A Corny Argument

A few weeks ago the lovely DonnaK posted a list of Mikey’s latest idiocies, as well as her critique of them.  One particularly stuck out in my mind.

Proposal Three: Ban high fructose corn syrup. “And I will be the poster boy of that campaign.” Earlier in his lecture, Moore suggested that corn syrup’s historical dominance as a sweetener was a result of government collusion with large agribusinesses.

This is, simply put, one of the most retarded things he has ever said.  The EXACT OPPOSITE is true.  The prevalence of HFCS is a direct result of government interfering in the free market, and it was implement by the Grand Socialist himself FDR.  Here’s what I wrote FOUR YEARS AGO on my personal blog regarding this issue.

There’s one aspect to this that this article neglected to mention.  The next time you buy a Coke look at the ingredients.  You won’t see sugar, you’ll see “high fructose corn syrup.” This is sugar syrup made from corn, and it’s used in almost everything.  Why?  Because the high tariffs on imported sugar inflate the price to such a high level that using corn syrup is far less expensive.  The main group lobbying for these high sugar tariffs is a corporation called Archer Daniels Midland.  Why should ADM care about sugar tariffs?  Because, you guessed it, ADM are the makers of, among other things, high fructose corn syrup.  There’s absolutely no reason that Coca Cola couldn’t be made, as it used to be, with sugar, except for the artificially high price caused by government interference in free trade. 

To put it in simple terms, the government puts tariffs on imported sugar in order to keep the price artificially high.  (I have heard estimates that sugar is five to ten times more expensive than it would be if subject to market forces.) The makers of HFCS only have to make their product a penny or two cheaper than sugar to make it an economically attractive alternative.  Coca Cola alone must save millions, of not billions, of dollars by saving those few pennies with each batch of Coke they produce. 

Why is business able to collude with government?  If government were to get out of the sugar price support business, and let the market decide, you would have fewer products using HFCS because sugar would immediately drop in price.  What Mikey is proposing with his ban on HFCS is treating the symptom, not the disease itself.  If the government were not involved in sugar prices, then there would be no avenue for business to collude with them to keep the price of sugar high.  Mike is therefore correct in stating that it is collusion between agribusiness and government, but he implies some kind of corporate conspiracy, when the simple solution is to just end all farm subsidies once and for all.

So, let’s look at this in the context of the current election.  Cato has a great post up about the policy proposals of the specific candidates regarding this very issue.

In an article in today’s Congress Daily, key sugar lobby groups praised Senator Obama’s newfound enthusiasm for the U.S. sugar program. As a senator from the candy-making state of Illinois, he was none too fond of the price supports and import restrictions that raised input prices for factories in his state.

Not anymore. In a letter to sugar groups, Senator Obama gave assurances that while he “has concerns” with the program, he would listen to and work with them to “reward [their] hard work with policies that will keep [their] industry and your communities strong”. Oh dear.

One former lobbyist pointed out that “…the candidate now “represents a broader range of interest” than when he was a state legislator…[and] added that Obama has never voted against the sugar program and supported the 2008 Farm Bill.” McCain, on the other hand, would likely have lost the support of formerly Republican-leaning farmers because “…[he] has consistently opposed the program and agreed with President Bush’s decision to veto the Farm Bill.” Another lobbyist said that “Sen. McCain seems to want to radically alter [the farm safety net].”

Thus McCain’s policies would achieve the result that Mikey wants, fewer people using products sweetened with HFCS.  And Obama, with his socialist proclivities, will work to keep this very same collusion between agribusiness and government in place.

See, the issue here is that Michael Moore is a died-in-the-wool socialist.  Add to that the fact that his admirers are, generally, not the brightest people in the world.  All you have to do is mention the word “corporation” and it’s like you said “child rapist.” The solution is clear—if you want to avoid collusion between business and government, get the fucking government out of business.  As long as government retains the power to keep price subsides in place, corporations will always have an interest in making sure that government stays there.  It’s much easier to make a few campaign contributions to key legislators than it is to, y’know, actually compete in a free and open market.

Olbermoore

From the blog at that notorious right-wing neocon-worshipping rag The New Republic comes this fascinating Isaac Chotiner piece.

Peter Boyer has a fairly long Keith Olbermann profile in this week’s New Yorker which is not necessary reading, although it does feature a notable anecdote. Olbermann is reading over an interview with President Bush in which the following exchange occurs:

Q: Mr. President, you haven’t been golfing in recent years. Is that related to Iraq?
A: Yes, it really is. I don’t want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the Commander-in-Chief playing golf. I feel I owe it to the families to be as—to be in solidarity as best as I can with them. And I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal.

Boyer then goes into great detail about how Olbermann furiously raced home to his computer and typed a blistering 18-page screed which contains the following nugget of genius, which he refers to as the “final blow to our nation’s solar plexus.”

Mr. Bush, I hate to break it to you six and a half years after you yoked this nation and your place in history to the wrong war, in the wrong place, against the wrong people, but the war in Iraq is not about you. . . . It is not, Mr. Bush, about your golf game!

Choitner then nails it.

Oh, how quickly we forget!  Just four years ago, in fact, Michael Moore’s Farenheit 9/11 arrived in theatres, and one of the big scenes featured--you guessed it--Bush playing golf. The president is asked a question about terrorism, he responds by saying that all countries must unite against evil, and then he pauses before saying, “Now watch this drive.” Moments later he tees off. This was of course supposed to prove that Bush does not take terrorism seriously, or is an idiot, or God knows what. But now Bush has sworn off golf, which apparently also proves that he is cruel and uncaring. And something tells me the same people who nodded vigorously at Moore’s movie are now nodding vigorously at Olbermann’s monologues. Terrific.

Of course they are.  Bush playing golf = evil.  Bush not playing golf = evil.  See how logic works in the fantasy world where Olbermann and Moore live?

Dealing With the Facts

Let’s assume that there are still some readers out there who harbor the delusion that government-run healthcare is a good idea.  Could we even afford to pay for it?  The answer, of course, is no fucking way.

If you forgot to get a Christmas present for Charlie Rangel, don’t worry. The congressman picked one out for himself, and he’s sending you the bill: $2 million for a shiny new Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at City College.

The New York Democrat’s Monument to Me was one of about 9,000 earmarks in the omnibus spending bill Congress approved before going on vacation. Most represented a more subtle form of self-aggrandizement, aimed at maintaining power and prestige by currying favor with voters.

