| M. Moore (Narrator): | Not far from where Charlton Heston and I grew up is a training ground for the Michigan Militia. | |
| M. Moore: | Why do you use the bowling pins [for target practice]? | |
| Militia Member (1): | From a self-defense or tactical standpoint it is a small target and is supposed to represent the vitals of a human being should you ever have to shoot at one. |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | The Michigan Militia became known around the world when on April 19th 1995 two guys living in Michigan who had attended Militia meetings, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, blew up the federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people. The Michigan Militia wanted everyone to know that they were nothing like McVeigh and Nichols. | ||
| Militia Member (2): | It’s an American tradition, it’s an American responsibility to be armed. If you’re not armed you’re not responsible. |
|
|
| M. Moore: | Who is going to defend your kids? | ||
| Militia Member (2): | The cops? The federal government? | ||
| M. Moore: | No, none of them. | ||
| Militia Member (2): | It’s your job to defend you and yours. If you don’t do it you’re in dereliction of duty as an American… period. |
| Militia Member (3): | I’ve had guns, pretty much, since I was able to have them. And I learned how to use them… [Pauses to tell her daughter who is playing beside her, “You’re Silly.”] Because, being a female, for one, I felt it was important to be able to protect myself with the best means possible. And one of those means is having a gun. When a criminal breaks in to your house, who is the first person you’re going to call? Most people would call the police because they have guns. Cut out the middle man; take care of your own family yourself. If you’re not going to protect your family, who is? |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | This is James Nichols, the brother of Terry Nichols. James graduated from High School the same year I did in the district next to mine. On this farm in Decker, Michigan, McVeigh and the Nichols brothers made practice bombs before Oklahoma City. Terry and James were both arrested in connection to the bombing. Terry Nichols was convicted and received a life sentence, Timothy McVeigh was executed, but the Feds didn’t have the goods on James so the charges were dropped. | ||
| James Nichols: | Them people, law enforcement, if you want to call them that, were here and they were shaking in their shoes. They were physically shaking, scared to death. |
|
|
| M. Moore: | Of? | ||
| James Nichols: | Because they thought this was going to be another Wacko. Because certain people, namely my ex-wife, and other people, said I’m a radical, I’m a wild man, I got a gun under every arm, down every leg, in every shoe, every corner of the house… if you say anything to me I’ll shoot you. If the people find out how they’ve been ripped off, and enslaved in this country, by the government, by the powers to be, they will revolt with anger… with merciless anger. There will be blood running in the sheets. When the government turns tyrannical it is your duty to overthrow it. | ||
| M. Moore: | Well, why not use Gandhi’s way? He didn’t have any guns and he beat the British Empire. | ||
| James Nichols: | I’m not familiar with that. |
| James Nichols: | Nobody has the right to tell me that I can’t have [a gun]. That is protected under our constitution. | |
| M. Moore: | Where does it say a handgun is protected? | |
| James Nichols: | No, gun. We should, every citizen in this… | |
| M. Moore: | It doesn’t say gun, it says arms. | |
| James Nichols: | What is arms? | |
| M. Moore: | It could be a nuclear weapon. | |
| James Nichols: | See, that’s right. It could be a nuclear weapon. | |
| M. Moore: | You think you have the right to have weapons grade plutonium here on the farm? | |
| James Nichols: | We should have the right to anything… | |
| M. Moore: | Should you have weapons grade plutonium? | |
| James Nichols: | I don’t want it. | |
| M. Moore: | Should you have the right to have it if you did want it? | |
| James Nichols: | That should be restricted. | |
| M. Moore: | Oh, oh, so you do believe in some restrictions. | |
| James Nichols: | Well, there’s wacko’s out there. |
What a Wonderful World |
| 1950’s 1953: U.S. overthrows Prime Minister Mossadeq of Iran. U.S. installs Shah as dictator. 1954: U.S. overthrows democratically-elected President Arbenz of Guatemala. 200,000 civilians killed. |
| 1960’s 1963: U.S. backs assassination of South Vietnamese President Diem. 1963-1975: American military kills 4 million civilians in Southeast Asia. |
| 1970’s September 11, 1973: U.S. stages coup in Chile. Democratically elected president Salvador Allende assassinated. Dictator Augusto Pinochet installed. 5,000 Chileans murdered. 1977: U.S. backs military rulers of El Salvador. 70,000 Salvadorans and four American nuns killed. |
| 1980’s 1980's: U.S. trains Osama Bin Laden and fellow terrorists to kill Soviets. CIA gives them $3 billion. 1981: Reagan administration trains and funds "contras". 30,000 Nicaraguans die. 1982: U.S. provides billions in aid to Saddam Hussein for weapons to kill Iranians. 1983: White House secretly gives Iran weapons to help them kill Iraqis. 1989: CIA agent Manuel Noriega (also serving as President of Panama) disobeys orders from Washington. U.S. invades Panama and removes Noriega. 3,000 Panamanian civilian casualties. |
| 1990’s 1990: Iraq invades Kuwait with weapons from U.S. 1991: U.S. enters Iraq. Bush reinstates dictator of Kuwait. 1998: Clinton bombs "weapons factory" in Sudan. Factory turns out to be making aspirin. 1991 to present: American planes bomb Iraq on a weekly basis. U.N. estimates 500,000 Iraqi children die from bombing and sanctions. |
