A Good Friday - or Michael and the system Police Raid, Shut Down My Booksigning in San Diego About Michael Moore's book "Stupid White Men" Driving across America, going home to NY after the tragedy:
Good Friday/Passover/Easter, 2002
Dear friends,
I've never quite figured out why they call it "Good
Friday." I mean, for Christ's sake, a guy got nailed to death
on a cross! Actually it was THREE guys on that hill in Jerusalem
-- the other two being petty thieves who apparently had run afoul
of Rome's three-strikes-and-you're-out policy. Maybe someone came
up with the term "Good Friday" to try and put a positive
spin on things, realizing it's hard to attract converts to your
religion with such a downer image of its leader being executed.
I've often wondered why the Catholic Church doesn't use Jesus
rolling back the stone and rising from the dead as its chief icon,
something we'd all like to be able to do someday. Instead, we get
his corpse hammered into wood and hung above every altar. It's
like the Democrats deciding to replace the donkey as their symbol
with JFK's brains being blown out the back of his head. Who'd vote
for the candidate with that image next to his or her name on the
ballot?
I am being evicted today, Good Friday, from my office. I had just
one week left to edit my film, but the landlord -- heartless
bastard! -- is having me tossed out for non-payment of rent. Back
in October, my publisher, HarperCollins, was supposed to pay me
for the work I did in writing "Stupid White Men." Citing
"the tragic events of 9-11" (a mantra that seems to have
been repeated by every business in America as they've shamelessly
used the dead of that day to justify their obscene layoffs and
cutbacks) the publisher claimed they did not have to pay me until
the book was "published." I said, "What do you call
50,000 copies of this very book that have already been printed and
are now sitting in your warehouse?" They said, "We call
that printing 50,000 copies of a book that's now sitting in a
warehouse, but not yet 'published.'"
Well, once you head down the road trying to fight that kind of
logic, you are lost in a vortex from which you may never return.
So, the book didn't really "exist" (and it sat in
"nonexistence" in that warehouse for another 4 months).
Meanwhile, I had no paycheck. Now, I don't want to bore you with
my financial situation, and I certainly don't want you feeling
sorry for me. I have done better than I have ever dreamed of with
my high school education, and I'm sure most of you could fill both
my ears with what it takes for YOU just to make it through the
week. My current problems were compounded by the fact that I had
decided to spend the bulk of 2001 making the documentary film that
I am now finishing. I got my last paycheck for this film 12 months
ago, so I was counting on the fee for the book to get me through
the rest of 2001.
When that didn't happen (as most of you know, the publisher wanted
me to "tone down" the stuff about Bush in the book, and
I wouldn't, so there was a standoff until they finally backed
down), things began to fall apart. After I had already gone a few
months without being able to pay the office rent where our edit
room was located, the landlord went to court and got an order --
to have the sheriff toss me out on the curb! Suddenly, visions of
Deputy Fred from "Roger & Me" were dancing in my
head! Well, I negotiated with the landlord to give me a little
more time, and the angels from Salter Street Films in Canada (who
have backed this documentary from the start) agreed to pay some of
the rent. But the landlord would only accept the money on the
condition that we leave the premises on Easter weekend.
And, thus, here I am, using the last computer still hooked up to
electricity, writing you this letter. I can't get past either the
irony or the yin/yang of this moment: I've got the number one
bestselling book in the country -- and the landlord has just cut
my off my electricity in the middle of this sentence! I don't even
know if the computer has backed-up this letter! Agggghhh!!...
Okay, I've returned from my encounter with the landlord in the
hallway and the lights are back on. How surreal is this? Now comes
a message from the publisher that the book goes on sale in the
U.K. and Ireland this week, and they've also just sold the rights
for the book in China, Japan, Korea, France, Germany, and... THE
LINE JUST WENT DEAD! The phone company has disconnected our phone
lines. AARRRGGHH!!...
Okay, the phones are back up. And, lucky for me, just in time,
because the guy who does our taxes is calling to tell me that our
tax returns are all filled out... "But there's just one
little problem -- you have no money in the bank to pay your
taxes!" he says.
"You know that home improvement loan you got to fix up your
apartment? We'll have to borrow that money from the bank instead
to pay your taxes!" Waahhhggggghhh!!!
What is next? Please, Supreme Being in Charge Up There -- I GET
IT!: "You wanna sell 400,000 books? A pound-and-a-half of
flesh, sonny boy!"
The credit card company has now called because they have cut off
our card. But, wait, we paid THAT bill! People in our building
have heard we are moving and are stopping by to see if they can
pick over our furniture and equipment at fire sale prices. I see
my desk being hauled away one minute... then I see someone trying
to walk off with our Ficus tree that we ran for Congress in
2000... and now some stranger is swiping the third reel of our
film! SOMEBODY STOP HIM!
The phones, though, are still working. I know this to be a fact
because on the phone is the lawyer helping us avoid yet another
court appearance. The British TV network, Channel Four (the people
who produced the first season of "The Awful
Truth"), have not paid one of their bills here in New York,
and it is now way overdue. The guy wants to be paid -- he should
be! -- but he hasn't sued Channel Four for the money. He has come
after us! And why not? Why go 4,000 miles across an ocean to try
and collect when the Channel Four employee whose name is on the
bill -- mine! -- is just down the street from you?! So, just days
short of completing my documentary, I have now had to sell off
half our edit equipment to pay off the creditor whom Channel Four
failed to pay. MOMMMYYYY!!!
Does it get worse? Of course it does! And this time, the news is
tragic. My wife and I have had four deaths in our extended family
in the past four months -- and now word comes today, Good Friday,
that an in-law has had a horrible accident in Michigan and is in
critical condition. He was in Michigan to attend his mother's
funeral, just four days ago... she was a wonderful woman whose
simple presence brought happiness to all around her. I can still
remember Maryann decorating the church for us the night before our
wedding, an inner-city church that had seen its day and not many
weddings of late. She had transformed it into a beautiful place
for my wife and I. Now her son lays unconscious in a hospital
fighting for his life.
The TV is on, blaring in the background... suicide bombers strike
again in all their horror and a former butcher-now-prime minister
appears ready to slaughter as many people as he can, their blood
on their doorsteps will not protect them, no angel will pass over
to spare them... and my wife is on the phone with her sister who
is telling her this bad news about the accident and it all just
becomes too much to handle... my petty problems are reduced to the
significance they deserve, and I quietly go into the other room
and start to cry. After a few moments, I suck it in and get back
to work boxing up my belongings, listening to a producer tell me
why "10 minutes HAS to come out of the film" (it won't),
and talking to my daughter who, out of the blue, just wanted to
thank me for working so hard so she can go to college.
And that made it all worthwhile.
Yours from Inside His Own Private Golgotha,
Michael Moore, Author, Filmmaker, Dad - posted 4/7/02
StupidWhiteMen@aol.com
Police Raid, Shut Down My Booksigning in San Diego
Dear Friends,
It's a few minutes before midnight, on Friday night on 3/8/2002.
I'm in San Diego, and I have just escaped being arrested by the
San Diego police. This book tour keeps getting more surreal, but
the last hour has been unlike anything I have yet seen.