According to Citizens Against Government Waste, the total cost of the 11,000 or so earmarks in the omnibus bill and an earlier defense bill is about $14 billion, which is not much in the context of a $2.8 trillion federal budget. But the same tendency that explains the persistence of earmarks—the habit of staying popular by pretending your constituents can get something for nothing—also explains the failure to address the federal government’s increasingly dire fiscal situation.

The root of that situation is not earmarks, which represent less than 1 percent of federal spending. Nor is it the war in Iraq, which at $100 billion or so a year accounts for less than 4 percent.

So-called entitlement programs are the reason “America faces escalating deficit levels and debt burdens that could swamp our ship of state,” as Comptroller General David Walker put it in a recent speech. Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid account for 40 percent of federal spending and are expected to consume 51 percent in a decade.

Right now Social Security makes the federal fiscal picture look better than it really is, since the program generates a surplus that masks the true size of the deficit. In fiscal year 2007, for example, the official budget deficit was $163 billion; excluding the Social Security surplus, it was more than twice as high.

Since the government spends the surplus on other programs, the Social Security “trust fund” consists entirely of federal bonds, and those IOUs will come due soon. The oldest baby boomers become eligible for early retirement in 2008. They will start drawing Medicare benefits in three years.

The result, said Walker, will be a “tsunami of spending” that “will never recede.” Under current law the estimated gap between the benefits retirees have been promised and revenue to fund them is $53 trillion, of which $34 trillion is due to Medicare.

For those of you who aren’t aware, Medicare is America’s free government healthcare program for the poor.  So when Michael Moore tells you that there is no healthcare here for poor people, I’ve got $34,000,000,000,000 in IOUs that say otherwise.  Make sure you take note of the fact that the Iraq War costs less than 4% of federal spending.  This is one of the most common arguments we hear from Moore-ons who write us, that if it wasn’t for the evil Bush and his war for oil then we’d have all the money in the world for fabulous free government healthcare.

So, let’s hear some real-world solutions from the Michael Moore crowd.  Other than claiming that “free” government healthcare is more “compassionate,” make a practical argument about (a) how and (b) why the US government can provide fabulous free healthcare for everyone.

Suddenly Susan

In the Two Emails post below I posted an email from a Canadian named Susan Jendrick.  Just to give you an idea of how utterly clueless Moore fans can be, I am posting our entire email exchange here.

From:
Subj: Once again, the stupidity of United States is shinning through

Thank you MR. MOORE, you have again opened the eyes of many and shut the ones that are already blind. Blinded by stupidity. Michael Moore is one of the best things that is happening in the states.  Its pretty sad when people from the states have to sneak across the border, lie and say that they are Canadians just to get treatment they think they deserve.  Well if you are so deserving of this treatment, look to your own government for help.  You think that your land is the best, everything in the states are better than everyone else, WOW do you people need an awakening!  How much more stupid can you people get, you support a government that cares more about war then its own people.  They even treat the terrorist with better health care than they give their own people.  Hello?  should that not tell you something.  Its really a shame that you people can only see whats in front of you.  Take off the blinders, the rose colored glasses.  Hey, there is a world out there, other countries that do look after their own.  Theres alot about this SiCKO film that alot of you americans can learn alot from.  Take notes, that is if you can read or write!

My reply.

Once again the stupidity of some Canadian moron has made the front page of our website.

http://www.moorewatch.com/index.php/weblog/comments/two_emails/

Honestly, you retarded Canucks make it too easy sometimes.

To which she responded (and this is exactly as I received it, formatting and spelling identical):

So very american.  Can’t think of anything smart enough to come back with except name calling.  How mature!  Very proud Canadian, you . . . only wish! and as I said to you friend,
“ Thank God you are not me.  Do americans really believe the world looks up to them?
americans do keep us laughing though . . . their lack of knowledge of
anything beyond their own borders is
amazing.  When we go to other countries, we do not have to lie about who we
are or where we are from. Someone
is a little jealous by the sounds of things, and I don’t blame you.  Tell
me, do you get tired of standing up for a country
that does nothing but let the people in it down?”

Wow you two really are amazing.

My reply:

Listen to me, you fucking ignoramus.  I’ve personally LIVED in the following countries, not visited but LIVED.

Australia (the country where I was born)
Italy
Turkey
Iran
Morocco
Burma
Indonesia
Malaysia
Singapore
Norway
Scotland
the United States
And I currently reside in Beijing, China.

In addition to my residence in these countries, I have also traveled the world extensively, at one time or another visiting all of Europe and every continent except Antarctica.  Other than Russia, Egypt, India, and North Korea, I’ve been to every place in the world I could ever hope to go.  So you can take you smug sense of Canadian self-satisfaction and shove it up your socialist ass.

As far as name calling goes, go back to your original post and point out ONE SINGLE LOGICAL ARGUMENT you made.  Do it, I dare you Find one.  You did nothing but write to me for no reason other than to insult me, Jim, the site, and to praise both your disgustingly poor healthcare system and your idol, Michael Moore.

When you can make an argument with more intellectual veracity than that of your average fifth grader, feel free to write me back.  Otherwise, fuck off and die.

Oh, and when you end up on a waiting list for a year and half for hip surgery, don’t you DARE come to America to get it done.  I want you to lay there in agony for 18 months, convincing yourself that this is the best way to provide healthcare to people.  Because other than your failing healthcare system and an army that is going bankrupt participating in UN peacekeeping missions (where little girls are routinely raped by the blue helmets), you Canadians have exactly jack shit to distinguish yourselves from America.  And it pisses you off.

As for lying about who I am or where I am from, I proudly claim both my Australian and American citizenship.

So, if you feel like talking out of your ass and continuing to make yourself look like a complete ignoramus, feel free to respond.  And try and meet my challenge, if you can—quote your original email to me and point out a single logical argument you made.  Find ONE.  I dare you.

Moron with an inferiority complex, the concise definition of al too many Canadians.

So, does Susan meet my challenge?  See if you can guess.

