I thought we’d seen the nadir of knee-jerk anti-Americanism when Rose McGowan freaked out and begged Iran, “Please don’t kill us.” But it appears Michael Moore took that as inspiration to up his game. Today he posted this tweet in Farsi which is directed at Ayatollah Khamenei:

آقا ،
با ابراز تأسف عمیق از اقدامات خشونت آمیز به نام ما توسط مردی که اکثریت آمریکایی ها هرگز به آن رأی نداده اند ، من می خواهم که شما با خشونت جواب ندهید بلکه در عوض شجاعانه عمل کنید و به ما ، مردم آمریکا اجازه دهید از قدرت خودداری کنید. مردی

خالصانه
مایکل مور
شهروند امریکایی

— Michael Moore (@MMFlint) January 7, 2020

Google translate renders this as “Sir, I deeply regret the violence on our behalf by a man that most Americans have never voted for. Avoid power. A sincere man, Michael Moore, an American citizen.” Maybe the translation is off but Yashar Ali suggests the tweet was poorly written in Persian to begin with:

If you want to truly appeal to the Supreme Leader — which is impossible because he is deeply mistrustful of Westerners — I would start by having a native speaker/professional translator handle your translations. This is poorly written. https://t.co/Dl2yMXEmmk

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) January 7, 2020

I have to include this response to Ali’s tweet just because it made me laugh.

I don't think anyone can actually drag him.

— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) January 7, 2020

In any case, Moore has been putting out tweets about Soleimani for several days, starting with this:

Hello fellow Americans. Do you know this man? Did you know he was your enemy? What? Never heard of him? By the end of today you will be trained to hate him. You will be glad Trump had him assassinated. You will do as you are told. Get ready to send your sons &daughters off 2 war pic.twitter.com/8CprNDMgTf

— Michael Moore (@MMFlint) January 3, 2020

This is a disgusting tweet, which presents ignorance as proof of innocence. Most Americans can’t name a single member of the Supreme Court. That doesn’t mean the Supreme Court is insignificant or has nothing to do with their lives. Soleimani has been in charge of the Quds Force for 20 years and was leading Iranian attempts to kill American soldiers in Iraq through the use of roadside bombs known as EFPs. Those efforts killed several hundred Americans and wounded many hundreds more. That’s in addition to his more recent work murdering unarmed civilians in Iraq and Iran and even more recently staging the attack on the US Embassy in Iraq. To present a picture of Soleimani smiling and suggest he’s no one Americans should know or care about is repulsive, but not surprising for Michael Moore.

Moore also release a podcast which he said was a direct appeal to the Ayatollah:

I have just sent the Ayatollah of Iran a personal appeal asking him not to respond to our assassination of his top General with violence of any kind, but rather let me & millions of Americans fix this peacefully.

Apple:https://t.co/yQ7JTAHqw8

Spotify:https://t.co/a9vUxmWc50

— Michael Moore (@MMFlint) January 5, 2020

You can listen to it here if you feel inclined. The sycophantic tone of it would make Grima Wormtongue blush. But I think Moore probably lost the Ayatollah’s attention about 5 minutes in when he gently explained why theocracy is a bad idea and doesn’t work.

Clearly none of this is meant for the Ayatollah so much as for Moore’s fans. He does political stunts for a living and that’s what this is. There’s clearly a big market for this sort of thing so he’ll keep selling his wares. Still, it’s amazing that he’d rather cozy up to a theocratic dictator and the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism than an American President. It’s a long way to go to own the cons.