushing the war, has joined a nephew of Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress and apparently the source of much misinformation before the war. The nephew has opened a law office in Baghdad, and Feith's erstwhile law partner is marketing the firm in the United States. Hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts have already been awarded--without competitive bidding--to American businesses, including Halliburton Co. and Bechtel Group Inc. Hey, no favoritism there. Appearance of impropriety? Don't be a churlish nitpicker. Democratic Sen. Tom Daschle's office has documented the "gold-plating" of cost estimates in dozens of contracts. These include such gems as $6,000 each for hand-held radios and satellite phones, as well as $200 million to protect 100 Iraqi families, at an average cost of $200,000 per family member. The federal witness protection program costs $10,000 per person per year. While the main cell-phone contract has yet to be announced, MCI has the preliminary contract. MCI has no experience in building cell networks--and it also perpetrated the largest accounting fraud in history. We're footing the $87 billion-and-counting tab (not including the $79 billion we already spent) for this venture, and the Senate Finance Committee has the chutzpah to consider granting a $100 billion tax break to corporations that make profits overseas. This dandy notion would permit American firms to "repatriate" overseas profits at a reduced tax rate of 5.25 percent, rather than the current 35 percent. Now, does anyone think that doing so might, just might, encourage more corporations to move their operations overseas? El stinko to high heaven-o. yeah, where is bob dole? i always liked that guy. where's my fucking reacharound?

"i like o'reilly. he's a fairly straight shooter and i believe he is geniunely dedicated to balance. " I believe he genuinely tries to be but he is not, and doesn't realize it. this is why i think so many people hate him. he uses words like 'libel' and 'slander' and 'propaganda' so (no pun intended) liberally, and can't realize that aside from the mediocre jokes, he's the same as Michael Moore. Moore tries and claims to be objective in his methods of research and documenting, but he's not. I like Moore simply because I agree with him on more issues and because he can make me laugh. Ditto Maher, a Libertarian who I dont AS often agree with but more than half the time still do. I could like Bill O'Reilly however he can't stand up for himself without acting like a spoiled child when he's having his same methods put back in his face. That to me, makes him a complete pussy asshole. Kinda like that jock in high school who beat on everyone, but cried in the shower room when someone said "dummy". He really can't take it and you can tell. His beef with Gross was he wasnt being treated the same as Franken. I never heard Frankens interview, but come on, O'Reilly's interview would be standard fare for any pundit or columnist being interviewed here. Those weren't all that hard questions. It was certainly NOT a hack job. If anything, Gross was being easy and dancing around saying what she wanted to say, kinda like Jon Stewart does when bill Kristol goes on the show. The only difference is Stewart can ease the tension with jokes and his audience. Example. If you have a satellite or want to read the Toronto Sun, find Michael Coren, or watch Michael Coren Live on CTS. He's overtly conservative, but I really like the guy. He's a complete 'straight shooter' and 'no spin zone' guy, but without the braggadacio, self-importance, and LCD gimmickry. I guess you could say he's a college rock O'Reilly. and by the way, he might be considered 'independent' by some in the Scope of American politics (which if you look at it is really only finding a line between Dem and Rep, which is very thin). In Canada he'd be part of the "progressive conservative" party. Easily defined to the right. No spin there.

Micheal Moore is a hack, and knows it. If he were anyone I could even begin to respect, he would have turned down that Oscar for Best Documentary so that someone who really deserved it could have it. On pure entertainment, if you have no strong feelings about the right to own guns, BFC would have been funny, almost parodical, as Canadian Bacon was. But to present it as a documentary is egregious.

Perhaps you mean the right to own guns without any restrictions whatsoever. What else would you classify it as? It's a documentary in the sense that it follows the story of a man trying to figure out an obsession with guns in America. I would think it would have been better if Moore was not both subject and director of the film. But I still think it did a good job of raising important issues that most Americans need to think about and don't, regardless of the obvious flaws in the film.

maybe you totally over looked it was perhaps it was lost on you some of the poignant social commentary Moore made about fear in the American social fabric and how it is used to box us in.

regarding Columbine spunk.... hypothetically speaking, say it was your kid in the school, there you and eri are, standing outside, behind this little yellow tape fretting your brains out "Don't worry. We'll handle it." they tell you while all these armed and armored public servants sit around and figure out what the fuck to do. Meanwhile, your kid could be bleeding do death. what do you do? you'd probably do like all the other parents, stay behind that little yellow tape? why? FEAR! what is that makes americans lock our doors whereas in canada its not really a thing. they have very very similar gun laws, or so moore points out (i really don't know), why are the statistic so heavily skewed. what is it? have you ever sat down and wrote a list of your fears, particularly fears of a global scope that you've dealt with since you can remember? that would be interesting....have children say, in Norway or some place like India and the US write their fears and compare them.

Flaws, Sem? deliberately chopping up a speach, and putting together a completely different speech is NOT a flaw. And then to have the nerve to call it a "documentary" No. No respect what so ever.