Two Emails

I just received two emails, one right after the other.  They are the polar opposites of each other.  One is from someone with a perfectly legitimate question, and in return she receives a perfectly legitimate answer.  The other is a typical Canadian Michael Moore-worshipping moron.  The first:

I have read your site for the last few hours. I admit, you do have some excellent view points, but between you three it seems to be a tug a war on one sidedness opinions. You guys express it through your site, and Moore expresses it through his films. Now about Moore generosity, well we all know that was more the sake of the movie, and to get attention to him and his ideas. But if you are here to argue his beliefs amd bash him to the ground, you need to consider what he has done for you besides his little donation, he not only allowed you to get more hits to your site, and allow people to see your view points but allowed people to make a “choice” by deciding what we want to believe in, stand for. He is allowing us to choose, to make a choice between the point of views. right or wrong? then again, is there a right or wrong between you three??? I beg to differ.

My response:

Vivian, thanks for a pretty reasonable question.

Let me put it like this.  Name ONE THING in Sicko which expressed, in any manner, that there is a downside to socialized medicine.  Name one.  You can’t, because there isn’t any.  This is why I say on the site that Moore has no interest whatsoever in actually seeing people get quality healthcare.  He wants to see people get healthcare *through socialism.* That’s his primary goal, to see his grand socialist plan implemented.  In order to do so he has to ignore all the negatives, and present socialized medicine as some kind of medical Disneyland, where people will come to your house and wipe your ass for you if you choose, and it’s all FREE FREE FREE!

Now, by way of comparison, Jim and I freely admit that the current US system sucks.  We also make the case that socialized medicine, far from being the utopian paradise portrayed by Moore, is just as bad, if not worse.  So the solution is not to abandon one shitty system (the US) for a system which is, at best, equally shitty (European and Canadian).

Moore’s trickery has made this appear like a two-sided coin:  one one side are the bloodthirsty evil capitalists and their for-profit healthcare system, and on the other are the kindly, benevolent government-run systems, which never deny anything to anyone.  The impression left in the viewers mind is “Wow, if I care about people then how can I support anything but socialized medicine?” Search our site, you’ll find countless horror stories about socialized medicine—people pulling their own teeth out with pliers because they couldn’t get in to see a dentist, nurses merely turning sheets over between patients to save on laundry costs, rationing schemes which send old people home to die because it would cost too much in limited resources, and so on.

Again, was ANY of this mentioned in Moore’s film?  No, of course not.  Because it was a two hour lie.

So, in this respect, does Moore actually give you a choice of what to believe in?  Or does he lie, distort, obfuscate, bullshit, and *trick* you into believing what he wants you to believe?  And if socialized medicine is so wonderful, why does he need to present such a distorted and inaccurate version of its reality? These are the real questions you should be asking yourself.

Take care.

And now, the clueless Canadian moore-on.

From:
Subj: Once again, the stupidity of United States is shinning through

Thank you MR. MOORE, you have again opened the eyes of many and shut the ones that are already blind. Blinded by stupidity. Michael Moore is one of the best things that is happening in the states.  Its pretty sad when people from the states have to sneak across the border, lie and say that they are Canadians just to get treatment they think they deserve.  Well if you are so deserving of this treatment, look to your own government for help.  You think that your land is the best, everything in the states are better than everyone else, WOW do you people need an awakening!  How much more stupid can you people get, you support a government that cares more about war then its own people.  They even treat the terrorist with better health care than they give their own people.  Hello?  should that not tell you something.  Its really a shame that you people can only see whats in front of you.  Take off the blinders, the rose colored glasses.  Hey, there is a world out there, other countries that do look after their own.  Theres alot about this SiCKO film that alot of you americans can learn alot from.  Take notes, that is if you can read or write!

First off, I would be willing to bet that I have lived in more countries than this dunce will ever visit in her entire life. Secondly, the Canadian inferiority complex is clearly evident here.  And third, the fact that there is an entire healthcare industry in Canada whose sole purpose is to find medical care in the United States for Canadians who are stuck for years on waiting lists shows that this woman clearly has absolutely no idea what she is talking about.  In other words, she’s a typical Moore fan.

Cocksucking Moron

There’s nothing I find more entertaining than people who write me hate mail telling me how stupid I am, and do so in an email filled with spelling errors.  Note “your” and “fowl” and the use of “U” in this email from .

I’m gonna make this short and quick so that I dont waste too much of my time

YOUR A MORON

Yes yes I hate moore too his movies are one sided and point out benefits but no problems. A horrible debater and anyone who argues with him is in for a treat

HOWEVER, you and your friend run the biggest anti moore site, but your just as bad as moore, if not worse. U never combat moore fans with real facts, instead telling them they are stupid and mindless (or cocksuckers) and then bask in curse words and fowl langeuge as you point out they are a moore fan, hence they are stupid

My friend I’ve done this arguement with a moore fan many a time but I gotta say man, your as bad, and by doing that, your making us all look bad

cocksucking moron…

I’d be willing to bet my next paycheck that our good friend Jordan is indeed a Michael Moore fan, but that’s not really the point.  Jordan has obviously never read the site before.  For the past—what, five years now?—Jim and I and the other contributors have posted VOLUMES of data and arguments against Moore’s claims.  My guess is he saw the movie, went to the site, and read the first two or three posts, which lately have been dealing both with the copious amounts of email that Jim and I have been receiving from Moore fans and the general level of illiteracy and ignorance that they display.  Note that in this post I specifically detailed and responded to some of the intelligent email critiques that we have received.  And we’ve done this numerous times over the years.  Good letters making good points are responded to politely with logical refutations.  Hate mail is posted to be ridiculed and laughed at.

So, to Jordan and anyone else who may read this, do yourself a favor and spend more than five minutes skimming the top two posts.  The entire point of this site was to act as a single-source repository of sorts for people wishing to make factual refutations to Moore’s claims.  Jim and I joke that we’re the most uncredited media source in the world, for we have no doubt that members of the press doing Moore research monitor this site.  Jim and I have both done media interviews.  I was interviewed by a reporter for the Times of London once for over an hour, and while I wasn’t directly quoted for the piece, many of the points and issues I raised did indeed make it in. 

On the right hand side of the front page are the categories for each post.  If you want to view posts relating to Sicko or F9/11, for example, you can do so.  If you want horror stories of people having to pull out their own teeth with pliers because they couldn’t get an NHS dentist, or a woman who had to make a mixture of fake blood and pretend she was vomiting it up in order to get admitted to hospital, you can find them there. (Both these stories came from the UK, one of Moore’s socialist healthcare utopias.) If you want to see arguments eviscerating the idea of gun control there are hundreds of them, studies and scholarly articles and the like.  If you saw Sicko and wonder why the US can’t have a wonderful tropical healthcare wonderland like the tiny communist island, you can find photos of Cuban patients sitting in pools of their own excrement, or Donna’s excellent series of articles on Reinaldo Arenas.  The data are all there, but you have to spend more than two seconds on the site looking for them.

