Standing on the Bellies of Giants

Christopher Hitchens wonders out loud who will be the liberal Buckley, the liberal Limbaugh.

He's found that, and much more:

With Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, however, an entirely new note has been struck. Here we glimpse a possible fusion between the turgid routines of MoveOn.org and the filmic standards, if not exactly the filmic skills, of Sergei Eisenstein or Leni Riefenstahl.

Riefenstahl and Eisenstein? Ow. That's gotta hurt.

Now, I almost want to see it.

I especially like this part:

To describe this film as dishonest and demagogic would almost be to promote those terms to the level of respectability. To describe this film as a piece of crap would be to run the risk of a discourse that would never again rise above the excremental. To describe it as an exercise in facile crowd-pleasing would be too obvious. Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of "dissenting" bravery.

The other part that seems obvious, from Moore's own hype - it preaches to the choir. Nobody that hasn't drunk the Democrat Underground koolaid - indeed, nobody that doesn't have an IV hooked to their arm - is going to buy into this - and I suspect that's just fine. It's an exercise in inflaming the moonbat base, if all the current signs are accurate.

Read it all.

Posted by Mitch at June 22, 2004 07:19 AM