which speech spunk, and reference your source, because most of the "Bowling For Truth" etc websites have been put together by gun groups. While I don't expect Moore to be entirely correct on his statistics, I trust him more than an NRA spokesman. heres just one example of where I specifically take issue with O'Reilly "It is true that if you are poor, and can't afford a good lawyer, your odds of going to prison skyrocket. But you know what? Tough. Don't do the crime! Poverty is a terrible thing. But millions fight their way out of it, legally! If you are a poor criminal, you know what awaits you. So too bad. Society does not have a responsibility to provide top notch legal representation at taxpayer expense. " Um... doesn't that statement assume that everyone charged with a crime is guilty, Bill? here, below, taken from buzzflash.com: The Bill O'Reilly 21 Spin Tips A BUZZFLASH READER COMMENTARY by Bobbie Frank 1) Adamantly declare your show a "No-Spin Zone" and repeat this often. Soon it will appear that your spin is not really spin! 2) Make as many vague general statements as you like because: a) if they don't pan out, who cares? b) if they do, then you can take credit for being FIRST to tackle the issue! 3) Go for the easy targets: politicians and celebrities, and if they don't know who you are or decline to appear on your show, then portray them as being "afraid" of you because they know they're "wrong". 4) Always refer to yourself as a "reporter" and to your show as a "news program," no matter how sensationalistic the topics you have chosen. 5) Label everyone who doesn't agree with you a "liberal", and use as many colorful adjectives as possible when describing the left wing. Label everyone and everything--you can never label people enough! 6) However, never use colorful adjectives when describing your position or that of other conservatives. Portray your position as scientific granite-hard fact! 7) If you say "I only deal in facts" with enough proud anger, you will easily offset anyone who questions you and they'll be less likely to demand your proof. Or just lie and take the high road. 8) In the rare instance someone does pursue proof of your "facts," just bulldoze them with questions and opinions to create an air of 'you-must-be-crazy-to-believe-otherwise.' 9) If someone continues to demand cited facts, then say "Everyone we've talked to says so." Then book a few selected inconspicuous guests in the future to come on and back your statement. You can easily represent any group's opinion in any way you want by doing things this way! 10) Pick several obscure fringe issues to bring up during each show. It's, of course, a breeze to be right when ranting about them and this scores easy sensational-points. 11) The more questions you can fire at a guest without giving them a chance to answer, the more "authority" status you gain and the more credibility they lose. AKA The O'Reilly Master Method. 12) Whenever you get into trouble during a debate just align yourself with the working class. In fact, you can pull out your "hero-for-the-struggling-people" act for any tight spot you may find yourself in. Never underestimate how powerful it is to exploit this! A related and untouchable spin is the "hero-for-the-little-children" act. 13) If you have a guest who is beating you in debate, simply overpower them with questions, demands for facts, or just change the subject with the segue "Ok, look, let's get back to the issue," and then bring up a new issue. Remember, it is extremely easy to make an unprepared guest look bad. 14) In-between questions make little comments, unfinished question fragments, or subtle sarcastic quips that express what you really think, then quickly interrupt yourself with your next scripted question. These little remarks are pure golden spin! 15) If you have ever been to a foreign country always bring that fact up, especially if you've been to one where violent conflict was occurring (or at least nearby). This is a great defense if ever your 'journalistic integrity' is threatened or if you need to interject some patriotism to throw off a guest. 16) When all else fails, make a face of pity and say something religious like "Well, I know God blesses you," or "I don't think Jesus would do that, but...." 17) At the end of every interview just say "We'll let the viewers decide." This nicely removes your responsibility for most of the things you've just said. 18) Always take your position to the extreme when dealing with simple mundane issues. This keeps the sensationalism ball rolling. 19) Bring attention to ALL press you receive, good or bad. Also talk about press that is NOT about you as if it IS. 20) End your show with a humble-pie slice of criticism from your viewers, but always remember to follow each little run of bad opinions with one or two of praise. This end-spin is useful in many, many ways. 21) Portray all newspeople as 'afraid to ask' the 'hard-hitting' questions that you do, and tout that you get 'serious answers' even if most of your show is factually impotent. This effective spin is called the 'Viagra Tactic.' I especially agree with no. 19, and is probably one of the main reasons for my dislike of him. I can't decide if he's either self-obsessed, paranoid, or both. I welcome anyone (especially Nate, because his will be hilarious) to make a similar list about Moore, Franken, etc.

http://www.kmox.com/mp3/morningmeeting/alvsann1.mp3 http://www.kmox.com/mp3/morningmeeting/alvsann2.mp3 this is funny stuff. I think we're all united in hating Ann Coulter, right?

Spunk, I'll bet you haven't even watched "Bowling for Columbine." Am I right?

i think he said once that he had not. i cant recall... ... a late disclaimer. BFC should definitely not be believed 100%, questions must be asked, and the whole Dick Clark scene is way out of line. However, it should be noted, that while authors have picked apart each other for lying over and over again, with definite proof, with BFC, the vast majority of claims against the film are of the 'he said, she said' variety, and ones that have been proven 100% wrong (like the Willie Horton caption) have actually been retracted by Moore and altered for DVD release... other disputes, such as the where/when of Heston's speech, the gun/bank incident, the Littleton/rocket scene, ignore the larger statement and look past any ironic intent... If you want to target Moore's ideas, its better to go after his books, which are much more easy to dispute, especially when you compare to his mvoies or tv shows, where for the most part its him just wandering around to offices to try and yell at CEOs... I read some of O'Reilly's book at the store today. Its surprisingly dull, and I put it down when he started trying to get spiritual. ugh. I ended up buying Frankens book because of a sweet discount i didnt know i could get because i work in the same block of stores. Its pretty funny, and more than most other authors, I get the impression Franken is the most honest, probably because his is unapologetically unprofessional, and doesn't have an agenda, at the very least nowhere near the way Moore, Hannity or Coulter do. And he's got an incredible sense of irony, which I like. I encourage anyone if they have a few seconds at the bookstore to at least take a look at the Supply Side Jesus cartoon near the back. "If I heal these lepers, It won't deter others from not getting leprosy!" But my real favorite part is him describing his conversations with O'Reilly after he was able to call him on his Peabody award "mistake".

my point was that BFC was NOT a documentary, and he did not deserve that award.

Moore editorializes, for sure. however if you actually watch the movie, and see how it is for the most part, a series of interviews with varying peoples, both pro-gun, anti-gun, etc, its enough of a documentary to merit that categorization. so spunk, answer, have you watched it, or not? theres several definitions on dictionary.com for 'documentary'... heres a few. Consisting of, concerning, or based on documents. Presenting facts objectively without editorializing or inserting fictional matter, as in a book or film. the other: A work, such as a film or television program, presenting political, social, or historical subject matter in a factual and informative manner and often consisting of actual news films or interviews accompanied by narration the second makes no mention of editorializing, and neither do any of the other defintions of the word on the site. if you think it has to be objective, you are entitled to that opinion, absolutely. its a fair piece of criteria. however I think theres a defense for taking a stance and getting involved with the documentary. how much news 'reporting' is objective, or even factual? would people say the same thing of BFC if Moore wasnt on camera, but still tried to affect people a certain way by camera work, juxtaposition, etc in the editing room? Or do you say it is not a documentary simply because you don't agree with what you see is the opinion of the film? Would you think the same if you agreed? When BFC is really effective, its because Moore is asking a lot of good questions, and not arriving at clear answers. He provides possible answers, but I dont think anyone who's watched the film can tell me that Moore walks out of this movie with a clear conclusion in his head. IT seems clear to me he was more confused and uncertain than he was going in.

His depiction of Heston's speech a complete cut and paste job. He portrayed Heston, a real person, giving a speech he did not give. He changed the context and the content of the speech. Same goes for the Bush-Quayle add. Oh, and the Lockheed Martin interview. And the one on one Heston interview. Do you understand the NRA? Have you read it's charter? As for seeing the movie, no. I have seen the parts I refer too, I have read the transcripts of the parts, and visited his website. At best, and even this is a stretch, I would give it a "dramatization based on real events". That is what I am objecting too. The subject and point it tries to make are not what I am debating. The classification of a documentry is.

how many times do i have to ask for your source? and when you do put up your source, i want you to tell me what organization this information originated from these people belonged to. (in other words, don't give a source to a page run by a housewife that mirrored a gun-lobbyists claim about events) and are you going to even say HOW it was changed, WHAT was omitted, and what the proper context WAS? are you going to read Moore's rebuttals to some of the allegations that he has put on his website? are you ever going to watch the movie yourself? Come on spunk, put up your dukes.

