Michael Moore vs. John Stossel
LOS ANGELES — Michael Moore's latest documentary now has a title - and a theme that resonates with recession-weary audiences. Moore's look at the consequences of big business will be called "Capitalism: A Love Story." The documentary is due in theaters Oct. 2. Distributor Overture Films said "Capitalism" examines the disastrous effects of corporate profiteering.
"It will be the perfect date movie," Moore said. "It's got it all - lust, passion, romance and 14,000 jobs being eliminated every day. It's a forbidden love, one that dare not speak its name. Heck, let's just say it: It's capitalism."
John Stossel responds: "Michael Moore Gets It Wrong."
19 Comments:
Title: "Michael Moore gets it wrong."
Alternative titles: "Water is wet," "The Pope is Catholic," "The Sun Rises in the East..."
I like Michael Moore for the same reason I like McDonalds: consistency.
Michael Moore ALWAYS gets it wrong
Yes, but why do people like Paul Krugman get it wrong? Shouldn't he be a little more educated about these matters?
John Stossel has no credibility anymore. Thanks for posting this empty article just to appease people who agree with you. Does this really help further debate or is it just a chance to jump on the "hate Michael Moore's new movie bandwagon" early?
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John Stossel lacks credibility and Mike Moore has credibility. Thanks anon - 1:25 for that in depth ad hominem attack totally lacking in factual or logical content.
Michael Moore lives in a $1 million apartment, sends his children to private school and is known to treat his employees horribly. Isn't he projecting his greedy personality onto other people?
While there are good points to make about businesses getting into too much debt, they pale in comparison to what Moore's favorite institution, government, has done. It's just the Feds has a printing press and the IRS to get their money.
Anon. 1:25,
It seems to me that John Stossel and Michael Moore are very similar. Both are outspoken, media personalities differing on political orientation.
Television, film and print media are all biased to a certain extent. Isn't critical thinking premised on the idea that one subjects what one reads/watches to critical scrutiny?
Spinsanity offers the following articles for your consideration on
Michael Moore
as well as
John Stossel
In order to understand both sides of the issue, we should at least consider each other's positions.
I'm surprised, but happy to see at least Moore admit he hates capitalism. I hope the rest of the Democrats, including The Messiah, are honest enough to rally around him so we can finally have some clarity.
> I like Michael Moore for the same reason I like McDonalds: consistency.
Consistency in error is no virtue.
Otherwise, the Left WOULD be correct and COULD claim the moral high ground, because they'd be the most virtuous souls in all human history.
> John Stossel has no credibility anymore. Thanks for posting this empty article just to appease people who agree with you.
Demonstrating what I just said.
No actual content in his brain-dead observation, just "he's wrong" -- Translated: "I can't stand to see Moore criticized for something flat out obvious to anyone with a lick of sense of any kind -- which isn't 'Anonymous', in this case".
> Isn't he projecting his greedy personality onto other people?
No, get with the program: there's virtue in error, now.
Moore is hence one of the greatest saints ever to exist... He makes Nicholas and Mother Theresa look like Ebeneezer Scrooge, his virtue is second only to God/Jesus... and even He's looking over His shoulder.
See how it works? Glad I could clear that up for ya.
:oD
.
> In order to understand both sides of the issue, we should at least consider each other's positions.
Sorry, QT, I am not sufficiently a contortionist like Moore that I could get my head that far up my ass.
Some people deserve to be given the respect of serious consideration. Others, like Moore, have exhausted all such credit, and, barring a major shift in technique (unlikely, he's been rewarded by the left with millions for his BS), has no chance of re-earning any such respect.
Moore does not compare to Stossel, he compares to Rush Limbaugh. Both have a position, both are good at expostulating on it, and both have as a first purpose, self-aggrandizement. They are, first and foremost, demagogues.
I respect Limbaugh distinctly more because he's generally correct in his positions, even if not always in the rhetorical techniques that he uses to get him there. But in either case, you cannot really trust much of anything they say simply on the basis of their own arguments. Hence I don't pay that much attention to Limbaugh, either.
I've seen enough of Stossel's work to know it's usually based in reality and real-world considerations. The same can virtually never be said for Moore.
Also, QT -- Spinsanity is hardly an unbiased source for information on Stossel:
Link: ABC's John Stossel, one of the very few network reporters given free reign to design one-hour news specials told blatantly from one ideological perspective
Oh, yeah, right... There's NO question the rest of the media gets it "nice and balanced"... Yeesh :-S
Actually, if you look at the anti-Stossel complaints, a quick look suggests that they appear to all come from Bryan Keefer and Ben Fritz, who both are, I suspect, liberal attack dogs -- Ben makes the following statement in support of that notion, regarding Bryan:
Perhaps that's because, as Bryan Keefer demonstrated here on Spinsanity last week, the evidence for global warming is overwhelming.
It's never been overwhelming if you have any brain at all. And it's even less so now, of course, than it was then (2001). But even then it could hardly qualify as "overwhelming". Both are almost certainly grade-A libtard journalistic schmucks. If they spent half the time attempting to debunk the claims from the Left that they spend trying to find some crack in Stossel's cases, they'd actually be approaching proper journalists instead of leftist hacks.
If MM hates capitalism, why is he troubled by the 14k jobs lost daily? Those jobs don't exist in the first place w/o capitalism.
OBH,
Thanks for the contortionist joke. Really enjoyed that.
Did not think Anon. would accept that his/her comments re: Stossel were ad hominem while others comments re: MM were fair and reasonable.
The documentary has not yet been released so he/she can easily justify their position by saying that we are judging the work before it has even seen the light of day.
The only idea that I was trying to get across was that one cannot accept at face value what one reads or watches in a movie theatre. You have to actually check what someone is saying are the "facts" to determine bias, accuracy, etc. When a figure is as controversial as Michael Moore, one should also consider why that might be and whether there is a legitimate basis for the criticism.
RE: Rush Limbaugh
The way one proves an argument is relevant. Fallacious arguments, straw men, ad hominem, extreme comparisions...whatever it takes to score cheap points in an argument sound no less odious from Rush Limbaugh than they do from Michael Moore. The end does not justify the means.
Re: Spinsanity
Agree that this site is just as biased as any other. Bias doesn't necessarily invalidate the source but is something that we need to take into account when we assess information. Wikipedia is a classic example. The site is useful as a quick & dirty reference however, on many subjects, the discussion page reveals that folks like Annie Leonard (The Story of Stuff) get a free pass go.
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Well Michael Moore is experiencing rapture over the demise of GM...
There's a very thorough fisking of Moore's rant by MooreWatch though...
this is Anon 125. I think my comment was misread. I was just wondering how this post really pushes forward a valuable conversation about capitalism. I was not claiming that Michael Moore has more credibility that John Stossel. I think Rush, Stossel, and Moore all fall under that same category. They just appease to people that agree with them, often times using false logic to connect there points together. I should have written this better.
I started reading this blog at first because it gave a centrist perspective on important issues. More recently it has taken a dive in a strictly conservative direction. There's no problem with the stronger conservative direction but what is a problem is distracting readers by posting empty stories like this. I really just wanted to get readers thinking about their own views. Remember the movie hasn't even been released yet.
Hopefully this helps to clarify a little.
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