and it made me feel kinda sorry for you americans and your lousy healthcare service :confused:

When lardass finally has his heart attack or stroke, it will be American doctors managing his health care, right here in the U.S of A. Bank on it.

When lardass finally has his heart attack or stroke, it will be American doctors managing his health care, right here in the U.S of A. Bank on it.


:lol:

I hope you don't actually believe the garbage Michael Moron puts in his movies! All he does is distort facts. For instance, in that Fahrenheit 7/11 movie (or whatever it's called) there were 59 inaccuracies in it.

Actually, we have the best healthcare (quality of service) in the world.
Thousands of cardiac specialists, for instance.
Emergency room treatment for everyone who walks in whether they can pay for it or not.

I've read that many Canadians come down here for the health service.

Just don't visit Martin Luther King/Drew Medical Center's E.R. in Los Angeles:

LOS ANGELES — New 911 tapes released Tuesday reveal that dispatchers refused to send help to a woman ignored by hospital staff as she lay dying on the floor of a Los Angeles emergency room.

Edith Isabel Rodriguez, 43, died after dispatchers on two 911 calls refused to contact paramedics or an ambulance to send her to another facility, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday. The second dispatcher went so far as to argue with the caller over whether it was a real emergency.

Rodriguez died of a perforated bowel on May 9 at Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital. Her death was ruled accidental by the Los Angeles County coroner's office.

In the calls — posted after they were released by the county Sheriff's Department under the newspaper's California Public Records Act request — callers plead for help for the woman left bleeding from the mouth and writhing in pain for 45 minutes on the hospital's floor.

"I'm in the emergency room. My wife is dying and the nurses don't want to help her out," he said in Spanish through an interpreter.

"What's wrong with her?" a dispatcher asked.

"She's vomiting blood," Prado said.

"OK, and why aren't they helping her?" the dispatcher asked.

"They're watching her there and they're not doing anything. They're just watching her," Prado said.

The dispatcher told the man to contact a doctor and then said paramedics won't pick up his wife because she already was in a hospital. Later, she told Prado to contact county police officers at a security desk.

Experts have said Rodriguez could have survived had she been treated early enough. The head of the county's Department of Health Services, which oversees the facility, has called her death "inexcusable."

A second 911 call was placed eight minutes later by a woman bystander who requested that an ambulance be sent to take Rodriguez to some other hospital for care.

"She's definitely sick and there's a guy that's ignoring her," the woman told a different dispatcher.

During the brief call, the dispatcher argued with the woman over whether there really was an emergency.

"I cannot do anything for you for the quality of the hospital. ... It is not an emergency. It is not an emergency, ma'am," he said.

"You're not here to see how they're treating her," the woman replied.

The dispatcher refused to call paramedics and told the woman that she should contact hospital supervisors "and let them know" if she is unhappy.

"May God strike you, too, for acting the way you just acted," the woman said finally.

"No, negative ma'am, you're the one," he said.

"What's real confusing … was that she was at a medical facility," Sheriff's Capt. Steven M. Roller, who is in charge of the Century Station, which handled the calls, told the Times. "That poses some real quandaries."

Roller told the Times that the second dispatcher's tone was inappropriate.

"As a station commander, I don't like any of my employees getting rude or nasty with any caller, regardless, and in that particular case, obviously, the employee's conduct could have been better," Roller said, telling the Times the employee received written "counseling."

Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital formerly was known as Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center. The name was changed as part of a reorganization after years of problems including patient deaths blamed on sloppy nursing care and hospital mismanagement that has threatened its federal funding.

MOORE'S SICK RX

MICHAEL Moore's new film "Sicko," a critique of the U.S. health-care system and paean to socialized medicine around the world, premiered amid great fanfare at Cannes last month. Time magazine reviewer Richard Corliss rejoiced, "The upside of this populist documentary is that there are no policy wonks crunching numbers."

Wouldn't want anyone messing up Moore's fantasy with . . . facts.

The American health-care system undeniably has serious problems, and Moore effectively dramatizes the suffering of people caught up in them. Yet he often exaggerates those problems. For example, he frequently refers to the 47 million Americans without health insurance, but fails to point out that most are uninsured for only brief periods, or that millions are eligible for programs like Medicaid but fail to apply.

