War Porn

Indie war correspondent Michael Yon is suing Michael Moore for copyright violation.  Basically he used one of Yon’s pictures in the banner on his website, and despite numerous requests to take it down has refused to do so.  Be sure and read the whole thing for the specifics, but this section really struck me as being right on.

Justice Potter Stewart once defined pornography by saying, “I know it when I see it.” Pornography and propaganda are closely related, as they are both cynical attempts at manipulation, rooted in a lack of respect for humanity. War Porn is one of the more disturbing developments in the new media, as people on both sides of the Iraq War get their kicks watching video images of death and destruction – as long as it’s their opponents who get killed. Whether it’s an Al Qaeda cell-phone video of an IED attack or the grisly footage of a Coalition air strike, War Porn is degrading and incendiary. Of course, some footage is newsworthy and informative and the public deserves to see it. There is also great value to soldiers in watching footage for training purposes and to better understand battlefields and weapons. But at some point, especially when the material is used to make political points, images of combat can cross the line into pornography. People die in war, but we must never forget that each casualty is a human being, even people as deserving of death as Al Qaeda. Denying our opponents’ humanity, we lose a little of our own.

When someone’s grandmother disseminates the photo of Major Beiger cradling a dying girl in his arms, I allow the usage because I feel she is trying to share the human tragedy. When Michael Moore puts that same photo on his web site, alongside images of George Bush, John McCain and Hillary Clinton, the clear implication is that Farah’s death is their fault. That is a misrepresentation of the facts on the ground, as well as the story of the photo. Farah was killed by a suicide car bomb in Mosul on May 2, 2005. Major Bieger and other soldiers literally risked their own lives to save many children and adults that day, but Farah didn’t make it. Michael Moore apparently does not understand – or refuses to acknowledge – the moral distinction between a man who would murder innocent people, and a man who would sacrifice himself to save them. The photo, as I took it, is the truth, but Moore uses it – illegally – to convey falsehoods. His mind is that of a political propagandist who sees Farah’s death not as a human tragedy, but a tool.

Hey, as long as Mikey can sell his shitty movies and books and keep on making himself even more millions, what the hell does he care?

Somewhere in a penthouse in New York Michael Moore is feeling ill!

President-elect Obama has chosen Dr. Sanjay Gupta as the new Surgeon General when his term begins this month.  You might remember Dr. Gupta from his criticisms of Moore’s propaganda film, er, “documentary” Sicko:

CNN’s Gupta Fact Checks Moore’s Sicko

and his on air debate with the corpulent one over the “facts” of the film:

You tube video of the Gupta/Moore debate over Sicko

Is it any surprise that Moore would not only question, but criticize and attack such a choice?  Check out his website for the numerous references to the decision by Obama:

MichaelMoore.com

Considering the vast knowledge and wisdom of Moore and that fact that according to him we should never question anything HE says, what could someone like Dr. Gupta possibly offer as the Surgeon General?  Well, a lot it seems according to some sources such as U.S. News and World Report:

Gupta, a surgeon and assistant professor of neurosurgery at Emory University (where he still cares for patients), would bring to the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services unique talents unrivaled by any of the prior 17 surgeons general going back to 1871. Among them are his truly outstanding health communication skills and the fact that he is already a trusted figure in many people’s living rooms on all matters of health and disease—particularly on the major national heath problems that are within the domain of the surgeon general.

But what about the problems facing veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan?  Surely this “quack” wouldn’t know how to address THOSE issues!  Or would he?:

Speaking of wars, Gupta gained some unique battlefield exposure as an embedded correspondent in Iraq with a U.S. Navy medical unit dubbed the “Devil Docs.” He will no doubt bring to the job a perspective on military health eminently helpful to his office as the Iraq War winds down and thousands of men and women return to civilian life carrying with them their wartime experiences and sometimes residual illnesses.

So why would anyone criticize such a choice?  Apparently, it’s because of the fact that Dr. Gupta had the audacity to actually question the “infallible” Moore on the so-called facts in his film “Sicko”.  Consider the criticism from the New York Times’ Paul Krugman:

I don’t have a problem with Gupta’s qualifications. But I do remember his mugging of Michael Moore over Sicko. You don’t have to like Moore or his film; but Gupta specifically claimed that Moore “fudged his facts”, when the truth was that on every one of the allegedly fudged facts, Moore was actually right and CNN was wrong.

So what’s wrong if Dr. Gupta accused Moore of “fudging the facts”?  Which of course, Moore would NEVER do? 

Gupta didn’t say “Michael Moore is an annoying blowhard”; he didn’t say “We question his interpretation of the evidence”; he said he “fudged the facts”. In other words, he accused Moore of lying. That’s a very strong accusation, which had better be backed by solid evidence. Instead, we had CNN misreading a number from Moore; CNN objecting to Moore using a projected health care spending number for 2007 instead of an actual number for 2005 (and the projection was right, by the way); CNN accusing Moore of not showing a number that was in fact right there in the movie. And Gupta did not apologize, except for the misread number.

Huh, so making strong accusations without solid evidence is wrong and therefore brings a person’s integrity into question?  Really?  So can Mr. Krugman or anyone else who defends Moore’s propaganda and cherry picking of information repackaged to push Moore’s agenda tell me what kind of “solid evidence” Moore EVER provides to support his accusations against anyone and everyone he’s ever attacked or accused of wrongdoing?

To be honest, I really don’t care about Dr. Gupta’s qualifications as Surgeon General.  After all, what does the Surgeon General do anyway except provide warnings about stuff we already know is unhealthy?  Does the Surgeon General have the power to directly influence or personally change medical policies or the health care system in our country?  I’m just tickled that Obama, the man that Moore has praised and glorified and taken personal credit for helping to get elected has made a decision that pisses Moore off so badly.  Although I didn’t vote for Obama and still have reservations about how he is going to handle crisis in our country when all he really won the election on was charm and cult of personality, I am really looking forward to see how many of the liberal/democrat flock of sheep start questioning him and are forced to eat crow in front of the rest of us.  It looks like Dr. Gupta is the first appetizer!