I have come to San Diego to speak at an event organized for my
book ("Stupid White Men"). The event is being held at a
middle school in an auditorium that seats about 800 people. I have
spent the week in California, pretty much at my own expense. Weeks
ago, the publisher informed me that they would not be sending me
to this state if they had to pay to get me there.
So I called up my friends at "Politically Incorrect" and
asked if they could book me on the show and bring me out there.
They were more than happy to help out. I can't believe the crap
this show has had to endure because its host one night, early on
in "America's NEW War" had the guts to state the truth
as he saw it. Now advertisers have dropped like flies, affiliates
in DC, Columbus, and other cities have canceled the program, and
ABC seems eager to deep-six the whole hour it shares with
"Nightline." But, for now, they have come to my aid, and
I am grateful.
In the past six days, I have spoken to 15 separate mobs of people.
I don't know what other word to use because, quite simply,
wherever I go, there is this unbelievable pandemonium. Every day,
every night, hundreds -- or thousands -- jam themselves into
halls, arenas, churches, auditoriums to listen to me talk about my
book and whatever else is struggling to make its way through my
brain. Forget about standing room only -- these venues look more
like breathing room only. A clever fire marshal could have made a
small fortune tailing me across this state. As I look out at the
crowds of humans doing their best to impersonate sardines, I worry
not that some deranged person may shout "Fire!" but
rather that someone may belt out, "There's an extra six
inches over here by the radiator!"
I have visited the most out-of-the-way places in California and,
no matter where I go or how right-wing the congressman is that
represents their district, all sorts of people are desperate to
get inside to be with the thousands of others who want to be part
of "United We Stand Against the Thief-in-Chief." Grass
Valley, Hayward, San Francisco, Santa Rosa, Ukiah, Arcata,
Berkeley, Westwood, East L.A., Koreatown (L.A.) -- I wish all of
you could see what I have seen. In every town, at every stop, huge
throngs of Americans who are sick and tired of the silence that
has been demanded of them, lest they be thought of as
"unpatriotic" should they dare to question the actions
of George W. Bush and company. That's what this tour is all about.
It's time to come out and start acting like Americans again.
And then there was San Diego.
Over a thousand people are packed inside the 800-seat auditorium.
Outside, another thousand people are on the lawn trying to get in.
The traffic on the street is tied up and the stream of San
Diegoans keeps filing up the sidewalk. I tell the organizers that
I am going to spend a half-hour outside here speaking to the
people who cannot get in. They are, after all, like me -- slackers
who are habitually late. The crowd outdoors is wired and jazzed
that they are being honored for being tardy.
Then I go inside, give my usual talk, and begin to sign books.
There's a 90-year-old lady whose granddaughter has driven her down
from Orange County. There's a union organizer from the antiunion
San Diego Union-Tribune newspaper who announces that his
grandfather was a sit-down striker with my uncle back in 1937 in
Flint. Some punk-poet kid tries to finish me off for good by
offering me two Krispy Kreme donuts. Hundreds line up to have
their books, their "Awful Truth" DVDs and, in one case,
an Iron Maiden jean jacket, signed. I am told that we are getting
close to the time when we will have to leave the school, as it has
only been rented until 11pm. That is not good. Hundreds are still
in line. I don't think any of these signings this week have been
over before midnight.
Somewhere around 11:30pm, I hear a commotion at the back of the
auditorium. I see people start to scatter. The San Diego police
are coming down the aisle, their large flashlights out (the
auditorium lights are still on, so we all understand the implied
"other" use of these instruments). The police are
telling everyone to "VACATE THESE PREMISES IMMEDIATELY OR YOU
WILL ALL BE ARRESTED!" I cannot believe what I am hearing.
"YOU WILL NOT RECEIVE ANOTHER WARNING. LEAVE NOW -- OR FACE
ARREST!"
The cops approach the stage where I am signing the books. People
are visibly frightened -- and about half the book-line bolts
toward the doors. I stand up and speak to the officers. "I am
the author of this book," I tell them politely. "These
people are only here to get a book and all I am doing is signing
them. We will be done shortly."
"I don't care who you are," they reply. "We have
received a call from the school district and we have been told to
remove you. You were supposed to be out of here at 11:00pm."
We had apparently violated our curfew.
"C'mon guys, you can't be serious," I said.
"Are you saying that you are going to arrest me for signing
people's books, and arrest the people who are here because they
want to read this book?"
"I don't care what you are doing -- this is your last
warning. I am ready to arrest you and everyone else."
"Who is your superior?" I ask.
"I'm it. Only the Chief is above me at night, and I am not
going to wake him up. This has already gone through many channels.
We are here because this has already gone through many people in
the last half-hour, people in authority, and the decision has been
made to clear you out of here or arrest you."
I have never been arrested, strange as that may seem. I could not
believe that, of all I have done, all I have stood for over the
years, that it has come down to this -- and I was about to be
hauled away for autographing books!
"OK," I said. "We'll leave." I then mumbled
something about the last time I checked, this was still the United
States of America -- even if we were just five miles away from
where it ends. They escorted me and the few remaining souls out of
the building. The brave lady who was the owner of the independent
bookstore and who was there selling my book, leaned over and
whispered to me, "I am willing to go to jail for this if you
want me to." Ya gotta hand it to the independent bookstores
-- they've been through hell lately, so much so that they are now
ready to be led away in handcuffs!
I walked outside and about 40 people ask me if I would still sign
their books in the dark of the parking lot. A girl gets out her
pocket flashlight. A guy runs over and turns on his headlights. I
remark that it feels like we're in some sort of banana republic or
East Berlin, secretly meeting so we can have our little book
gathering. "Sign quick, Mike, here come the police!"
I finish the last book and hop in my sister's car. She remembers
to give me a plaque that had been presented to me in abstentia
(while I was outside talking to the people who couldn't get in).
It was from the city councilwoman from the area of San Diego we
were in. It read "Official Proclamation: City of San Diego
Declares -- March 9, 2002, 'Michael Moore Day.'"
"Maybe we should have shown this to the cops, " she
says. We drive to her house where I catch four hours sleep before
I get up and head for Denver.
Yours,
Michael Moore
Author, Filmmaker, NonEvildoer--- 3/12/02
mmflint@aol.com
StupidWhiteMen@aol.com
PS. I have heard from so many of you about how hard it is to find
my book in the bookstores. It's true -- the book does not exist in
most stores. Yet it is #1 in most cities across the country on the
bestseller lists. I don't get it. HarperCollins has been very slow
to print books and get them out there. Why this is, I do not know.
No doubt they have been caught by surprise with the overwhelming
response to the book. You can't really blame them -- they thought
the "president" had an 80% approval rating.
Bookstore owners have been desperately pleading with me to help
them get books shipped to their stores. I called HarperCollins,
and their official line is that "There are plenty of books
out there and the book has never been out of stock."
Everything that I and others have personally seen says the exact
opposite.
So, I need your help. If you go to a bookstore and they don't have
the book, please send an email to HarperCollins at ...
... and be sure to c.c. me at ...StupidWhiteMen@aol.com
Hopefully, this will help.
You can also call the Customer Service Hotline at ...800.242.7737
(Punch in 1,1,0 to get to message center.)
PPS. This week, you can catch my Stupid Tour in Ann Arbor and
Detroit on Tuesday, Flint on Wednesday, Chicago on Thursday, and
Minneapolis/St. Paul on Friday.
