THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MIKE



The enemy of all things Republican didn't disappoint his liberal minions last week, delivering a scorching sermon at the Lane County Fairgrounds decrying the alleged tyranny of the Bush administration.

Here are a few excerpts from Michael Moore's heated, sometimes hilarious, often hyperbolic tirade:

Michael Moore weighs in on ...

* The prospect of a second Bush term: (With hands clapped to ears and eyes shut tight) "La, la, la, la, la, la!!!" .... (Translation: 'I ain't tryin' to hear that!')

* The War in Iraq: "It's the height of arrogance for George W. Bush to go in there (to Iraq) and create this mess and then say to Kerry, 'OK, how are you going to clean this up?'"

* The Draft: "They are going to bring back the draft if he gets four more years ... just do the math, they're running out of troops."

* Ralph Nader, who is reportedly angrier at the Democratic Party this year than Republicans: "Ralph, there's anger management classes for this. You don't need to take it out on the American people."

* John Kerry: "There's a reason George W. Bush calls John Kerry the No. 1 liberal in the Senate -- he IS the No. 1 liberal in the Senate!"

* Gay Marriage -- "Any two adults who love each other should be allowed to marry each other."

* Pres. Bush's insistence during the debates that John Kerry was denigrating the Poles by mocking Bush's "coalition of the willing" -- "Five days after the debate, Poland announces it's pulling its troops out of Iraq ..."

* The Swift Boat Veterans anti-Kerry ads: "We were so inspired by those Swift Boat ads, the humanity ... the courage it took to go after a man who had been wounded only three times," Moore said.

Those ads did not go far enough, Moore insisted. In a video presentation of mock 30-second political commercials he said he would offer the Bush campaign for free, Moore took the Swift Boat theme to another level. Here are a couple ...

- "58,000 Americans died in Vietnam -- John Kerry wasn't one of them. If he truly loved his country, he would've died," said a stern voice-over amid images of the war in Vietnam.

- "John Kerry used to have long hair. Then he had shorter hair," said the voice-over as a picture of a young Kerry testifying on Capitol Hill against the Vietnam War flashed on the screen. "Two words: Flip flop. Vote Bush."

One of Moore's more amusing moments came at the end of his rally, as he laughed about the pharmaceutical industry's reaction to learning they would be the next subject of a Moore documentary.

He said a Pfizer, Inc., employee secretly e-mailed him a copy of an internal memo distributed within the company:

"If you're approached by a bearded, heavyset man wearing rumpled clothing ... and holding a microphone, you may want to think twice before answering his questions," read the memo. "Word has it that Michael Moore is making a documentary about pharmaceutical companies. We're not sure if he's pro or con."

Moore laughed as he said, "You know they're in for an ass-whooping now, if they can't even see it coming!"