Do your own research. I am not going to drag you around by the nose.

fuhgeddaboutit, rowlf. you stinky, bush-hatin', liberal canadian.

I've done my research. I've watched the film. I've been to moorewatch, bowlingfortruth, etc. I've read Moore's responses to comments made on those sites, and seen him back up his research with his own proof, as well as providing outtakes. I was hoping you'd have told me that you saw the BFC clips from the report on CNN, where they interviewed a 'critic' and 'researcher' for the Independence Institute, who happens to be a contributing editor of Gun Week Magazine. A fact CNN didnt tell whoever was watching, which could have possibly included you. Or maybe it was from John Lofton, who believes that the majority anti-gay violence and hate speech comes from other gay people, not homophobes. Most liberals have backed down from defending BFC the second critiques hit, without ever questioning who the debunkers were, without fact checking them. Pussies. I know Moore has lied in the past, in his books and in his movies. And some of them he even allows into the movie for proper context. For example, how he lied to Heston about the nature of his visit, and initially lied about his position on the 2nd amendment, in order to get Heston to be more relaxed and admit things he would not otherwise say. He did it in Roger & Me as well when he posed as a shareholder in order to get to Roger Smith at a meeting. Its documented, and he did it himself. These anti-Moore sites have caught Moore in a lot of lies, mostly from his books. However when they haev gone after BFC, they are targeting lies Moore has either corrected and apologized for, or lies he has admitted himself and allowed in the film so people could see how he got in and did his interview. Come on spunk, go for it. I'm prepared.

ah dave, maybe I will fuhgettaboutit... I've read so much political stuff these past few weeks, probably more than even right before the war started, that I've been even more on edge than usual. ...that and I just watched BFC with my parents last night, and its fresh in my mind.

"...that and I just watched BFC with my parents last night, and its fresh in my mind." pre-emptive strike: last night was not my first viewing

okay. last thing to say. heres a favor, for you spunk. This is the best attack on BFC I've read to date: http://www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html and even this one is very flawed, exaggerated, and has taken things out of context, and attacked elements of Moores editing to try and convince people Moore is trying to connect unrelated events. of course its biased as well, i wouldnt expect it not to be. without having Moore or Franken or whoever point it out to me first, I found out David T. Hardy is an avowed conservative, used to work for the government, is president of the Tuscon Rod and Gun Club, contributes to keepandbeararms.com, and I could go on and on and on and on. he doesnt mention these connections on the BFC page, of course. I could get into items more, but spunky seems to want to drop this whole thing. if he wants back in, the links here. cut and paste your heart out.

Rowlf, lay off. You'll hurt the kid.

Hardylaw.net has been in my favorites list for months.

in that case, you're going to REALLY want to watch the movie now. remember how Hardy says that Hestons "from my cold dead hands" speech was intercut immediately with the line about what he was told by the mayor? well, when you actually go out and watch the movie ,you'll see that the "cold dead hands speech" was used as an introduction of Heston to juxtapose with a line said by a Columbine mourner... that line being "they came in and shot everyone". The juxtaposition of course, to persuade that Heston's stance on gun control is inappropriate given the grief of the Littleton residents. Also, consdiering "cold dead hands" is Hestons catchprase, that is how you introduce him... just as you'd perhaps use a clip from the Terminator to introduce Schwarzenneger. After Heston says the line, while holding the gun above his head in the clip, Moore adds in, "Just ten days after the Columbine killings...” As he's talking, theres a cut to a NRA billboard , then another cut to the Denver convention, where they show the crowd applausing. Then Heston begins his speech. To recap: "Cold Dead Hands" , then Moore: "Just 10 days after..." , then START of Denver convention with audience giving standing ovation. Hardy says the order of events happened like this: Weeping children outside Columbine then Cut to Charlton Heston holding a musket and proclaiming "I have only five words for you..." the Cut to billboard advertising the meeting, while Moore intones "Just ten days after the Columbine killings..." then Cut to Heston "I have a message from the Mayor..." this next post is taken verbatim from a pro-BFC analysis I've read before: "The website claims that Moore cuts to Heston (supposedly) continuing his speech. That is just a blatant lie. Again, Moore shows the "Cold Dead Hands" clip, then goes to the billboard while he says "Just 10 days after...” and then to the START OF THE CONVENTION with the audience giving Heston a standing ovation. He does NOT cut right to Heston saying, "I have a message from the Mayor". The crowd sits down and Heston says, "Good morning, thank you for coming. And thank you for showing courage..." Moore then cuts to the father carrying the "My Son Daniel Would Expect Me To Be Here Today" sign (with other "Shame On The NRA" signs in the background), and then Moore cuts to the "message from the Mayor line". How could Moore "cut to Heston (supposedly) continuing his speech"? He showed the very beginning of the convention! I have read the entire transcript from Heston's speech, and I don't think Moore cut anything out or re-edited anything that put Heston's speech out of context. What was Moore supposed to do? Show the entire convention in a two-hour film? BFC is an anti-gun film. Of course Moore is going to use clips that support his opinion. The website's biggest criticism of this part was that Moore suggested that the "Cold Dead Hands" line was given at the Denver convention, which simply is not true. Remember, Moore didn't cut to the middle of the convention, he showed the start of it, and he showed it AFTER the "Cold Dead Hands" clip. Under the assumption that it was the same event, does it make any sense to show a clip from the supposed middle of his speech, and then cut to the beginning of the convention? I saw this film two times before hearing about this site, and I never once thought he was implying it was the same event. Go watch the DVD right now and tell me if I'm wrong. " well, spunk, go watch the DVD right now and tell us if we're wrong. and read hestons speech to see if it was taken out of context. here's a spoiler: it wasn't. And thats just one. Welcome back. Are you sure you're ready for this?

