Period
Renee K. Tran, a writer over at Useless-Knowledge.com makes an observation about Michael Moore and the anti-Moore sites:
Moving on to another high profile individual...Michael Moore. Is what this man presents to America in his films truth? Once again, who knows. You might as well just flip a coin. On one side you have Mr. Moore touting all of his conspiracy theories with what seems to be “factual evidence” to back him up. To see this evidence all you have to do is go to his website. He has posted facts to back up his claims in every thing he has presented in the movie Farenheit/911. However, there are at least four anti-Moore websites that contain just as much “factual evidence” to refute those claims.I have seen his movies, I peruse his website on a daily basis, and I even saw him live here in Toledo. I have also read an enormous amount of information that is contrary to what he has to say. So, again, I can not form an opinion on this man and his claims due to a lack of hard evidence. How am I supposed to decide who’s facts are truthfull and who’s facts are false? I can’t and neither can you. Period.
Who’s facts are truthful? Here’s a hint. Unless it’s a fact, it’s not truthful.
When Moore makes a claim in one of his movies, and then backs it up with “factual evidence” on his website with a link, that seems to satisfy some people. I don’t know how many people even click the links on his website to see if the “evidence” in his source material is being represented accurately.
Take for example Moore’s assertion that Bush spent “42% of his presidency” on vacation and spent the “rest of August” on his ranch in days before 9-11 . Moore uses a quote from the Washington Post for the 42% part. Moore ignored that fact that some of those “vacation days” were weekends, when Bush was in Church and were calculated into the equation. (On second thought, he didn’t ignore it, any idiot would know better) Also included were days when Bush was hosting Foreign Leaders at the Ranch. The 42% number falls apart with a little research.
He didn’t even bother to try to “factually backup” the part about August. He provides no other evidence other than a single article for this and many of his “factual backups”. However, the author of the article above could have researched the claim on her own.
The thing is, any idiot, yours truly included, could easily go to another source to corroborate these claims. Here’s how I decided on the “August “ issue:
I went to the WhiteHouse site and looked at the President’s schedule for that month. On his schedule, it said he went various places, 5 different states actually during August. Then, knowing he was the President, I figured that if he made an appearance at say, a Habitat for Humanity function for example, there would be a news story about it. So I googled that function to read the account of Bush’s attendance.
With those two pieces of information, we can see that Moore did not properly research his claim, rather, he took a single article from a knowingly Bush-biased newspaper and made it part of his movie. Sure, he provides “proof” that his source actually said what they said, but he stops there when he finds they said what he wanted to hear.
I didn’t even need to get past Moore’s “factual backup” of his assertion that “Gore got more votes in 2000” to realize that it wasn’t proof at all. . A while back, I went to Moore’s War Room and looked at his “proof” . I wrote about it here, found that Moore’s source actually contradicted his claim. Most people don’t know that however, since they don’t click through like they ought to.
There are tons of examples like this. Our research is simply better than his. Good research is supposed to trump bad research. That’s how you know “who to believe”.
Here’s my advice Renee, ( and the rest of you ) keep in mind that on sites like this and the other “anti-Moore” sites, we invite response and challenges to our research. Moore offers his readers no such option, save an e-mail address to a mailbox that is always full. We can’t get away with half -truths here, our readers hold us to account all too well. Heck, they’d rip us to shreds.
There IS a way to know who is telling the truth: CHECK IT OUT FOR YOURSELF!
Our readers usually do, and they let us have it with both barrels if they think we have made a mistake. It’s a lot easier to decide who to believe when you don’t rely on “flipping a coin”. Period.
***UPDATE***
Renee responds via e-mail.
Dear Frank,
Thank you for taking the time to read my article. I believe you failed to
read the bold red print on the bottom of all the articles at U-K that say:
All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to
be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED!
I dont know Frank, I think you probably should have posted a link to my
article instead of copying and posting half of it onto your site.
Sincerely,
Renee K. Tran
Ahem,
1) If you click YOUR NAME at the very start of this article, you will see that it links right to your artilce. It is in bright red as not to be missed. You’ll see that people have used it if you checked your traffic. It will have gone up today.
2) Brush up on “Fair Use” copyright law ( hint; try google) which allows reproduction of a portion or quote from written works, provided the use is not for profit. A usage may be considered “fair,” if that usage is for the purpose of criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.
3) Since you are commenting about anti-Moore sites,( Moorewatch being the biggest, oldest, and best known), I believe that we are well within the guidelines of journalistic decency to resond to your article about US. I even did you the courtesy of letting you know that an article referencing you was being posted, so that you may be able to respond. I certainly didnt expect you respond with a “Prosecution” e-mail. Nice.
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