The applause at the end of the film troubled me.   

Of course, I was not surprised by it.   After all, I live in Boston -- the heart of Kerry Country.  A stone’s throw from the People’s Republic of Cambridge.  A city full of arguably the most educated in the United States, if not the world.  Yet they seemed to take everything the man in the baseball cap said as if it were the gospel truth.  One would think reasonably intelligent people would not take the word of Michael Moore at face value.

In Fahrenheit 9/11,  Moore laments the loss of life at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and indeed, a friend of Moore’s was killed at the WTC.  Yet Moore cannot bring himself to describe this as an act of terrorism.  He is moved only to call it “a foreign attack.”

But then again this film isn’t really about 9/11; it is about tarring George W. Bush and seeing what will stick.  Moore asserts that the Bush family had a business relationship with the Bin Laden family.  He asserts that after 9/11, members of the Bin Laden family were allowed to leave the country for Saudi Arabia without being questioned by the FBI.  He asserts that the Taliban government of Afghanistan had visited Texas in 1997, while Bush was Governor of that state, to discuss the possibility of having a gas pipeline built through Afghanistan with the help of Unocal and that one of Unocal’s consultants was Hamid Karzai -- now the President of Afghanistan.

While the Bush and Bin Laden family may have had business connections, Moore does not establish what the remainder of the Bin Laden family had to do with 9/11 or supporting terrorism.     With regard to the Bin Ladens leaving the country without being interviewed by the FBI, Christopher Hitchens pointed out that the bin Laden family was questioned by the FBI and that their flights out of the United States were authorized by Richard Clarke.   Yes, that Richard Clarke -- the former czar of counter-terrorism strategy in the Bush Administration who has become lionized by the Left for his criticisms of the War in Iraq.  One would have thought that Moore might have mentioned this, given the pivotal role Clarke plays in the film.  But why let the facts get in the way of an argument?

As for the pipeline it, well, it turns out to be nothing more than a pipe dream.  Unocal withdrew from the project in 1998.   

Once Moore has tired of talking about the Taliban and becomes weary of waxing philosophical on the Wahabbis in Saudi Arabia, Moore focuses his attention on Iraq.  In fact, Moore would have us believe that Saddam’s Iraq was a kind, gentle place where kids spent their days flying kites and going to amusement parks.  He neglects, however, to tell us about mass graves, plastics shredders, rape rooms and the prisons that housed children.  Then again he neglects to mention Saddam’s name altogether.   

Moore’s message is clear.   Everybody in Iraq was just having a dandy time flying kites until America got involved.  It was reminiscent of the LBJ attack ad against Barry Goldwater that showed a little girl smelling a daisy, only to be killed by a nuclear bomb because darn it that’s what would happen if Goldwater were to be elected President.

No doubt, war (any war) is ugly.  But Moore portrays American soldiers as bloodthirsty thugs who are interested only in killing Iraqi civilians.  Yes, there are soldiers who are brutes.  But to tar everyone with the same brush shows that Moore has nothing but contempt for our men and women who have of their own volition decided to devote their lives to defending this country and protecting those in need of our help.

Moore focuses a great deal of attention on military recruiters and follows a couple of them around as they talk to young people at a local mall.  He emphasizes that this mall is not in the rich section of town.  No doubt military recruiting, like fundraising, involves a great deal of selling and with selling comes the use of assertive, if not aggressive strong arm tactics.  On the other hand, if Moore objects to these methods, what would he suggest?  The reinstatement of the Draft?  If the Bush Administration even hinted at reinstating the Draft, Moore would be the first to cry foul.  

Moore makes a couple appearances in Washington, D.C.  He takes John Ashcroft to task for…well, being John Ashcroft.  Of course, he also takes issue with the Patriot Act and that no read the legislation before it was passed.  After Michigan Congressman John Conyers, a liberal Democrat, reveals that most legislators cannot and do not read most of the legislation that appears before them, Moore takes action.  He commandeers an ice cream truck near Capitol Hill and proceeds to read the Patriot Act for the benefit of members of Congress.  Well, sort of.

There are over 1,000 sections in the Patriot Act.  Somehow I doubt that Michael Moore read all 1018 sections of the Patriot Act.  If he had, the ice cream truck would have quickly run out of its stock.   

