Author: david

  • Is ‘Fahrenheit’ Swinging?

    I think the people who say Fareihnheit won’t reach many of the undecided have forgotten about the kids. For one thing, millions of kids have going to the movies built into their weekend schedules. They don’t have to be pried loose from their homes by special interest in a parcticular film. And given that you…

  • The Sweet Spot

    Fahrenheit 9/11 is a very big deal by any standard. “Steven Spielberg has said the film could reap $100 million.” (article) But the specific electoral impact is going to be enormously magnified, because it is soo perfectly aligned with the sweet-spot of Bush’s popular support. The Alignment This scene is already famous: NYT, 6/20/04 “[T]he…

  • The Detainee Documents

    The statements on detainee treatment released by the Bush administration yesterday carefully keep all the options of torture and Geneva violations open. From today’s NYT (All italics are mine.) “[A] senior Justice Department official said the document [the already infamous 8/02 Justice Department memo] was ‘overbroad and irrelevant’ and was unnecessary because no one in…

  • Too Deep for Me

    I was listening to a review of this new kid’s movie, and I don’t get why there’s a law that a rowboat will not harm a human being!

  • Cheney’s Shootdown Orders

    When Cheney issued the shootdown orders on 9/11, he said Bush had “signed off on the concept.” Apparently Bush told him not to issue the order right away, when he got off the phone. It was more like: “Shoot down the planes, but only if someone asks.”

  • aka “State-Sponsored Terrorism”

    Many of us saw this news item last week: Ex-C.I.A. Aides Say Iraq Leader Helped Agency in 90’s Attacks, NYT, 6/9/04, article “Iyad Allawi, now the designated prime minister of Iraq, ran an exile organization…that sent agents into Baghdad in the early 1990’s to plant bombs and sabotage government facilities under the direction of the…