Moreover, he implies that people without insurance don't get health care. In fact, most do. Hospitals are legally obliged to provide care regardless of ability to pay, and while physicians don't face the same requirements, few are willing to deny treatment because a patient lacks insurance.

Treatment for the uninsured may well mean financial hardship, but by and large they do get care.

Moore talks a lot about life expectancy, suggesting that people in Canada, Britain, France and even Cuba live longer than Americans because of their health-care systems. But most experts agree that life expectancies are a poor measure of health care, because they are affected by too many other factors like violent crime, poverty, obesity, tobacco and drug use, and other issues unrelated to a country's health system. Americans in Utah live longer than those in New York City, despite having essentially the same health care.

And when you compare the outcome for specific diseases, like cancer or heart disease, the United States clearly outperforms the rest of the world. When former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi needed heart surgery last year, he didn't go to an Italian hospital or to France, Canada or Cuba. He came to the Cleveland Clinic.

While overly critical of U.S. health care, Moore overlooks the flaws of national health-care systems. He suggests, for example, that Canada's waiting lists are mere inconveniences, interviewing apparently healthy Canadians who claim they have no problem getting care. Yet nearly 800,000 Canadians aren't so lucky. The Canadian Supreme Court has pointed out that many Canadians waiting for treatment suffer chronic pain and, "Patients die while on the waiting list."

Similarly, Moore shows happy Britons who don't have to pay for their prescription drugs. But he didn't talk to any of the 850,000 Britons waiting for admission to National Health Service hospitals. Every year, shortages force the NHS to cancel as many as 50,000 operations. Roughly 40 percent of cancer patients never get to see an oncology specialist.

Delays in getting treatment are often so long that nearly 20 percent of colon-cancer cases considered treatable when first diagnosed are incurable by the time treatment is finally offered. Perhaps Moore could have talked to some of these folks?

Visiting France, Moore waxes ecstatic about the government's willingness to pay for nannies to help care for newborns. He apparently doesn't notice that the taxes necessary to pay for such a system have given France one of the lowest rates of economic growth in Europe or that many of the country's best and brightest are fleeing.

Moore also slides over the facts when he implies that the French system is "free." It's funded through a 13.55 percent payroll tax, a 5.25 percent income tax and other taxes on tobacco, alcohol and drug-company revenues. And the system is still running a $15.6 billion deficit.

And French patients still have to pay high copayments and other out-of-pocket expenses, and physicians can bill patients for charges over and above what the government reimburses. As a result, 92 percent of French citizens have private health insurance to complement the government system. Yet there remain shortages of modern health-care technology and a lack of access to the most advanced care.

America needs to have a serious debate about how to fix our health-care system. But Moore's demagoguery and refusal to address the numbers will do little to contribute to that debate. Maybe he could've used a few policy wonks after all.


NY Post
Michael Tanner is director of health and welfare studies at the Cato Institute.

http://newsbusters.org/node/13169

John's Partner Blasts Michael Moore and 'Sicko'

Maybe Michael Moore should listen to people who actually have socialized medicine—at least those who are allowed to disagree with their government’s policies. Singer Elton John’s partner David Furnish slammed (http://breakingnews.iol.ie/entertainment/story.asp?j=221294288&p=zzyz94994) Michael Moore and his latest docuganda “Sicko” for misrepresenting the quality of the US health care system. On June 02, Furnish stated, ”[America] was the only place to get good treatment”(emphasis mine):

Elton John's partner David Furnish has hit out at filmmaker Michael Moore for criticising the US healthcare system.
The star - who lives in England - insists new movie Sicko is inaccurate, and has praised America's medical services - branding it "the only place to get good treatment".

He says: "I completely disagree with Michael Moore. With my own father, when he was ill, the only option was to hire a jet and fly him to America. It was the only place to get good treatment."

