Maineiac

Moore's Tirade About Bush, War at Oscars Shameful

The nominees for the most tasteless and shamelessly partisan acceptance speech from a celebrity at the 75th annual Academy Awards ceremony Sunday night are: Documentary filmmaker Michael Moore, for his childish rant against President Bush after Moore won best feature length documentary Oscar...

Wait, there are no other nominees.

Moore wins the award by acclamation!

Moore, who authored the exceptional documentary "Roger and Me" a few years back, was nominated for his anti-gun documentary "Bowling for Columbine." When his film won, he took the stage and brought with him all the losing documentary filmmakers he beat in the category. Which sounded nice and gracious, until he actually started talking.

He said the other filmmakers were on stage with him in "solidarity with me, because we like non-fiction, and we are living in fictitious times. ... We live in a time where we have a man who's sending us to war for fictitious reasons." He went on to complain about "fictitious votes in the 2000 presidential election" with a fictitious president.

We suspect at this point some of the other nominees standing behind Moore on stage were trying to discreetly edge their way off. "We are against this war, Mr. Bush. Shame on you, Mr. Bush. Shame on you," Moore concluded as the orchestra music swelled to urge him off the stage.

First, we defend Moore's right to his opinion. That is, after all, what American soldiers have fought and died for the past 227 years. Moore may not appreciate that fact, but his freedom of speech so shrilly exhibited Sunday night came at a cost in lives and sacrifice by his fellow Americans.

While Moore appeared to have been preaching to the choir of his Hollywood anti-Bush buddies that night, we are pleased to report that amid the applause for his comments, Moore received some hearty derisive boos and catcalls from the audience.

What was tasteless about his comments is the timing. They came just hours after the shocking video was released on Iraqi TV of American POWs who appeared to have been beaten and some even executed by their Iraqi captors. Millions of Americans on Sunday afternoon had either seen the shocking footage or heard about it. By Sunday night, the last thing Americans needed to hear was a cry-baby tirade by some self-appointed "Blue-collar Everyman" who can't seem to get over the 2000 presidential election.

Shame on President Bush?

Shame on you, Mr. Moore, shame on you.

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