Sicko Smackdown

Now here’s a review of Sicko that isn’t some fawning sycophantic nonsense like so many others. It actually points out how, again, Michael Moore makes over generalizations and huge leaps of logic. Example:

A large part of the film is taken up with Moore showing how wonderful everything is in France and how much in love with the government all the French are, including some expatriate Americans living there. Poor Michael. How could he know that shortly after wrapping his film, the French would throw the Government out in an unprecedented repudiation of how things are going and in a landslide replace the leftwing Socialist government of the corrupt Jacques Chirac with the much more conservative Nicolas Sarkozy who will institute policies that will be anathema to Michael. Too late to recut the movie, so Michael is stuck with about 40 minutes, the heart of the film, of Frenchie after Frenchie telling about how much they love the government that’s no longer in power and how sorry they feel for the poor Americans who have to live under a government that is much like the one the vast majority of Frenchies just installed.

This is not to say I don’t think he makes some good points in the film. The American health care system has a lot of serious flaws. But most of them stem from the very things Michael Moore endorses. Over regulation and socialized policies. All the socialized medicine countries he cites have failing, and collapsing systems. He equates the show hospital in Cuba with what the average Cuban gets. If its so great there, why are people constantly risking their livesto escape. In fact, why can’t they just leave if they want to? Answer: It’s a totalitarian dictatorship.

Saddam had socialized medicine, too. If he were still in power I wonder if Moore wouldn’t have visited Iraq, also. The fact is, we improved the hospital since we’ve been there. They were in horrible shape under Saddam. Even though the oil for food embargo did not include medical supplies.

Here’s another:

“Sicko" is meant to be an indictment of America’s capitalistic health industry. While we do hear some insurance company horror stories, Moore spends a great deal of screen time strolling Paris and London describing how much better those countries treat their citizens. (If France is so perfect, why are there so many student protests?) It’s amusing to hear Moore talk about great dental coverage in England, given all the stereotypes about big British smiles.

Hmmm - I actually think you are getting a things wrong about the movie ... Now, I’m not saying that Moore has made a right and objective movie about the healthcaresystems around the world, anyone with half a brain can see that that he hasn’t. Having lived in france in my youth, I can tell you that what he calls an “avarage home” is much more like a way-above avarage home. But if you look beyound that, and focus on the point of the film, it’s true what he says ... if you get sick in France, the country takes care of you. You don’t have to worry about the costs of anything ... wouldn’t YOU like that?

And I also think you misunderstod the thing about “the people loving their government”. That’s not what he says ... he says that they love their healthcaresystem, and if they think they are being poorly treated, they protest!

Same goes with your comment on Cuba. Why do people try to escape? Because it’s a dictatorship, of course!!! But the fact is (I suppose, I didn’t know that before this movie) that they have a great healthcare system. Does that mean I would want to live there? HELL NO !!! But again, that’s not the point of the movie ... Moore is not trying to show that Cuba is a better place to live than America - he is trying to show that they have a better healthcare system!!!
And you can’t really deny that…

Posted by  on  06/27  at  12:26 AM

We’ll leave France out of it because I don’t have a lot of info on the French system at teh moment. But Cuba’s is anything but good. The hospital he shows in the film is nothing more than a place foreigners and elites go. It does not represent teh true face of Cuba’s health care.

http://publiuspundit.com/2007/04/michael_moore_a_big_fat_sicko.php

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/FredThompson/2007/05/03/the_myth_of_cuban_health_care

http://www.canf.org/Issues/medicalapartheid.htm

Posted by  on  06/27  at  01:31 AM

“It does not represent teh true face of Cuba’s health care.”

How do you know? Now, I don’t know if that whole Cuba-thing is true or not - but what makes you so sure that you are right?
I read those three links you posted, and they are nothing more than “opinions” by likeminded… it’s not “facts”.
It’s like finding a blog that advocates the same belifes you have, and using that as referrence.

Posted by  on  06/27  at  04:07 AM

I could ask you the same question. Moreover, I’d love to hear you explain to me how a country so poor and dysfunctional as Cuba could have great medical facilities. Or explain why Castro had to get a doctor from Spain to take care of him the last time he was ill.

