Michael Moore is a popular American documentary filmmaker and book author, best known for his outspoken views on politics in the United States and for his trademark baseball cap. Michael Moore is generally viewed as an "everyman" type who likes to confront serious issues including gun control, outsourcing, and 9/11, often in humorous and creative ways.
Born in Flint, Michigan, Michael Moore was the child of a blue-collar family, with a father who built cars for General Motors in Detroit. Moore briefly attended college in Flint, but dropped out and created an alternative newsweekly magazine, where he could share his political views. From there Michael Moore became the editor of the liberal Mother Jones Magazine in California.
Since 1989, Michael Moore has directed numerous movies, starting with Roger & Me, which is a scathing critique of the globalization phenomenon. His most famous films, however, are the 2002 documentary Bowling for Columbine, which deals with the Columbine school massacre and the issue of gun control in the United States, and Fahrenheit 9/11, which deals with President George W. Bush's reaction to the September 11 attacks and his ties to Osama Bin Ladin. The film is the highest grossing documentary of all time, with more than $200 million US Dollars (USD) in worldwide revenue.
Michael Moore has also hosted several short-lived television shows, including TV Nation, which was first aired on NBC, and then on Fox, and served as a controversial news show, and The Awful Truth, which parodied corporations and public officials, and was shown on Channel 4 in Great Britain and on the Bravo Network in the United States.
Michael Moore has also achieved great success as an author. His books typically also deal with criticisms of American politicians and their policies. His most popular book, Dude, Where's My Country?, released in 2003, explored the Bush family's ties to Saudi Arabian royalty and to the oil industry.
In America and throughout the world, Michael Moore is both loved and reviled. He has been listed as an "enemy of America" on many lists by right-wing Republicans, but he is considered one of the country's foremost spokespeople by many liberal progressives.