| 2000’s 2000-01: U.S. gives Taliban-ruled Afghanistan $245 million in "aid". September 11, 2001: Osama Bin Laden uses his expert CIA training to murder 3,000 people. |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | South of Denver in Littleton on the grounds of the U.S. Air Force Academy there sits an actual B52 Bomber. The plaque underneath it proudly proclaims this plain killed Vietnamese people on Christmas Eve 1972. It was the largest bombing campaign of the Vietnam War. Just outside Denver is Rocky Flats, the largest plutonium weapon making factory in the world, and now a massive radioactive dump. A few miles away, buried inside a mountain, is NORAD. Which oversees our nuclear missiles, many of which dot the Colorado landscape. And once a month, Lockeed transports one of its rockets, with its Pentagon payload, through the streets of Littleton, passing nearby Columbine High School, on its way to an Air Force Base on the other side of Denver. The rockets are transported in the middle of the night, while the children of Columbine are asleep. |
April 20, 1999: Largest one day bombing by U.S. in Kosovo War. |
||
| Serbian News Anchor: | Twenty-two NATO missiles fell on the village [name undecipherable]. Deadly cargo was dropped on the residential part of the village. | |
| President Clinton (TV coverage): |
We’re striking hard on Serbia’s machinery of repression, while making an effort to minimize harm to innocent people. | |
| Serbian News Anchor: | On the hit list were local hospital and primary school… | |
One Hour later: |
||
| President Clinton (TV coverage): |
We all know there has been a terrible shooting at a High School in Littleton Colorado. I hope the American people will be praying for the students, the parents and the teachers. And, we’ll wait for events to unfold and there’ll have more to say. | |
Excerpts from Columbine H.S. news coverage during and after the attack: |
||
| Paramedic: | They have automatic weapons okay… so you got to send lots and lots of paramedics. | |
| Paramedic: | We have a couple of kids out in the hall who are shot, so we’re trying to get to them. Don’t let anyone else in until we tell them to… | |
| Operator: | Jefferson County 911 | |
| Issy Povich: | Hi, it’s “Issy Povich” at NBC News. We’re calling about the school shooting. We’re on the air live right now on MSNBC. Is that something you could just, literally… I mean I can patch you through to Mike Silverman you can tell us on the air… | |
| Wendy: | Hi, it’s Wendy at CNN still. | |
| Representative: | Oh, Hi Wendy. We’re just taking names and numbers from the press now. | |
| Wendy: | Ok, because Fox has somebody on now. | |
| Representative: | Huh. | |
| Wendy: | Fox has somebody from your office on now. | |
| Representative: | I know, we’ve talked to a whole bunch of people and you can only do so many because you have so many coming in. | |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | When the shooting was over Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had killed twelve students and one teacher. Dozens of others were injured by the over 900 rounds of ammo that were fired. It is believed that the guns that were used all legally purchased at stores and gun shows. And many of the bullets were bought at the Littleton Kmart, just down the street. | |
| Newscaster: | Harris’ diary also detailed ideas about hijacking an airplane and crashing it in to New York City. Some may characterize that as fantasy… | |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | In the end they turned the guns on themselves. | |
| Columbine Student: | (Sobbing and speaking through tears) And then he came into the library and shot everybody around me, then put a gun to my head and asked if we all wanted to die. I started screaming and crying, and telling them not to shoot me. And so he shot the girl – shot her in the head in front of me. And he shot the black kid, because he was black. |
| Marilyn Manson: | When I was a kid growing up music was the escape. That was the only thing that had no judgments. You can put on a record and it’s not going to yell at you for dressing the way you do. It’s going to make you feel better about it. I can definitely see why [the politicians, religious right, and protestors] would pick me [as the reason for the Columbine killings] because it’s easy to throw my face on TV because I’m, in the end, sort of a poster boy for fear. Because I represent what everyone is afraid of, because I do and say what I want. The two byproducts of that whole tragedy were violence in entertainment and gun control. And how perfect that that was the two things that we were going to talk about with the upcoming election. And also, then we forgot about Monica Lewinsky, we forgot that the President was shooting bombs overseas. Yet, I’m a bad guy because I sing some rock-and-roll songs. And who is a bigger influence, Marilyn Manson or the President? I’d like to think me, but I’m going to go with the President. |
|
|
| M. Moore: | Did you know that the day that Columbine happened the United States dropped more bombs on Kosovo than at any other time during that war? | ||
| Marilyn Manson: | I do know that and I think that’s really ironic that nobody said maybe the President had any influence on this violent behavior. Because that’s not the way the media wants to take it and spin it and turn it in to fear. Because then you’re watching television, you’re watching the news, you’re being pumped full of fear. There are floods, there’s AIDS, there’s murder, cut to commercial, buy the Acura, buy the Colgate… If you have bad breath they’re not going to talk to you, if you got pimples the girl’s not going to fuck you. It’s a campaign of fear and consumption. And that’s what I think it’s all based on, it’s the whole idea that... keep everyone afraid, and they’ll consume and that’s really the symbols people are bound to. | ||
| M. Moore: | If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine and the people in that community, what would you say to them if they were here right now? | ||
| Marilyn Manson: | I wouldn’t say a single word to them, I would listen to what they have to say. And that’s what no one did. |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | Why wasn’t anyone blaming bowling for warping the minds of
Eric and Dylan to commit their evil deeds? Wasn’t it just as
plausible for blaming Marilyn Manson? After all, it was apparently
the last thing they did before the massacre. But wait a minute, there’s
a lot of bowling going on in other countries. And don’t they
listen to Marilyn Manson in Germany, the home of sinister Goth music?
