Opinion ID: 203199
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Documentary

Text: While Damon consented to the NBC interview and subsequent broadcast, he neither consented to the use of the interview in another broadcast, nor was he ever advised that Appellees were considering using his interview for anything other than the original broadcast. Notwithstanding, Moore was allowed to place Damon in the documentary. The allegedly defamatory portion of the documentary contains the following statement: Moore: While Bush was busy taking care of his base and professing his love for our troops, he proposed cutting combat soldiers' pay by 33% and assistance to their families by 60%. He opposed giving veterans a billion dollars more in health care benefits, and he supported closing veterans hospitals. He tried to double the prescription drug costs for veterans and opposed full benefits for part-time reservists. And when Staff Sargent Brett Petriken from Flint was killed in Iraq on May 26th, the Army sent his last paycheck to his family, but they docked him for the last five days of the month that he didn't work because he was dead. Rep. McDermott: They say they're not gonna leave any veteran behind, but they're leaving all kinds of veterans behind.    (Video of Walter Reed Hospital) Veteran (in wheelchair) To say that we're forgottenI know we're not forgotten. But missed? Yes. Yes, you know there's a lot of soldiers that have been missed, you know, they've been skipped over. Um, that didn't get the proper coverage that they deserve. Veteran: They have the death toll but they're not showing the amount of people that have been injured and been amputated because of the injuries, you know. Subtitle: (Nearly 5,000 soldiers wounded in the first 13 months of the war.) Damon: Like I still feel like I have hands. Voice: Yeah. Damon: And the pain is like my hands are being crushed in a vice. But they do a lot to help it. And they take a lot of the edge off of it. And it makesmakes it a lot more tolerable. According to Damon, the documentary was an attack upon the integrity of the Commander-in-Chief and the war effort, and it denounced the United States' military action in Iraq by, among other things, attacking the credibility of the Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces about the justification for the war, its cost and consequences. . . . Accordingly, Damon alleges that his unwitting appearance in the documentary falsely portrays himand has been interpreted by members of the military and veteran communities as sharing, adopting and endorsing Moore's attack on the President and the war effort.