Has he ever been? I figure he'll give up, say some mildly insulting comments that don't really address any of the issues and say nothing more. That seems to be to be the modus operandi.

sem, its a little something like this. All these anti-Moore sites, they pick on whats in the movie and make claims they can't prove, but they don't make a critique about whats NOT in the movie, and thats where the really justified complaints are. (btw, there is one scene in the movie that i believe to be dishonest. in the scene where Heston is walking away and Moore holds up the photograph of Kayla, it cuts to another front shot of Moore that I don't believe was possible on that staircase. Either he never said it to Heston while he was there and taped it afterward, or part of the sentence was overdubbed to the other shot of Heston walking away. Becuase theres no cut from Moore holding the picture as the camera turns around and Heston is still there. Its entirely possible that Heston was moving so slowly that the cameraman was able to move down and change position in front of Moore, and edited two different angles of Heston walking away together. The bottom line is its questionable.) anyway, the justified complaint. I didn't see Moore talking to any gang leaders, do you? If Moore's trying to find out what makes America so violent, that should be addressed. It could be a big factor, it could be a little factor, we don't know. However I know I wouldn't want to go talk to some gang leaders. Coulda talked to police, though, i don't know. but some acknowledgement of gang violence I believe was necessary. It IS a double-(triple?)-edged sword though. You ignore the gangs and people can say "he just doesnt want to offend black people", you acknowledge them and act as polite as he usually does even with people he really disagrees with (see Moore vs. Fred Phelps), people say "he's not asking the tough questions like he did for Heston!". You ask the hard questions, you put yourself in danger. The other complaint I have off the top of my head is the Manson interview. While I certainly agree Mansons not to blame for Columbine, TV pundits have raised the point over and over again that Manson for years has had an obsession with guns in his music, and his lyrics, bad as they are, are far the most part, so ambiguous that I still don't even know if he likes guns or not. Moore should've asked him what these songs are about... Finally, its fair to accuse Moore of using the same scare tactics he decries in the film. While I walked away from it thinking Moore depicted everything as too silly to be afraid of, others have walked away from it being even more afraid of American people, more afraid they're going to get shot. I know my parents the other night after it was over called the movie "scary". I suppose they think next time they head over to Buffalo to get some giant chicken wings that they're going to be in danger... theres a spin to that too, but I wont bother. I have to go get some leftover turkey now.

at least until some "critical thinker" up and plagarizes the previous 5 moore critiques in a fresh new way. then, he'll drop another spunk bomb on the thread.

ahem. i was next.

spunk are you really getting your tits in a tangle about someone taking Charlton Heston out of context? where's your sense of humor? Heston SCREAMS to be taken out of context. He's a joke of an individual.

so are you.

dood SNL skits are not made from my absurdity. South park and Simposon episodes are not made from my absurdity. you just feel bad because you constantly make retarded judgments using even more retarded sources to prop them up only to get your panties all ruffled when someone here actually widdles you down to the dope you can be.

speaking of retarded judgments... heres number two spunk on hardylaw.net, Hardy claims that Moore says Heston came to Flint 48 hours after little Kayla's death. it says the movie doesnt show its a 'get out the vote' rally, that it simply says its a pro-gun rally. well for one, all NRA rallies are pro-gun rallies. Number two, Hardy ignores the over 10 seconds of shots of "get out the vote" placards, including a 5 second shot of one in particular. pretty hard to miss that. secondly, Moore never once, NEVER, said it was 48 hours after Kaylas death. he said Heston came to Flint AFTER the death. Then Moore says that Heston had conducted interviews where he talked about Kaylas death, which he shows footage of, to prove that Heston was aware he was coming to an area where there had been a school shooting. Finally, Moore says, precisely, that the school shooting is even mentioned on the NRA website. Cut to a shot of a piece of paper that says hightlighted "48 hours after Kaylas death...". This paper is referring to the NRA/Clinton public battles, and if you freeze frame the DVD you can see it for yourself. NOWHERE does it say or even imply that Heston came to Flint 48 hours after kaylas death, if you actually WATCH THE MOVIE and HEAR HIS WORDS, you see the piece of footage is simply there, for no other purpose, to prove that Heston and the NRA were aware they were holding a rally in a city that recently had a tragic school shooting. David Hardy lied to you spunk, and it can be 100% absolutely proven. Too bad you never took the initiative to watch the movie and as you suggested to me, "do your own research"

Now that pre-school I mentioned a little earlier, well, it was a tough town. Our pre-school activities including the disassembly, cleaning and reassembly of a Uzi submachine gun. This was mandatory as there was constant danger of the threat of attack by raccoons. The raccoons were after our caramel taffy apples and our sock monkey finger puppets, and they didn't care who got in their way. If it weren't for "Uncle Chuck" arriving that fine fall day, riding behind "Uncle Ted" on a white buffalo at the head of a train of Conestoga wagons full of semi-automatic weapons, I might not be typing this today.

michael moore's emailed letter is what turned me off to him. i fulled expected to hate BFC. i thought it was great. it wasn't about gun control. not even kinda. it wasn't anti-gun. it wasn't anti-gun ownership. i think michael moore is a pud. i think he uses his power to influence people poorly. i think he keeps the liberal conventual wisdom stocked with mistruth. but BFC was a quality film.

michael moore IS an idealogue. bill o'rielly is not. in my oh so very humble opinion.

Fahrenheit 9/11 could really hurt Moore if he doesn't stay as tight with his facts as he has for BFC. I fear a lot of his evidence for his next film will be tainted. We'll have to wait and see. I can prove O'Reilly consistently lies. Very often with bias. real proof. not just opinion. verified facts and figures. for me, the biggest being about himself being against the death penalty when he's called for it on various persons in numerous occasions. and then there's his flagrant hypocrisy, specifically his Pepsi boycott. And all the times he's been wrong and shouted down people before they could prove him wrong. Another reason to hate him. He's the most unfair host I can think of. I mean, even Alan Colmes gets to speak half as much as Sean Hannity does. I believe O'Reilly's not an independent because whenever he's been caught lying, its always been in statistics that would benefit the right. A sample of O'Reilly making up facts and figures on the spot: On Feb 5 '02 he shouted down NOW president Kim Gandy with a claim that 58 percent of single mothers are on welfare. The actual factual statistic is 14% of single mothers. Gandy had started to tell him this, but he interrupted and disallowed her to speak, saying, and I quote: "You can't say no, Miss Gandy. That's the stat. You can't just dismiss it. Its 58 percent. That's what it is from the federal government" and Nate, when you said the US gives the most foreign aid? well according to Phyllis Bennis of the IPS (which i'll say right now is a liberal think-tank), Japan gives the most, not per capita, the most. period. and the US gives less of its GNP than any other developed nation. heres a link to some of these and more, from FAIR, which i've always considered... well... fair! "The 'Oh Really?' Factor" http://www.fair.org/extra/0205/oh_really.html I'd like to continue this but its better for another thread.

yeah, well. my opinion is probably wrong. i don't know. i've really lost the will to care about any of this anymore. everyone is lying.

