I've never paid him much mind, but does Bernie have anything to say about the current state of the political parties? It's interesting that he so strongly avowed a partisan party mindset. Kinda too bad.

Um, yeah, lets not forget that his party in Burlington wasn't "I", it was "S" = SOCIALIST. That isn't an option in Washington, so he has to go with the "I"....

 

His party was never (S). Sanders was Libery Union (LU) until 1976, and he has run as an Independent (I) for every race since (mayor, governor, congress, senate).

 

Yes, that's been his title, because we don't have a Socialist party. That doesn't mean he didn't call himself a socialist...

"Sanders is a self-described democratic socialist, but because he does not belong to a formal political party he appears as an independent on the ballot."

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1396719/posts

http://www.motherjones.com/washington_dispatch/2006/11/bernie_sanders.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/04/AR2006110401124.html

You can love him all you want, and I freely admit, he's done some good things. But at the end of the day, he's a socialist, but doesn't call himself one when running for office. How can a guy who's a socialist, but runs as an independent, caucuses with the Dems, then say one has to stay tru to the party? Sorry, that's um...crap. You can't simultaneously say you're fighting the power by and play by the same semi-occluded rules of that big guys at the same time. Either he's an outsider or he's not. Either he's a lone voice fighting against an increasing troubled system, or he's selling out.

If he's a (democratic) socialist, that should be his f'in party! It's dishonest. And don't give me any BS about "that's the way the system works." The same way I can't stand that Clinton won the Senate seat in NY while open stating "no, I have no plans on running for the presidency" or whatever bullshit she spouted, I can't be ok with someone basically lying about their views by hiding behind an "Independent" label. ESPECIALLY given how the rhetoric of being "independent" plays in a place like VT. He votes DEM! The Dems of VT didn't even bother running anyone against him last election. That's a joke. He should sack up and call himself by what he believes.
It's call honesty. If he want to be the "underdog", the "little guy", he should take that first step of doing something his peers don't: be honest!

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't you a Republican when you were secretary of the Navy?

 

Now, let me qualify that a bit, lest my comments get mistaken for some left vs. right diatribe. No such luck. A few questions: when was the last time Bernie voted with a republican majority on an issue? How many times, for important votes, has be been the deciding factor? How often do the Dems need to actually court his vote, versus just assuming they'll have it. Granted, he has voted against Dem. majorities, but he was doing so with 2-3 other people who were making a point, not swinging the vote. If he were truly independent, he vote would need to be courted. Now, some of you might know his record enough to prove to me that I'm totally off base. And, I'd be happy to let the facts stand in the way of a good rant. However, my sense is that at the end of the day, his independence is questionable, at best.

Now to be fair: lots of people used to be pretty pissed every time Jeffords voted with the Dems before switching parties. When he finally moved, people said "well, he wasn't much of a Republican anyway." That might have been true, and so you can see why people weren't happy.

My concern isn't left or right. It's the fact that a guy who paints himself as being outside of party nonsense is up to his ass in it. Does anyone think he'd lose many votes if he just called himself a Dem? VT votes for incumbents. His $$ comes from all over America (at least when he's running against the Republicans), he no longer has to be supported by Chittenden county alone.

He's like the Michael Moore of politics. The point might be valid, but the means used to get that point made are hypocritical.

 

How is Michael Moore hypocritcal?

 

How isn't he? What's his goal? To show people the 'truth' behind the 'lies'? He manipulates. He uses the same techniques to craft his story as the people he criticizes. He fabricates, he deceives. Sure, his message might be more palatable that the ones against which he argues. But, when he treats the people he's 'enlightening' like moldable sheep, he's no better than his opponents. The means do not justify the ends. That's called totalitarian government. Like Communism. You know, that pesky offshoot of socialism.

Example?
Plenty. But this should be a good read:
http://www.slate.com/id/2102723/
(Christopher Hitchens, of all people!)
http://www.mooreexposed.com/

http://www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html

Again, the point is not discounting the overall points he makes. Yes, the war sucks. Yes, health care is a disaster. No questions there. But, the way he portrays things, and the ways in which he manipulates are just wrong.

That's how he's a hypocrite.