Furnish flew his father, who lives in Canada, to America for the fast, advanced quality care that he does not believe can be had elsewhere.
According to Canadian journalists who saw “Sicko,” Moore gave “lavish praise” Canada’s socialized health care system in comparison to the US, but once Canadian journalists challenged (http://newsbusters.org/node/node/12914) those claims, Moore changed his tune about Canada's medical utopia and began bad-mouthing the country’s program. Although he now criticizes the Canadian system, he still states that it is better than ours, although to “insult” it, he claimed, “The Canadian system…if not that far above us…The French system is the best in the world.”

If Canada is that much better than the US, why would Furnish leave the country? If socialized medicine that better than the free-market system, then why didn’t Furnish take his father to the UK or France for the “best in the world” level of treatment? Instead, he chose the US. It could have even been free of charge in France.

I wonder if Michael Moore will call Sir Elton’s partner a greedy corporate dupe for spreading the capitalist lie that American health care is better than the rest of the world's. Surely, he’ll chastise Furnish for not dutifully waiting in line for months for treatment, even though survivability rates for many diseases (http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZWE3ZTI3Y2I3ZWIyOWU3NDkzZDk1MDgwNzcwNmNhZTU=) like breast cancer (fatal to 46% in UK vs. 25% in US) and prostate cancer (fatal to 57% of Brits, 25% of Canadians and 19% of Americans) are significantly lower in Canada and the UK than in the US.

David Furnish and Elton John are a popular celebrity couple in the UK and Europe. Any time that a celebrity bashes Bush or the US or supports Moore, the media are quick to cover it. Will they cover this celebrity attacking “Sicko” and Michael Moore? So far, not in America, and only minimal coverage in Europe. It is still early, so it is possible.


Update 06/04 06:40 EST:
The UK's the Times apologized for criticizing Furnish for supposedly flying his father to the US on a private jet, which for some reason was an indcation of wrong doing. WENN reported (http://uk.news.yahoo.com/wenn/20070603/ten-newspaper-apologises-for-furnish-cri-c60bd6d.html) that "Furnishes father took a commercial Air Canada flight."

If a son can afford to send his sick father to a hospital on a private jet instead of a crowded plane so he is comfortable, then why should UK'sTimes care? What Furnish was rumored to have done for his father sounded rather compassionate and thoughtful to me, but not everyone feels the same way. A "Sicko" fan in England contacted me to say he agrees with the Times' criticism of Furnish over the "guff" about the private jet. Since the dad actually flew on Air Canada and not on a private jet, the point is moot.

Michael Moore rocks! :rock: It's nice to see someone who tells it like it is.

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_5961927

Lowry: Michael Moore's 'Sicko' rehashes tired leftist propaganda
Salt Lake Tribune

Is all that ails the U.S. health-care system that it's not run by a communist dictatorship? That has long been a premise of apologists for Fidel Castro who extol the virtues of medical care on his totalitarian island nation.

Left-wing documentary filmmaker Michael Moore is reviving this Cold War relic of an argument in his new movie on health care, ''Sicko,'' which premieres in a few weeks and favorably compares the Cuban health-care system to ours. Moore ostentatiously took a few sick 9/11 workers to Cuba for care. ''If they can do this,'' Moore told Time magazine, referring to the Cubans, ''we can do it.''

All that the Cuban government has done, however, is run a decades-long propaganda campaign to convince credulous or dishonest people that its health-care system is worth emulating. These people believe - or pretend to believe for ideological reasons - that a dictatorship can crush a country's economy and spirit, yet still deliver exemplary medical care.

Cuban health care works only for the select few: if you are a high-ranking member of the party or the military and have access to top-notch clinics; or a health-care tourist who can pay in foreign currency at a special facility catering to foreigners; or a documentarian who can be relied upon to produce a lickspittle film whitewashing the system.

Ordinary Cubans experience the wasteland of the real system. Even aspirin and Pepto-Bismol can be rare and there's a black market for them. According to a report in the Canadian newspaper the National Post: ''Hospitals are falling apart, surgeons lack basic supplies and must reuse latex gloves. Patients must buy their sutures on the black market and provide bed sheets and food for extended hospital stays.''

How could it be any different when Cuba embarked on a campaign of economic self-sabotage with the revolution of 1959? It went from third in per-capita food consumption in Latin America to near the bottom, according to a State Department report. Per-capita consumption of basic foodstuffs like cereals and meat actually has declined from the 1950s. There are fewer cars (true of no other country in the hemisphere), and development of electrical power has trailed every other Latin American country except Haiti.