Check my website, http://www/michaelmoore.com
, for further details.
(Top)
Stupid White MenDear friends, All I Am Saying Is Give War a Chance
10/08/01
Dear Friends,
It's about time! I was beginning to worry that
George II didn't have it in him, that he might wander off to
vacation in Omaha again. But finally, the bombs are raining down on
Afghanistan and, as Martha Stewart says, that's a good thing.
Oh, don't get me wrong -- I deplore war and
killing and violence. But, hey, I'm a pragmatist, I know where I
live, this is America and dammit, somebody's ass had to get kicked!
Our Leader, a former baseball club owner,
could have at least had the decency to wait one more day until the
baseball season was over. Poor Barry Bonds -- will anyone even
remember what he did a month from now? At least Fox had the good
grace to get the football game back on the tube within an hour of
the war's start! They KNEW none of us could stomach looking at
Stepford Drones from Fox News for the rest of the day.
Fellow liberals, lefties, Greens, workers, and
even you loveable Gore voters and recovering Democrats -- let me
tell you why I think this war on Afghanistan is good for all of us:
1. Network Unanimity in Naming The War.
It has been so confusing the past four weeks, what with all the
networks calling this thing we are in by so many names:
"America's New War," "American Under Attack,"
America Fights Back," "War on Terrorism," etc. Now,
nearly every network has settled on "America Strikes
Back."
I like this because, first of all, it honors
George Lucas. We're a humble people, we Americans, so we can't quite
bring ourselves to call it "The Empire Strikes Back."
"Empire" sounds a little scary, and there's no use
reminding the rest of the world that we call all the shots now. So
"America Strikes Back" is appropriate (and, as Sunday was
the last day of baseball, "strikes" has the necessary
sports metaphor we like to use when bombing other countries).
2. The Citizenry Can Now Go Back to What They
Were Doing. I don't know about you, but nearly four weeks of
anxious and tense anticipation of what would happen next was
starting to wear me down. I thought nothing could top what spending
the whole summer agonizing over whose baby it was on
"Friends" did to me.
But the last four weeks was worse than a bad
classic rock extended drum solo. NOW we have resolution. NOW we know
the ending -- the bombing to smithereens of a country so advanced it
has, to date, laid a total of 18 miles of railroad tracks throughout
the entire country! How very 19th century of them! I hope our
missiles were able to take them out. I don't want this thing going
on forever. Best that we obliterate them before they come up with
some smart idea like the telegraph.
3. Dick Cheney Has Been Moved Into Hiding
Again. This can only help. The farther this mastermind can be
kept from young Bush, the better. He's like that creepy friend of
your dad's who has taken a bit too much of a shine to you. Wait --
he *is* that creepy friend of his dad's! Anytime I hear they have
transported Cheney out of town and into a bunker in the woods, I
feel safe. And don't worry about him having any workable form of
communications with Bush -- remember, this is a government which
discovers that a known terrorist is taking flying lessons in Florida
and does nothing.
4. Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Orrin Hatch
Will All Be Fighting This War for Us! These are all honorable
men, men of their word, men who would not expect someone else to
fight their battles for them. They have all called for war, revenge,
blood -- and, by God, it is blood I want them to have! Now that we
are at war, let us insist that those who have cried the loudest for
the killing be the first to go and do just that!
I would like to see, by the end of the day,
Rush and Bill, Orrin and the rest of their colleagues down at the
recruiting station signing up to join the U.S. Army. Sure, I know
they are no longer young, but there are many jobs they will be able
to do once they get through the Khyber Pass. Surely these men would
not expect our sons and daughters to die for something that they
themselves would not be willing to die for. To make it easy, guys,
you can just go to the Army's website right now!
Get your butts over there to Afghanistan and
defend a way of life that allows companies like Boeing get rid of
30,000 people while using the tragedy in New York as their shameful
excuse.
5. Really Cool War Footage. It's been way too
long since we've been able to watch those cruise missiles and smart
bombs with their little cameras on them sail in and blow the crap
out of a bunch of human beings. This time, let's hope the video is
in color and that it's attached with a miniature set of Dolby
speaker microphones so we can hear the screams and wails of those
Afghanis as our shrapnel guts them into strips of bacon. Oh, and
let's pray the video can be loaded into my Sony Playstation!!
6. Better a Quickie War Than the Permanent
War. Orwell warned us about this one. Big Brother, in order to
control the population, knew that it was necessary for the people to
always believe they were in a state of siege, that the enemy was
getting closer and closer, and that the war would take a very long
time.
That is EXACTLY what George W. Bush said in
his speech to Congress, and the reason he said it is because he and
his buddies want us all in such a state of fear and panic that we
would gladly give up the cherished freedoms that our fathers and
those before them fought and died for. Who wouldn't submit to
searches, restrictions of movement, and the rounding up of anyone
who looks suspicious if it would prevent another September 11?
In order to get these laws passed that will
strip us of our rights, they have been telling us that we are in a
LONG and PROTRACTED war that has no end in sight. Don't buy it! We
are bombing Afghanistan, and THAT is the only war in progress. It
should be over anywhere from a few days from now or in about nine
years (Soviet-style). Either way, it will end. The good guys will
win. And, if George II is anything like George I, then the bad guy
will win, too, getting to live and go on doing what he enjoys doing
(what were we, like, 40 miles from Baghdad?) while we continue to
bomb the innocents (540,000 Iraqi children killed by U.S. in last
ten years from bombs and sanctions).
As I'm sure you must agree, there are many
upsides to this war. Sure, The Emmys got cancelled again, and, as a
nominee this year, I already found out that I wasn't getting one of
those little gold people so who cares if I can't walk down the red
carpet in my Bob Mackie gown? I don't even wear a gown -- I wear
pants, ill-fitting pants at that! Yesiree, I say, BOMBS AWAY!
Rockets red glare! We are all WHITE WITH FOAM!
And please, dear friends, let's look at the
bright side for once: The last time a Bush took us to war and got a
90% approval rating, he was toast and a ghost the following year.
You can't get better than that.
Yours,
Michael Moore
mmflint@aol.com
9/22/01
Dear Friends,
The drive across New Jersey has been the
longest portion of this trip across America. It is only 60 miles to
New York City and I am having trouble keeping my eyes open. I had
just pulled off the road in Allentown, PA, to throw some cold water
in my face. Kathleen and I have grown very silent. It is the dread
of what is ahead.
As we cross the George Washington Bridge into
Manhattan, the plume of smoke from the lower part of the island
hovers, bright blasting searchlights attempting to crash through it.
The college radio station from Fordham is playing Dylan's "A
Hard Rain's Gonna Fall."
Instead of making the turn south to go home
down the West Side Highway, I go north and head toward the town
where our daughter goes to college. It is one in the morning, and
when we arrive on campus we note that every single light in the
dorms is on (when do these kids sleep?).
We call Natalie and tell her we have made it
home. She directs us to the nearest gate where she is with some
other young women who are working on the school paper. We pull up,
she comes out... and this is, as it always has been, the happiest
moment of our lives. We hug her, and hug her again. She is happy to
see us, and she generously, good-naturedly, tolerates our weepy
parental doting. She is, after all, the only reason we have made
this drive. Nothing else matters at this point.
