f you’re a fan of Michael Moore, his latest literary rant, Dude, Where’s My Country? will deliver. If you’re not a fan, you probably haven’t read him yet. In that case, you are an increasingly rare species of American.

Journalist, documentary filmmaker and always the satirist, Moore was once an obscure, fringe-liberal pet of college kids and is now a household name—one which will doubtlessly be dropped during countless Thanksgiving dinners next week.

For those of us who savored every episode of Moore’s struggling first TV program, “TV Nation,” like the last days of summer vacation, his guest appearance last Sunday on what may fairly be called history’s most successful sitcom, “The Simpsons,” tasted oh-so-sweet.

Back in Moore’s Bravo network days, long before a certain notorious acceptance speech (I think he forgot to thank God and the Academy…), it seemed as if Moore was doomed to an awful, and all-too-familiar, fate. Either he would stop targeting worker exploitation by Bravo’s advertisers—thus selling out—or his show wouldn’t be allowed to go on.

But Moore’s journey from left-wing looney to mainstream Moses has entailed no personal transformation on his part. His tune has remained the same, to say nothing of his wardrobe.

To the consternation of the corporations Moore relentlessly hounds, the very anti-conglomerate message he aims at them sells. It sells fantastically. Dude, Where’s My Country? followed in the footsteps of Moore’s Downsize This! and Stupid White Men, which led him straight to the top of The New York Times Best-Seller List.

The day it was released—after being held back in warehouses for months by the original publisher (a subsidiary of Fox’s News Corp.), which threatened to pulp all 50,000 copies unless Moore removed all negative remarks regarding President Bush—Stupid White Men was the number one purchase on Amazon.com.

In the foreword to Dude, Where’s My Country? Moore remarks that “the worst thing to tell a free people in a country that’s still mostly free is that they are not allowed to read something…that my book would go on to be the number-one selling non-fiction hardcover book of the year in the United States screams volumes about this great country.”

His next statement nicely sums up Moore’s attitude and the motivation for his work: “The American people may look like they don’t know what’s going on half the time, and they may spend too much time picking out different-colored covers for their cell phones, but when push comes to shove, they’ll rise to the occasion and be there for what is right.”

Moore works as an American icon because he is, on a very fundamental level, so American. It’s contrary to right-wing characterizations, and obvious from watching five minutes of footage of him, that Moore is above all an average guy who has merely set out to say what average Americans think about their country—which they love, albeit from an ever-increasing distance.

Moore’s most tenderly patriotic work yet, Dude, Where’s My Country? is to the United States what Moore’s breakthrough film “Roger and Me” is to his hometown of Flint, Mich. It’s a call for reclamation. It is also his most vehemently critical targeting of President Bush to date—just take a look at the cover.

So many Americans have phenomenally received Dude, Where’s My Country? because it gives voice to the realization that most of us have begun to face with increasing anxiety: that since Sept. 11, 2001, when four airplanes were hijacked by terrorists, many of our fundamental rights as Americans have been hijacked by our own government in the name of the War on Terror.

In keeping with the conclusions of “Bowling for Columbine,” the documentary which won him an Oscar and the spotlight in which to make his famed acceptance speech, Moore asserts that an endless fear is necessary to fuel the endless war that keeps U.S. citizens’ focus away from the real problem: corporate crime.

We have nothing to fear but George W. Bush, he writes, whose logic runs like this: “Let’s dismantle our way of life, so that they [the terrorists] won’t have to blow it up.”

Dude, Where’s My Country? won’t surprise any of Moore’s seasoned fans, dubbed “Mike’s Militia.” Neither does it achieve more than fleeting moments of eloquence. Moore is no literary genius. He creates entire chapters out of verbal gags that would have been brief, biting showcases of his signature sarcasm in film form.

A somewhat painful chapter, “Oil’s Well That Ends Well,” is structured as a dream-dialogue in which Moore’s great-granddaughter piteously questions why Americans greedily used up the world’s oil reserves, causing worldwide famine.

It’s fitting that Moore recently visited the animated world of Homer Simpson. Over-extended parables like this bring to mind the episode in which Marge urges Homer to be satisfied that he has invented a new drink that put Moe’s Tavern on the map, even though Moe isn’t sharing in the profits.

Homer answers: “Oh, look at me, I’m making people happy! I’m the magical man from Happy Land, in a gumdrop house on Lollipop Lane. In case you couldn’t tell, I was being sarcastic.” Like Marge, sometimes Moore’s readers may be tempted to answer his more overdeveloped sarcastic jabs with, “Well, duh!”

However, this overstatement is signature Moore, an integral part of why we love him. And in his latest book it’s counterbalanced by the gem that is the chapter titled, “Woo hoo! I Got Me a Tax Cut!”, a letter addressed to President Bush. In it, Moore pledges: “I will give the maximum legal amount to the candidate who has the best chance of defeating you.”

You can offer suggestions on how the tax cut should be spent by visiting www.SpendMikesTaxCut.com.

If Moore had his way, Oprah would be announcing her candidacy for the presidency. As it is, many of us are left wondering whether Bush Jr. will be in office when Moore’s next documentary, “Fahrenheit 9/11,” is released.

And judging by the popularity of Dude, Where’s My Country? millions of Americans agree with him that “four more years of this insanity and suddenly Canada isn’t going to look so cold.”
rachael@red-mag.com