Lightning rod: Speaking at the first annual Paul Wellstone Memorial Dinner, filmmaker Michael Moore returned fire against a recent attack by the Bush White House – and helpfully provided fodder to his critics by confessing to associations with groups accused of scandalous, even murderous, behavior.

The White House recently attempted to smear Rep. Jack Murtha, a decorated Vietnam vet, by comparing Murtha’s proposal to withdraw from Iraq to Moore’s position. The smear didn’t stick, Moore said, because it was misdirected:

If they really wanted the American people to hate Congressman Murtha they should have compared him to Scooter Libby. Put that name in there. Then people would dislike him. Put Karl Rove’s name in there. Put Dick Cheney’s name in there.

Another reason the smear failed, Moore said, was the fact that a “majority of the people agree with me now” that the war should be ended. He then stated his position on withdrawing from Iraq, which is not substantively dissimilar to Murtha’s – and is in line with about two-thirds of Americans, according the latest polls:

The troops need to come home, and they need to come home as soon as possible. People say, “We can’t do that because it’s just going to fall into chaos there.” HELLO!? What is there? The CIA’s own report says there’s goiing to be civil war in Iraq whether we stay or whether we go. There’s no way to prevent it. Sadly, that’s the truth.

So why should one more American have to die?

Moore chided his critcs for misstatements about him in the media, deliberate and otherwise – and even offered to write a tell-all about his faults that would set the record straight on what a “flawed individual” he really is:

[My critics] always get it wrong … and I’m thinking, God, there’s so much wrong about me, why would [they] need to make it up? I just want to help them [s0 here are] all the things about me that need to be revealed:

For instance, I belong to an organization and attend its weekly gatherings. An organization that has participated in the cover up of abuse: That’s the Catholic Church.

I am a Catholic. (Laughter. Smattering of applause.) The reporters are running out of the room now.

I once went to an institution that was a defense contractor – the University of Michigan. A defense contractor. So I participated in that.

And I have given a lot of money to a cartel that has killed more Americans than all the tobacco companies combined: the McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken cartel of mass murder. (Laughter.)

Now you know the awful truth about me.