Christopher Hitchens has reviewed Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11. I say "reviewed": his piece is more of a long, drawn-out hissy fit, a vitriolic rant that seems just a little too emphatic. Not having seen the film, I'm disinclined to comment further, except to say:

1. Didn't Christopher Hitchens oppose the 1991 Gulf War? Good lord, so he did, as Tariq Ali's postscript to Bush in Babylon makes embarrassingly clear; and yet here is Bush Snr's war, drafted in support of an argument that Michael Moore displays "'let's have it both ways' opportunism".

2. These are Hitchens' concluding sentences:

You might hope that a retrospective awareness of this kind [aware of how great bombing Kosovo, Iraq, etc etc was] would induce a little modesty. To the contrary, it is employed to pump air into one of the great sagging blimps of our sorry, mediocre, celeb-rotten culture. Rock the vote, indeed.

After accusing Moore of making unwarranted personal attacks upon the saintly figure of George W. Bush, Hitchens concludes with, erm, a personal attack on Moore. "[G]reat sagging blimps"! Pardon me for indulging likewise, but has Hitchens looked in a mirror recently?

3. Pot, kettle, black, anyone?