Just before Moore’s Bush-bashing Fahrenheit 9/11 premiered at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Moore charged that Disney had told him “officially”—just the day before—that it would not distribute the film. Moore said they were trying to kill the film, and that an article in that day’s New York Times correctly explained Disney's decision: "According to today's New York Times, it might 'endanger' millions of dollars of tax breaks Disney receives from the state of Florida because the film will 'anger' the governor of Florida, Jeb Bush."

Well, in a subsequent CNN interview, Moore admitted he knew almost a year ago that Disney (as it is their right to do) would not distribute the movie. Oh, and it wasn't the New York Times that said Disney feared losing tax breaks, but Moore's agent who was quoted in the Times as saying it. Disney denied that president Michael Eisner told the agent of any such fear. Eisner told ABC News that Disney “informed both the agency that represented the film and all of our companies that we just didn't want to be in the middle of a politically oriented film during an election year.” Despite Disney’s stance—from the beginning—that they wouldn’t be distributing the film, Moore’s whining only started when Harvey and Bob Weinstein (heads of Miramax pictures, whose parent company is Disney) were finally convinced when they wouldn’t be able to change their bosses’ minds. This happened at a time that just so happened to coincide with the film’s premiere at Cannes. The Weinsteins have since bought the film—for roughly $6 million—from Eisner, so they can shop it to another distributor, but not under the Miramax name.

Buzz about the film (just like Moore had planned) skyrocketed in the wake of his winning the Palme d’Or, the festival’s top prize. The film’s premiere had already produced a 20-minute standing ovation, which was amazing, because, as you know, it is very hard to get a French audience to cheer at anything critical of the United States. When the reportedly shocked and breathless Moore (do you think the breathless part could have anything to do with his Santa-like build?) climbed up to the stage to accept the award, he covered his mouth with his hands like Miss America and gasped, “I'm completely overwhelmed by this!” He should have won best actor, too.

It is interesting (well, not really) to note that the jury at Cannes—surprisingly containing only one Frenchman—contained three jurors with ties to Miramax, including filmmaker Quentin Tarantino, who vehemently denied that politics had anything to do with his vote. At a (what?!!?) unprecedented, specially-organized press conference to dispel rumors that the jurors weren’t voting for political reasons, Tarantino said that all the jurors “agreed that Fahrenheit 9/11 was the best movie of the competition," and their vote had nothing to do with "all the politics crap."

Of course, statements like those are a little hard to swallow when one of the other filmmakers, Jonas Geirnaert, preceded the showing of his film with the message, “In case (Michael Moore) shouldn’t win, if anyone is watching this from the United States, please don’t vote Bush.” And later, when presenting an award, actor Tim Roth complemented the young man for his comments, which he called “extraordinarily brave.” The mood had already been set.

As if you hadn’t guessed by now, Fahrenheit 9/11 is a partisan political commercial disguised as a movie. While McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform laws prohibit you or me from raising a bunch of money to produce a conventional political ad to promote Bush or Kerry within 60 days of an election, we can do it in the form of a film—a medium that is not blocked by McCain-Feingold. And that is what Michael Moore is doing.

Need more proof (other than his mouth) of Moore’s sneaky partisan agenda? Well, just look at whom Miramax has hired to promote the film: Howard Wolfson (ex-campaign press secretary for Sen. Hillary Clinton), Michael Feldman (adviser for Al Gore's 2000 presidential campaign), Mark Fabiani and Chris Lehane (former Clinton White House advisers), and Matthew Hiltzik (campaign staffer for Hillary Clinton’s U.S. Senate campaign).

Moore wants Fahrenheit 9/11 to come out as soon as possible so that it will help to defeat Bush in the upcoming November election, and Hollywood will stop at nothing to enthusiastically oblige. I wonder what Hollywood would say if a filmmaker wanted to help Bush win the election?