F/911's effect on a Bushie Navy man, the media, and thoughts

[ArtieBoy]

(This post is a collage of random thoughts.)

First, CBS just announced that Farhenheit 9/11 is Number One at the box office for the weekend...a movie in 1/3 as many theaters as other top-draw movies.

A friend of mine who's a career Navy man and huge Bush fan saw Farhenheit 9-11 last night. I talked to him on Yahoo! chat earlier today and asked him what he thought. He said, "Why doesn't Moore interview Mr. Kerry?...I'm still proud to be heading to Iraq in two months, I think we're doing good things over there..." At the same time I raised about a dozen points from the movie and he didn't respond to any of them. But people didn't turn Repug immediately after hearing Rush Limbaugh, it tooks years of steady exposure. I think for a lot of people the facts of this movie will sink in slowly but surely -- slowly, but surely.

A point that will probably rub a lot of people wrong here, but I have to make it: people are saying our news media failed us. But where did the damning clips of Bush come from? Network news! Rumsfeld and Rice saying Saddam was no threat clearly had a Today show logo (or some other show...can't remember) in the corner. Bandar laying it all out on Larry King Live. What this movie showed me was it's not what the news shows me, but how I watch the news. The 11 o'clock news last night looked much different because I had learned how to watch.

Myself, even as a DU member and Howard Dean supporter, the movie jarred me more than I even expected. As a piece of film and entertainment I would quibble that it's pace was uneven and some things that should have been delved into were skimmed while other points were ran in the ground. In the end, though, as the credits rolled and I contemplated what I had learned, I realized I had seen possibly the most important movie in American history. Maybe in the history of the world! A movie that exposed corrupt power connections around the world in living color!

Everyone posts about this, but I just had to get those thoughts out :)

[Eloriel]

1. Thank you, Artie

Re your Navy friend -- he probably has to continue believing in Bush and the war and that "we're doing good things over there" if he's headed over there soon (cognitive dissonance and all that). Poor man. It's either that or -- what? Go with dread (not good for anyone's morale, which isn't good for anyone's safety)? Not go? Give up a whole career?

I disagree with you re our media, but I'll leave that discussion for another time.

[AbbeyRoad]

2. Spin

I'd just say not to forget the heavy spin that mainstream media talking heads often put on those same clips. They introduce them, and many times editorialize inappropriately.

[Cha]

3. Exactly! Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 is

the anti spin on that footage or at least giving another point of view of which has been truly, sadly, missing on this "miserable failure".

[Jade Fox]

4. Slowly, but surely....

You're right, people don't do a complete turnaround instantly. Those
silences are signifigant. He is still processing the information from the
movie, but he knows the old answers are just not going to work anymore.

And he hasn't been to Iraq yet, it sounds like. Stay in touch with him!:)

[ibegurpard]

5. Here's the deal with the news:

Would you consider that the media is doing it's job if it runs one of those situations that paints Bush in a bad light once or towards the back of the paper while giving over resources and repeated airtime to the Bush administration line and the minutiae of the Laci Peterson trial? Because that's what's happened. The media, if it reports these things at all, has mentioned them only in passing or relegated them to the back page and then it's full bore "Operation Iraqi Freedom" and the latest Laci Peterson/Michael Jackson updates.

[ArtieBoy]

6. Sure...

Sure, I realize that things like Laci Peterson take up too much space. But for instance I told my mom, "And you know they've grabbed more people than that Nick Berg? The movie showed this driver for Haliburton..." My mom already knew about that. It was on the news! I watch the news, I read this site two or three times a day and catch "Meet the Press" on Sunday night (that's all I can squeeze in) and I never knew about the Haliburton guy! Never knew about the Japanese reporters. And by the time Rice was calling Hussein "no threat" on TV in 2000 anyone would have thought, "Well, duh," and forgot about it. It has new significance in the current context.

What makes the difference, I think, is that we're used to seeing men with black hoods and AK-47's holding hostages on the nightly news and we're not fazed. But when it's shown on a huge screen in THX Quadraphonic sound, we "get it" in a whole new way. I did, anyhow.

As for my pal in the Navy...he said he bought "Bowling for Columbine" on DVD and watched it today. Think some thing is happening? :)

[bandy]

7. I have repeated this so many times to friends and family...

Moore PRODUCED this film, Bush STARRED in it. Let who ever say what they want. As stated above tho, this Navy man needs our support and may our Angels go with him because Bush and the US gov. will not.