Your *opinion* is wrong? Your opinion is never wrong. It can be illinformed and unethical but not wrong. It can change if you want.

it is my opinion that my opinion is wrong. see, lapis? relativism's classic weakness.

thats funny... you know Nate, I dont really care about a significant amount of the issues, like the ones I try to show O'Reilly lying about above. i don't know if thats clear. Why should I care about some of these US issues that dont affect me? I don't. But I'll never get sick of webpages and books proving, clearly, that their enemies lie. Thats why I love the new Al Franken book. Its 300 pages, focused almost solely on lie debunking. I think he should give up on all his other crap and just put out one of these books every year, be Mr. Lie Almanac, and expand the amount of people he covers to include independent leftist media groups, etc.. I'm sure I've spewed a lot of things on this site and others that were either probably or definitely not true, that I'm not even aware of.

Moore has been a windbag his entire life. He can't write or speak a paragraph without lying. Now you want me to believe that BFC isn't a load of tripe? Nope, sorry, can't do it. He lied when he said that anyone can pick up a gun at the bank. He lied when he said that the factories in Colorado made weapons systems. Time and time again it's been shown that "This is Spinal Tap" had more elements of truthfulness in it. Moore is the master of illusion and insenuation. But truth? He wouldn't know what the truth is if it hit him in the face.

heh. the thing is, rowlf, is that the franken book is debunking lies in the coulter book that was debunking lies in ... bla bla. someone on the right is going to write a book that debunks the franken book and on we go. raging dave, you sounds pretty smart. tell me how hard it would be for me to go out and find a paragraph from michael moore that contains zero lies? probably not too hard. i'm not going to go look, though, because i don't have a job. and not having a job makes a man lazy and liberal. as for lying about the factories in colorado making weapons systems- you're not talking about the factory where he interviewed that guy infront of the missle assembly line, are you? because, uh. dude. the missles. they were, uh. right there. behind the guy. missles. maybe they were for the space program.

Evan McCollum, the man interviewed in the film said this: "Unfortunately, I'm included in Moore's film. I say unfortunately, because when I agreed to be interviewed, I did not know about Mr. Moore's style what I now know or I would not have granted the interview. Nor did Moore make his intentions known before the interview. In the film, he chose to imply a connection between America's defense budget and the defense/aerospace industry and the 1999 tragedy at Columbine High School. We strongly assert that this is a factually and ethically flawed judgment. In the film Moore states that Lockheed Martin monthly ships one of its "missiles" through neighborhoods where Columbine students sleep. The word "missiles" implies a weapon. Although other units of Lockheed Martin Corporation elsewhere in the country produce weapons to support the defense of the U.S., we make no weapons at the Littleton-area facility Moore visited. I provided specific information to Moore about the space launch vehicles we build to launch spacecraft for NASA, NOAA, the Dept. of Defense and commercial customers, including DirecTV and EchoStar. Some viewers also may be left with the impression that we transport our space launch vehicles at night for some questionable reason. The fact is they are huge and move slowly; we prefer to avoid causing traffic jams, so we transport them from our facility to the airport at night when traffic is comparatively much lighter. They are then flown to launch sites at Cape Canaveral or Vandenberg Air Force Base, depending on the mission." He TOLD Moore BEFORE the film was made what these missiles were used for.

Raging Dave's Home. Now I linked sorabji to a website called 4 Right Wing Wackos! OOOOO So much more fun then swapping soup at Bennigans!

"heh. the thing is, rowlf, is that the franken book is debunking lies in the coulter book that was debunking lies in " I'd like to look at Coulters book and see if shes ever debunked a lie, but it would be a) painful to read and b) hard to take seriously, because of all pundits of all political beliefs, I sincerely believe she is a wackjob, a phony, a crazy nut who never tells the truth about anything. hey spunk... "Lockheed-Martin and Nuclear Missiles. - The whole point to that segment was that the media and others were taking the easy route out and blaming among other things, heavy metal music, and more specifically Marilyn Manson for the shootings. Why? Because it was the simple answer. He's the freak, he's different, let's blame him. Let's not ask the tough questions. Let's not look in the mirror. Let's not look at the structure of society, and the prejudice’s we have. So Moore simply asked, if Marilyn Manson can be so easily blamed for such tragic events, is it not possible that the fathers who work for the #1 defense contractor to the United States could be an influence as well? And if a guy who sings some rock songs can be an influence, why not parents who work for a large weapons manufacturer such as L.M.? This was the (condensed) question Moore asked the PR guy for L.M. and his response was, "well I guess I don't see that connection". If L.M. was just producing "communication satellites and space exploration units" as the "Truth" website claims, wouldn't you think their PR guy might mention that? Regardless of whether that specific factory makes weapons, L.M. is a weapons manufacturer just as Moore claimed. If you'd like to know what L.M. makes, don't take my word for it. Why not hear it from the horse’s mouth? The following paragraphs are right off of LM.'s very own website: 1990's - Traveling Time and Space: Lockheed-made aircraft and weapons systems and Martin Marietta-made missiles, weapons, and electronics make significant contributions to Operation Desert Storm, as do the works of heritage companies Vought, IBM Federal Systems, Loral, and Unisys. In 1995, Lockheed and Martin Marietta merge to become one of the largest aerospace, defense and technology companies in the world. The company's core efforts now also include telecommunications and information systems. 1991 - The Vought-made Army Tactical Missile System becomes the first surface-to-surface missile ever fired by the U.S. Army during combat. Lockheed, Martin Marietta, Vought, IBM Federal Systems, Loral and Unisys -- all heritage companies -- contribute to the allied victory in the Persian Gulf. Lockheed provides multiple aircraft and electronic countermeasures systems, while Martin Marietta contributes missiles, weapons systems and electronics. 1999 Lockheed Martin wins one of two contracts to develop a Joint Strike Fighter for the U.S. Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps and the British Royal Navy. The contract includes design, development, construction and, ultimately, flight test of two full-scale demonstrator aircraft. The Pentagon goes on to select the Lockheed Martin led team to build the next-generation multirole strike fighter in 2001. http://www.lockheedmartin.com/about/history/1990.html The "Truth" website makes it sound like Lockheed-Martin (L.M.) is making weather balloons. The website claims that weapons aren't made at the Littleton factory, which is supposed to discredit the segment. As evidence of this, the website gives a link which describes what they make at the Littleton factory. One of the factories main purposes is converting Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM's). They "refurbish, integrate, and launch 14 Titan II ICBMs for government space launch requirements". Because the Littleton L.M. plant no longer produces missilies, the "Truth" website throws all of Moore's points out the window, and totally misses the point of the segment. The website also takes shots at Moore for stating that they truck the weapons through the city, "in the middle of the night while the children are asleep." Yet if you read the page (provided by the "Truth" website), you would read this: BACKGROUND - Lockheed Martin built more than 140 Titan ICBMs, once the vanguard of America's nuclear deterrent force, for the Air Force. Titan IIs also were flown as space launch vehicles in NASA's Gemini manned space program in the mid-1960s. Deactivation of the Titan II ICBM system began in July 1982. The last missile was taken from its silo at Little Rock Air Force Base, Arkansas, on June 23, 1987. Deactivated missiles are in storage at Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino, California. Lockheed Martin is responsible for transporting the Titan IIs from California to its facilities in Denver. http://www.ast.lmco.com/launch_titanIIfacts.shtml - L.M. plainly states that they built more then 140 Titan ICBM's. Some of them even carry the Martin name, such as the "Martin-Marietta LGM-25C Titan II Missile", and the "Martin MGM-31A Pershing I Tactical Ballistic Missile". For pictures of the ICBM's click here: http://members.tripod.com/missileer/pic5.html " credit: Tim Dudley thats three