We
eventually leave her to her own life and head toward New York
City. It is now deep in the middle of the night and the radio plays
"O Superman" by Laurie Anderson ("Here come the
planes - - they're American planes!... hold me in your arms... your
military arms...") and then the DJ says that he is going to
play a song that they have never let him play before on the station.
What an odd thing to announce, I think, considering we live in a
free country where you can play whatever music you damn well please.
I recall the email I received the night before
from a radio station manager in Michigan. He passed on to me a
confidential memo from the radio conglomerate that owns his station:
Clear Channel, the company that has bought up 1,200 stations
altogether -- 247 of them in the nation's 250 largest radio markets
-- and that not only dominates the Top 40 format, but controls 60%
of all rock-radio listening.
The company has ordered its stations not to
play a list of 150 songs during this "national emergency."
The list, incredibly, includes "Bridge Over Troubled
Water," "Peace Train," and John Lennon's
"Imagine." Rah-rah war songs, though, are OK.
And then there was this troubling instruction:
"No songs by Rage Against the Machine should be aired."
The entire works of a band are banned? Is this the freedom we fight
for? Or does this sound like one of those repressive dictatorships
we are told is our new enemy?
The song the college DJ goes ahead and plays
is, "Hey, War Pig," by Katrina and the Waves, and he
dedicates it to the "all the war mongers out there." Yes,
there is hope, the kids are all right.
We arrive at our apartment building and I am
too tired to drop the vehicle off at the rental car place, so we
unload, head upstairs, and hit the sack.
I awake at noon. A horrible stench has filled
the apartment. I did not notice it a few hours earlier, but the
winds have shifted. It is the odor others had warned me about. It is
a smell I have never smelled. I am told by someone in the building
that it is a combination of chemicals, rubber, sheetrock, and... he
pauses. He does not want to list the final ingredient, and I do not
want him to.
I thank him and go back upstairs and close all
the windows. I look at the cereal box I had left half-opened before
our trip to L.A. I stare at this box for a long time. Nine days of
ash has descended on the city. It is everywhere, microscopic,
invisible, non-discriminatory in where it has landed. No part of the
city is untouched, and all are treated equally to the smoke and
stench, regardless of station in life. There is no way to turn away
and ignore it.
I take the rental car back. As I park it, I
look across the street and see our neighborhood firehouse consumed
in flowers and candles. "They lost nine firemen," the
rental woman tells me. "It's a pretty sad place."
There's a firehouse every few blocks in New
York. Back in Michigan, I grew up across the street from a fire
station and I have always loved the sound of that screeching siren.
The (mostly) men who work down the street from us now in New York
are our neighbors in the truest sense of the word.
They are quintessential New Yorkers, right to
the bone, and when they are called to do their job (for which they
are grossly underpaid), they never stop for a moment to think of
themselves. I always enjoy shooting the breeze with these guys, and
when possible, I've put them on my show, as they are natural-born
comedians and wiseguys. I have never once complained about the wail
of their fire trucks as they barrel down my street.
I walk across the street to pay my respects. A
lone fireman spots me coming and approaches me, arms outstretched.
He grabs me and hugs me. He says, "Mike, thanks, thanks for
everything you do for the..." I am stunned and embarrassed by
this, and I cut him off. "Stop," I say, "I haven't
done shit. I am here to thank you and to tell you how horribly sorry
I am..." He cuts me off. "Shutupwillya! Lemme say what I
need to say..."
He continues to thank me, I can't take this --
I HAVE DONE NOTHING BUT RETURN A DAMN RENTAL CAR -- and I break down
in tears. "Oh, don't go gettin' mushy on me, Mike -- c'mon,
we're Irish!" He laughs, I laugh, I grab him and hold him and
these two big Irish lugs and crybabies make for quite a sight in the
middle of a Manhattan street. Kathleen and I sign their book and we
take down the name of the fund for the nine families of our
neighbors. "Don't forget," our fireman friend says as we
leave, "We need your prayers more than we need the
donations."
I cannot go to work. But I have a film to
finish. Our editor has been unable to make it in from New Jersey,
but he is there now waiting for some word on what to do. I can't
even think about this movie. I don't WANT to think about it because
if I think about it I will have to face an ugly truth that has been
gnawing through my head...
This started out as a documentary on gun
violence in America, but the largest mass murder in our history was
just committed -- without the use of a single gun! Not a single
bullet fired! No bomb was set off, no missile was fired, no weapon
(i.e., a device that was solely and specifically manufactured to
kill humans) was used. A boxcutter! -- I can't stop thinking about
this. A thousand gun control laws would not have prevented this
massacre. What am I doing?
My wife does not want to go down to the
memorial to the victims that has spontaneously taken over Union
Square in the Village -- she is still in too much shock having
returned to this sullen city -- but she encourages me to go, and I
do.
The Square is filled with hundreds of people.
But, more importantly, the walls and fences around Union Square are
covered in a blizzard of "MISSING" posters of loved ones.
Thousands of handbills, flyers, photos, notes -- all pleading to
contact them should anyone know the whereabouts of their mother,
father, son, daughter, infant.
Yet, all of us who stare at these faces, we
know their "whereabouts." And the smoke, the ash, the odor
is much thicker down here, just 20 blocks from The Site. The faces
of the victims, culled from wedding photos, birthday party home
videos, vacation snapshots, are striking in their diversity. Easily,
the majority are African-American, Arabic, Hispanic, Asian, Jewish.
Their jobs at the World Trade Center are
listed. They were clerks, secretaries, janitors, security guards,
assistants, dishwashers, waitresses, receptionists -- all the people
who HAVE to be at work first thing in the morning, the lower wage
workers. The wall is also filled with the faces of brokers, lawyers,
managers, accountants, insurance agents -- it is endless, it is
everyone, it is America.
I am told that there may be over 500 "illegals"
-- those less-than-minimum wage workers that the commerce of America
depends on -- who are also among the dead, but there are no photos
of them. Citizens from over 80 countries are victims of this attack
and, remarkably, the country that seems to have the most people who
were killed is the Muslim country of Pakistan.
For two hours I walk through Union Square,
listening to the debates that rage in various small circles, between
hippies and Army guys, Israelis and Palestinians, those for war and
those against. They are heated, passionate -- but never do I sense
the threat of violence between them. No police are in sight.
"We are self-policed," one kid tells me. Others are
singing or rapping, many are quietly crying.
I leave and go down to Canal Street. It is as
far as they will allow civilians to go. The odor is now nearly
unbearable. I tell the officer I would like to volunteer, to do
anything that is needed -- carry buckets, lift, haul, relieve,
whatever. He tells me that no more volunteers are needed. He says
that, right now, they do not expect to find anyone alive.
The job they are doing is one of recovery of
the dead and the removal of all the steel and concrete, and they
have left these jobs to the professionals. I can't help but think
they could still use an extra pair of hands -- surely, at least ONE
person could still be alive! I remain upset and appalled that Wall
Street has ordered its employees back to work -- to trade stocks! --
next-door to a mass, open graveyard of yet unburied bodies. How
cruel is this to the workers who must walk by, or to the dead who
are treated to this sacrilege? And, in my mind, what IF someone was
still down there alive? How can you be running around a stock market
floor when you should be on your hands and knees digging out the
possible survivors? I just don't get it...