Don’t they watch the same violent movies in France? Most of
the violent video games are from Japan. Many people in America believe
it’s the breakup of the family unit that’s the cause of
so many wayward youth to turn to violence. But statistics show that
there are more breakups in Great Britain than in the U.S. Liberals
contend that it’s all the poverty we have in America that causes
all this violence, but the unemployment in Canada is twice as much
as it is here. Of course most say it’s because we Americans
have a violent history, a violent past. Cowboys and Indians. The wild
west. A history of conquering and bloodshed. Well, if that’s
all it takes to end up in a violent society like we have in America,
how do you explain this: Germans exterminate
12 million. Yet, in spite of all this, how many people are killed with guns each year? In Germany, 381. In France, 255. In Canada, 165. In the United Kingdom, 68. In Australia, 65. In Japan, 39. In the United States, 11,127. |
A Brief History of America clip (From official site) |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
| Prof. Barry Glassner: | I love these boulevards; you just don’t get this in most of L.A. |
|
|
| M. Moore: | How come when I turn on the 11 o’clock news all I hear is “Tonight in South Central.” Tonight in South Central there was a drive by shooting. This, that, or whatever – they’re not making that up, are they? | ||
| Prof. Barry Glassner: | No, they’re not making it up, but they’re choosing what they’re covering. If you turn on the TV, look at the news, what are you going to hear about? Dangerous black guys, right? Unnamed black guy who is accused of some crime. | ||
| M. Moore: | Right. | ||
| Prof. Barry Glassner: | You’re going to see black guys doing bad things, or hear stories about black guys doing bad things. And we’ve heard this our whole lives. |
News coverage clips from various U.S. cities |
||
| News Audio (1): | The suspect is a black male in his twenties, we are told he has a large afro, side burns, and he was wearing a silver chain at the time. | |
| News Audio (2): | The suspect is African-American, police believe…suspect… black man, black man. | |
| M. Moore: | Susan Smith drowns her two children; she tells her people that a black guy did it. Stole the car and stole the kids. And everyone at first bought it. | |
| Prof. Barry Glassner: | The anonymous, urban… which usually means black male, comes by and does this, is the excuse for all kinds of things. | |
| M. Moore: | Charles Stewart, the lawyer in Boston, kills his pregnant wife, says a black guy did it. Everybody buys it. |
| M. Moore (Narrator): | You know, the thing I love about this country of mine is that, whether you’re a psychotic killer, or running for president of the United States, the one thing you can always count on is white America’s fear of the black man. | |
| News coverage audio: |
||
| Reporter: | We’ve heard the stories on the news and in the paper, and they have killed people. Killer bees, also known as “Africanized” Bees. | |
Rosemary
Shivety (Elderly woman): |
I’m scared, I’m really worried with them. | |
| Reporter: | Rosemary Shivety never expected a nest of Africanized Killer Bees to shack-up across the street from her. | |
| Rosemary Shivety: | I’m terribly allergic to them, and so are my grand kids. | |
| Reporter: | They’re originally from Southern and Eastern Africa. Dr. Ward Care brought them to South Africa in 1956 and tried to mate them with the European bee, the kind that we’re used to. But, they got loose, took over, and moved all the way to the Southern United States. The main difference between a traditional honey bee and a Africanized honey bee is the bees aggressiveness. If I was to do [remove a stick placed in the hive with bees on it] to an Africanized bees hive I could have several hundred stings in a matter of minutes. | |
| Reporter: | Danny Felts raises the kinder gentler European bee and has done the research. | |
| Danny Felts: | The only way you can tell between the two of them is doing measurements on the body parts. | |
