Fahrenheit’s Missing Question
When I met Michael Moore last January, we spent most of the time talking about the senate primaries and how disastrous the Bush presidency has been, but one of the subjects that naturally came up was Bush’s actions on September 11th. Now there’s been a lot written about the “seven minutes” sequence in Fahrenheit 911 for good reason (it’s pretty damning to watch the leader of the free world sit still while his nation is under attack), but that wasn’t the question that seemed to tug at Mike the most. When we spoke, his big question was about the reports that on the evening of 9/11, Bush went to bed at his normal time, around 11PM.
“How could he have just gone to bed after all that? Everyone I know was glued to their TV’s and unable to sleep.” he said.
That’s a damn good question and one whose answer is probably every bit as disturbing as Bush reaction to the plane hitting the second WTC tower. While I can’t speculate how Bush was able to fall asleep while the rest of us remained sleepless for weeks afterwards, I gotta say I’m a little surprised that it wasn’t one of the questions posed in Fahrenheit 911. Maybe he couldn’t figure out a good way to pose the question in a film or couldn’t track down any footage of Bush wearing his footie pajamas.
(Before you ask, the answer is “No, Michael Moore wasn’t insinuating that Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance.”)
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It’s a very good point. Everyone I know, to this day, can tell you all the things they did, said, felt, experienced on 9/11. Going to bed at the usual time was NOT part of it. But Dubya’s sweet dreams were apparently undisturbed: “Nighty night, and sleep tight…Ashcroft will protect you…”
Comment by Capt. Kangaroo — June 30, 2004 @ 11:04 am
i just saw something on CNN about a new book called “Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Guy” or something like that.
the author was trying to refute all the evidence in Farrenheit, but his arguments were very shallow and they don’t really shift the blam eaway from W.
anyway, i’m sure we’re going to be seeing a lot of this stuff popping up now. i’m waiting for the right-wing equivalent of Moore to rear his ugly head and release a documentary that “proves” liberals are evil communists. oh wait… we already have that- it’s a 24 hour news network called Fox.
Comment by tom — June 30, 2004 @ 11:43 am
That’s very interesting, Greg. I find the fact that Bush went to sleep at 11PM much more compelling evidence that he’s an empty-souled cipher than the book-reading thing. At least sitting with the kids for seven minutes right after the attack is an understandable human response–Bush was frozen, scared, and didn’t know what to do. It demonstrates a lack of leadership, courage, and resolve, but at least I could imagine myself having the same reaction.
As for going beddy-bye at 11pm that night, well…that’s a whole different animal. I don’t think I slept for about four days after 9/11, and it wasn’t exclusively because I was working at a radio station at the time. It seems like precisely the kind of night that a President would pull an all-nighter, but perhaps he was tired from flying all over the country in Air Force One, escaping phantom threats and letting Rudy Giuliani steal the show.
Comment by Jonathan Scott Chinn — June 30, 2004 @ 12:02 pm
There’s a lot of that kinda crap on the horizon. There’s a movie called “Michael Moore Hates America” that’ll probably come out in the next few months as well.
Of course it’s telling that the only way they seem to be able to counter Moore’s arguments is by attacking the man himself or engaging in the kind of nitpicking that Trekk(ies/ers) are known for.
(I saw one website that was so obsessed with tearing down Bowling For Columbine that the author complained about Moore’s depiction of the Salem Witch trials showing people being burned at the stake when they were really hung.)
I’m not to concerned with it all really. Moore’s a controversial figure and this sort of thing goes along with it. When November rolls around, Bush is gonna be on a ballot and Moore won’t.
Comment by greg — June 30, 2004 @ 12:29 pm
“Bush was frozen, scared, and didn’t know what to do”
i didn’t see that at all… i saw absolutely NO FEAR on his face or in his eyes. he looked more like a kid who got caught doing something wrong and was trying to act like he didn’t do anything. not that i’m saying “he knew” but i didn’t see ANY fear in his eyes in that footage.
Comment by tom — June 30, 2004 @ 1:41 pm
I think Bush was trying to follow the intricate nuanced plot intertwined with the flawed yet complex characters in “My Pet Goat”.
Comment by Becky — June 30, 2004 @ 2:15 pm
I can only imagine that Moore wasn’t able to prove 100% that Bush went to bed early that night, otherwise I’m sure he would have used it.
Comment by Kyle — June 30, 2004 @ 4:11 pm
Bush probably got to sleep early that night the same way I did…downing a fifth of Jack Daniels.
