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"O'Reilly called me a smear merchant, which is an enormous compliment because he would know smear." Filmmaker Robert Greenwald told me by telephone. "But we are living in a time where there are these attacks from the Right that are about the messenger not about what is being said. I hope that we can keep pushing back so that it becomes more a discussion about substance."

Greenwald is the documentary filmmaker responsible for UNCOVERED: THE WAR ON IRAQ and OUTFOXED: RUPERT MURDOCH'S WAR ON JOURNALISM. He like Michael Moore has been accused of making propaganda films.

"A documentary is a film that deals with real people, real stories, and real events. I think that some folks have gotten confused about propaganda and point of view. All films have a point of view." Greenwald said in response to the propaganda versus documentary question. "In UNCOVERED what I attempted to do was take people with expertise-Republicans, Democrats, Independents, people who have spent their life studying and working on these critical issues from weapons inspection, to information in the CIA, to people in the Pentagon, to people in Foreign Service. And I had them in a very clear objective manner explain why the reasons we were given for going to war were not accurate reasons. Now bear in mind that some of these people were in favor of the war, but what they could not accept is the rationale, the explanation being distorted."

UNCOVERED focuses on the reasons the Bush Administration originally gave to garner support for the war in Iraq.

"What I did in this film was take these 23 patriots and I was a voice for them to get their voice out louder and clearer." Greenwald said of UNCOVERED.

He continued.

"The film does not take a position on the election. The film does not take a position on the war. The film takes a position on distortion. And I think that there is a lot of agreement as we are seeing each day now. And the men and women in this film spoke to me last summer and last spring. The fact that they are so accurate as to the explanation is something that Republicans and Democrats should take their hats off and salute them saying 'hey' we are not getting the true story here and that's important. Now you could decide you are still in favor of the war, but that's not the point. The point is that in a democracy our reasons are important."

Some EI readers and even staff have attacked me for being decidedly left in my personal views allegedly expressed in film reviews and feature pieces. Truth is that the only films out there have been accused of being anti-war or anti-Bush. I emailed the distributor of FAHRENHYPE 911 requesting a copy to review and after a few days heard nothing. I ordered one today and will post a review as soon as I see the film.

"We are living in a time right now where there is a lot of character assassination or shoot the messenger." Greenwald told me. "Look at Richard Clarke for goodness sake. The man is a hawk, a man that has spent his life working for all kinds of government, Republican and Democrat, who did not hesitate and try to kill terrorists. And they turned on him like he was some kind of left winger. I think that it is very sad that we've come to a time when it is not about the content, it is about the person. And I hope that with these films [UNCOVERED and OUTFOXED] we can get back to a debate about the content. And I think that it is a fair argument. Let's stop shooting people because of reasons other than what they said."

Greenwald's film OUTFOXED deals with the Fox News Channel and takes the position that its reporting is anything but fair and balanced. In the wake of the Dan Rather CBS document scandal, I asked Greenwald about the recent false posting on Foxnews.com of invented comments attributed to John Kerry.

"It's more than that, it's one reporter, Carl Cameron, that did it. And in my film OUFOXED we have an extraordinary sequence that a source sent to me where in the Presidential election 2000, you see Paul Cameron before an interview talking to Bush about how his wife is working on the Bush campaign. So, sadly he has a long tradition of bias and should not be covering the campaign."

While Greenwald's position certainly isn't that reporters cannot have any political affiliation, he maintains that it bleeds over to how Fox News reports the news. I asked him that if, for the sake of argument, we say that his films are propaganda, isn't there a place for propaganda and even for the Fox News Channel in the media arena?

"There is a place for points of view and propaganda but it should be fairly labeled. What I object to with Fox News is that they claim they are a news station and they say they are fair and balanced. Everyone knows that's not true and that's just silly."

Greenwald continued.

"They [Fox News] should be proud of the fact they carry a conservative Republican point of view. Air America doesn't try to hide the fact that it has a progressive orientation. Pacifica radio doesn't try to hide the fact. Fox News is either ashamed of being Republican of some other reason is trying to hide it, I don't know."

And Greenwald's goal in making UNCOVERED and specifically OUTFOXED?

"I want to shine the hard spotlight of truth on Fox News in order to dissuade some of the others from moving in that direction."

EI readers have no doubt seen a lot of documentary films this year that have given them a great amount of information. And watching CNN, MSNBC, the networks, and Fox News can help us make up our minds. I'm a fan of the nightly Fox show Hannity and Colmes and have been impressed with their debate coverage after each debate. The debates themselves have become a weekly event in my household. The water cooler talk these days isn't about SEX AND THE CITY or even that new hot show LOST, but often we find ourselves talking politics.

"I have a lot of respect for my fellow countrymen and I think there is a level of interest and concern and desire to have information to help make critical decisions. I mean two people can get the same set of information and make two different sets of decisions, it's fine. But let's not prevent the information from getting out there by saying you're a Leftie or a Communist or a Bush-hater or any of those things, it's just silly."

For more information about UNCOVERED and OUTFOXED visit the websites: http://www.outfoxed.org/ and http://www.truthuncovered.com/

Listen to the interview in streaming audio (requires Apple Quicktime)

Jonathan W. Hickman