Michael Moore's film Fahrenheit 911, exhibits all the strengths and weaknesses of the liberal left. Moore, an outspoken opponent of the U.S. war on Iraq, brilliantly titles the film after science fiction writer Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. In the original sci-fi novel, it is the job of the firemen, who work for the authoritarian police state, to burn books. The temperature at which the book burning is achieved is 451 F. Moore's analogy here seems to be that the conditions under which unprovoked and–under international law–illegal war by a superpower on an independent, sovereign nation is achieved is when an incident such as 9-11 has occurred, or been permitted to occur.
Moore appropriately begins the film by reminding viewers of the conditions under which the "President" of the U.S. assumed office, focusing on the disenfranchisement of Black voters in several Florida counties. For readers of the NT Forum who have been following the reactionary role of Fox News in the railroading and blackballing of Muslim leaders and causes, Fahrenheit reveals an interesting point about Fox: With the polls still open on Election Day 2000, and all the major television stations broadcasting that Gore was well ahead in the Florida race, suddenly and gratuitously, the Fox News Channel announced that Bush had won that state. The other stations, embarrassed at their perceived mistake, quickly followed suit, retracting their original broadcasts and announced the putative Bush win–a win so dubious that the case eventually resulted in dozens of Congressional Hearings and ultimately wound up in the Supreme Court. But on Election Day, the announcement by Fox News of Bush's win might well have influenced results at the polls; more importantly it raised questions of whether Fox reported or fabricated the news. (For more on Fox News, see the critical documentary Outfoxed now playing in selected area theaters and available on video soon.)
In Fahrenheit 911, Moore uses humor to cover an otherwise heart-wrenching story: the story of a president who covers his own ineptitude in neglecting the national security interests of the country prior to 911 by going to war to destroy an innocent and defenseless Iraqi nation. Off over 500 members of the U.S. Congress, only one has a son or daughter in the armed forces in Iraq, says Moore, who in the movie is shown somewhat comically accosting these fast-retreating legislators before the cameras, audaciously requesting them to volunteer a son or a daughter to fight for freedom and democracy in Iraq. He rents an ice cream truck and drives around Capital Hill reading the Patriot Act over the loud speakers of the truck as a service to Congress members, who have signed away the First Amendment Rights of the people, with scarcely a glance at the text of the draconian bill they have signed.
Fahrenheit has the integrity to show extensive footage from un-embedded journalists: Iraqi children screaming with pain from napalm wounds, trucks laden down with civilian corpses, and the terror experienced by Iraqi women during house-to-house searches by U.S. soldiers. Moore's interviews with U.S. soldiers revealed the diversity of attitudes among these young men and women. One young black marine, a Muslim, said he preferred jail to being returned to Iraq to fight other people of color, who had done nothing to him. Another, a bespectacled Caucasian youth, reported that once the adrenaline was pumping, and the right music was playing in the tank or humvee, he would shoot up the enemy without qualm, preferably to the tune of "The roof is on fire..."
In a profoundly personal touch, Moore juxtaposes the bombed out areas in Iraq with scenes from his hometown of Flint, Michigan. Footage of Flint's slums with their rampant unemployment and ramshackle housing shows a striking resemblance to parts of Iraq. Ironically, this desperately poor U.S. town, and many others like it, is prime recruiting area for the U.S. military. Here, says Moore, the children of poor Blacks and Whites, who have few employment options, and often view the military as a means of paying for college, are picked up for military service–to go and kill the children of poor Iraqis.
In contrast with his clarity on the inhumanity of the war, Moore seems confused about the driving force to go to war. Through various interviews, Moore brings up the point that plans to attack Iraq were clearly laid out well before September 11. Perhaps the first quarter of the film amply emphasizes Bush's ineptitude, inaction, and his vacation panacea–when the going gets rough, the Prez goes on vacation. And Moore cuts poor Bush no breaks for going on one vacation after another early in his administration. In one scene, Bush appears in a Florida kindergarten classroom (actual footage) reading a children's book with the class as part of a photo-op. As he sits in the classroom, an aid enters to inform him that the first plane has crashed into the World Trade Center. The Commander-In-Chief remains exactly where he is in the kindergarten, calmly reading the kiddy book, with a slightly moronic look on his face. Moore's voice over explains that perhaps Bush's inaction stems from the fact that no secret service members are around to suggest an appropriate response to the President. It is clear from this and numerous other scenes that Moore might not put money on Bush's intellectual ability.
Someone more focused, agenda-driven, and amoral even than Bush had to come up with a plan to attack Iraq--in defiance of the Security Council, the U.N. General Assembly, the EU, and NATO; in contempt of traditional U.S. allies France and Germany; and in utter disregard for worldwide protests. And that someone had to be determined enough to persevere with the plan, even if no WMDs were found; even if the U.S. image and alliances throughout the world were tarnished; even if it meant years of U.S. occupation of Iraq, at costs threatening to bring down the U.S. economy; and even if it meant heightened hatred for U.S. imperial policies and increased risk of terrorist attacks on the U.S. itself. Yet the illustrious film-maker offers no suggestions as to the masterminds of such a well thought out scheme. Perhaps in consideration of his career as a Hollywood film-maker, Moore carefully sidesteps scrutiny of the political allegiances of the men formulating policy for the Bush Administration: Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Perle, or any of the other AIPAC affiliated-Neocons to whom Bush routinely reports. Interestingly, Wolfowitz and Perle, despite their vociferous and unabashed push to attack Iraq, barely appear in the film. Instead, Administration mouth pieces--Rice, Powell, and George Dubya himself–are shown repeatedly throughout the film. They are like puppets with unseen puppeteers.
The film spends considerable time exploring links between the "Saudi" royal family and the Bush family, and the fact that numerous Saudis were permitted unencumbered exit from the U.S. immediately after 9-11, when all other flights were grounded. Moore hints that perhaps these Saudis ought to have been detained and interrogated before they were sent on their merry way. He mentions joint investments by the Bush family and members of the Bin Laden family, intimating that the Bin Laden family might not be as estranged from Osama as previously believed, and that this, too, is cause for inquiry. Shockingly, the otherwise politically shrewd Moore seems almost completely unaware of the servile role of Saudi Arabia, and the subservience of its military, intelligence and judiciary to U.S. interests. Without the use of Saudi airspace and intelligence sharing, the "success" of both Gulf Wars, might have been in question. But no Saudi sits on the President's cabinet or in his closed circle of advisors which formulate U.S. foreign policy. Several self-described Israeli citizens, however, do sit on these boards, determining the allocation of U.S. taxpayers money. In his preoccupation with the Saudi royals' imaged role in 9-11 and his complete inattention to the very real Zionist role in the Iraq War, Moore misses the boat on who is the policymaker and who is the obsequious executor.
Sadly, the release of Fahrenheit 911 in the heat of the election summer and well after the decimation of the Iraqi population, leads one to wonder if Moore may be a dupe to the Other War Party–the Democrats.