 

You haven't convinced me. I don't see why Michael Moore is a hypocite.

 

Here's how: it's called deceit. Is not his point with all his work to bring the 'truth' to light? Isn't he concerned with unveiling the dark side of government and big business? And how does he do that? Manipulation, half-truths, and basic slight-of-hand. That's deceit. That's what he accuses other people of.

You know why people deceive to make their point? One of two reasons. Either they're not telling the truth, or they are, but don't think the people they're telling are smart enough to make their own decisions. Or more specifically, that people won't make the decisions they want them to.

It's dishonest.

 

"I like being an Independent, too. It's what makes this blog so good. You pretty much know the agenda is my own here. I can endorse Paul Decelles, Bob Kiss, Ron Paul and Barack Obama and nobody can tell me no."

Yo H, isnt that more a product of being an American? I am a republican, but I vote for the best person that may support the issues I believe in, or the best person for the job, be they R, D or I. no one, not even my republican friends has ever put a gun to my head and told me who to support.

 

And how does he do that? Manipulation, half-truths, and basic slight-of-hand. That's deceit.

Filmmaking is certainly a manipulation of image and media, and since truth is infinite it can be measured as "half" by any observer. I'm not with you on the slight of hand thing. I don't recall Michael Moore doing any card tricks in any of his movies.

Let's see... I've seen Roger and Me, Bowling for Columbine, Farenheit 911 and Sicko. And I've read Stupid White Men and Dude Where's my country. If you click the picture of me and the Dalai Lama at the top of this blog, you will be taken to MichaelMoore.com.

I happen to be a big fan of Michael Moore, so my opinion isn't going to be swayed, just because you accuse him of deceipt. You have to actually give an example of the deceipt and then back it with some evidence, if you want to convince a thinking person. You haven't done that yet. So far you have just been ranting and raving.

 

Yo H, isnt that more a product of being an American?

Yeah. I guess.

 

Have you read the posts I sent. Plenty of evidence. Bowling for Columbine: he completely distorted the reality of several event to make his point. That's dishonest. If you like him so much, you shouldn't ever be surprised why Bush got reelected: people will believe what they want to hear....

 

Have you read the posts I sent.

No.

What events did Moore distort reality of in Bowling for Columbine?

 

MOMMY ! DADDY!.. Stop yelling! Idont like it when you fight!


You guys are classic. :)

 

You asked for it ("borrowed from http://www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html):

A. Columbine Shooting/Denver NRA Meeting. Bowling portrays this with the following sequence:

Weeping children outside Columbine;

Cut to Charlton Heston holding a musket and proclaiming "I have only five words for you: 'from my cold, dead, hands'";

Cut to billboard advertising the meeting, while Moore intones "Just ten days after the Columbine killings, despite the pleas of a community in mourning, Charlton Heston came to Denver and held a large pro-gun rally for the National Rifle Association;"

Cut to Heston (supposedly) continuing speech... "I have a message from the Mayor, Mr. Wellington Webb, the Mayor of Denver. He sent me this; it says 'don't come here. We don't want you here.' I say to the Mayor this is our country, as Americans we're free to travel wherever we want in our broad land. Don't come here? We're already here!"

The portrayal is one of an arrogant protest in response to the deaths -- or, as one reviewer put it, "it seemed that Charlton Heston and others rushed to Littleton to hold rallies and demonstrations directly after the tragedy." The portrayal is in fact false.

Fact: The Denver event was not a demonstration relating to Columbine, but an annual meeting (see links below), whose place and date had been fixed years in advance.

Fact: At Denver, the NRA cancelled all events (normally several days of committee meetings, sporting events, dinners, and rallies) save the annual members' voting meeting -- that could not be cancelled because the state law governing nonprofits required that it be held. [No way to change location, since under NY law you have to give 10 days' advance notice of that to the members, there were upwards of 4,000,000 members -- and Columbine happened 11 days before the scheduled meeting.] As a newspaper reported:

In a letter to NRA members Wednesday, President Charlton Heston and the group's executive vice president, Wayne LaPierre, said all seminars, workshops, luncheons, exhibits by gun makers and other vendors, and festivities are canceled.