But the routine medical care, we're supposed to believe, is superb. The statistic frequently cited for this proposition is that Cuba has the lowest infant mortality rate in Latin America. Put aside that the reflexively dishonest Cuban government is the ultimate source for these figures. Cuba had the lowest infant mortality rate in Latin America prior to the revolution and has lost ground to other countries around the world since. It also has an appallingly high abortion rate, meaning most problem pregnancies are pre-emptively ended.

Other countries in Latin America have made advances in health without Cuba's vicious suppression of human rights (which, no doubt, contributes to the island having the highest suicide rate in Latin America). The way public health works in Cuba was nicely illustrated by the case of Dr. Desi Mendoza Rivero, who complained of an outbreak of dengue fever that the regime preferred to ignore in the late 1990s, and was jailed for his trouble.

As is always the case with Cuba, anything that's wrong is blamed on the United States. If there is a shortage of medicine, well, that's because of the U.S. embargo. But the United States is not the only country in the world that sells drugs. Cuba could buy them from Europe or elsewhere, and the U.S. embargo makes an exception for medicines.

The only reason to fantasize about Cuban health care is to stick a finger in the eye of the Yanquis. For the likes of Michael Moore, the true glory of Cuba is less its health care than the fact that it is an enemy of the United States. That's why romanticizing Cuban medicine isn't just folly, but itself qualifies as a kind of sickness.

Michael Moore rocks! :rock: It's nice to see someone who tells it like it is.
You think Cuba has better health care than the United States?

You think Cuba has better health care than the United States?

No, I don't. But the heath care in this country is not what it should be.

No, I don't. But the heath care in this country is not what it should be.
You said Moore rocks for telling it like it is. He's saying that health care in Cuba is superior to the U.S. Still think he rocks? I think he's got rocks in his head.

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=264727916191999&kw=michael,moore (http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=264727916191999&kw=michael,moore)

Less Of Moore

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY

Hypocrisy: Propaganda filmmaker Michael Moore is wondering where America's soul has gone. He could get the answer by engaging in a little bit of introspection.

Moore is being feted and toasted at the Cannes Film Festival for his latest manipulative movie "Sicko" just as he had been for "Fahrenheit 9/11." Imagine that: Garnering applause at a snooty international event for anti-American movies.

Naturally, the media treat Moore as if he's a serious person making serious movies, which lets him explain his higher motives in creating an opus with a schoolyard title.

"I'm trying to explore bigger ideas and bigger issues, and in this case the bigger issue in this film is who are we as a people?" Moore told reporters after a press screening.

"Why do we behave the way we behave? What has become of us? Where is our soul?"

Speaking of "soul," the real soul-destroying problem we have in this country comes from a cadre of hostile culturati who harbor malice for the virtues that made America strong and proud. Moore is mainly an ego-driven opportunist, but he fits in neatly with the sneering elitists since he speaks their language so well.

The elitists — who are always on the left — trade in lies, half-truths and disinformation. They're anti-capitalists (except when it benefits them).

Their goal is to undermine our American tradition of free men, free markets and individuality that has served better than any other system in history. They dreamily long for progressive (or more precisely, statist and socialist) policies to regiment human behavior. They are nostalgic for a time that never was in this country but regrettably was in the Soviet Union.

The elitists' rejection of our time-honored values has torn at our souls, assaulted our sensibilities, eroded our work ethic, softened our attitudes about responsibility and increased our sense of entitlement. The last insult is in their mainstreaming of mushy thinking.

The insufferably narcissistic Moore, who lives on the ritzy Upper West Side of Manhattan while portraying himself to be just another working man, has helped the cause by using the art of distortion to paint America as a villain.

In "Sicko," his critique of the U.S. health care system, Moore tries to claim that U.S. medical care is a captive of free-market "greed." Nearly 20 years earlier, he used "Roger & Me" to try to paint General Motors and then-CEO Roger Smith as cogs of a rapacious American corporate machine that devours the weak and the poor.