i read an ann coulter book. i don't remember which one. she writes in an annoying but easy to read style. she often strings together things in misleading ways. however, she also heavily footnotes and sources her information. of course, i didn't source check. so who knows.

Nate, a whole chapter in the Franken book goes into how Coulter uses her 'footnotes' to lie, and how any author can do it... and they're endnotes. not footnotes.

This Coulter article sees Ann dealing with the very trivial lies she was caught in, and with none of the big lies she was caught in. Hilarious, too see Big Bad Ann not writing the way she normally does. http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/coulter1.asp

"When I left office, there was a substantial amount of biological and chemical material unaccounted for. That is, at the end of the first Gulf War, we knew what he had. We knew what was destroyed in all the inspection processes and that was a lot. And then we bombed with the British for four days in 1998. We might have gotten it all; we might have gotten half of it; we might have gotten none of it. But we didn't know. So I thought it was prudent for the president to go to the U.N. and for the U.N. to say you got to let these inspectors in, and this time if you don't cooperate the penalty could be regime change, not just continued sanctions."

...oh. and she's lying here too, with the simple denial method. Same way O'Reilly did his denials. Most of the time when O'Reilly has simply denied he ever said something (eg. Peabody Awards lie), he almost always did. Way to counter Frankens use of archive searches and actual quotes. Just deny.

"When I left office, there was a substantial amount of biological and chemical material unaccounted for. That is, at the end of the first Gulf War, we knew what he had. We knew what was destroyed in all the inspection processes and " take it to another thread, Billy Boy

no longer depend on our partners in the Gulf War coalition to continue to uphold the sanctions or to punish Saddam when he blocks or evades U.N. inspections. Our ability to ensure that Saddam Hussein is not producing weapons of mass destruction, therefore, has substantially diminished. Even if full inspections were eventually to resume, which now seems highly unlikely, experience has shown that it is difficult if not impossible to monitor Iraq's chemical and biological weapons production. The lengthy period during which the inspectors will have been unable to enter many Iraqi facilities has made it even less likely that they will be able to uncover all of Saddam's secrets. As a result, in the not-too-distant future we will be unable to determine with any reasonable level of confidence whether Iraq does or does not possess such weapons. Such uncertainty will, by itself, have a seriously destabilizing effect on the entire Middle East.

Iraq repeatedly made false declarations about the weapons that it had left in its possession after the Gulf War. When UNSCOM would then uncover evidence that gave the lie to those declarations, Iraq would simply amend the reports. For example, Iraq revised its nuclear declarations four times within just 14 months, and it has submitted six different biological warfare declarations, each of which has been rejected by UNSCOM. In 1995 Hussein Kamal, Saddam's son-in-law and the chief organizer of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program, defected to Jordan. He revealed that Iraq was continuing to conceal weapons and missiles and the capacity to build many more. Then and only then did Iraq admit to developing numbers of weapons in significant quantities--and weapons stocks. Previously it had vehemently denied the very thing it just simply admitted once Saddam's son-in-law defected to Jordan and told the truth. Now listen to this: What did it admit? It admitted, among other things, an offensive biological warfare capability, notably, 5,000 gallons of botulinum, which causes botulism; 2,000 gallons of anthrax; 25 biological-filled Scud warheads; and 157 aerial bombs. And I might say UNSCOM inspectors believe that Iraq has actually greatly understated its production. . . . Next, throughout this entire process, Iraqi agents have undermined and undercut UNSCOM. They've harassed the inspectors, lied to them, disabled monitoring cameras, literally spirited evidence out of the back doors of suspect facilities as inspectors walked through the front door, and our people were there observing it and had the pictures to prove it. . . . Over the past few months, as [the weapons inspectors] have come closer and closer to rooting out Iraq's remaining nuclear capacity, Saddam has undertaken yet another gambit to thwart their ambitions by imposing debilitating conditions on the inspectors and declaring key sites which have still not been inspected off limits, including, I might add, one palace in Baghdad more than 2,600 acres large. . . . One of these presidential sites is about the size of Washington, D.C. . . . It is obvious that there is an attempt here, based on the whole history of this operation since 1991, to protect whatever remains of his capacity to produce weapons of mass destruction, the missiles to deliver them, and the feed stocks necessary to produce them. The UNSCOM inspectors believe that Iraq still has stockpiles of chemical and biological munitions, a small force of Scud-type missiles, and the capacity to restart quickly its production program and build many, many more weapons. . . . Now, let's imagine the future. What if he fails to comply and we fail to act, or we take some ambiguous third route, which gives him yet more opportunities to develop this program of weapons of mass destruction and continue to press for the release of the sanctions and continue to ignore the solemn commitments that he made? Well, he will conclude that the international community has lost its will. He will then conclude that he can go right on and do more to rebuild an arsenal of devastating destruction. And some day, some way, I guarantee you he'll use the arsenal. . . . In the next century, the community of nations may see more and more of the very kind of threat Iraq poses now--a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction, ready to use them or provide them to terrorists, drug traffickers, or organized criminals who travel the world among us unnoticed. If we fail to respond today, Saddam, and all those who would follow in his footsteps, will be emboldened tomorrow by the knowledge that they can act with impunity, even in the face of a clear message from the United Nations Security Council, and clear evidence of a weapons of mass destruction program.

