Say Anything Blog

As I'm sure you've all heard by now, MoveOn announced their Bush In 30 Seconds commercial contest winner. The crowd at the event was star-studded, to say the least, and it seemed like every celebrity their brought an opinion:

I had planned on writing a post meant to show how stupid some of the things these people are saying truly are, but once I got to reading what they said I decided to just let them speak for themselves. Here's a run-down of what these geniuses had to say while at the event (the links lead to where I found the quote):

Michael Moore

I don't blame [Republicans] for being angry about that. It would have been good enough just to compare Bush to Bush. You don't need Hitler when you already got Bush.

Julia Stiles

I was worried that some soldiers over in Iraq who are actually younger than I am would see some salacious report on MSNBC and think that I was attacking them and not the government that put them there. And I was afraid that Bill O'Reilly would come and, with a shotgun at my front door, and shoot me for being unpatriotic. But I decided that that's actually, that fear that was silencing me is actually why it's so important that MoveOn exist and do this ad contest.

Chuck D

We don't want eight more years of a Colin, a Bush, and a Dick.

Al Franken

I'm a last-minute substitution, former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill was supposed to be the presenter, but unfortunately he was murdered.

Margaret Cho

Despite all of this stupid bullsh-- that the Republican National Committee, or whatever the f--- they call them, that they were saying that they're all angry about how two of these ads were comparing Bush to Hitler? I mean, out of thousands of submissions, they find two. They're like fu--ing looking for Hitler in a haystack. You know? I mean, George Bush is not Hitler. He would be if he fu--ing applied himself. (big, extended applause) I mean he just isn't.

I think this last year has just proven how stupid Republicans are. (big applause)

For example, Judge Roy Moore, or Jay Moore or whatever, in Alabama. [inaudible] ... Ten Commandments statue stay in the lobby of a courthouse. 'You can't move the Word of God! You cannot remove the Franklin Mint edition of the Word of God!' [said in Southern accent] People are protesting there and like, I think it could have been solved so much easier if they had just placed a golden calf next to the statue and then people would have started worshiping that. And then they could have moved the Ten Commandments to Bush's office -- which he needs them, desperately. Or maybe he needs a new version of the Ten Commandments -- George W. Bush's Ten Commandments: Thou shalt not steal ... votes. (big applause) Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's ... country. (big applause) Thou shalt not kill ... for oil. (big applause) Thou shalt not take grammar ... in vain. (big applause) I mean, whatever fu--ing happened to separation of church and state? I mean, you can't like, impose your god on my god. God has many names. God is God, God is Jehovah, God is Allah, God is Buddah, God is Beyonce. (laughter) You know, you cannot impose your God on other people.

And ah, George W. Bush is coming out with the weirdest stance on same-sex marriage as well. What he says about it is, well, 'Well, we're all sinners.' No we're not! Just because somebody ate an apple one time does not make us all sinners. And if it was from the tree of knowledge, I think she should have eaten more than one. (laughter) Possibly even baked a pie. (applause) 'I don't understand the whole same-sex marriage thing,' he was quoted as saying. Well, you you uh, just gotta take the speck out of your own eye before you take the co-- out of your neighbor's. [in Southern accent] (laughter)

I mean, I'm afraid of terrorists, but I'm more afraid of the Patriot Act.(big applause)

Maybe Margaret needs to go and live in Israel for a while. Then perhaps she'll know what true fear from terrorism is. On the whole, it seemed like these people were long on obscenities and catchy phrases and short on supporting details. Typical. Those kind of statements make for catchy sound bites.

I have to question some of these people's reasons for being at these events. Looking at the names on the list I wonder if, for some of them, this isn't an effort to re-kindle a career flame that has largely gone out (Yes, I'm talking to you Margaret Cho, Jeanine Garofolo and Chuck D). When was the last time any of these people did anything truly noteworthy in their chosen professions?

This would all be so much easier if some of these people were required to show proof after they made their statements. You think Bush is like Hitler? Ok, point us toward the mass graves so we can confirm that. Want to insinuate that Republicans are murderers? Show us some dead bodies.

Speaking of the Bush-Hitler connection, Jeff Jarvis has the best commentary to date on that subject:

To use the architect and perpetrator of the Holocaust as a convenient analogy for anybody with whom you happen to disagree is to diminish his crime and the suffering of his victims; it is to glibly dismiss the murder of six million Jews.

This isn't to say that I'm going PC on you. I'm even fine with Hitler humor (see Springtime for Hitler and Hogan's Heroes). But to call someone you disagree with "Hitler" is to make Hitler just another person with whom you disagree, just as to call a man who leers at a woman a "rapist" is to make rape equivalent to leering.

In Cho's case, this was quite purposeful.

Look at the sequence here: MoveOn ended up distributing commercials in its contest that made this very Hitler analogy. A firestorm ensued. MoveOn shouted at those who complained, saying their criticism just wasn't fair because MoveOn didn't endorse the commercials and then MoveOn took them down.

Yet now at a MoveOn event, Margaret Cho goes out of her way to make the Bush/Hitler analogy again, thumbing her nose at the critics and those who were offended by this.

Cho is not stupid; she's unfunny (how long did her "sit"com last, a week?) but not stupid. She knew what she was doing: She was using Hitler and thus his victims for her convenience in her screed quite on purpose. This is all the more a poke in the eye to objects of ethnic genocide when it comes from someone who objects loudly whenever anyone makes a crack about her own ethnicity.
She should know better. She does know better. She decided to do this anyway. And she deserves to be called on it.

Right on, Jeff.