As I sit here in the early morning hours of
Saturday, September 22, 2001, I cannot untangle much of the past 24
hours. I am exhausted from the trip, from all that has hit me upon
returning to New York. I have to unpack eventually. What was it
exactly I had packed all these bags for in the first place? Oh,
yeah, The Emmys in L.A! Big friggin' deal now, eh? I tick off
the list of everything that no longer matters.
I watch Bush speak in front of Congress, but I
cannot answer him right now, I am tired. The mayor has drastically
upped the death toll. My phone rings off the ... whatever phones
ring off of these days. Calls from the BBC, CBC, Canal+, ABC
(Australia), Swedish TV, Dutch TV -- all want me to appear live on
their national primetime newscasts. Not a single American network
has called.
Frankly, I don't want to be on anybody's TV
show no matter where they are from, but I cannot help but feel this
sinking feeling in my gut that the rest of the world wants to hear
what I have to say, yet in my own country, I am to have no voice in
the media (other than through these letters on the Web). This is MY
country. I love MY country. Every channel and it's the same damn
repetitive drumbeat WAR WAR WAR WAR WAR...
And yet, I have just driven 2,944 miles, a
drive that began on the corner of Wilshire and the Pacific Ocean in
Santa Monica, California. I have heard the voices of the scores of
fellow Americans I met, the average Joes and Janes, who are NOT
screaming WAR WAR WAR! Why can't their voices be heard?
Forget about me, I can barely utter a sentence
anyway; I don't wanna go on no TV. But where is Noam Chomsky, or
Howard Zinn, or the editors of "The Nation" or "Tikkun"
or "The Progressive" or the thousands of college kids who
protested at noon on Thursday on 148 American campuses? Don't they
count? Is this still the America we believe in, the one we are being
asked to defend?
Coming home tonight, I noticed a strange sound
in the city. I did not hear a single car horn being honked! I have
never heard that sound in New York City. No one was yelling, it was
quiet and peaceful.
I called my dad on my cell phone. He tells me
of things getting even worse back home in Flint, the city now
bankrupt, the state preparing to take it over. The fire department
has had to lay off over 50% of its firefighters. Fires now are just
allowed to burn because they have neither the trucks nor the people
left to fight them.
Then he said, "Mike, that guy you call
'The Boss' -- he's singing right now on TV!" The nationwide
telethon for the September 11th victims has started. I could hear
Bruce Springsteen singing in the background. My father (bless him
and his Big Band soul at the age of 80!) knows how much I love Bruce
and says, "let me hold the phone up close to the set so you can
hear him," and he does, and I hear Springsteen sing these
haunting words: "My city is in ruins, my city is in ruins...
c'mon, rise up!"
I love my dad and my mom, my sisters, my wife
and my daughter, and I am grateful for this life and for the
privilege I've been given to live it with all of them. I come
upstairs and Kathleen and I watch the rest of the telethon. Neil
Young appears at one point, alone at the piano, and he does not sing
one of his own songs. Rather, he sings the banned
"Imagine." The Walrus had to have loved that one from
where he was watching!
My wife looks over at me. The tears won't
leave my eyes. I tell her what I was told today.
"Woody (our assistant editor) saw a
rescue truck going down the West Side Highway to help in the relief
effort," I tell her.
"On the side of the truck, it read 'FFD.'"
The Flint Fire Department.
All the way from our home.
To our home.
It was more than either of us could bear.
Yours,
Michael Moore
mmflint@aol.com
9/19/01
Dear Friends,
We have made it to Columbus, Ohio for the
night and are staying just a couple of blocks from the state capitol
building where Governor Rhodes gave the order on May 4, 1970, to
send the National Guard to Kent State. There they opened fire on
hundreds of unarmed students, killing four and wounding many others.
Few dared to call it a terrorist act committed
by the state of Ohio… but, there I go again. Off message! Stay
focused on the main themes, Mike: “AMERICA UNITED!” “SMOKE
‘EM OUTTA THEIR HOLES, HUNT ‘EM DOWN, AND GIT ‘EM!” “THE
SLEEPING GIANT HAS BEEN AROUSED!” and “REMEMBER THE POSTER IN
THE OLD WEST: ‘WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE!’”
I have a question to all the war hawks out
there: When you listen and look at our Commander-in-Chief, do you
really think THIS is the guy who is going to kick some major league
ass? I’m just asking all you conservative drum beaters out there
-- man, you must be *embarrassed* that this is the best we have to
offer.
I know we are all supposed to be supportive of
Mr. Bush, at the moment, but has it dawned on anyone that he is not,
in fact, the “president?” I hate to bring up a thorny subject,
but this is the man who *lost* the election. He got the *least*
number of votes between the two major party candidates. His brother
oversaw a rigged vote in Florida.
I am so, so sorry to bring this up now, but
the tragedy of the past week is EXACTLY the kind of horrible
circumstance many Americans feared we’d find ourselves in -- A
NATIONAL CRISIS UNDER A LEADER WHO IS NOT THERE BY THE WILL OF THE
PEOPLE. It is a tribute to the goodwill of the American public that
they have rallied behind George W. Bush as best they can, ‘cause
he and his fake flight jacket is all we got right now in the Oval
Office.
Someone needs to get in charge and propose
some real solutions to bringing the perpetrators to justice and
preventing this -- as best as possible -- from happening again.
Instead, what we have is Bush speaking like a wind-up doll, mouthing
a bunch of nonsense clichés, repeating them over and over and over.
But occasionally his batteries run out -- and
he goes off on some unintelligible tangent. You can see his handlers
desperately trying to cut him off and whisk him away. You watch in
awe and you ask the question that none of us even wants to
contemplate right now, and that no one will dare to ask, so I might
as well take the hit and be the one: THIS is the Commander-in-Chief
of the most powerful country on earth? Who amongst you feels secure
tonight? What enemy is going to be afraid of *this* guy?
Bush keeps calling what we are in “a war.”
Has anyone told him that the more he keeps using this word, the more
HE puts US in jeopardy? A “war” implies that two sides are
participating in an action to kill as many of the other side as
possible. Bush and the pundits use the word like it’s a one-sided
deal, like we’re going to be the only ones doing the bombing. War
means we bomb them, then they bomb us. That’s what war is, you
idiots. We strafe Afghanistan, then the terrorists drop a canister
of chemical weapons in the New York subway. We send in a group of
commandos and wipe out a camp of Muslims, they take out the Sears
Tower.
All of you who are screaming for war: are you
prepared to pay the price, to take thousands of more casualties?
Because, my big, macho-talking friends, THAT is what this kind of
war would be like. America is a complex and open society with a
massive and intricate infrastructure that is fragile and vulnerable
and susceptible to easy attack and disruption. IT CAN BE BROUGHT
DOWN WITH A BOXCUTTER. Let me repeat that:
IT CAN BE BROUGHT DOWN -- IT CAN BE BROUGHT TO
A TOTAL STANDSTILL -- BY A BOXCUTTER!
Nearly a week with no stock market, no
commercial television, no professional sports, three days with no
planes in the air (for the first time since 1911), no airports open,
the country essentially shut down. A week later and the phone lines
still don’t all work. A boxcutter, folks! Do not be misled into
thinking he with the biggest missile is going to win this “war.”