Here is what was known by 1998 based on Iraq's own admissions: * That in the years immediately prior to the first Gulf War, Iraq produced at least 3.9 tons of VX, a deadly nerve gas, and acquired 805 tons of precursor ingredients for the production of more VX. * That Iraq had produced or imported some 4,000 tons of ingredients to produce other types of poison gas. * That Iraq had produced 8,500 liters of anthrax. * That Iraq had produced 500 bombs fitted with parachutes for the purpose of delivering poison gas or germ payloads. * That Iraq had produced 550 artillery shells filled with mustard gas. * That Iraq had produced or imported 107,500 casings for chemical weapons. * That Iraq had produced at least 157 aerial bombs filled with germ agents. * That Iraq had produced 25 missile warheads containing germ agents (anthrax, aflatoxin, and botulinum). Again, this list of weapons of mass destruction is not what the Iraqi government was suspected of producing. (That would be a longer list, including an Iraqi nuclear program that the German intelligence service had concluded in 2001 might produce a bomb within three years.) It was what the Iraqis admitted producing. And it is this list of weapons--not any CIA analysis under either the Clinton or Bush administrations--that has been at the heart of the Iraq crisis.

The reason for war, in the first instance, was always the strategic threat posed by Saddam because of his proven record of aggression and barbarity, his admitted possession of weapons of mass destruction, and the certain knowledge of his programs to build more. It was the threat he posed to his region, to our allies, and to core U.S. interests that justified going to war this past spring, just as it also would have justified a Clinton administration decision to go to war in 1998. It was why Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, William Cohen, and many other top officials had concluded in the late 1990s that Saddam Hussein was an intolerable menace to his neighbors, to American allies, and ultimately to the United States itself, and therefore had eventually to be removed. It was also why a large number of Democrats, including John Kerry and General Wesley Clark, expressed support for the war last year, before Howard Dean and his roaring left wing of the Democratic party made support for "Bush's war" untenable for Democratic candidates.

After Operation Iraqi Freedom, the U.S. military was led by an Iraqi to a part of the desert where, lo and behold, a number of MiG fighter jets had been buried under the sand. Note that the Americans did not discover the jets themselves. Discovering chemical and biological munitions will be somewhat harder. Kay recently reported to Congress that there are approximately 130 Ammunition Storage Points scattered across Iraq, a country the size of France. Many of the ammunition depots take up more than 50 square miles. Together they hold 600,000 tons of artillery shells, rockets, aviation bombs, and other ordinance. Under Saddam, U.N. inspectors learned, the Iraqi military stored chemical ordnance at the same ammunition depots where the conventional rounds were stored. Do you know how many of the 130 Iraqi ammunition depots have been searched since the end of the war? Ten. Only 120 to go.

Saddam Hussein had four years of unfettered activity in which to hide and reconfigure his weapons programs. Our intelligence on this, as we noted earlier, may have been lousy. David Kay's task has essentially been to reconstruct a story we don't know. In fact, he's learned quite a bit in a very short time. For instance, as Kay reported to Congress, his team has uncovered "dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the U.N. during the inspections that began in late 2002" (emphasis added). In addition, based on admissions by Iraqi scientists and government officials, Kay and his team have discovered: * A clandestine network of laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment suitable for research in the production of chemical and biological weapons. This kind of equipment was explicitly mentioned in Hans Blix's requests for information, but was instead concealed from Blix throughout his investigations. * A prison laboratory complex, which may have been used in human testing of biological weapons agents. Iraqi officials working to prepare for U.N. inspections in 2002 and 2003 were explicitly ordered not to acknowledge the existence of the prison complex. * So-called "reference strains" of biological organisms, which can be used to produce biological weapons. The strains were found in a scientist's home. * New research on agents applicable to biological weapons, including Congo Crimean Hemorrhagic Fever, and continuing research on ricin and aflatoxin--all of which was, again, concealed from Hans Blix despite his specific request for any such information. * Plans and advanced design work on new long-range missiles with ranges up to at least 1,000 kilometers--well beyond the 150-kilometer limit imposed on Iraq by the U.N. Security Council. These missiles would have allowed Saddam to threaten targets from Ankara to Cairo.

In addition to these banned activities, which were occurring right under the noses of the U.N. inspectors this past year, Kay and his team also discovered a massive effort to destroy evidence of weapons programs, an effort that began before the war and continued during it and even after the war. In the "looting" that followed the fall of Baghdad, computer hard drives were destroyed in government buildings--thus making the computers of no monetary value to actual looters. Kay also found documents burned or shredded. And people whom the Kay team tried to interview were in some cases threatened with retaliation by Saddam loyalists. Indeed, two of the scientists were subsequently shot. Others involved in the weapons programs have refused to talk for fear of eventual prosecution for war crimes. Nevertheless, Kay has begun piecing together the story of what happened to Saddam's weapons and how he may have shifted direction in the years after 1998. It is possible that instead of building up large stockpiles of weapons, Saddam decided the safer thing would be to advance his covert programs for producing weapons but wait until the pressure was off to produce the weapons themselves. By the time inspectors returned to Iraq in 2002, Saddam was ready to be a little more forthcoming, because he had rejiggered his program to withstand somewhat greater scrutiny. Nevertheless, even then he could not let the inspectors see everything. Undoubtedly he hoped that if he could get through that last round, he would be home free, eventually without sanctions or further inspections. There are no doubt some Americans who believe that this would have been an acceptable outcome. Or who believe that another six months of inspections would have uncovered all that Saddam was hiding. Or that a policy of "containment"--which included 200,000 troops on Iraq's borders as an inducement to permit inspections--could have been sustained indefinitely both at the U.N. Security Council and in Washington. We believe the overwhelming lesson of our history with Saddam is that none of these options would have succeeded. Had Saddam Hussein not been removed this year, it would have been only a matter of time before this president or some future president was compelled to take action against him, and in more dangerous circumstances. There are people who will never accept this logic, who prefer to believe, or claim to believe, that the whole Iraq affair was, in the words of Ted Kennedy, a "fraud" "made up in Texas" for political gain, or who believe that it was the product of a vast conspiracy orchestrated by a tiny little band of "neoconservatives." Some of the people propagating this conspiratorial view of the Iraq war are now running for the Democratic nomination for president; one of them is even a former general who led the war against Slobodan Milosevic in 1999. We wish them the best of luck selling their conspiracy theories to the American people. But we trust Bill Clinton won't be stumping for them on this particular issue. Robert Kagan & William Kristol, The Weekly Standard

Poor bunnies.

Is he really doing a movie called Fahrenheit 9/11? I'll have to check out his website. Is there any mention of it on there?

you'll have to do a lot better than post bill kristol articles.

Especially since it's been well established no one is going to read cut and paste articles with no personal commentary. Rowlf does it well, I think. He posts quotes and then talks about them which is very readable and contributes to the strength of his arguments.

if there was ever a thread to kill a hard on, this would be it. not that i have a hard on. but im just saying.... you know.... all this shit about Coulter, O Reilly and lies and whatnot. i mean really, i can't scroll down fast enough.

