Michael Moore: Arrest Wall St. Bankers, Not Wall St. Protestors

In the following Democracy Now! broadcast, Amy Goodman and Michael Moore discuss the Occupy Wall St. protests, where Moore spoke Monday despite the fact that police have forbidden protestors from using a PA system.

AMY GOODMAN: Today we spend the hour with one of the most famous independent filmmakers in the world, Michael Moore. For more than two decades, Michael’s been one of the most politically active, provocative and successful documentary filmmakers in the business. His films include Roger and me, Bowling for Columbine, for which he won the Academy Award, Fahrenheit 9/11, Sicko, and Capitalism: A Love Story." Today, we speak with Michael Moore about his new book that just came out, it’s called, Here Comes Trouble: Stories From My Life. It comprises 20 vignettes from his life that illustrate how his political and sociological view points developed. As far back as 20 years ago, when Michael Moore made his award winning debut documentary, Roger and Me, he knew he was anything but an average child.

MICHAEL MOORE: I was kind of a strange child. My parents knew early on something must be wrong with me. I crawled backwards until I was years old, but I had Kennedy’s inaugural address memorized by the time I was six. It all began when my mother didn’t show up with my first birthday party because she was having my sister. My dad tried to cheer me up by letting me eat the whole cake. I knew then there had been warned to life than this.

AMY GOODMAN: That was Michael Moore in his award winning 1989 documentary, Roger & Me. Well, today he’s one of the world’s most acclaimed and notorious independant film-makers and rabble-rousers. On Monday night, Michael visited the Occupy Wall Street protest in lower Manhattan. Police have barred the protesters from using any form of public address system at the encampment, so the crowd amplified Michael’s comments by repeating them in unison.

MICHAEL MOORE: Whatever you do, don’t despair because this is the hard part. You are in the hard part right now.

CROWD: Whatever you do, don’t despair because this is the hard part. You are in the hard part right now.

MICHAEL MOORE: But, everyone will remember,

CROWD: But, everyone will remember,

MICHAEL MOORE: three months from now,

CROWD: three months from now,

MICHAEL MOORE: six months from now,

CROWD: six months from now,

MICHAEL MOORE: 100 years from now,

CROWD: 100 years from now,

MICHAEL MOORE: that you came down to this Plaza,

CROWD: that you came down to this Plaza,

MICHAEL MOORE: and you started this movement.

CROWD: and you started this movement.

AMY GOODMAN: That was Michael Moore addressing the Occupy Wall Street protesters in Lower Manhattan. Well, for the remainder of the hour, we’re delighted to have him here in studio and we won’t be repeating everything you say, Michael, although it is ingenious when you’re not allowed to use a microphone.

MICHAEL MOORE: It’s a little weird at first because it sounds either like your reciting the Rosary and church or that seen in, Life of Brian, where the whole crowd just repeats everything that Brian says. But, the reason they do it is because the police have not allowed them to have an amplification. So, in order for the people to hear in the back, everyone around you just shouts out what you just said so everybody can hear it. I thought it was, actually, kind of an interesting and a workable idea.

AMY GOODMAN: Well we’ve put out to the world that you’re coming in today. Of course, the questions came in on Facebook. We tweeted this and people can tweet back right now. But, when we posted the question on Facebook, "What you want to ask Michael Moore?", Tausif Khan wrote, "What do you think is the next step the protesters need to take to get Washington and Wall Street to listen and to make real change?"