Basically most people expect this site to be like some kind of magic encyclopedia, where they can close their eyes, grab a volume off the shelf, open to any random page, and presto! find the information they’re looking for.  It doesn’t work that way.  Information here is presented in a linear fashion, from most recent posts to the oldest, so if the issue you are looking for isn’t recent then you might have to dig a little.  You can search the site using both Google and the software’s built in search capabilities.

It’s not difficult.  It’s all there.  But “your” going to have to be more than a “cocksucking moron” to find it.

Lee and Jim:  Fathers of Medicine - UPDATED

I really don’t want to turn the blog into “post every hate mail you receive,” but this one was too good to pass up.  It so perfectly encapsulates the abject stupidity of the average Michael Moore fan that it simply had to be shared.  From :

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN,

I AM NOT A MORON OR AN IDIOT!!!!!!!!!! I AM A PERSON WHO HAS THE RIGHT TO MY OWN OPINION AND AS I WATCHED SICKO IT DISGUSTED ME TOO SEE THAT AMERICA, THE LAND OF THE FREE AND HOME OF THE BRAVE, TREATED THE SICK SO BADLY! BEFORE I HAD BCBS, WHEN AND I STRESS WHEN MY SON WAS ALIVE , WE HAD TO HAVE GOVERNMENT INSURANCE FOR HIS ASTHMA, THE DOCTOR DID NOTHING TO HELP HIS SICKNESS ONLY BUT A BAND AID ON IT, ON TUESDAY JUNE 3, 2001, I FOUND MY SON NEAR DEATH AND TRIED TO REVIVE HIM WITH CPR. WELL IT DID NOT HELP, NOR COULD THE DOCTORS. YOU WANT TO KNOW WHY, BECAUSE IT WAS TOO LATE, THE GOVERNMENT WOULDN’T PAY FOR THE SPECIAL SHEETS, BEDDING, FLOORING, ALLERGY SHOTS AND OTHER THINGS NECESSARY FOR MY SON TO BE HEALTHY. SO AT ELEVEN YEARS OLD I LOST MY SO. SO SCREW LOSING YOUR ADULT LIFE, WHAT IF YOU HADN’T LIVED LONG ENOUGH TO EVEN DRIVE!!!!!!!! WITH TEARS IN MY EYES IT MAKES ME MAD THAT YOU HAVE THE BALLS TO TAKE MICHAEL MOORES MONEY, AND THEN CURSE HIM IN THE OTHER HAND!!!! ARE YOU CHRISTIANS??????????? DO YOU THINK GOD APPROVES OF WHAT YOU DO??????? AND IF YOU THINK YES THEN YOU SHOULD BE STRUCK DOWN BY LIGHTNING, BECAUSE IT SAY THAT ONLY GOD IS IN JUDGEMENT OF US. SO YOU COUNT YOU BLESSING YOUR ALIVE, WHILE MY ELEVEN YEAR OLD SON IS IN THE GROUND. HOW DARE YOU, WHO DO YOU REALLY THINK YOU ARE, YOU SHOULD STOP THIS. BUT AS MY HUSBANDS ALWAYS SAYS, PEOPLE CAN’T MIND THERE OWN FUCKING BUSINESS AND ALWAYS HAVE TO BE IN OTHERS, HE SAYS “ MIA THEY TALKED ABOUT JESUS, SO JUST LET THEM TALK!” CAR MA IS A BITCH AND WHAT COMES AROUND GOES AROUND. SO I SUGGEST YOUR WIFE TAKES CARE OF HERSELF, BECAUSE MICHAEL MOORE MIGHT NOT BE THERE TO TAKE CARE OF HER AGAIN IF SHE GOES INTO REMISSION, IT MIGHT SOUND CRUEL, BUT ARE YOU REALLY BEING NICE BY TALKING ABOUT SOMEONE YOUR DAMN SELF!!!!!!!

HIPPOCRATES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MIA JONES

1. hypocrite (noun) a person who indulges in hypocrisy. 
2. Hippocrates was a Greek physician born in 460 BC on the island of Cos, Greece. He became known as the founder of medicine and was regarded as the greatest physician of his time. He based his medical practice on observations and on the study of the human body. He held the belief that illness had a physical and a rational explanation. He rejected the views of his time that considered illness to be caused by superstitions and by possession of evil spirits and disfavor of the gods.

Hippocrates held the belief that the body must be treated as a whole and not just a series of parts. He accurately described disease symptoms and was the first physician to accurately describe the symptoms of pneumonia, as well as epilepsy in children. He believed in the natural healing process of rest, a good diet, fresh air and cleanliness. He noted that there were individual differences in the severity of disease symptoms and that some individuals were better able to cope with their disease and illness than others. He was also the first physician that held the belief that thoughts, ideas, and feelings come from the brain and not the heart as others of him time believed.

Hippocrates traveled throughout Greece practicing his medicine. He founded a medical school on the island of Cos, Greece and began teaching his ideas. He soon developed an Oath of Medical Ethics for physicians to follow. This Oath is taken by physicians today as they begin their medical practice. He died in 377 BC. Today Hippocrates is known as the “Father of Medicine”.

Update from Lee: Here’s my reply to her.

Mia, do you watch American Idol?  If so, do you recall when Simon Cowell tells someone that they could be the worst singer in America?

In exactly the same manner, you could possibly be the stupidest person who has ever written to me.  And I’ve literally received tens of thousands of pieces of hate mail over the years.  Your letter is amazing, and has been posted on the website so that the entire world can bask in the brilliant glow of your stupidity.

http://www.moorewatch.com/index.php/weblog/comments/lee_and_jim_fathers_of_medicine/

I was having a lousy day until now.  Thank you for cheering me up.  It’s people as ignorant and stupid as you that make this whole blogging thing worthwhile.

I wasn’t being facetious.  The fact that there are people this monumentally ignorant about the world around them is why we continue to write this blog.  It sure as hell isn’t for the money or the fame.  It’s because two fucking jackoffs from nowhere want to make sure that there is a repository of information to rebut Moore’s lies and distortions.

