My wife and I went to see the latest Michael Moore film last night. It was what I expected, being typical Michael Moore fare. I liked the film. It was entertaining and in many places it was enlightening. However, there were a couple places where I thought he missed the mark somewhat.
In general he did a very good job of describing an America where those that would govern have completely lost touch with those that they would govern. This is not a situation unique to the United States. All of the Western countries are going through a period where the ruling elites have almost completely lost touch with their citizens. The problem is made worse in the US, however, by the prevelence of money in their political system. Ms. Clinton raised and spent more money on her failed bid to win the US Presidency than the Canadian federal government and all of the Federal Parties spent on the 2015 election combined. And by a huge margin I would add. Power corrupts but money greases the wheels for that corruption and that is what is happening in the United States right now. The segment in the movie describing the Flint, Michigan water crisis and how it came about is a great demonstration of that.
There were a couple of arguments in the film where I believe he is off base. He spent a fair amount of the film describing how the Democratic Party establishment was and is undermining left wing candidates in the Party, from Bernie Sanders to many candidates currently running as Democrats in the mid-term elections. He puts this effort down to the fact that the Democratic Party takes money from many of the same donors as the Republican Party. Although there is some truth to that it is probably not the whole picture. The Tea Party movement in the United States is an extreme conservative movement that rose up around two decades ago. In that time it took over the Republican Party and Donald Trump is its progeny. I am no fan of Mr. Trump for many reasons but one big one is the historian in me knows that extremism breeds extremism and history has demonstrated that nothing good comes from extremists battling each other. It invariably leads to hardship, injustice and authoritarianism. And it sometimes leads to war. The current crop of very left-leaning candidates in the Democratic Party could be the beginnings of left-wing "Tea Party" movement and as with the real Tea Party movement it will continue moving farther to the extreme left, which will inevitably lead to a left-wing version of Donald Trump. Preventing that from happening is in the best interests of society so any attempt to impede the movement towards extremism is a necessity. The Republican Party completely failed in doing that and the United States is living with the consequences. If the Democratic Party fails to keep a lid on its extremists then the situation in the US will become much worse.
The second argument where he was off base was to compare the situation in the US with with the fall of the Weimer Republic, to Adolf Hitler, in the 1930s. Mr. Moore's comparison, in the film, is compelling but it was superficial and somewhat misleading. To compare the two situations is to compare apples to elephants. The Weimer Republic came into existance in Germany in 1919, after centuries of Germany being lead by autocrats. There was no democratic tradition in Germany before 1919. The democratic institutions of the Weimer Republic were weak and ineffective because of that. So when Adolf Hitler managed to win enough votes to become Chancellor (Prime Minister) of Germany just 14 years after the establishment of the Republic he had no problem subverting the new democracy. The United States has more than two centuries of democratic tradition to fall back on. Its democratic institutions are effective and robust. If any US politician had designs to do what Hitler did in Germany he would find it impossible to pull off. The price of freedom and democracy is eternal vigilence and Michael Moore effectively reminds us of this fact but he let himself go too far by inferring that the US was on the verge of going the way of Germany of the 1930s.
Other than those two quibbles I would say Fahrenheit 11/9 is a good film and I would highly recommend going to see it.
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