We will never be able to protect all of us
from this kind of terrorism. Back and forth, more buildings bombed,
more planes downed, more innocent American lives lost. When does
this end? After we have killed every terrorist? When exactly is THAT
scheduled to happen? Or is it just when we kill Osama bin Laden,
*then* we win the war? Are you serious? We couldn’t even
assassinate Hitler during a massive World War that lasted 6 years!
Bush now says this is “a war against the
evil people in the world.” Oh, really? THAT war! Yeah, we should
be able to defeat “evil,” oh, sometime in the next millennium or
two. Get a grip. “War” is not going to get the justice we demand
or make us more safe. You know it and I know it. There is a
different way to go, and I will lay it out in a later letter, but to
simplify it for now and put it in a nutshell, it goes like this:
One billion people on this planet have no
clean drinking water. Two billion have no electricity. Three billion
have never made a phone call from their home. We have the money and
the people-power to alter ALL of this. We also have the moral
imperative to stop supporting repressive regimes and corporations
who exploit these people.
When we decide to help improve these billions
of people’s lives, we will pull the rug out from under the
terrorists who need those they send to their deaths to be poor and
exploited and angry at us. The multi-millionaire bin Laden isn’t
going to give up HIS life!
When all the people in the Middle East have
food on the table, a decent home, a good job, and democratic control
over their own lives, who among them is going to be convinced to
sacrifice his life by crashing himself into a tall office building?
Sure, there will always be those who go insane
and kill without reason. The British saw that in a Dunblane
schoolyard, we saw it in Oklahoma City. There will always be
religious fanatics willing to kill and be killed because they
believe God has so ordered them. Ask the families of the
assassinated women’s clinics’ doctors in Buffalo and Florida
about those willing to commit evil in the name of religion in
America.
There IS a way to protect us from further
attack, to lift the rest of the world out of its misery, but it
requires some smarts and some guts, two things in short supply in
Washington these days.
After arriving in Columbus, Kathleen and I met
up with one of our best friends from Flint, Al Hirvela. Al teaches
at Ohio State. He was just the shot in the arm I needed this week.
He, Kathleen, I and a bunch of others all used to put out an
alternative newspaper in Flint many years ago and we miss being
around each other in times like these. We miss being able to talk
and try to figure out what it all means -- and what we should be
doing about it. Al is a Quaker and a pacifist, and sitting in the
Big Boy last night talking to him was the kind of grounding
experience I needed after four days on the road.
My publisher called two nights ago to ask
where I might end up for the evening, as my editor wanted to ship me
a copy of my new book, just off the press. This was bittersweet news
-- I have dedicated this book to Al, and to think that I would be
there when he opened it up and saw his name on that dedication page
was indeed a lucky privilege, a cool moment I never expected to
have.
But the book publisher also gave me this news:
They are “delaying” the release of my book due to the events of
the past week. No doubt, this book is going to ruffle some feathers,
and in light of the attack in New York, the book suddenly gave
everyone connected to it (including me) the heebie-jeebies. What a
feeling to have in a free country!
In a way, though, I was relieved with their
decision -- I have absolutely ZERO interest in going out on a book
tour this week. Even though I have much I would like to say --
opinions and thoughts that are NOT being heard in the media right
now -- I just can’t go out there and have my name attached to
something that is “on sale” (I have asked our webmaster to
remove anything from our site that leads one to purchase any of my
films, TV shows or books).
I am very proud of this book, and I hoped it
would stimulate a lot of discussion on various topics. I don’t
know now when it will come out -- maybe next month, maybe next year.
In the meantime, I will continue to communicate on the Web and speak
to any media outlet that will listen to -- and report uncensored --
what I have to say about the tragic situation in which we are now
immersed.
I can’t believe all the incredible letters
you are sending me -- over 41,000 letters in the last week. I am so
sorry I cannot respond to each of you. I have scrolled down through
the subject headings and read a few of the letters and it is clear I
am not alone in my sadness over this tragedy or in the anger I have
for what is being proposed by our leaders. I will print these
letters and let our elected officials see what the REST of America
is thinking about the idea of “war.”
We are now driving across Ohio toward West
Virginia and Pennsylvania. On the radio, NPR is running a history
report on Osama bin Laden. We are told that he comes from a wealthy
family and that they are the main builders for the Saudi royal
family. They’ve remodeled palaces and built holy sites. Their
construction projects are everywhere. Kathleen turns to me, and with
one word sums up the kind of low-life we are talking about here.
“Contractors,” she says. “Bin Laden is a
contractor.” Indeed, it all made sense.
Someone at NPR tracked me down on the road and
asked me to stop by the nearest NPR station and read my letters over
the air. I agreed, but I got choked up reading them into the
microphone. I wonder if they will even broadcast them. I hope they
do, as I felt that my reading of them conveyed more of a real and
human sense of what I am trying to say and what I am seeing on this
drive across America.
Later in the evening, my letters go out on an
NPR program called “The Connection” from WBUR in Boston. More
mail pours in. On the Pennsylvania Turnpike we pass through nearby
Shanksville, PA, where the United flight went down. The girl at the
newsstand counter in the rest stop says it was “just three miles
down the road.” Close enough for all of them to hear it crash. Her
voice shakes as she tells me this. A car parked in front of the door
has a temporary “Cemetery Pass” sitting on its dash.
I think of Barbara Olson, the conservative
commentator and wife of the man who argued Bush’s case for
installation in front of the courts last year. I have been on
“Politically Incorrect” with her on a couple of occasions. She
was always a warm and friendly person. She was on that plane, on her
way to do that show.
Monday night, the program went on, and Bill
Maher left a chair on the stage empty, in her honor. I agreed with
her on nothing, and I cried when I saw that empty chair. She was a
human being who deserved to live. She was an American who loved her
country. Maybe I should have gotten to know her better, instead of
just ignoring her because of her politics. She was a year younger
than me…
We will make it home to New York, sometime
tonight…
Yours,
Michael Moore
9/16/01
Dear Friends,
Pulling out of Albuquerque on Saturday, on
our way back to New York City, we pass by the exit that invites us
to visit the "National Atomic Museum," but figuring we
probably couldn't get a New York Times there, we decline the offer
and head out across New Mexico.
The amazing thing is that you can even still
get a Wall Street Journal -- anywhere and everywhere. As I write
this late Sunday night, the captains of Capitalism are declaring
that the stock exchange will re-open on Monday, even if they don't
have running water and phones, just to show its enemies that
NOTHING can stop the forward accumulation of wealth.
The vast majority of the dead are those who
labored to bring them that wealth, and it dishonors them and their
families to so callously crank up the greed machine within days of
this tragedy. Their bodies -- thousands of them -- are still
buried under the rubble down the street, but, hey, why wait to
give them a proper burial -- let's get busy making some money! I
can only hope that the stench from the rotting corpses of their
former employees will haunt them for the rest of the day and
remain in their consciences for the days to come...
The Wall Street Journal has not missed a day
of publication, even though much of their operation has been moved
to New Jersey. Perhaps this explains why they lifted a portion
from my first letter to you last Wednesday and reprinted it out of
context. As this is a publication whose editorial department has
no moral compass, I shouldn't be surprised that they would
appropriate my words and twist them to fit their own conclusions.
I thought I'd write them a letter about this, and then I went, Ah,
jeez, do I have to explain satire to these people? I gotta drive
through Texas!
