Bowling for Columbine

The film explores what Moore suggests are the causes for the Columbine High School massacre and other acts of violence with guns. Moore focuses on the background and environment in which the massacre took place, and some common public opinions and assumptions about related issues. The film looks into the nature of violence in the United States, focusing on guns as a symbol of both American freedom and its self-destruction.

In Moore's discussions with various people, including South Park co-creator Matt Stone, the National Rifle Association's then-president Charlton Heston, and musician Marilyn Manson, he seeks to explain why the Columbine massacre occurred and why the United States has a higher number of violent crimes, especially crimes involving guns and charges that the occurrence of violent crimes in the US is relatively higher than other developed nations.

Weapons of mass destruction
Early in the movie Moore links the violent behavior of the Columbine shooters to the presence in Littleton of a large defense establishment, manufacturing rocket technology. It is implied that the presence of this facility within the community, and the acceptance of institutionalized violence as a solution to conflict - be it real, implied or potential - contributed to the mindset that led to the massacre.

Moore conducts an interview with Evan McCollum, Director of Communications at a Lockheed Martin plant near Columbine, and asked him
"So you don't think our kids say to themselves, 'Dad goes off to the factory every day, he builds missiles of mass destruction. What's the difference between that mass destruction and the mass destruction over at Columbine High School?'"
McCollum responded:

"I guess I don't see that specific connection because the missiles that you're talking about were built and designed to defend us from somebody else who would be aggressors against us."

"What a Wonderful World"
The movie then cuts to a montage of American foreign policy decisions, with the intent to contradict McCollum's statement, and cite examples of how the United States has, in Moore's view, frequently been the aggressor nation (set to the song "What a Wonderful World" performed by Louis Armstrong).

The following is an exact transcript of the onscreen text in the Wonderful World segment:
1953: U.S. overthrows Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq of Iran. U.S. installs Shah as dictator.
1954: U.S. overthrows democratically-elected President Arbenz of Guatemala. 200,000 civilians killed.
1963: U.S. backs assassination of South Vietnamese President Diem.
1963-1975: American military kills 4 million people in Southeast Asia.
September 11, 1973: U.S. stages coup in Chile. Democratically-elected President Salvador Allende assassinated. Dictator Augusto Pinochet installed. 5,000 Chileans murdered.
1977: U.S. backs military rulers of El Salvador. 70,000 Salvadorans and four American nuns killed.
1980s: U.S. trains Osama bin Laden and fellow terrorists to kill Soviets. CIA gives them $3 billion.
1981: Reagan administration trains and funds "contras." 30,000 Nicaraguans die.
1982: U.S. provides billions of dollars in aid to Saddam Hussein for weapons to kill Iranians.
1983: The White House secretly gives Iran weapons to kill Iraqis.
1989: CIA agent Manuel Noriega (also serving as President of Panama) disobeys orders from Washington. U.S. invades Panama and removes Noriega. 3,000 Panamanian civilian casualties.
1990: Iraq invades Kuwait with weapons from U.S.
1991: U.S. enters Iraq. Bush reinstates dictator of Kuwait.
1998: Clinton bombs "weapons factory" in Sudan. Factory turns out to be making aspirin.
1991 to present: American planes bomb Iraq on a weekly basis. U.N. estimates 500,000 Iraqi children die from bombing and sanctions.
2000-2001: U.S. gives Taliban-ruled Afghanistan $245 million in "aid."
Sept. 11, 2001: Osama bin Laden uses his expert CIA training to murder 3,000 people.

On the website accompanying the film, Moore provides additional background information.[4]