Update by JimK

First of all, it’s absolutely a tragedy that this woman lost a child.  That doesn’t give her the right to attack me, however.  She is sending me more all-caps, off-the-rails email.  She’s wished me dead three times, told me her husband would kick my ass, and called me about 26 different names.  The emails are all in caps, with a simply ridiculous number of exclamation points.  She can’t seem to figure out why I won’t, and I quote, “EXPLAIN AND ANSWER THE QUESTION ASSHOLE!!!!!!! STUPID BITCH!!!”

Seriously.  That’s cut and pasted from her follow-up.  As is “JUST BE A MAN AND ANSWER THE FUCKEN QUESTION. IT GOOD THAT PEOPLE CAN SAY THINGS TO OTHER PEOPLE WITHOUT SEEING THEM FACE TO FACE. BECAUSE MY HUSBAND WOULD REALLY KICK YOUR ASS!!!!!!!!!!!” I don’t even know what the fucking question is that she wants answered.  If I’m a Christian?  If God approves of what I do?  Given that I am agnostic, those questions don’t apply to me.

That’s actually pretty common, and something I should have listed in this post; Many of the Moore-ons that send hate mail automatically assume that I am Christian, and therefore a hypocrite because I don’t want everyone to give away all their money to care for “the poor.” Sometimes, for added flavor, they think I’m a big, big fan of Bush.  Not a normal Bush fan, though.  A fan so devoted that they think that - in addition to wuvving him and wanting to snuggle-wuggle wif hims - I believe in the “coming apocalypse” and want the Rapture to happen yesterday, like he allegedly does.  It’s weird enough that they believe he believes that, but somehow the fact that I do not trust Moore’s every word as gospel - and have a website that has documented his lies on numerous occasions - automatically makes me some mythical Rapture-loving Neoconpublicanaziunicorn.  Also, the neocons are controlled by Jews, but the Rapture is a Christ thing so I’m really confused and my brain hurts now.

Anyway, back to Mia.  You know what my favorite part of her original screed is?  The fact that she took the time to tell me “BUT AS MY HUSBANDS ALWAYS SAYS, PEOPLE CAN’T MIND THERE OWN FUCKING BUSINESS AND ALWAYS HAVE TO BE IN OTHERS.” First of all, how many husbands does she have?  Secondly, Holy Lord Jesus, the irony.  Could she be any more “IN OTHERS” business with this campaign of crazy threatening emails?

Couple that with what seems to be a pro-universal healthcare stance - even though it was Medicaid that failed to provide her with what she needed - and I am getting really, truly confused.  According to her, the government failed her and contributed to the death of her son, and the answer is to listen to Moore and have the government in charge of everyone’s health.  So they can kill more kids, adults, old people...everyone.  There are no successful entitlement programs.  None.  Not a one.  Mia’s grief has driven her to a strange place, where she is attacking someone who wants a system that would have helped her, and she;s defending a man who would put the same government that has already failed her in charge of even more children.

There are none so blind…

AGAMEMNON!

Update from Lee: I’ve been getting the same ALL CAPS profanity-laden hate-filled emails from her this morning, too.  She keeps asking me to “answer the question,” and, like Jim, I have no idea what she asked, due to her astonishingly poor grammar, spelling, and sentence structure.  That being said, during a re-read I think I figured it out.

“BLOG THIS YOU DECAYING OLD BITCH!!!!! YOU CAN DISH IT OUT BUT YOU CAN’T TAKE THE HEAT, CAN YOU? YOU NEVER ANSWERED MY QUESTION. HOW CAN YOU JUDGE SOMEONE ELSE? THAT IS GODS JOB!!!!!”

So the question is, how can Jim and I judge Michael Moore, because it is God’s job to judge people.  Considering Jim and I are both completely non-religious, making a religious argument with us is beyond stupidity.  I can’t believe I actually have to write something so blindingly obvious, but if judging people is God’s job, who the hell is Mia to judge Jim and I?  If there is a God (which there isn’t) then I will one day stand before Him and be condemned to an eternity in hell.  Mia will be right there with me, because she has been judging Jim and I in the harshest, most vile, hate-filled manner for a couple of days now. God is watching, Mia. 

It’s a shame, really.  I’m sure her son is in heaven and would like to spend eternity with his mother.  Too bad she’s so judgmental and full of hate that she’s going to deny him that.

LOOSER

Perfectly encapsulating everything Jim and I wrote in the preceding two posts, I just received this hate mail not five minutes ago from .  The formatting, spelling, capitalization, and sentence structure are exactly as they were received, I have not altered so much as a single pixel.  If you haven’t read Jim’s post yet, do so before continuing.  Or, re-read it so his comments are fresh in your mind.  Then read on.

A Collection of Emails

Allow me to follow up for a moment on Jim’s brilliant post below.  As the recipient of an astonishing amount of hate mail myself, let me state for the record that I agree with everything Jim wrote, and every word of what he said is true and accurate.  I’d like to focus on the few intelligent critiques we get.  First there was this one, which Moore fans will undoubtedly accuse me of inventing myself.  The author’s first name is Lauren, and if she gives me permission I will post her full name and/or email.  The subject of her email was “Sometimes, closed minds can be opened.”

Perrignoramus

The hate mail Jim and I have been receiving lately has just been legendary.  We’ve always received death threats ever since we started the site, so that’s old hat really, but we’ve now evolved (devolved?) to the point where Moore’s fans are literally wishing for Jim’s wife to die.  I’m not going to dignify these emails by posting them, but something just came through my inbox that was just too monumentally stupid to go without comment.  It’s from some guy called Steven Perrigo.

Why do you deem it necessary to bash Moore when all he is trying to do is help and he has no political agenda?

That’s right, folks. Michael Moore has no political agenda, and just wants to help people.

You’ll have to excuse me while I go shit myself laughing.

The Awful Truth About Sicko

Michael Moynihan’s link-rich review of Sicko in Reason is oh-so worth reading.  Here’s a taste.

Take the case of four-year-old Elias Dillner. In 2004, Dillner’s parents were told by doctors that their son too would benefit from cochlear implants. After being fitted with the first implant, Dillner’s insurance provider said the second operation could not be “prioritized.” The family would have to wait. “We will do anything,” Elias’s mother told reporters, “even if it means that we have to take out a loan for the operation.” Without insurance, the second procedure would likely cost $40,000.

