# 2016: Obama's America - What payola mechanism got this in theaters? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [September 7, 2012, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038 "2012-09-07T21:23:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/21 "2012-09-08T14:46:13Z")
It is also being released during the slowest time of the year for movie releases. All of the summer blockbusters have been released, kids are headed back to school, and it is a bit too early to release the potential Oscar films. The multiplexes have to find something to show, so this garbage gets a couple of weeks in theaters. ---
**Author:** ![Ca3799](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9f8e36/32.png) [@Ca3799](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ca3799)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/22 "2012-09-08T15:06:23Z")
My righty coworker is pushing this heavily at work, encouraging the non-political folks to go see it. I believe Dinesh D’souza has written some kind of anti-Obama book “(Obama’s Rage”? or some such) and some articles as well. I have not seen the rage (in Obama), myself. He seems pretty mellow to me. I only know a little about D’Souza and saw a clip of him with Bill Mahr that was not very impressive. D’Souza never met Obama and claims to know of his point of view intimately by reading Obama’s book “Dreams From My Father”. D’Souza thinks it’s of paramount importance that Obama wrote the title with the word “From” and not the word “Of”, and that indicates Obama wants to institute his father’s (not sure what) agenda. How D’Souza ‘knows’ all this is a mystery to me. Obama only met his dad once as a kid. I find it hard to believe he was of much influence to his son. Also, my righty coworker goes on and on about “Obama’s anti-colonial worldview.” I still don’t know what she and D’Souza mean by that. It just sounds stupid to me. ---
**Author:** ![Peanut\_Gallery](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/838e76/32.png) [@Peanut\_Gallery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peanut_Gallery)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/23 "2012-09-08T16:20:34Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > [The American Conservative’s takedown of the article that gave rise to the film.](http://www.theamericanconservative.com/larison/obama-anticolonial-hegemonist/) Thanks for that. Since I won’t be seeing the movie, I went ahead and read both D’Souza’s original Forbes article and the criticism. D’Souza is one paranoid, scatterbrained dude. He offers his hypothesis, and then just pulls out any random thing he can think of to ‘prove’ it, however unconnected to his idea. Taxes are too high on the rich! ground zero mosque! Obama’s book title uses From, not Of! Scotland released the Lockerbie bomber! And my favorite part: “A few months ago nasa (sic) Chief Charles Bolden announced that from now on the primary mission of America’s space agency would be to improve relations with the Muslim world.” See. Obama hates America. QED. (What Bolden actually said is in the first two minutes of [this interview](http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/talktojazeera/2010/07/201071122234471970.html)) ---
**Author:** ![Non\_Lawyer\_Paid\_Spokesentity](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Non\_Lawyer\_Paid\_Spokesentity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Non_Lawyer_Paid_Spokesentity)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/24 "2012-09-08T21:32:16Z")
> [@An\_Arky](#): > > I’m not the least bit surprised that there are people out there who’ll gobble it up; and that’s not my point. My point is that there’s no more demand for it here in Arlington, VA than there would be for a homoerotic art flick in small town Utah, and that I suspect there are other factors in play, perhaps. Wow, you really know absolutely **nothing** about where you live, do you?:dubious: A suburb of our nations capital where then entire economy revolves around politics, in state Virginia with one of the most conservative governors in the United States, so of course an movie about Obama be it pro or con would have absolutely _zero_ appeal in Arlington. Right, you keep on thinking that way.:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/25 "2012-09-08T22:11:53Z")
> [@An\_Arky](#): > > Did you bother to look at the credits for Fahrenheit 9/11? Moore wrote, directed and starred in it, duh back at you. As TimeWinder stated, Molen is a producer (semi-retired); a money guy, with a hard-on for Obama, apparently. You’re retort is that it isn’t exactly like MM’s films? BFD. It’s not like Dinesh D’Souza is some unknown-- he’s written several books on the NYT Best Seller’s list. You’ve got a well known author and political commentator teamed up with a producer with this filmography: **Filmography** \*batteries not included (1987) (associate producer) Rain Man (1988) (co-producer) Days of Thunder (1990) (executive producer) Hook (1991) (producer) Schindler’s List (1993) (producer) Jurassic Park (1993) (producer) The Flintstones (1994) (executive producer) Casper (1995) (executive producer) The Trigger Effect (1996) (executive producer) Twister (1996) (executive producer) The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) (producer) The Other Side of Heaven (2001) (producer) Minority Report (2002) (producer) The Legend of Johnny Lingo (2003) (producer) Beyond the Blackboard (2011) (executive producer) A veritable nobody. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Arky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/26 "2012-09-08T22:30:08Z")
