By Debbie Schlussel

Mark Twain, once said, “There are lies, damn lies, and statistics.”

But Twain lived in the 19th Century. In the 21st Century, there are lies, damn lies, and Michael Moore “documentaries.”

Like Twain, Moore wants to be the great social commentator of our era. But, “Fahrenheit 9-11” (F911), his latest propaganda film, shows why he will forever remain in “wanna-be” status.

It’s typical Moore: lies, half-truths, far-left wackos and kooks as experts, snarky cheap shots, and just plain nonsense.

F911 starts out by recounting the tired liberal-left canard about George W. Bush “stealing” the 2000 Presidential Election. Gee, we haven’t heard that one before. And for those who actually read the paper and peruse bookstores, there’s little else new in this waste of celluloid.

Moore shows endless shots of Bush and administration officials being made up for TV appearances, montages of Bush golfing and on vacation, a shot of Bush with his dog – all accompanied by the sarcastic vocal commentary of Michael Moore. (You didn’t expect the self-important, schlubby Moore to spare us and stay off-screen, did you?)

In Moore’s world, liberal politicians never get made up or hair coiffed for TV appearances. In Moore’s world, Bill Clinton never golfed, never vacationed for months on Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard, never had a dog named “Buddy” – all while Slick Willie had the opportunity (several times) to have Osama Bin Laden handed over to him, but declined.

But that’s Moore’s world. He has learned the Costas Gavras (the famous Socialist-Communist director who produced Anti-American films) technique well. Bush and other administration “villains”–so cast by Moore–are shot from down below, to make them look even more evil.

Moore spends much time on Bin Laden family members flying out of the US when the rest of America was grounded, right after 9-11. Showing a clip of Khalil Bin Laden at the airport, a chyron on the screen cleverly reads “days after 9-11.” But, how many days? In fact, while some Bin Ladens did get to fly out early, most of the Bin Laden family flew out of America, after the rest of America could already fly. Moore says the FBI was not allowed to interview them, but in fact, the FBI was allowed to interview them and chose not to. That is disturbing, but it’s not what Moore “reported”.

The close relationship between the Bush family, including the current President, and the Saudi Royal Family is troubling. But it’s nothing new, and Moore offers no alternative. The Saudi Royals are, no doubt, despicable. They foster and fund madrasas, mosques, and clerics who preach the death of the West, Christians, and Jews. They hold telethons to fund the “martyrs” and allowed Al-Qaeda to grow. Women can’t drive, and non-Muslims are the equivalent of slaves. Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar is slimy and dishonest.

But the precarious Saudi Royal Family is better than the alternative–the Saudi masses who hate us even more and who love Osama Bin Laden.

If Crown Prince Abdullah is deposed by its extremist population, Bin Laden is the most popular replacement. Given the large Saudi investment in our economy (upon which Moore touches) and large holdings in our banking system, a change in Saudi leadership could result in the collapse of our economy. $2 a gallon oil? That would be a pleasant memory from the past, and only rich phonies like Michael Moore would be able to afford to drive. The Saudis are the largest producers of oil, and the radical Saudi population would see to it that we go back to the horse and buggy.

That is why it’s important for Bush to remain on good terms with the sleazy country that is the home to public beheadings and 15 of the 19 hijackers. Leftists from Moore’s “Amen” crowd won’t let us drill for oil in Alaska, so we can get away from dependence upon the Saudis. Not a peep about that in F911.

And while there’s plenty of factual material to use against the Saudis, Moore fabricates on that, too. He claims that the US Secret Service’s Uniformed Division protects only the Saudi Embassy, no others. That’s just plain false. Any tourist to Washington, DC, will see plenty of Secret Service Police guarding all of the other foreign embassies which request such protection. Other than guarding the White House and some federal buildings, it’s the largest use of personnel by the Secret Service’s Uniformed Division.

Since Moore lies about little things like that, what else has he lied about in this master docu-fakery?

Then there are Moore’s Congressional “experts.” F911 features extensive interviews with two of the biggest wackos ever elected to Congress, Reps. Jim McDermott and John Conyers, both far-left Democrats. They spout off against everything from the USA Patriot Act to the War on Iraq.

But he fails to tell us that Jim McDermott was on the take from Saddam Hussein. McDermott was one of three Congressmen who went on Saddam’s propaganda tour of Iraq in Fall 2002. The trip was funded by Life for Relief and Development (LRD), a “charity” which laundered money to terrorist group Hamas’ Jordanian operation. LRD is funded in part by Shakir Al-Khafaji, a man who did about $70 million in business with Saddam through his Falcon Trading Group company (based in South Africa). LRD’s Iraqi offices were raided by US troops last week, and the Detroit-area “charity” is suspected of funding uprisings, such as the one in Fallujah. Its officials bragged of doing so at a recent private US fundraiser.