But Dillner’s truculent insurance provider was not Aetna or Kaiser, but the notoriously generous Swedish welfare state, where health care is “free.” And because there is no private clinic in Sweden that could perform the operation, Elias will sit in a queue, hoping, in lieu of privatization, for prioritization. Swedish legislator Robert Uitto said that the Dillner case was unfortunate, but “People shouldn’t, on principle, be allowed to purchase care in the public system.”

Sicko also introduces us to Diane, whose brain tumor operation was initially denied by Horizon BlueCross because it didn’t consider her condition “life threatening.” She eventually received treatment, but “not without battling the insurance companies,” Moore says.

Jack Szmyt found himself in a similar situation. After waiting two months for his initial diagnosis—he too had a brain tumor—Szmyt was told that it would be another month until doctors could start the necessary treatment. Rather than wait in a queue, he borrowed $30,000 from a friend, and flew to a private clinic in Germany. Had he not sought private treatment abroad, his German doctor said, he would likely have died. When contacted by the media, his insurer, again the Swedish government, said it didn’t consider the assigned waiting period “unreasonable.”

But wait, there’s more!

Viewers are taken to London’s Hammersmith Hospital, held up as a shining example of socialized care, where doctors are well-paid and patients well looked after. Moore ambles through the corridors interviewing patients that acclaim the NHS’s ‘free care,’ and express horror at the barbarism of the American system. Indeed, the facility’s “cashier” exists to give money to patients—for travel reimbursements—rather than taking it from them. But as is often the case with Moore’s films, the reality is more complex.

In 2005, London’s Evening Standard reported that Hammersmith Hospital would slash hundreds of jobs; the hospital, the most debt-ridden in Britain, was hemorrhaging money and desperately needed to cut costs. And while the hospital was “downsizing”, Hammersmith’s CEO—yes, even the NHS has an executive class—collected a year-end bonus of close to $20,000. Small beer by American standards, but enough to provoke tabloid headlines in Britain.

Much like the American hospitals Moore excoriates, Hammersmith Hospital, the Evening Standard reported, faced pressure from administrators to limit the number of patients treated in order to cut spending. In a country where the government promises to winnow down queues to 18 weeks, this isn’t an anomalous problem. A recent BBC documentary accused the NHS of using dangerously high doses of radiation on patients “to save time and money.”

After the critical reaction to his previous films, Moore opts for elision over outright falsehood. So when he marvels that a doctor working in the NHS owns an Audi and “million dollar home,” it is hardly in his interest to point out, as The Independent did in January, that “soaring salary levels of doctors are worsening the NHS cash crisis.” And while bitterly lamenting the U.S. system of “wage slavery"—American students, Moore says, are saddled with debt and, thus, “won’t cause [employers] any trouble"—he ignores a recent report from the British Medical Association suggesting that, by their fifth year of medical school, British students “have accumulated an average debt of” $39,000.

None of this will make the slightest difference to Moore’s fans, of course.  They’re not called Moore-ons for nothing.

“A fellow American; unfortunately.”

I can’t speak for Jim or anyone else here, but for me this whining, disgusting, pathetic loser is exactly the type of maggot that typifies the Michael Moore fan base.

From: angela m ([email protected])
Subject:  You should be ashamed to call your self an american.

First I would like to say that I understand where you are coming from.  I understand why you can hate Michael Moore so much.  He is the man who shows footage that “talks down on” your country leaders and politicians.  I understand that this is a man who has said many bad things about these people you follow and support.  I however feel that you should be ashamed to call yourself an American because of the fact that this man; Michael Moore, has showed us what these leaders of yours are doing to the people like me.  I am from a poor family and I still live in poverty because of the so called “Government” that is put into place in America.  I work 40 hours a week and I make 11.90 an hour.  This kind of pay is great if I didn’t have a family to support.  With this kind of money I can pay for a little less than half my bills.  If I could afford to pay for college I would be making more; but if I want to feed my child, my husband and I, it is a sacrifice I have to make.  I have to choose what will keep my family alive.  This country of yours has destroyed my families life and soon to be mine as well if I don’t get out.  How can you tell me that this country is great and grand when I can not get the medical treatment I need. I have arthritis in both knees and hips and have had it since I was 13 years old.  I was told that I can not be helped until I turn at least 36 years old ; at which time I will not be able to walk because of the fact that I can’t walk during high or low pressures or temperatures, which being in a state with four seasons makes things even more complicated.  I am 21 years old and I feel like an 80 year old woman because of someone else’s mistake and because the insurance company I had would not pay for anything more; which forced my mother into debt and eventually bankruptcy.  How can you tell me this country is great when this so called government can’t even take care of the men and women who were hurt in combat.  This so called government won’t even take care of veterans form the Vietnam war.  You disgust me.  You talk so horridly about a man who is trying to help this country. To help the people like me and my family step up and say enough is enough.  To say that I am done being used and being pushed down by this money grubbing “Government”.  I am honestly ashamed to say I am an American.  Any time I have gone out of the country I lied about where I was born and I still do because of how embarrassed I am of this country and it’s “leaders’; or should I say murderous thief’s.  It makes me sick that you talk so badly about a man who saved your wifes life; I understand you thanked him but what the hell.  Do you have no pride, no dignity, no humility, or are you another drone produced by a brainwashing country to treat your fellow human this way?  Why do I and others in my position have to suffer at the expense of politics and the personal gain of those in that kind of position?  Why do I have to work so hard for nothing in return?  Why do I have to pay taxes to social security and run a chance to never see that money when I may need it?  Why should you try and say this country is good when “it” will walk all over it’s people just for a financial profit?  Why do you support a government; nay, a facade that lies, cheats, and steals from it’s people, oh and not to mention kills them if they don’t benefit from it.  Why are you so blind and so ignorant.  I’m so disgusted at this time that I am looking for the soonest and closest way out of this god forsaken and barren country.  I honestly hope that this countries leaders; and anyone involved in making it the way it is today, rot in hell as they deserve.  I hope that you rot there along with them for supporting this travesty.  Oh and get this, I was born and raised in America and I support democracy; which is not part of this country no matter how much you try to say it is.  I am so irate I don’t even know what more to say to you.  Just know that I wish you well in your life and I hope that your god judges you with his righteous hand of justice and punishes you for your sin’s.

A fellow American; unfortunately.

Please, do yourself and the rest of us a favor and at least have the dignity to take your own life.

Update I’m not going to post every hate mail I receive, but this is too good to pass up.