All that's left is a members' reception with Rep. J.C. Watts, R-Okla., and the annual meeting, set for 10 a.m. May 1 in the Colorado Convention Center.

Under its bylaws and New York state law, the NRA must hold an annual meeting.
The NRA convention April 30-May 2 was expected to draw 22,000 members and give the city a $17.9 million economic boost.

"But the tragedy in Littleton last Tuesday calls upon us to take steps, along with dozens of other planned public events, to modify our schedule to show our profound sympathy and respect for the families and communities in the Denver area in their time of great loss," Heston and LaPierre wrote.

Fact: Heston's "cold dead hands" speech, which leads off Moore's depiction of the Denver meeting, was not given at Denver after Columbine. It was given a year later in Charlotte, North Carolina, and was his gesture of gratitude upon his being given a handmade musket, at that annual meeting.

Fact: When Bowling continues on to the speech which Heston did give in Denver, it carefully edits it to change its theme.

Moore's fabrication here cannot be described by any polite term. It is a lie, a fraud, and a few other things. Carrying it out required a LOT of editing to mislead the viewer, as I will show below. I transcribed Heston's speech as Moore has it, and compared it to a news agency's transcript, color coding the passages. CLICK HERE for the comparison, with links to the original transcript.

Moore has actually taken audio of seven sentences, from five different parts of the speech, and a section given in a different speech entirely, and spliced them together. Each edit is cleverly covered by inserting a still or video footage for a few seconds.

First, right after the weeping victims, Moore puts on Heston's "I have only five words for you . . . cold dead hands" statement, making it seem directed at them. As noted above, it's actually a thank-you speech given a year later in North Carolina.

Moore then has an interlude -- a visual of a billboard and his narration. This is vital. He can't go directly to Heston's real Denver speech. If he did that, you might ask why Heston in mid-speech changed from a purple tie and lavender shirt to a white shirt and red tie, and the background draperies went from maroon to blue. Moore has to separate the two segments.

Moore's second edit (covered by splicing in a pan shot of the crowd) deletes Heston's announcement that NRA has in fact cancelled most of its meeting:

"As you know, we've cancelled the festivities, the fellowship we normally enjoy at our annual gatherings. This decision has perplexed a few and inconvenienced thousands. As your president, I apologize for that."

Moore then cuts to Heston noting that Denver's mayor asked NRA not to come, and shows Heston replying "I said to the Mayor: As Americans, we're free to travel wherever we want in our broad land. Don't come here? We're already here!" as if in defiance.

Actually, Moore put an edit right in the middle of the first sentence, and another at its end! Heston really said (with reference his own WWII vet status) "I said to the mayor, well, my reply to the mayor is, I volunteered for the war they wanted me to attend when I was 18 years old. Since then, I've run small errands for my country, from Nigeria to Vietnam. I know many of you here in this room could say the same thing."

Moore cuts it after "I said to the Mayor" and attaches a sentence from the end of the next paragraph: "As Americans, we're free to travel wherever we want in our broad land." He hides the deletion by cutting to footage of protestors and a photo of the Mayor before going back and showing Heston.

Moore has Heston then triumphantly announce "Don't come here? We're already here!" Actually, that sentence is clipped from a segment five paragraphs farther on in the speech. Again, Moore uses an editing trick to cover the doctoring, switching to a pan shot of the audience as Heston's (edited) voice continues.

What Heston said there was: "NRA members are in city hall, Fort Carson, NORAD, the Air Force Academy and the Olympic Training Center. And yes, NRA members are surely among the police and fire and SWAT team heroes who risked their lives to rescue the students at Columbine.

Don't come here? We're already here. This community is our home. Every community in America is our home. We are a 128-year-old fixture of mainstream America. The Second Amendment ethic of lawful, responsible firearm ownership spans the broadest cross section of American life imaginable.

So, we have the same right as all other citizens to be here. To help shoulder the grief and share our sorrow and to offer our respectful, reassured voice to the national discourse that has erupted around this tragedy."

"NRA members are, above all, Americans. That means that whatever our differences, we are respectful of one another and we stand united, especially in adversity."