One of those links is an ex-patriat Cuban organization. Since they lived there, I’d say they have more credibility than Michael Moore who went there looking to find exactly what Castro showed them.

Hey, I provided cites with pictures. And let’s face some facts, Moores movies, all of them, are rife with blatant lies and misdirection.

Here’s an article by fairly left wing MSNBC. When you read down you get this:

While Moore got free care in Cuba, most foreigners pay, in what some critics call a “two-tiered system” where elite hospitals are reserved for the Communist leadership and celebrities such as Argentine soccer idol Diego Maradona.

“In Cuba, the elite hospitals are as good as here, if not better,” said Leonel Cordova, a Cuban doctor who works as a emergency room physician at Miami’s Baptist Hospital.

“The hospitals dedicated to the health of regular citizens are a disaster,” said Cordova, who was sent to work in Zimbabwe and defected in 2000. At these hospitals, Cubans bring personal items such as towels, bed sheets, soap and even food, he said.

More here:
http://www.therealcuba.com/Page10.htm

I spent time in Russia and I have talked to many people from former Soviet states and they all tell a similar tale about their health care system. There’s no reason why Cuba would be any different, except one. Cuba does work on prevention. That’s their big advantage.

Now, I know we have a lot of problems with our system. Tons, in fact, but having lived in England, another country he praises, I remember all the almost nightly horror stories about the National Health service (which has not improved, but worsened according to many of the people I know who live there). And Canada, which he praises has huge problems with its system.

I also am a veteran so I’ve got a lot of my medical treatment from the VA, and we all know how F’ed up that can be. I know full well about relying on the govt for health care.

Socialized medicine isn’t the answer. Because governments can’t do anything right.

Posted by James Hudnall  on  06/27  at  09:36 AM

“I could ask you the same question”
I’m not claiming to have ANY answers at all ... I’m just questioning some things. That’s what I like to do

“why Castro had to get a doctor from Spain to take care of him the last time he was ill”
Being a millionair I don’t blame the guy for wanting the best damn doctor money can buy ... and Moore dosn’t claime that Cuban has the best doctors, but that “everybody” is taken care of. Two different things.

“Socialized medicine isn’t the answer. Because governments can’t do anything right.”
Well ... I guess this really is the heart of the matter, isn’t it?! I belive you are right about the point that governments “can’t do anything right” (more or less, anyway) - but that is not to say that “socialized medicine” isn’t a good thing. It “just” has to be handled right ... and not by the corrupt people we have in power today.

Posted by  on  06/27  at  12:52 PM

And another thing ...

I see it as a clear and typical righty-propaganda to draw attention away from what this movie is all about - the corrupt and moneyhungry insurance- and pharmaceuticalbusiness.

And how are they doing that? By running around and crying about how he dares compare us to a thirdworld country like Cuba. Jesus, get over it ... it’s not the point.

Honestly, I wish he had never started comparing US to other countries ... because that’s all the righties can concentrate on now, and it ruins the general story the man is trying to tell.

Posted by  on  06/27  at  01:11 PM

Well, we agree on that. The insurance companies and pharm cos are really corrupt. The pharm companies do things that equate to payola with drugs and doctors. But drugs can kill or seriously inure people, unlike pop songs (with the exception of some lame groups). And insurance companies are one of the biggest rip offs ever. I have had several that try to get out of paying for the limited things they cover. Lucky for me, my last insurance company was a place a friend worked at as a supervisor, so they responded very quickly to everything.

The problem with socialism isn’t the idea, that sounds perfectly reasonable, which is why a lot of people buy into ity. The problem is, it doesn’t work in practice because power corrupts and socialism is about empowering bureaucrats.

Bureaucrats, in general, the last people you want making decisions for you or having power over your lives. Socialism is all about bureaucracy.

Moore made one of his best films with Sicko, but he ruins it, as you say, by going for these sloppy comparison arguments. They are mostly sophomoric.

Posted by James Hudnall  on  06/27  at  01:53 PM
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