Here Comes Trouble - Michael Moore [0]
Table of Contents
Copyright Page
For
my mother
who taught me to read
and write
when I was four
Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer
Or the misfit
So alone…
—“Subdivisions”
Neil Peart/Rush
A Note from the Author
This is a book of short stories based on events that took place in the early years of my life. Many of the names and circumstances have been changed to protect the innocent, and sometimes the guilty. They say that memory can be a strange and twisted amusement park, full of roller coaster rides and funhouse mirrors, frightening freak shows and gentle contortionists. This is my first volume of such stories. I wanted to commit them to paper while paper (and bookstores and libraries) still existed.
SANDY BATES [WOODY ALLEN]: Shouldn’t I stop making movies and do something that counts, like helping blind people or becoming a missionary or something?
THE ALIEN: Let me tell you, you’re not the missionary type. You’d never last. And incidentally, you’re also not Superman; you’re a comedian. You want to do mankind a real service? Tell funnier jokes.
—from Stardust Memories/Woody Allen
Epilogue
The Execution of Michael Moore
I’m thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I’m wondering if I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it… No, I think I could. I think he could be looking me in the eye, you know, and I could just be choking the life out [of him]. Is this wrong? I stopped wearing my “What Would Jesus Do?” band, and I’ve lost all sense of right and wrong now. I used to be able to say, “Yeah, I’d kill Michael Moore,” and then I’d see the little band: What Would Jesus Do? And then I’d realize, “Oh, you wouldn’t kill Michael Moore. Or at least you wouldn’t choke him to death.” And you know, well, I’m not sure.
Glenn Beck,
live on the Glenn Beck program,
May 17, 2005
Wishes for my early demise seemed to be everywhere. They were certainly on the mind of CNN’s Bill Hemmer one sunny July morning in 2004. He had heard something he wanted to run by me. And so, holding a microphone in front of my face on the floor of the 2004 Democratic National Convention, live on CNN, he asked me what I thought about how the American people were feeling about Michael Moore:
“I’ve heard people say they wish Michael Moore were dead.”
I tried to recall if I’d ever heard a journalist ask anyone that question before on live television. Dan Rather did not ask Saddam Hussein that question. I’m pretty sure Stone Phillips didn’t ask serial killer and cannibal Jeffrey Dahmer, either. Perhaps, maybe, Larry King asked Liza once—but I don’t think so.
For some reason, though, it was perfectly OK to pose that possibility to me, a guy whose main offense was to make documentaries. Hemmer said it like he was simply stating the obvious, like, “of course they want to kill you!” He just assumed his audience already understood this truism, as surely as they accept that the sun rises in the east and corn comes on a cob.
I didn’t know how to respond. I tried to make light of it. But as I stood there I couldn’t get over what he had just said live on a network that goes out to 120 countries and Utah. This “journalist” had possibly planted a sick idea into some deranged mind, some angry dittohead sitting at home microwaving his doughnut-and-bacon cheeseburger while his kitchen TV (one of five in the house) is accidentally on CNN: “Well, more chilly weather today across the Ohio Valley, a cat in Philadelphia rolls its own sushi, and coming up, there are people who want Michael Moore dead!”
Hemmer wasn’t finished with his dose of derision. He wanted to know who gave me these credentials to be here. “The DNC [Democratic National Committee] did not invite you here, is that right?” Hemmer asked, as if he were some cop checking ID, something I’m sure he would ask no one else attending the convention that week.