John McCain: Would Michael Moore Prefer 'Hand-to-Hand Combat?'
Thursday, 29 Jan 2015 07:31 AM
By Sandy Fitzgerald
Filmmaker Michael Moore's comments on military snipers earlier this month were "idiotic" and "insulting," Sen. John McCain said Wednesday, adding that the documentary maker's series of statements on the issue almost don't deserve a response.
"Sometimes when I hear an idiotic statement like that from someone like Michael Moore, I don't want to dignify it with a response because it's so outrageous," the Arizona Republican, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee chairman, said in an interview with CNBC's "Squawk Box."
Earlier this month, just after the movie "American Sniper" was released in theaters, Moore tweeted that a sniper killed his uncle during World War II and "we were taught snipers were cowards," who often shoot their targets in the back and "aren't heroes," a thought McCain ridiculed.
"That's like saying we should not use airplanes, we should not use tanks, we should not use any other weapon. What does he want us to do, go back to hand-to-hand fighting?" McCain said.
Moore's statements, McCain said, were "a great disservice to say that about so many of our young men and women who are serving in the Marines, in the Army, and many of them are scout snipers, so it's almost insulting to them."
With his comments, Moore created controversy timed with the release of the hit movie, directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Bradley Cooper as the late Chris Kyle, the Navy SEAL credited with the most kills in American military history.
On Sunday, Moore took to Facebook to place a lengthy post about how he actually supports the military, firing back at Fox News and at conservatives like Sarah Palin, who at the Iowa Freedom Summit over the weekend posed for a photo with Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer, who held up a sign that read, "F--- you Michael Moore."
But the night before, Moore used his Twitter account to continue his attacks, with a barrage of tweets that included proposals for Sunday school classes that slammed the idea of using snipers in a war zone.
McCain, who admitted on CNBC that he hasn't yet seen "American Sniper," on Monday praised the film, saying Eastwood and his cast were to be congratulated for "an outstanding cinematic achievement," reports The Hill.
"This film depicts with subtlety and compassion those brave few who serve our nation in uniform, their experiences in the horror of war, the burdens they often bear upon returning home, and the untold sacrifices of their families," McCain said in a statement.
"It is deeply regrettable that obsessive critics of U.S. foreign policy have sought to disparage this film and denigrate the memory of a noble American warrior," he wrote.
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On Wednesday, McCain, a veteran who was held as a prisoner during the Vietnam War, praised snipers, saying they "save the lives of others of their comrades because they are able to neutralize or take out an enemy that's been destroying them."
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