> [@Non\_Lawyer\_Paid\_Spokesentity](#): > > Wow, you really know absolutely **nothing** about where you live, do you?:dubious: A suburb of our nations capital where then entire economy revolves around politics, in state Virginia with one of the most conservative governors in the United States, so of course an movie about Obama be it pro or con would have absolutely _zero_ appeal in Arlington. > > Right, you keep on thinking that way.:rolleyes: That is the most laughable post I’ve seen in at least a couple of weeks. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Arky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/27 "2012-09-08T22:31:20Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > You’re retort is that it isn’t exactly like MM’s films? BFD. It’s not like Dinesh D’Souza is some unknown-- he’s written several books on the NYT Best Seller’s list. > > You’ve got a well known author and political commentator teamed up with a producer with this filmography: > > **Filmography** > > \*batteries not included (1987) (associate producer) > Rain Man (1988) (co-producer) > Days of Thunder (1990) (executive producer) > Hook (1991) (producer) > Schindler’s List (1993) (producer) > Jurassic Park (1993) (producer) > The Flintstones (1994) (executive producer) > Casper (1995) (executive producer) > The Trigger Effect (1996) (executive producer) > Twister (1996) (executive producer) > The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) (producer) > The Other Side of Heaven (2001) (producer) > Minority Report (2002) (producer) > The Legend of Johnny Lingo (2003) (producer) > Beyond the Blackboard (2011) (executive producer) > > A veritable nobody. Oh, wait, I spoke too soon. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Arky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/28 "2012-09-08T22:42:59Z")
Anyway, I think the “slow movie week” explanation is at least logical. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2012, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/29 "2012-09-08T23:04:31Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > You’re retort is that it isn’t exactly like MM’s films? BFD. It’s not like Dinesh D’Souza is some unknown-- he’s written several books on the NYT Best Seller’s list. :rolleyes: [ > [@](#): > > **Barack Obama** > At one point, D’Souza was supportive of Obama, saying that Obama “…makes his claims on the merits, and he appeals to shared American ideals,” while contrasting him with people like Jesse Jackson. This was while trying desperately to justify his twisted views on racism, as he used the fact that a black man had been elected president to assert that racism was dead.[11] > > He then hopped on the “Obama is un-American” bandwagon, claiming that Obama is an anti-colonialist who wants to suck America dry and distribute the spoils among Third World nations.[14] His argument is as follows: Obama’s father was an anti-colonialist, and one of Obama’s books is titled Dreams From My Father, so he must be carrying on his old man’s alleged agenda and wishing for the swift demise of America’s empire.[15] Obama’s hatred towards the country he leads is clearly indicated by his failure to spend the first 17 years of his life there (Hawaii doesn’t count). This is in stark contrast to D’Souza’s own upbringing, whose all-American identity was forged by spending the first 17 years of his life in America’s heartland of Mumbai, India. > > His evidence for this unorthodox theory consists of a few choice quotes from both Obamas and already-debunked myths, such as an alleged support of Brazilian offshore drilling with US taxpayer money.[16] Why Obama would take his father’s understandable opposition to British rule over his country (not to mention that the US had some issues with British colonialism itself) and turn it into an anti-American doctrine remains a mystery.[17] > > In yet another case of a broken record spinning completely out of control, D’Souza insisted on making a movie about this (non-)issue entitled 2016: Obama’s America. Predictably, the biggest critical booster of the film is WND.[18] More recently, he claimed that Obama was sympathetic to Muslim jihadis and other terrorists because his mother “wanted to marry a Third World anti-American guy,” among other things.[19] D’Souza’s production of pseudo-psychological crap on this subject is unequaled. > > **Debating tactics** > 1.D’Souza has an aggressive and rhetorical speaking and debating style, which makes him sound forceful and convincing. He uses the Gish Gallop frequently and effectively, rebuffing his opponent for not addressing every point he makes. > 2.He frequently employs caricatures and strawmen of atheist positions. He presents these positions so as to make them sound whimsical or silly, while presenting his own statements with an air of utmost gravity, no matter how lunatic or far-fetched they may be. > 3.He is a big fan of quote mining. Not content with simply taking his opponent’s statements out of context, he will take a quote about a topic completely unrelated to the one under discussion and re-frame it to make it sound as if his opponent is uninformed or delusional. > 4.A main weapon in his debating arsenal is the emotional appeal, where he paint his opponent’s position as false because some of its implications may be distasteful to certain members of the audience. > 5.He enjoys painting his opponents as vicious critics of innocuous policies and events, and himself as a paragon of intellectual virtue. While not going as far as character assassination (at least not in a face-to-face debate), he does subtly attack the character of his opponent. > 6.He often says that an assertion by his opponent, or even the opponent’s entire position, is invalid because it is not intuitively or obviously true. He paints this as a “common sense” argument, where he calls upon the audience to evaluate an assertion using their own intuition. In reality, this is a denial of the obvious fact that many things are counterintuitive and require