I was really having fun with this thread until a former president and a newspaper decided to skirt away from the issue... so was that you spunk? trying to change the topic? way to go. you know, you could have put these posts in the "too busy to find WMDs" thread or somethin.

oh come now. Let's not go naming names like that. when we have IPs.

it wasnt spunk and i'm not Rowlf

Interesting article from FAIR.org: MEDIA ADVISORY: Is Media Bias Filtering Out Good News from Iraq? October 28, 2003 Are the media ignoring the good news in Iraq? From pundits to White House officials, that's what many critics are saying. According to George W. Bush (10/6/03), "We're making good progress in Iraq. Sometimes it's hard to tell it when you listen to the filter." While these complaints have sparked extensive discussion and debate in the media, an examination of coverage finds very little substance to this critique of media treatment of Iraq. The pro-occupation critics claim that there's not enough coverage of the rebuilt schools, for example, or the fact that hospitals in Iraq are open. Congressmember Jim Marshall (D.-Ga.) was perhaps the most blunt of them all, alleging in an opinion piece for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (9/22/03) that the media's "falsely bleak picture weakens our national resolve, discourages Iraqi cooperation and emboldens our enemy." Marshall concluded by lamenting "the harm done by our media. I'm afraid it is killing our troops." MSNBC host Joe Scarborough (9/26/03) told viewers that "some of the most powerful media players in America don't want America to succeed in Iraq…. American soldiers have told me that the biggest morale challenge that they are facing is not Saddam and Osama's thugs, but, rather, it's dealing with the biased, slanted reports that they're getting from American news organizations." But are these critics complaining about bad press, or simply bad news? As the Associated Press (10/17/03) explained: "The schools, for example, need rehabilitation in large part because of the chaotic looting touched off by the U.S. military's entry into Baghdad in April. And many schools have not been rehabilitated, particularly in poorer neighborhoods and the south." Newsweek (10/27/03) pointed out that "reporters who covered the war say that some of the Coalition's achievements are less impressive than they sound. Paul (Jerry) Bremer, the U.S. civilian administrator in Iraq, proudly announced the reopening of Iraq's schools this month, while White House officials point to the opening of Iraq's 240 hospitals. In fact, many schools were already open in May, once major combat ended, and no major hospital closed during the war." Newsweek went on to note that journalists who might actually try to cover what these critics deem the "good" news are discouraged from doing so: "In Baghdad, official control over the news is getting tighter. Journalists used to walk freely into the city’s hospitals and the morgue to keep count of the day’s dead and wounded. Now the hospitals have been declared off-limits and morgue officials turn away reporters who aren’t accompanied by a Coalition escort." So while critics say journalists should be chastised for not reporting on hospitals, the occupation forces are making it more difficult for reporters to actually visit them. The fact that reporters are kept away from hospitals suggests that it's risky to assume that more coverage of Iraqi reconstruction would yield "good" news. Consider New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins' description of the scene at an Iraqi hospital (NPR's On the Media, 10/3/03): "The hospitals are open. If you've been in a hospital in Iraq, however, the reality is far different. One should not picture a hospital in the United States. A typical hospital in Iraq is a nightmarish place where they don't have electricity yet. Where there's people sleeping on the floors; where the emergency rooms at night are flooded with people who have been shot and maimed in the chaos that breaks out after curfew." But some reporters are still grappling with the criticism that their coverage has been too "negative." ABC's Baghdad correspondent Neal Karlinsky told Nightline (10/15/03) that "there's a lot of good news stories here that we are trying to get out. And, quite frankly, news events sometimes get in the way of that. It's hard to work on a feature story about life in Baghdad getting back to normal when there is suddenly a car bombing that kills a half dozen people nearby." Karlinsky seems to be complaining that breaking news keeps getting in the way of reporting the news. CNN's Bill Hemmer (10/14/03) wondered if life in Iraq could "also be better than what's being reported also. If you consider that these reporters, many of them tell us they want to go cover the new school opening, but they can't because there's another bombing or shooting and that prevents them from sending that story?" But other critics note that "good news" is hardly the only thing missing from Iraq coverage. Seth Porges writes in Editor & Publisher (10/23/03) that coverage of injured and wounded U.S. soldiers gets very little media attention. "For months, the press has barely mentioned non-fatal casualties or the severity of their wounds," writes Porges. "Few newspapers routinely report injuries in Iraq, beyond references to specific incidents. Since the war began in March, 1,927 soldiers have been wounded in Iraq, many quite severely." New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, on the same day the Editor & Publisher piece was published, wrote that "we've had 900 wounded or maimed" in Iraq. Perhaps the fact that the Times so rarely publishes figures for wounded soldiers makes Friedman's error somewhat unsurprising; FAIR was able to find just one reference to the total number of wounded soldiers in the Times during the month of October. The paper did, however, run an editorial (10/5/03) that mentioned the "mournful daily roll call of additional dead and wounded soldiers." Ironically, that roll call of the wounded is rarely published in the New York Times. It is not unexpected for any administration to put forward its interpretation of news events. But the White House's aggressive pursuit of favorable news coverage threatens to squelch reporting on the actual human costs of the occupation. For example, the Washington Post's Dana Milbank reported on October 21 that the White House is "banning news coverage and photography of dead soldiers' homecomings on all military bases." Whether they are based in Baghdad or in Washington, journalists are obliged to report the news on the ground, not as "good" or "bad" but as news, regardless of how it fits with the vision the administration would like Americans to see.

Did you know that the dude who runs FOX news now was a member of the team that developed the Willie Horton ad for GHWB?

theres been lots of sketchy people involved with Fox news - John Ellis, Bush's cousin, being in charge of election coverage probably being the most notable... i think the most notable one people dont know too much about it Mansoor Ijaz, FOX's current foreign affairs analyst. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,46241,00.html Ijaz also writes for National Review. He runs the Crescent Investment Group, Inc., sat on the Council on Foreign Relations. Generally, his background is as a lobbyist for Pakistan. Ijaz is the person responsible for what has been commonly accepted as 'fact' that Clinton/Gore had bin laden handed to them on a silver platter, but rejected it. Ijaz tried to be broker/middleman whatever in allegedly handing over Osama bin Laden from Sudan, in exchange for sanctions to be removed from Sudan so his company could pursue oil interests. The US government went to the Sudanese government directly and there was no offer from them at all, they claimed no knowledge of bin Laden being in Sudan, captured or free or otherwise. And the US has a policy of not negotiating with private individuals. Other leads were pursued and nothing came of them. So of course, after 9/11, Ijaz all of a sudden is a FOX News analyst spreading around that Clinton is to blame for bin Laden being alive. Pissed off businessmen posing as pundits. Fair and balanced. Since then, he's become infamous for possibly having a link in the Daniel Pearl murder...