From:  Sonia ([email protected])
Subject:  Screw You

You are an evil person just like the rest of your country,I’m sorry,your politicians.oh my god wake up and smell what is going on around there in your country,I agree so bad with what Michael Moore says in is new movie because that’s the way it is,he is only trying to wake you up and smell the roses.stop being intimidated by your goverment.bush is evil.
I live in Canada and I am so PROUD to be a Canadian you don’t even know.
Michael Moore has an opinion and he has the right to is opinion,but he is being hated for it,he doesn’t need to agree with everything that is country is doing,at least he has commonsense.and look at what he did for your wife he paid for her because she was sick,who is the better man in this,not you and certainly not your stupid ass system.

Anyway I don’t know how you can sleep at night,you are a monster.

Your stupid ass soldiers are terrorist,and killing a bunch of inocent people,I would have no pity for you if you got attacked again.when I watch t.v and I hear you say that some of your heroes are back from the war,I feel like throwing up.they are not heroes,they are terrorist like I said earlier.
Michael Moore rocks and you suck.
Oh and by the I ain’t German or a Jew,I am white and native Indian,remember us,your damn ancestors took our land.that’s ok,what goes around comes around.
Sleep tight.
:):):):):):):)

Charming to the last.

Let’s Get One Thing Straight

Here’s a nice little piece of hatemail from [email protected].

You know i love how you hypocrites belittle people who have different views than your own by stating their IQ level is far below yours. I see that you are man of opinions but no facts.Men like GWB who cant handle intelligent discussion so you scream and yell insults to try to get your point across. guess what its not working anymore. Thank God people like you are losing steam and America is waking up to the reality of America has become. So please feel free to rant and rave and insult and mock all you want like a three year old child nobody is listening we are growing stronger and you hypocrites will see an end to all your lies and deceit.

This is a common mistake made by Michael Moore fans, primarily because most of them aren’t smart enough to think in anything but binary terms.  In other words, if you think Michael Moore is a disgusting, anti-American, worthless lying shitbag (as I do) then you must also be a Bush worshipper.  Go ahead and take a look at my personal blog, Right-Thinking from the Left Coast, and see just exactly what I think about Bush and this administration.  This would probably be a good starting point, but just scroll through the last few years of the blog.

I don’t buy into the usual corporate oil conspiracy bullshit that Mikey’s fans love so much, but I think it’s safe to say that Bush is tied with Jimmy Carter for the worst president of my lifetime.

But, feel free to make whatever ignorant, ill-informed assumptions you like.  You are, after all, Michael Moore fans.  It’s what he counts on.

Update Oh, one more point.

So please feel free to rant and rave and insult and mock all you want like a three year old child nobody is listening…

Nobody is listening?  Jim was just interviewed by Newsweek, for God’s sake.  Michael Moore put the site in his movie.  Nobody is listening?  You’re out of your fucking mind.

Hate Mail, the irony edition

Somehow I feel like the subject of this email and the contents are incongruous.  Or maybe not, it *is* the ACLU we’re talking about, and I’m not a radical far lefty.  Maybe it’s exactly the message they want their members to send, I don’t know.

Date: Sun, 19 Mar 2006 00:55:59 -0800 (PST)
From: Daemon Aazati [email protected]
Subject: Burn in Hell, You Mother Fucking Piece of Dogshit!
To: jimk

Defend your freedom! Support the ACLU in safeguarding our civil liberties! Click http://www.aclu.org/ to learn more about the small things that every person can do in order to keep America true to the design of its founders of 1776. Get informed.

Call me when the ACLU defends the Second Amendment.  Until then, I don’t care what they do, it’s all bullshit.  You either protect the Bill of RIghts or you don’t.

Hate Mail From A Lunatic

The moonbats have been out in full force lately!  Here’s a series of emails from some dunce named Cary Randolph, who has just discovered the irrefutable brilliance of Michael Moore.  Either that or she’s forgotten to take her medication, I can’t tell which.

Hate Mail

Oh how I love hate mail.

To: Moorewatch
From:
Subj: Europe

Regarding you’re quote “...Europe as the social model which we should aspire to”. Well, I’m European and I live in Spain - a country that suffered terribly under a right-wing dictator. You don’t quite have one of those yet, but you are on the way. Bush is an ignorant and stupid little man with rich, powerful and totally unethical friends.

You could only ever hope to be as forward-thinking as the Europeans. We even have free speech over here. Remember what that is? It’s something that the founding fathers wanted for your country, but that the republicans have made sure you don’t have.

You are sad and dangerous little people. Long live people like Michael Moore who attempt to educate the millions of Americans who have a fair and just outlook on the world.

Shame on you.

Roy, I’m honestly curious.  Can you give me examples of this lack of free speech you’re talking about?  Have the government death squads shut down the Daily Kos?  Has MoveOn.org’s headquarters been firebombed into oblivion?  Could a country with no free speech give Michael Moore the ability to make the largest grossing documentary in history criticizing the incumbent president only weeks before the election?

We’ve been hearing this drivel from left-wing morons for years, that Bush has shut down free speech.  If you agree with this, give me some examples.  Let’s see if Roy has the fucking balls to respond to this with some concrete, specific examples of the stifling of free speech under Bush.

Hate Mail

Now this is the type of hate mail I love to get!

