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Stupid White Men High
on New York Times Best Sellers List


Michael Moore's Political Views Prove Similar to GayToday's

Stolen Votes, Corporate Crime, GOP Zealots Running Amuck

By Jack Nichols

New York, New York-Michael Moore's latest political statement, Stupid White Men, has now enjoyed 17 weeks on the The New York Times Best Sellers list. Last week it stood in first place. This week it is in third place. Moore's viewpoints, according to Professor Raj Ayyar, are akin to those that have been published regularly in GayToday.

"I've been reading Stupid White Men," Professor Ayyar explains. "It clearly focuses on many of the same political issues that GayToday has covered regularly, about Bush and the theft of Election 2000 in Florida, about corporate criminality, mainstream media censors and the like. Moore also recommends the kinds of political strategies GayToday usually celebrates."

In fact, Michael Moore, though heterosexually inclined, long ago proved himself an honorary gay activist. His antics captured on his Bravo TV program, The Awful Truth, included his unforgettable journey through America's more homophobic states, riding in a large pink Winnebago clearly marked "Sodomobile." At that time this reporter wrote of him:

"Moore, you see, is a married heterosexual who doesn't mind if people think he's one of the unthinkables. He and his gang dress up like gay stereotypes. His Sodomobile is decorated in fashionable leopard skin wallpaper and adorned with pictures of Oscar Wilde. Signs on its exterior read: "If the Sodomobile's a Rockin' Don't Come a Knockin" and "Buggery on Board." Background music is courtesy of Madonna and The Village People.

"Accompanied by student actors pretending to be gung-ho gay activists, Moore calls on Westboro Baptist Church's Rev. Fred Phelps of God Hates Fags fame, picketmeister at Matthew Shepard's funeral and, most recently, at the trial of one of his killers. While Michael chats on camera with Phelps-showing him a big-print Bible-- his student-activist entourage jumps out of the Sodomobile dancing around and flirting with the minister, handing him reading material about the joys of anal sex."

Of Stupid White Men, Tom Paulin and Bonnie Greer on BBC Newsnight say that it is "absolutely amazing satirical wit, great journalism, great research…wonderful Swiftian rage…a total masterpiece."

Last week Moore returned as a guest to the controversial late night TV program, Politically Incorrect, hosted by Bill Maher. On Friday Maher was host for the final episode of his popular program, having been ousted by ABC-TV management after making comments ABC considered "politically incorrect."

Moore writes eloquently of the news media's corporate censors.

Although he completed Stupid White Men prior to September 11, what he has to say about George W. Bush and gang assumes far greater urgency in 2002 following W's declaration of what Gore Vidal predicts will be a Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace.

Moore, of Flint, Michigan, is a quintessential American, the kind of gadfly whose sassy style speaks eloquently and hilariously to the rhythms of a U.S. heartland beat. Hence his ever-present baseball hat.

His award-winning film, Roger and Me, was, oddly, birthed, he says in Stupid White Men, because of the ministrations of George W's cousin, Kevin Rafferty, who kindly taught Moore how to make movies. Roger and Me was once ordered by the senior Bush at a Camp David family gathering. Moore writes he would've liked to have been a fly on the wall on that occasion, inasmuch as his film was witheringly critical of General Motors' corporate bigwigs and Reagan-Bush policies.

Here's something I've always wanted to know," he writes in an open letter ("Dear George") to Dubya:

"At the end of the film (Roger and Me) as the deputy sheriff is tossing the homeless kids' presents and Christmas tree out on the curb because they were $150 behind in their rent, were there any tears in the room? Did anyone feel responsible? Or did you all just think, 'Nice camerawork, Kev.!' "

There are an astounding five pages in Chapter 2, listing the "brutally impressive" things George W. Bush has done since seizing office. Among the many Bushite behaviors have been the cutting of $39 million from federal spending on libraries; reducing funding for research into renewable energy sources by 50%; and reducing by 86 percent the Community Access Program, "which coordinated care for people without health insurance among public hospitals, clinics and other health care providers." Lovely.

Related Stories from the GayToday Archive:
Michael Moore: World's Funniest Political Pundit

Michael Moore's TV Hit: The Awful Truth

By Michael Moore: George W. in the Garden of Gethsemane

GayToday's Series: Big Brother Bush is Watching You Related Sites:
Michael Moore


GayToday does not endorse related sites.

Although Moore castigates "wimpy, spineless" Democrats like Joe Lieberman who have valued image over principle, he cautions against alienating Democrats whose offices can be properly used, he believes, to effectively unseat corporate-friendly GOP fascist-zealots. He suggests that readers of his book and their friends run for public offices, even in the lowliest offices as precinct delegates ("but also the foundation on which the whole house of cards is built."). He points out that "so few people vote in primaries-and so many precincts end up with no candidates-that often getting elected isn't much harder than just showing up. So head down to your board of elections or county clerk's office and pick up some petitions before the deadline passes."

After marshalling many of the unsettling proofs that George W. Bush stole Election 2000, with the help of his brother Jeb and Katherine Harris, Moore also meditates on the meddling of those Bush appointees on the U.S. Supreme Court. He introduces his detailed questions for Mr. Bush by saying:

"Let me be blunt: I'm afraid you may be a threat to our national security…"

1. Are you able to read and write on an adult level?
2. Are you an alcoholic, and if so how is this affecting your performance as Commander-in-Chief?
3. Are you a felon?





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