Indeed, if he had read the much maligned Section 215 of the Patriot Act (which brings the Foreign Surveillance Intelligence Act into the cell phone and internet age) he would have read the following:

An investigation conducted under this section shall not be conducted of a United States person solely upon the basis of activities protected by the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

I think Michael Moore probably skipped that passage.   

Towards the end of the movie, Moore petitions members of Congress to sign up their sons and daughters to enlist in the War in Iraq.

Cute.  Except for one problem.  Parents don’t enlist their children in the army.  This is not Iran, where children were sent to fight Saddam Hussein’s Iraqis.  Nor is this the Palestinian Authority, where parents encourage their children to become well adjusted for martyrdom.  Men and women enlist into the Armed Forces of their own volition.  This is a job for adults.  There are no parental consent forms when it comes to enlisting in the military.

Which brings us to Lila Lipscomb.  An executive assistant at an employment agency in Moore’s hometown of Flint, Michigan; Lipscomb is shown draping an American flag outside of her house.  She does this everyday.  She is careful not to let the flag touch the ground.

Her family has a military tradition.  One of her own children served in the 1991 Gulf War and another was serving in Iraq.  A self described “conservative Democrat,” she once held anti-war protesters in disdain.   However, this changed when her son, Corporal Michael Pedersen, was killed in the line of duty in Iraq.

Without question this is the most powerful part of the film.   Lipscomb says like any parent who loses a child that a child is not supposed to die before their parents.  She desperately wants to bring her son back but knows she cannot.  This will remain with her for the rest of her life.  Lipscomb’s pain is real.  Moore’s sympathy is not.

This might have been the one redeeming part of this film.  But Michael Moore’s own words betray him.   When interviewed by a Japanese newspaper concerning the War in Iraq, Moore offers:

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not ‘insurgents’ or ‘terrorists’ or ‘The Enemy.’   They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow – and they will win.

I wonder how Lila Lipscomb feels about Moore comparing the men likely responsible for her son’s death to the Minutemen?   I wonder how Lila Lipscomb feels about the fact that Moore wants American soldiers to die at the hands of these “Minutemen?”  I wonder how Lila Lipscomb feels about the fact that Moore wants these “Minutemen” to win?

Sure, Moore tells Lipscomb that America is “a great country.”   But when Moore is in Germany he tells Germans that “Americans are possibly the dumbest people on the planet.”  When Moore tells Germans that Americans are possibly the dumbest people on the planet, he is speaking of Lila Lipscombs and the Michael Pedersens of the world.  Moore reminds me of the sort of guy in high school who acts like your friend when he’s facing you and then proceeds to badmouth you to anyone who will listen the minute you leave the room.

Of course, this kind of material is eaten like ice cream in Boston, Ann Arbor, New York’s Upper West Side, Hollywood, Madison, Wisconsin and other big cities.  But with Lipscomb, Moore is attempting to court the Reagan Democrats.  In other words, does this play well in Peoria?   If it does then the Bush Administration is in serious trouble.  Michael Moore may be big and fat but he is no idiot.

On the other hand, most people who attend this movie hate President Bush to begin with and simply want that view of the world reinforced.  Most Bush supporters will avoid this movie except those -- like yours truly -- who like to win arguments with left-wingers.  But most people who see this film who are neither Left nor Right will recognize that Moore has an axe to grind and that he usually misses his mark.  They will feed sad for Lila Lipscomb.  But they will also recognize that she is overcome by grief, and a detached analysis of the matter at hand is simply impossible in this situation.  They might have some concerns about the Bush Administration’s judgment but will also wonder why Moore hasn’t offered any alternatives to remedy the situation.    This movie will leave most Americans cold.

I feel sadness for Lila Lipscomb.  I feel angry at Michael Moore for using her to advance his career, build on his lies and machinations, and pretending to actually care about her.   This is why Fahrenheit 9/11 leaves me cold.   

Aaron Goldstein, a former member of the socialist New Democratic Party, writes poetry and has a chapbook titled Oysters and the Newborn Child: Melancholy and Dead Musicians. His poetry can be viewed on www.poetsforthewar.org.