Republicans are behind the effort to censor Fahrenheit 9/11

By Kurt Nimmo
So desperate are Bush Republicans to kill Michael Moore's latest film, Fahrenheit 9/11, they have hired a public relations firm to set up a web site attacking Moore. The site, MoveAmericaForward.com, claims to be "non-partisan," but a glance at the "About" page of the site reveals the director and staff of Move America Forward are all diehard Republicans, anti-tax activists, and former legislative staffers. The PR firm is Russo Marsh & Rogers.

Russo Marsh & Rogers is a GOP consultation firm. In 2002, Ron Rogers teamed up with Reagan heavyweight Lyn Nofziger and Ed Rollins to work on the gubernatorial campaign of Bill Simon (see Campaign movements -- People & Organizations.)

Thanks to the detective work of WhatReallyHappened.com, it was revealed that Move America Forward's web site was registered in the name of Russo Marsh & Rogers. In other words, Move America Forward is about as partisan as it gets without putting the GOP seal of approval on the web site. In short, Move America Forward's campaign is a Republican dirty trick designed to smear Moore and pressure move theater owners not to run his film.

"Time is short," the Move America Forward web site declares, "we must act now to have our voices heard in time to make a difference. Help us get messages from millions of Americans sent to these film industry executives."

Certainly, time is short for the Republicans -- millions of Americans are about to learn how George Bush had a business relationship with the Bin Laden family -- and they will learn it right before the election. Russo and the "non-partisan" Republicans want to make sure you never see Moore's film. They don't want you to know the truth about Bush and his buddy-buddy dealings with the Saudis.

Incidentally, after a WHOIS check -- WHOIS is a searchable database maintained by registries and registrars that contains information about domain name registrations on the internet -- was run on MoveAmericaForward.com and it was discovered that the site was registered in the name of Russo Marsh & Rogers. Soon after this information was posted on the web, the registrant name was modified to omit Russo Marsh & Rogers.

Not only do the Republicans not want you to go see Moore's film, they also don't want you to know they are behind the campaign to smear Moore and pressure theater owners into not running the film. It's just like the Republicans to do this sort of thing behind your back. Of course, it is rather lazy and stupid of the Republicans to not think about WHOIS. But then nearly everything about the Republicans lately -- from the lies behind the invasion of Iraq to clumsily attempting to cover up the TortureGate scandal -- has been lazy and stupid.

Don't be fooled. The Bush Republicans are behind this now transparent effort to silence Michael Moore. If you care about the First Amendment and don't like the idea of Republicans dictating to theaters what movies you can see, write Russo Marsh & Rogers and tell them what you think. The contact person is Douglas Lorenz and his email address is: dlorenz@rmrwest.com. If you live in Sacramento, you may want to drop by the Russo Marsh & Rogers offices and ask why they want to censor movies: 770 L Street, #950, Sacramento, CA 95814.