expertise beyond the experience of the average person (but don’t take our word for it; ask your neighbor about quantum mechanics or the economics of sub-Saharan Africa). This is a particularly effective tactic, as it shifts audience opinion to his side. > 7.Thanks to his wide repertoire of tactics, he rarely is forced to allow a point by his opponent to pass unchallenged. This projects the illusion of competence, whereas most of his rebuttals are intellectually dishonest and completely invalid. > 8.When all else fails, he will spout outright lies and half truths, pulling facts and statistics out of thin air to give his argument some credibility. This amounts to an argument from authority, which he seems to derive from his public “reputation” as a political commentator, academic and writer. > 9.Lately, he appears to carry around a sizable library of books to debates, frequently flashing them at his opponent and at the audience, while stating that they completely prove his own, or disprove his opponent’s points. These are usually self published works by fringe lunatics (which are not worth the toilet paper they are printed on). This is argument from authority on steroids, since no one except him has read the book. Therefore, his opponent cannot call him out on it, and is forced to let the point go without comment. > > **Notable quote** > “Science hasn’t given us anything and it shows no promise of giving us anything in the future,” he said while speaking into a microphone, wearing glasses and standing in front of a large LED screen.[20] And most of his “books” were published by [url=[Regnery Publishing - RationalWiki](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Regnery_Publishing)]Regnery,](]No, you’re right, he’s not unknown.[/url) 'nuff said and less said the better. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2012, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/30 "2012-09-13T17:41:09Z")
The Wikipedia page kind of makes it sound like D’Souza is trying to become POTUS by hopping on Obama’s coattails. “Look how alike we are!” ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2012, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/31 "2012-09-14T19:47:33Z")
> [@An\_Arky](#): > > My point is that there’s no more demand for it here in Arlington, VA than there would be for a homoerotic art flick in small town Utah, and that I suspect there are other factors in play, perhaps. I don’t know about that. I went to see Batman in Rockville MD, a few weeks ago, and (much to my dismay) saw at least 3 couples get tickets for Obama 2016, out of about 30 people in line. They were easy to pick out, since they were all over 65. So it would not surprise me that there were enough right wingers in other communities to make it worth while screening it. The thing to remember about this and other movies that are aimed at the political/religious groups, is that people go not necessarily for their own enjoyment but because they want to show solidarity with the cause, and watching the movie becomes a moral act. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2012, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/32 "2012-09-14T19:52:40Z")
> [@Buck\_Godot](#): > > The thing to remember about this and other movies that are aimed at the political/religious groups, is that people go not necessarily for their own enjoyment but because they want to show solidarity with the cause, and watching the movie becomes a moral act. Just like people will buy Ann Coulter’s latest book without having any intention of actually reading that piece of crap. ---
**Author:** ![Shark\_Sandwich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f04885/32.png) [@Shark\_Sandwich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shark_Sandwich)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2012, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/33 "2012-09-14T20:07:40Z")
[slight hijack] Don’t know if anyone’s interested, but D’Souza will be debating Chris Hedges on Uprising Radio on the 18th. Article [here.](http://uprisingradio.org/home/2012/09/14/uprising-hosts-debate-on-0918-chris-hedges-vs-dinesh-dsouza/) [/slight hijack] ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2012, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/34 "2012-09-14T21:30:35Z")
> [@Shark\_Sandwich](#): > > [slight hijack] > > Don’t know if anyone’s interested, but D’Souza will be debating Chris Hedges on Uprising Radio on the 18th. > > Article [here.](http://uprisingradio.org/home/2012/09/14/uprising-hosts-debate-on-0918-chris-hedges-vs-dinesh-dsouza/) > > [/slight hijack] That sounds like Bambi vs. Godzilla. (And D’Souza ain’t Godzilla.) ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2012, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/35 "2012-09-14T22:18:00Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > :rolleyes: [url=]No, you’re right, he’s not unknown. Er, what kind of a link is this? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2012, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/36 "2012-09-14T23:07:25Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Er, what kind of a link is this? Sorry, [try it now.](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Dinesh_D%27Souza) ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2012, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038/37 "2012-09-15T09:08:22Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > That sounds like Bambi vs. Godzilla. (And D’Souza ain’t Godzilla.) D’Souza is no pushover either. In my (very biased) estimation, the one debate Christopher Hitchens noticeably lost was to D’Souza, since D’Souza nailed Hitchens on the Soviet Union. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-obamas-america-what-payola-mechanism-got-this-in-theaters/634038.md?page=1)