Dull, dull, dull (was Re: [lbo-talk] Ann Coulter's Living)

[npchilds at connect.ab.ca]

> On Tuesday, August 5, 2003, at 05:40  PM, budge wrote:
>
>> What I *have* 'bashed' him over, is his playing fast and
>> loose with the facts and his reluctance to have a fact
>> checker read his stuff before it goes into print.
>
> It seems to me that he is somewhat conflicted about whether to be a
> "political commentator/investigative journalist" or a comedian. When he
> tries to get serious, he loses me too.
>
> But as long as he remains a comedian, he doesn't need a fact checker.
> When did Groucho or Lenny ever check their facts?
>
I think this is real problem with Moore; he's trying to do both 'serious
journalism' and comedy, and it just doesn't work. Some things are just not
funny; personally I think Heston getting AD is cosmic karmic balance at
work, but exploiting that illness for easy points is just cruel.

What I think makes it more complex for Moore is that he really cares about
people in the stories he does thus separating him, again, from the
'serious journalist' crowd. If memory serves, in one of the first 'Awful
Truth' episodes he took his crew and a guy to the offices of an HMO that
was doing this guy over by denying him coverage for a transplant he needed
to live. Moore et. al. weren't going to get any help from the media flacks
sent by the HMO to deal with things so Moore promised that they would be
back until things were sorted out and this guy got the transplant. And he
eventually got it.

I thought the look he had on his face when he made that promise was the
look of someone who wanted to make sure the right thing was done, not a
journalist creating a self perpetuating story. I could be wrong and he
could be a better actor than I thought, but I think that type of
compassion puts Moore in a dilemma that leads him to taking the 'easy'
route for some stories.

PC