From: [email protected]
To: Lee
Subject: your website

I just wanted to say what a waste of time your website is.  Michael Moore is a true patriot who lets the American people know the truth about the corruption of our current administration.  I know that every administration has corruption, but this one takes it to another level.  Let me ask you, when did it become our policy to invade another country based on the premise that they “MIGHT” cause harm to our country.  For hundreds of years our country was based on defending itself, not provoking wars.  After 9/11 the world was on our side, we had support in this “war on terror”. Now with this pre-planned war,(before Bush was “given” the presidency by the supreme court,) has alienated our allies and we are seen as the terrorists throughout the world.  We are torturing innocent(among the guilty) prisoners, killing thousands of Iraqi citizens, draining our economy, ! exhausting our military, and countless other things based on “faulty intelligence”.  So if you think what we are doing is wrong you are labeled a liberal, a tree hugger blah blah blah.  Why not just admit that the oil is not flowing the way our Texas Tea-Black Gold President thought it would and the Muslim world is now our enemy for life.  It is not about Osama anymore.  There are a million Osama’s now.  For every one terror plot 5 yrs ago, there are now a thousand.  Our country is lost. Our undereducated citizens who look to their elected leaders have been missled.  The administration has divided our country on purpose.  They have allowed religion into our government.  Our President makes “faith based decisions” The last person to speak the way Bush does was Hitler.  We are now the great invaders.  Believe me, I want nothing more than to live in a safe peaceful world, and I know we have to kick some ass sometimes! to do it, but to provoke a war and invade a country who h ad never even killed a US citizen is wrong.  During Desert Storm our media worked with the Iraqi Interior Ministry, they were in hotels in Baghdad, did you see the Iraqi army storm in there and behead one person, NO!  Now Americans are a target all over the world, and if you think this foreign policy of ours has done anything to make us safer, you are lying to yourself.  Let’s not forget that we helped Saddam fight Iran, and provided him with chemical weapons, which he turned and used on his own people.  I guess in Mike Moore’s movie when he showed Rumsfeld meeting with Saddam in 1980 to make that deal that was a lie.. I also suppose that when we gave weapons to the Mujahadeen Army (Osama and other rebel fighters fighting Russia in the Afghan/Russian war),since that was in Mike Moore’s movie that was a lie as well. 
Do you also realize the US is the largest petroleum consumer in the world.  As the oil reserves run low the need to control the oil runs greater.  What no one wants to admit is we invaded Iraq for the sole purpose of controlling the oil fields.  The only problem was the idea that we would be welcomed with roses and parades was horse shit.  Even though Saddam was a tyrant, he was their tyrant.  Not a “western infadel” like we have put in power now.  The middle east population would take a million Saddams over one of our American leaders telling them what to do.  We don’t understand Islam, we don’t care to understan Islam and the rest of the world sees us as ignorant Americans, who are now the “Great Invaders.” This war has nothing to do with 9/11 and when Bush was making a case for it he compared the two.  It was a lie, it still is a lie, and to waste your time trying to make a liar out of Mike Moore i! s exactly what this spin doctor administration wants you to do.  Stop wasting your time arguing with eachother over partisan politics and start finding the leaders who will get us out of this mess and make America the great respected nation we once were.  Support our troops, they should be home securing our swiss cheese borders.  While we are invading Iraq, our country is being invaded everyday, by illegals(not immigrants) just illegals.  I hope they don’t have a certain date that the ones that are here pick up the weapons they have amassed off the streets and just start killing everyone in sight.  We had a 1 week warning about Hurricane Katrina and couldn’t handle that, heaven forbid that we wake up on a sunny Tuesday morning with a bunch of radical muslims running around with machine guns blowing up apartment buildings.  Wake UP AMERICA!!!!!

Hey, if you’re going to be a moonbat, be a barking moonbat!

Hate Spam

To whoever the dumb fuck is who has been signing me up to mailing lists all day: don’t you realize that every one of them requires an email confirmation?  By not responding to the email I don’t get added to the list.  And besides, it takes me all of about five seconds to add those addresses to my spam filter.  If you want to waste hours signing me up for mailing lists be my guest.

Yes, everyone.  Michael Moore fans are this stupid.

Pure poetry

And ya gotta see the picture at link as well.

Let’s face it, a career as a media whore is tough. One day you’re the toast of the limousine liberals and mainstream media with catered meals and foot massages; the next you’re schlepping around the country in a minivan filled with Stalinists trying to fire up a handful of room temperature IQ wingnuts on street corners. Got to be a downer, right?

Well said.  :)

Hate Mail

Once again, hate mail from someone too clueless to grasp even the most fundamental facts about this site.

From: Will Jacobs
To: Lee
Subj: You came to Australia?

First of all I am well aware of the fact that you are not the presidnt of the United States, secondly I can understand your hatred of Michael Moore as I know he sometimes bends the truth and sensationalises isues in American politics, however, your site has become more than a place to bag Michael Moore, mainstream political issues are now being discussed, such as you as an American supporting George W Bush. I am Australian and do not support John Howard as he is a bespektickled balding gnome. I respect your desicion to vote for Bush and post on your site that “Israel is an outpost of democracy in an oasis of authoritarianism”. I have never heard such bullshit in my life. Israel, where military service is compulsary and the Zionist sentiment is taught with such zeal as to rival the propaganda of the police states of the world? Please. If you wish to be taken seriously I sugget you take the high road and prove , if you can, your academic superiority over Michael Moore and stop wasting the influence you have by alienating the two thirds of the world that are pissed off about Israel and their illegal occupation of Palestine’s West Bank. If you continue to pot a picture of Tony Blair with flowers and halo’s and encourage people to Idolise a man, George Bush, who probably thinks the Plural of Goat is Sheep, then you do nothing more than waste your power to influence people for the better.

Okay, Will.  Since you seem to have such an astonishing inability to comprehend even a few basic facts (undoubtedly why you’re a leftie and Michael Moore fan) you might have to read what I’m writing here six or seven times.  Please, bear with me.  I’ll type this r-e-a-l-l-y s-l-o-w-l-y so that this stands a chance of sinking in.

The items you mention about Israel and Tony Blair are ADVERTISING.  Someone went to Blogads and purchased advertising space to put their message on this website.  Short of out and out rejecting an ad, we don’t have any say as to their content, and frankly, being proud capitalist whores, we’ll pretty much let anyone buy ad space for just about any message.  Do you grasp this?  It’s not OUR message, Will, it’s SOMEONE ELSE’S.  Understand?  Wipe the drool off your chin, it’s dribbling onto your copy of Dick and Jane at the Seashore.

Secondly, I couldn’t care less what 2/3 of the world thinks.  You seem to believe in the malleability of right and wrong, as though if enough people disagree with something then this inherently justifies that belief.  The vast majority of people in the world believe in some kind of supreme being.  Is this inherent proof that there is indeed a Creator of some kind?  Or does the number of people who believe in a supreme being in no way validate the existence of one?  (Sorry, Will, that kind of thought is WAY too advanced for someone as dim as you.  Let’s try something more your size:  “Brown is the color of poo.")

Here’s my personal view:  the Palestinians (i.e. displaced Jordanians) are terrorist vermin whose sole reason for existing is to destroy Israel and wipe Jews off the face of the Earth, and therefore Israel is fully within its rights to retaliate to any degree it sees fit.

Regarding my trip to Australia, I was born here, I’m a citizen, and I have family here.  I came for a visit.

As far as our support for George W. Bush goes, well, if you haven’t grasped it by now then there’s not a whole lot of point in re-explaining myself, is there?  Not to worry, Michael Moore will always be there to do your thinking for you.