I recently discovered that Moore has set up a new webpage to respond to a chosen few points of criticism, one of which is his, er, creative editing of Heston's speech. Click here for a link to his page, and for my response to his attempted defense of what he did. Basically, Moore contends that he didn't mean for the viewer to get the impression that "cold dead hands" was spoken at Denver -- that just "appears as Heston is being introduced in narration."

 

Big deal. That's called filmmaking and it gets at the truth of the matter through editing. Bowling for Columbine is filled with facts and statistics about gun violence which are not in dispute. All you've offered here is a film review. Of course Michael Moore has an agenda, but the facts he presents are, in fact, facts.

Notice how Bernie slipped out of this conversation scott-free.

 

Wow, that's one generous reading. I gave you but one of many examples in but one of his movies where his "truth" is, at best, questionable. You embody the problem exactly: "Facts are facts"? Fact is, Heston didn't say what Moore has him say, when nor where Moore has him say it. So, the fact is that Moore lied. But, because (presumably) you and millions of other people like what he has to say, that lie is ignored. Scary. Fact, cars and booze kill more people than guns do. Where's his movie on that? Fact, kids die in swimming pool drownings every year, where's his movie on that? Fact, saying Michael more tells "the truth" aint fact. He tells HIS "truth". That anyone of us makes it our truth is a completely different (if related) phenomenon.

Bernie still needs to stop deceiving people and start call himself a socialist.

 

"Facts are facts"? Fact is, Heston didn't say what Moore has him say, when nor where Moore has him say it.

Heston did say all those words, or else he wouldn't be on film saying them! You're pissed at Michael Moore for editing! That's what filmmakers do. Don't you see the difference between saying "x number of people are killed each year in America by guns" and using editing techniques to weave a narrative around such facts? You are missing the forest for the trees. You're so focused on playing the Gotcha! game on some stupid editing minutia, that you are missing A) The Facts presented; and B) The profound truth of the whole movie.

Yeah cars, booze and swimming pools kill people, but that isn't what Bowling for Columbine was about. You want to make a movie about cars, booze and swimming pools, go right ahead. Maybe get Sammy Hagar as your leading man.

This reminds me of Limbaugh trying to diminish the importance of the number of American casualties in Iraq, because more people die in car accidents, or some such stupidity. He neglects that one cause of death is the result of a political choice and one is not.

Bernie still needs to stop deceiving people and start call himself a socialist.

Bernie does call himself a socialist! I've heard him say he believes in democratic socialism many, many times.

I hate to say it but... Senator, you're no John Kennedy.

 

Yeah, JFK got shot. I'm alive and well.

See, here's the funny part: the minutia is exactly what matters. Yes, Heston did say those words. I'm not arguing that. But Heston did not say them, as Moore presented them. Moore is manipulating for his agenda. You're ok with that because you agree. But when someone or some party does the same thing re: an opinion with which we don't agree, its suddenly a problem. The point is this: what you call "narrative" and "editing" I call using the very deceptive techniques of the people he fights with. Fighting fire with fire just burns places down. You're happy to swallow the KoolAid as long as it tastes good. If it doesn't, then you care about the ingredients. Sheep can't take the moral high ground, no matter who their shepherd is.

Sure, Bernie calls himself that. In interviews, and basically in private. Why can't he run as one?

 

You're happy to swallow the KoolAid as long as it tastes good. If it doesn't, then you care about the ingredients. Sheep can't take the moral high ground, no matter who their shepherd is.

I stopped drinking KoolAid when I was in elementary school, and the Lord is my shepard. I don't know what you're talking about.

Sure, Bernie calls himself that. In interviews, and basically in private. Why can't he run as one?

Why can't you comment under your real name?

 

OK sorry about the 'real name' business. Didn't mean to get personal. I've already guessed you are senator Jim Webb of Virgina, but I understand why you can't admit it. Still, though- anyone can easily see on Site Meter you hit from Charlotteville and DC. No big whoop.

To answer your question, Sanders could run as a Socialist if he wanted to, but he is an Independent. I'm an Independent too. That's what makes this blog so good.

 

way to piss off the national talent haik. LOL

 

Oh, no harm, no foul. Legit question, re: the anonymity. I prolly should own up to being me, but this is more fun.