heyang said:
As much as I don't like Bush, I don't think it's in good taste to fake the assasination of a real person. It's not about him, but how it would feel if I was Laura Bush, George & Barbara Bush or one of his kids.
I would feel the same if Bush were an orphan. For me, the most important thing is that films like this encourage the idea that assassination is a legitimate way to get rid of a president whom you think is disastrous. We had not only the assassination of JFK, it was followed in quick succession by the assassination of RFK, MLK and the 2 attempted assassinations of Ford and the attempted assassination of Reagan. I always felt there was a 'copycat' theme going on there, tying into as high levels of political polarization at the time. The idea for me in democracy is that you vote out people you disagree with, not wipe them out.
Toni, The reason I didn't like the PT/911 film is that I was following current events closely during the whole time the film discusses. Anyone who watched the news remembers that every time Clinton tried to do something about terrorism that became generally visible, there would be a large group of congresspeople and senators on the air claiming that Clinton was 'wagging the dog' and that this terrorism thing was just a distraction and a red herring. So to me, it looked like Clinton was interested in curbing terrorism and Congress was not. And curbing terrorism is hard to do for any president if he is not getting cooperation from Congress.
Also, I read Richard Clarke's book...and while he felt there were some things Clinton could have done better, he was very serious and focussed about terrorism. And Clarke should know, he was there for all of it. Finally, as Ptichka said, the whole business about we could have gotten Osama in 1993 is just made up garbage, in many many ways. The whole Albright/Berger business was a complete libel, although US libel laws are very loose if you are a public person.
Also ABC originally claimed the 'docudrama' was based on the 911 commission report, which it wasn't, because the report laid things out about as I have represented them.
They may be sued by American Airlines for inaccuracies about them, too.
I would not be surprised if they were sued by either or all of Albright, Berger or Clinton as well, especially as the film was aired in New Zealand and the UK which have much lower standards for libel for public people.
So it was kind of a mess.