Rant about "Fahrenheit 9/11"

On one of the mailing lists I'm on, someone posted a link to this article about Michael Moore's latest film (which you may have heard about). He seemed to think this was a well-reasoned critique of the film, so I decided to try to edumacate him as follows:

The writer of the article (who curiously doesn't sign his or her work) casts aspersions on Moore's allegedly ersatz blue-collar roots by alluding to his growing up in a suburb of Flint, rather than the cold, hard city streets, but doesn't actually explicitly say -- did Moore grow up poor? Upper middle class? And how does this affect how we should view his movies? I'm not sure that whether he grew up in a white, middle-class suburb of Flint really changes the impact of watching Lila Lipscomb cope with her grief over the loss of her son and betrayal by her government in sending him off to fight a war under false pretenses.

(Also, exactly how is Moore anti-capitalist? He may be anti-exploitation, but that's not the same thing.)

And, "all the film's conspiracy theories have either been dismantled or rendered questionable by the American media." How about backing that up? The writer goes on to cite reviews that disagreed with the film's polemic tone, but nothing refuting any of the facts in the film itself. I think that's telling. In fact, the article spends a great deal of time attacking Moore's character, but nowhere refutes a single claim made in the film by showing evidence to the contrary.

And I like this non-sequitur: "If Bush is defeated, Moore will no doubt claim a slice of the credit, and perhaps rightly so. But is he a vote-changer?" If he can rightly claim credit for swinging the vote, isn't he by definition a vote-changer?

Oh, and this! The writer implies that Ms. Lipscomb's loss is mitigated by the fact that "Modernism is at war with medievalism." Yeah, all them Ay-rabs are stuck back in the dark ages. Never mind that Iraq was a fully modern, secular country until we bombed it back to the Stone Age.

I found the film to be highly patriotic. If you've ever really loved someone, you know that it involves not just being supportive, whatever she does, but correcting, and admonishing when she goes astray. That's a mature love, and the sort that Moore seems to have for America.

It's sad that so many on the right in this country don't seem to understand that "My country, right or wrong" is the furthest thing from true patriotism.