Comment by Charles V — July 1, 2004 @ 2:07 am
Bush was frozen, scared, and didn’t know what to do. It demonstrates a lack of leadership, courage, and resolve, but at least I could imagine myself having the same reaction.
I’m no paragon of leadership, courage, or resolve, but when I heard about the attacks, my first reaction was “I have to know what the hell is going on.” I immediately turned the radio on to NPR, and I pulled the TV out of the closet and tried to find a station I could receive (no cable, no external antenna).
So besides leadership, courage, and resolve, the man has no curiousity. Then again, he’s admitted as much. At what point do you just have to say that the man has no qualities at all which would qualify him for presidency?
Comment by Hamilton Lovecraft — July 1, 2004 @ 10:55 am
I think we passed that point a long time ago.
Comment by Jonathan Scott Chinn — July 1, 2004 @ 11:26 am
Bedtime for Bonzo
A blog I like a lot, The Talent Show, recently had a post called Fahrenheit’s Missing Question. Here’s how it starts: When I met Michael Moore last January, we spent most of the time talking about the Democratic primaries and…
Trackback by Past Peak — July 3, 2004 @ 5:34 pm
More interesting than what Bush did or didn’t do, was what Chief of Staff Andrew Card and the Secret Service DIDN’T do.
- Card didn’t wait for any possible immediate order(s) from Bush. He just whispered that a second plane had hit the WTC AND BACKED AWAY.
- The Secret Service DIDN’T rush the President away from his KNOWN public location. Didn’t even discreetly come up and discuss it with him. Rove’s explanation: They didn’t want to scare the kids.
Yeah, uh huh. Better to leave the kids in harm’s way, for all the president’s coterie knew.
Or did they know more than we’ve been told?
Regardless of what you make of W’s intelligence, decisiveness, etc. He was surrounded by highly trained professionals who acted as if they knew he would have no orders to give and was in no danger of attack.
In fact, given that the WTC had already been a terrorist target in 1993 and should have been well known as such anyway, why did Bush et al continue with the photo op even after they “only” knew about the first plane impact?
This doesn’t cover even 5% of what the media (including Michael Moore) aren’t asking about September 11.
Comment by Conspiracy Nut (Non-Governmental) — July 7, 2004 @ 12:32 pm
I will never forget where I was and how I reacted when I heard what happened. I wasn’t scared at first, I assumed that the first plane was an accident, then when I saw the second plane I was very concerned. When I heard about the Pentagon, I was freaking out. By that time, both the Net and cell phones were down. I was in the student lounge of my school with about 50 students and faculty members glued to the TV. There were two landline phones there, and administration allowed those with family in NY (I was in FL at the time…..2 blocks from the Capitol) to try and call for info. We didn’t know about Monkeyboy’s reaction, in fact I expected he would be swept away to that “undisclosed location” as soon as they determined it was an attack. I was sickened by Moore’s showing that Bush was clueless. In a state of national emergency, where the Emergency Broadcast System was utilized for the first time in my life, it would be expected that the president leave the photo op, be secured and then address the nation from that place, telling us that despite the attack, we were safe. He did no such thing. Imagine FDR, JFK or even Reagan in that situation, as soon as being told, they would have dropped what they were doing, contacted the military leaders, put our forces on alert and then do SOMETHING to calm the American people….but I guess that My Pet Goat must be one hell of a book!
It was at that moment on 9/11/2001 that I lost all respect (I had only a little to begin with) for our great leader. Isn’t it amazing how the sheep flocked to him afterwards, Saying he was there for us…..Well, guess what, when I was panicked, when they shut my school down and evacuated downtown Tallahassee, FL, I could have used the inarticulate idiot we call Mr. President, to tell me that bad things happened, but it would be alright. Great leadership.
Comment by mbf1978 — July 8, 2004 @ 9:37 am
i just saw the movie… i’m portuguese and i realized that mr.Bush is bad person to be at the commamd of the worl and he said that he could’ support the environmental politcs in discussion in sdney few years ago, because if so the economical situation in the U.S.A. would be in crisis, what kind of governor is the one that thinks in own country is superior to the interests of the planet. Doesn’t he live here? Perhaps with the money of the war he expects to by the moon…
i know that politics isn’t what it seems to be, sometimes, worst that we can imagine. If the american people can decide, directly, in whom they want to be the president some of these problems will be solved or even never had hapened.
the question is: Mr. President Bush made the war, and now what can we do for the iraqui people? They don’t want military force there not even help…
And now? What’s next?
Comment by maria silva — August 1, 2004 @ 2:21 pm