My, My, My...

It seems that someone is claiming that advertisements for Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 violate existing campaign finance laws. Seems to me, I've heard that one before. (HINT: scroll down)

The funniest part of the article is Moore's response:

"It's a violation of my First Amendment rights that I cannot advertise my movie. It's a movie," Moore said. "I have not publicly endorsed John Kerry. I am an independent; I am not a member of the Democratic Party."

What really makes me laugh is Moore's claim "I have not publicly endorsed John Kerry." No? This seems to be another example of Moore playing semantics. Like his tautological "all the facts in my movie are true," which is like saying "all the women in my family are female," he carefully phrases his claim so it sounds like he's saying something that he's not.

Moore may not have publicly endorsed Kerry anywhere. I certainly haven't seen him say anything specific about the man. But what he has done is publicly excoriate George Bush in what is, for all intent and purpose, a two-man race. What is that, if not an endorsement of Kerry by default? He's certainly said he hopes his film gets people to vote. Who does he want them to vote for, if not Bush? Yet, he uses the term "independent" so we will all see how "objective" he is.

And really...let's be honest. How many ads have you seen "supporting" a candidate which do nothing but talk about how awful his opponent is? Is Fahrenheit 9/11 really any different?

In a slightly different vein, the threads of "evidence" from 9/11 are already starting to unravel. First, Moore's claim that Bush spent 42% of his term on vacation takes a bump down to 13% when you realize that the initial numbers included weekends. Next, his criticism of Bush's reaction upon learning of the attacks is refuted by someone who was actually there--the Principal:

But Gwendolyn Tose’-Rigell, the principal at Emma E. Booker Elementary School, says Bush handled himself properly.

“I don’t think anyone could have handled it better,” Tose’-Rigell told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune in a story published Wednesday. “What would it have served if he had jumped out of his chair and ran out of the room?” ...

My take on it has always been that the "six or seven minutes" that Moore complains about is a non-issue. It seems to me that when someone appears to be targeting Washington and the country's leaders, six or seven minutes doesn't seem to be an extreme amount of time to, say, adjust security concerns that had been previously planned to the last detail. His security certainly had much to do at that point. Six or seven minutes seems fair to me.