We entered what I thought was Texas, but we
were never sure because there was no "Welcome to Texas"
sign on the road. All states greet you with some oversized pride
billboard when you cross their state line. Not Texas. Is the
implication that you don't need to know you are in Texas because,
as long as you are in the United States, you're essentially always
in Texas? Kathleen said let's just get across this state as quick
as we can.
We stopped for gas in Groom, Texas, a skanky
little hole of a place where someone's typo must have caused the
letter "r" to be hit instead of the intended
"l." A newspaper article near the cashier proclaimed
that Groom's mayor has been the big winner in the Texas state
lottery -- twice. I wasn't sure if the posting of this news was to
warn us not to bother buying a lottery ticket here 'cause the fix
is already in or to simply remind us just how lucky we should feel
to be in Groom. I bought my wife two souvenirs from the store: a
t-shirt that read, "I'm Smarter Than Him. I Can Count to
10," and a "Foxy Lady" car decal. These did not
make up for the "The Eagles" reference in my last
letter.
It seems like every sign and flashing
marquee along the road has some sort of message regarding the
massacre in New York: "GOD BLESS AMERICA UNLEADED. $2.09
GAL." and "REMEMBER WORLD TRADE CENTER PORK CHOP
BREAKFAST $5.99." But then a Southern Baptist preacher comes
on the radio and says the following: "Perhaps America has
some repenting to do. We propped up the Shah of Iran when maybe we
shouldn't have. We have used the poor of the world to make our
goods so we can make a profit when maybe we shouldn't..."
These were stunning words to hear, but it
coincided with much of what we have been picking up along the
road; namely, that many, many Americans are not in support of gong
off half-cocked and bombing innocent people, no matter how much we
all want those responsible to be brought to justice. I continue to
be hopeful...
Sunday morning in Oklahoma City. The clerk
at the hotel notices the California license plate on our rental
car and asks about where we are going. I tell him New York City,
and he tells me that this has been an especially hard week for
Oklahoma City. He puts his hand out to me and says he went to
three funerals himself after the Oklahoma City bombing, one of
which he sang at. "It was the father of my best friend."
Tears are pushed back.
We go four blocks down the street to the
memorial. The streets around it had been blocked off all week for
fear that someone may want to bomb it again. The barriers are down
now, and the place is full of people stopping to pray and reflect.
A large granite slab says "9:03" and I am struck by the
fact that this is the same exact minute that the second plane
slammed into the World Trade Center.
Kids are writing messages to the people of
New York with chalk on the sidewalk. Nearby, a man tells me he
hopes that our leaders pay heed to the words inscribed on the
memorial about violence never again being used. Another lady
points out that the business of vengeance is the Lord's, not ours.
Again, I am hopeful, but the sadness of this site is too
overwhelming, and we leave and don't say much for the next hour or
so on the road.
I wonder if New York will honor those lost
by turning the former blocks of the WTC into its own quiet,
peaceful memorial site. Or, as the pundits insist, will they
rebuild it immediately to show our enemies that the business of
America shall continue uninterrupted? At that moment we enter the
"Will Rogers Turnpike," and I think I know what he would
say about all this, let alone what he would say about this state
naming a toll road after him.
After passing by the birthplace of French's
Mustard somewhere in Missouri, we eventually make it to the city
that houses the National Bowling Hall of Fame, and spend the
night...
Yours,
Michael Moore
9/15/01
Dear Friends,
Our second day on the road back to New York
City...
Somewhere in the Land of Enchantment
I am awakened by the sounds of the "Star
Spangled Banner" coming from the lobby of the hotel where we
have spent the night in Flagstaff. The memorial service has begun at
the National Cathedral in Washington, DC, and it is on the TV in the
lobby. I go down to check it out.
A group of older black women are standing
there watching it, tears in their eyes. I am reminded by a sign we
saw on the way into town on a Hopi Indian store: "America Land
of the Free Home of the Brave." You probably can't find two
groups more denied the American Dream than these two and yet they
grieve like everyone else over the attack in New York.
Passing through the Indian reservations of
Arizona and New Mexico you are struck by the abject poverty of these
places, and reminded of the 500 years of state-sponsored terrorism
against these people, a virtual genocide. How many millions were
killed by the American settlers and soldiers? I can't remember now.
But the living results are brutally evident in the shacks and
trailers along old Route 66.
My wife and I make our way into town and find
a Catholic church, San Francisco de Asis, where a service is being
held to honor the dead. The church itself is remarkable for its
matriarchal images, with a large mural of Mary and her mother and
her family above the altar, and then a statue of her in place of the
usual crucified Jesus.
We stand, as there is no room to sit. Minutes
go by and the service does not begin. The priest comes and takes a
seat in the 7th row pew as if he were just another mourner. After a
long while, someone gets up from her pew and reads from the bible --
but the reading is not the one about vengeance and bloodshed.
Rather, it's about beating our swords into plowshares. Oops, off
message!
We leave the church and both of us are filled
with an overwhelming despair. We still have not heard from friends
in Manhattan or from our friend Barbara who works at the Pentagon.
We pass by a store -- "Guns and Groceries," the sign
proclaims. On the way out of town, the cell phone rings. It is
Barbara and her husband Sam calling from outside the Pentagon. She
tells me she is OK and that there is a large airplane wheel sticking
out of the side of the building where she works as a clerical. The
morning of the crash she was late for work because she was taking
Sam to the airport. I start to cry again. She says thanks and
"Don't worry I'm OK," and I hear Sam cracking in the
background "That's debatable" and they both laugh.
I pull off the road in Winslow, Arizona, and
tell Kathleen I want to get a picture of her on a corner. She
doesn't know why and, knowing her intense dislike of The Eagles, I
tell her it's a song by Jackson Browne (which is technically true;
he co-wrote it). She obliges, but when she reads this I'll be in big
trouble.
I continue to be amazed at the large number of
people -- both on the radio and those we run into -- who are
completely opposed to some half-cocked military response to what has
happened. No matter what the media tells you or shows you, I am
convinced there is a majority of Americans who, though they want
justice and want to be protected from further attacks, do not want
George W. Bush to start sounding like Dr. Strangelove.
Speaking of Strangelove, this past week began
with one of the most powerful pieces on "60 Minutes" in a
long time. They laid it all out: How the United States -- and
specifically Henry Kissinger -- plotted to overthrow the
democratically-elected president of Chile in the early 1970s. The
plot succeeded, President Allende was assassinated, and thousands of
other Chileans were brutally tortured and murdered. Today, many
within the new government of Chile would like to put Kissinger on
trial for these acts of terrorism. Do you think the United States
will give him up?
Well, that story was forgotten, 48 hours
later, as quickly as it had been forgotten 30 years ago.
A few of you have written me to say, Please,
Mike, don't talk about this stuff, at least not right now. We need
to bury the dead.
I agree. And I apologize to any who have taken
offense. No one wants to talk about politics right now -- except our
installed leaders in Washington. Trust me, they are talking politics
night and day, and those discussions involve sending our kids off to
fight some invisible enemy and to indiscriminately bomb Afghans or
whoever they think will make us Americans feel good.
I feel I have a responsibility as one of those
Americans who doesn't feel good right now to speak out and say what
needs to be said: That we, the United States of America, are
culpable in committing so many acts of terror and bloodshed that we
had better get a clue about the culture of violence in which we have
been active participants. I know it's a hard thing to hear right
now, but if I and others don't say it, I fear we will soon be in a
war that will do NOTHING to protect us from the next terrorist
attack.
