Match me, Sidney

A Republican front group has been created to smear Fahrenheit 911. If this becomes a “controversy” it’s important that we all send letters to the press so that they will know this group is not grassroots.

I imagine that this is why Moore has hired a war room staff:

Parachuting into France for the documentary’s Cannes Film Festival launch, a Miramax rep told us, were Howard Wolfson, ex-campaign press secretary for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, and Michael Feldman, a top adviser on Al Gore’s 2000 presidential race. (Feldman founded the Glover Park Group, a D.C. communications outfit, with ex-Clinton spokesman Joe Lockhart.) Also providing PR expertise on the anti-Bush movie: former Clinton White House advisers Mark Fabiani and Chris Lehane.

“We knew the film would obviously draw a lot of political attention and attacks, and we try to do what’s best for our movie,” Miramax spokesman MatthewHiltzik said from the film festival. “We felt that having the political expertise to withstand the political attacks would require hiring the people who have the most experience on that terrain.”

I know that everybody hates Lehane with a fervor only matched by their hatred for Bush. But, this is what he’s good at. He’d “sell out his own girl if he could stand up there … and suck in the sweet smell of success.” Politics and Hollywood have always had guys like him. They serve a useful purpose.

And one rather significant thing is that Moore and the Weinsteins aren’t hiding anything. The GOP frontgroup is pretending to be a bunch of Nascar Moms and Waitress Dads. The press will have to be reminded of this when they start interviewing Ethel and Gomer about how offended they are by the movie.