Mr. Alkhafaji, one of two Americans named in Iraqi newspapers as a participant in Saddam’s “Oil for Food” scam, gave Congressman McDermott $5,000 in October 2002 for McDermott’s legal defense fund in a lawsuit against him. He’s not biased about Iraq, right?!

Then there’s Conyers. He’s the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee. Heaven help us if the Democrats retake the House majority, and he becomes Chairman of the Judiciary Committee. The far-left Conyers never met a terrorist he didn’t like.

Take the June 13 Muslim American Society fundraising dinner for Islamic Relief, a charity with links to the Muslim Brotherhood. Conyers and his wife were the guests of honor. They watched and clapped as the Sanabel Al-Quds “dancing” troop from Milwaukee—featuring boys as young as seven—sang in Arabic of martyrdom and jihad for Allah and Palestine. They didn’t need to understand Arabic, as the young boys used a rifle to simulate killing and pistol-whipping, simulated throat-slittings and beheadings, and dishonored the American flag.

The War in Iraq is a major focal point of the film. Moore shamelessly dishonors our brave soldiers. He makes fun of soldier’s musical choices in Iraq (“The Roof is on Fire”) and depicts multiple wounded and dead Iraqis and soldiers raiding a home in Iraq searching for a militant. That’s what happens in war. People get wounded and killed. Moore shows the militant’s female relatives crying. “He’s a college student,” they cry out in Arabic. College students would never be terrorists, would they? Tell that to the Israelis, where the “colleges,” such as Bir Zeit University, are the breeding grounds for terrorists.

Very telling is the presence of the Al-Jazeera microphone in one segment of a women crying, “Allah Hu Akbar” (Allah is Great). Moore apparently thinks the sympathetic Terrorist News Network (Al-Jazeera) is the epitome of accurate news reporting.

Other BS in the Moore film:

* He shows Britney Spears saying she supports the President on Iraq. As if there weren’t a host of brain-dead bimbo celebs, (Madonna, Sean Penn, Russell Simmons, Lenny Kravitz, Susan Sarandon, The Dixie Chicks, etc.), spouting off on the other side.

* Moore repeatedly features Sam Kubba, of the American-Iraqi Chamber of Commerce, denouncing the War in Iraq as money-driven. But Kubba is a fringe character. Most Iraqi-Americans and their prominent leaders, such as Nabil Roumayah of the Detroit-based Iraqi Democratic Union, supported the war, whether they were Chaldeans (Christian Iraqis) or Shias.

* In very selectively edited clips, Moore poses the absurd notion that the main news anchors—Peter Jennings, Dan Rather, and Ted Koppel—wholeheartedly support Bush and the War in Iraq. Jennings, Rather, and Koppel supporting the War and Bush? Puh-leeze! Has Moore forgotten the hour-long Saddam softball interview Rather did just prior to the war, Jennings’ condescending coverage and Koppel’s critical “Nightline” episodes every step of the way?

* Moore exploits the grief of Lila Lipscomb, the mother of a soldier who died in Iraq. She denounces Bush and the War. But there are many mothers and relatives of US soldiers, alive and dead, who served there who don’t agree with her. Don’t look for them in this agit-prop “film.”

* Moore, as many misinformed “journalists do, makes light of the claimed Bush connection between Saddam and Al-Qaeda. But what about the meeting between hijacker Mohammed Atta and Iraqi Intelligence agents in the Czech Republic before 9-11? What about the Iraqi training camp in Salman Pak where Al-Qaeda used abandoned planes to train to hijack them? What about Ramzi Youssef, the Iraqi Secret Service agent and mastermind of the 1993 WTC bombing, who is the nephew of 9-11 Al-Qaeda mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed? What about Iraqi Intelligence and Secret Police (Mukhabarat) at a Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Al-Qaeda terror planning convention? These are just some connections, and there are others in “The Connection,” by Stephen Hayes, that you won’t see in Moore’s silver screen screed.

Not just the film–but the audience that populated the promotional screening I attended–looked like it came out of far-stage-left of Democratic Party central casting.

Those surrounding me were literally the “Great Unwashed.” They smelled as if they hadn’t taken a shower in weeks, not because they couldn’t afford running water, but because it’s cool to be dirty and nasty in the far-left. Not for any good reason, but just because they can. With their awful stench wafting universal, they want to make the rest of us as miserable and skanky as the Hate-America crowd.

It’s emblematic of the filmmaker and his fake-umentary. Michael Moore and “Fahrenheit 9-11” stink.