I have received more emails this week than
ever before -- about a thousand every four hours. Ninety percent of
them are from people who also refuse to be drawn into some form of
senseless bloodletting, and who agree that we need to find the right
way to bring those to justice who committed these acts.
I have been touched by many of your comments
and am so sorry I cannot respond to them while I am on the road. But
I am sharing your feelings with those I meet (and, I have to say
again, it is a Godsend to have an invention like the Internet where
I can travel across the country like this and be connected to so
many thousands of other Americans …and to so many foreigners who
grieve for us and fear for what our leaders may do).
We pass over the Continental Divide and Rush
Limbaugh babbles on about whom we must bomb. He signs off, and I am
sure he is on his way down to the nearest recruiting station to sign
up -- for surely he would not expect your son or daughter to risk
their lives for freedom while he just sits back and enjoys his new
half-billion dollar contract.
Coming into Albuquerque, Kathleen is leafing
through the Frommer's travel guide for a place to spend the night.
She finds what seems like a nice spot near the White Sands national
park, but then reads this passage: "Occasionally the road to
the hotel is closed for nearby missile tests." Yes, welcome to
New Mexico, the "Land of Enchantment," just one big
testing ground brought to you by the originators of every single
weapon of mass destruction known to man. We opt for the downtown
Hyatt.
The hotel is like a ghost town. "Every
convention cancelled," the lady at the counter tells us. I ask
the bellman how many people are actually here tonight.
"9.9 percent occupancy," he tells
me. Hmmm. Why not just say 10%?
I guess that would be asking for too much
optimism on a night like this...
I will write again when we get to our next
stop, Oklahoma City.
Yours,
Michael Moore
PS. Three days ago, I learned from someone at
ABC News that ABC had videotape -- an angle of the second plane
crashing into the tower -- that showed an F-16 fighter jet trailing
the plane at a distance.
I have not shared this with you as I had not
personally witnessed that tape myself and did not want to contribute
to all the unsubstantiated rumors. It just came across on the TV
that the government admitted they did dispatch fighter jets when
they knew the planes were off course.
From this point, I will pass on any censored
information to those of you in the mainstream media who are being
blocked from reporting.
Is it becoming more clear now that the plane
that went down in Pennsylvania was shot down to prevent it from
attacking its destination?
The truth is harrowing, unbearable -- but it
must be told to us. A free people cannot make an informed decision
if they are kept in the dark. Let's hear ALL the truth NOW.
Across
America Tonight ...
9/13/01
Dear Friends,
I am on the road tonight, the only way to get
out of L.A. and back home to our daughter and our friends in New
York City. Oddly enough, I have never driven across this vast
country. My wife and I have now stopped in Flagstaff for a few hours
sleep before moving on.
The sorrow and anger builds across America.
Talk radio tonight was filled with calls for carpet-bombing every
Arab country. Many want revenge, blood. But a surprising number of
people have called for us to not add to the killing of more innocent
humans. The rest stops and the convenience stores along the way were
filled with quiet, solemn people, many of whom, like us, can get
home no other way than by this four-day trip.
Our daughter is fine, mostly frightened by my
desire to fly home to her rather than drive. Once again, I was
outvoted 2 to 1. This is nothing new.
We have learned of more people we know who
have lost their lives. Bill Weems, who worked as a line producer for
us this year, was on the flight from Boston that crashed into the
World Trade Center. He was such a sweet and decent soul. Such
senseless madness.
The children of New York who are orphaned
tonight ... what do we say or do? I will do my part -- anything,
something -- as soon as I get to New York. But it will never be
enough.
The firefighters of New York: they are on
every other block, every day, and they are your best neighbors.
Sitting out on the sidewalks in front of the fire stations, a good
word and a kind smile to all who pass ... now, 350+ of them gone,
having risked their lives to save the victims of a carnage they soon
became part of.
A good friend from Flint is a clerical worker
at the Pentagon. I have heard no word about her condition. I have
tried contacting her family to no avail. Her son, Malcolm, worked on
our show. I cannot find him. I keep getting tears in my eyes. Once
she gave me a tour of the Pentagon, took me everywhere, and got such
a kick out of taking me around this building I used to march on.
Will our mutual friends who know Barbara, and know how she is,
please write me? Please.
The man who occupies the White House cried
today. Good. Keep crying, Mr. Bush. The more you cry, the less you
will go to that dark side in all humans where anger rages to a point
where we want to blindly kill. Your dad's and Reagan's old cronies
-- Eagleberger, Baker, Schultz -- are all calling for you to bomb
first and ask questions later. You must NOT do this. If only because
you do not want to stoop to these mass murderers' level. Yes, find
out who did it. Yes, see that they NEVER do it again.
But GET A GRIP, man. "Declare war?"
War against whom? One guy in the desert whom we can never seem to
find? Are our leaders telling us that the most powerful country on
earth cannot dispose of one sick evil f---wad of a guy? Because if
that is what you are telling us, then we are truly screwed. If you
are unable to take out this lone ZZ Top wannabe, what on earth would
you do for us if we were attacked by a nation of millions? For
chrissakes, call the Israelis and have them do that thing they do
when they want to get their man! We pay them enough billions each
year, I am SURE they would be happy to accommodate your request.
But I beg you, Mr. Bush, stay with the tears.
Go today to comfort the wounded of New York. Tell the mayor, a guy
most of us have not liked, that he is doing an incredible job,
keeping the spirits of everyone up as high as they can be at this
moment. Being there for a city I believe he loves, his own cancer
still with him, he goes beyond the call of duty.
But do not declare war and massacre more
innocents. After bin Laden's previous act of terror, our last
elected president went and bombed what he said was "bin Laden's
camp" in Afghanistan -- but instead just killed civilians. Then
he bombed a factory in the Sudan, saying it was "making
chemical weapons." It turned out to be making aspirin. Innocent
people murdered by our Air Force.
Back in May, you gave the Taliban in
Afghanistan $48 million dollars of our tax money. No free nation on
earth would give them a cent, but you gave them a gift of $48
million because they said they had "banned all drugs."
Because your drug war was more important than
the actual war the Taliban had inflicted on its own people, you
helped to fund the regime who had given refuge to the very man you
now say is responsible for killing my friend on that plane and for
killing the friends of families of thousands and thousands of
people. How dare you talk about more killing now! Shame! Shame!
Shame! Explain your actions in support of the Taliban! Tell us why
your father and his partner Mr. Reagan trained Mr. bin Laden in how
to be a terrorist!
Am I angry? You bet I am. I am an American
citizen, and my leaders have taken my money to fund mass murder. And
now my friends have paid the price with their lives.
Keep crying, Mr. Bush. Keep running to Omaha
or wherever it is you go while others die, just as you ran during
Vietnam while claiming to be "on duty" in the Air National
Guard. Nine boys from my high school died in that miserable war. And
now you are asking for "unity" so you can start another
one? Do not insult me or my country like this!
Yes, I, too, will be in church at noon today,
on this national day of mourning. I will pray for you, and us, and
the children of New York, and the children of this sad and ugly
world ...
Yours,
Michael Moore,
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