Moore was most dishonest when he made "Fahrenheit 9/11." He accused President Bush of using the 9/11 attack as a rah-rah excuse to go to war with Iraq. It was propaganda. Dave Kopel of the Colorado-based Independence Institute documented 59 deceits in the movie.

In his Riefenstahl-ish "Sicko," Moore tries to make the argument that Cuban health care is superior in both quality and cost to U.S. health care.

But if it were Moore's own health at stake, would he choose Cuba or the U.S.? This year even dictator Fidel Castro had to call in a doctor from abroad to get proper medical care for a relatively uncomplicated illness.

But don't say anything negative about the island-prison's health care. Doing so has landed many a Cuban in prison — assuming the care itself didn't put him in the ground — as would making a film that criticized the Cuban government, even on milder terms than Moore criticized the U.S.

It's reasonable to think that Moore himself may have considered the irony. But his greed and ego override it.

Were Moore merely poking at an ossified establishment, were he a modern-day Will Rogers or H.L. Mencken, then his work might have value.

But he has tried to pass off his fiction as fact. He goes for the emotional at the expense of the rational. He stages scenes and takes cheap shots. His is the work of a pretentious auteur looking for his own soul. That such a man should be praised is a shame on everyone involved.

You said Moore rocks for telling it like it is. He's saying that health care in Cuba is superior to the U.S. Still think he rocks? I think he's got rocks in his head.


I don't agree with everything he says, but I do agree with a lot of what he says.

I've grown quite cool on Michael Moore. I don't think I'll be seeing this movie.

I've grown quite cool on Michael Moore. I don't think I'll be seeing this movie.

I know what you mean. I'm not sure on the guy anymore myself. He wouldn't allow himself to be interviewed on "certain subjects" while in Toronto recently. I'm sure his movies are still eye opening, but yeah, what's inaccurate (as I'm sure there are in many social documentaries) and what isn't? You could be ending up getting yourself riled up for nothing.

In response to Fleet, yes, quite a few Canadians do go Stateside for certain medical treatments and surgeries (mainly heart), but that can be said of Americans coming up to Canada for certain procedures (especially cancer and pediatric). I know of quite a few. However, that said, our gov't has been destroying the fantastic health system we enjoyed for the past 20 years - both Liberal and Conservative. They capped doctors' salaries and what they could do so many have moved south to work in the U.S. while allowing fraud from the public to go unchecked.

Frankly, I don't think either system is ideal right now. It sure would be nice to find something that would work like it used to, but fraud was just rampant (and I hate to say it, but it was mainly new immigrants hopping on the system illegally that shut it down, but the gov't also allowed it to a large degree). There's been a lot of damage done. I don't know enough of the U.S. nor have seen this movie to comment further.

Michael Moore rocks! :rock: It's nice to see someone who tells it like it is.
You've got to be joking. He tells it like he sees it, not like it actually is.

http://www.cnsnews.com/cartoon/kellyimages/2007/Michael_Moore_and_Free_Heal.jpg

Actually, people on both sides of the political spectrum have been giving this movie rave reviews. I think you should all see it before you judge whether or not Moore is exaggerating or trying to pull one over on us. It couldn't hurt. I just watched this newest clip (http://movies.aol.com/movie/sicko/26778/trailer) and it makes me want to see it even more.

Actually, people on both sides of the political spectrum have been giving this movie rave reviews. I think you should all see it before you judge whether or not Moore is exaggerating or trying to pull one over on us. It couldn't hurt. I just watched this newest clip (http://movies.aol.com/movie/sicko/26778/trailer) and it makes me want to see it even more.
If it's a Michael Moore production, it's being exaggerated.

http://cagle.msnbc.com/working/070615/wright.jpg


http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/1257/moorehealthcarezj1.jpg

I think Moore is reaching a bit when he says Cuba has anything better to offer than the United States.

Aside from really good cigars...

;)

I think Moore is reaching a bit when he says Cuba has anything better to offer than the United States.
As Mark Levin said, "He is a nut. And he's made tens of millions of dollars being a nut."

Fahrenheit 7/11 movie

:rofl: A movie about a convenience store. Though he may know those quite well...


I've read that many Canadians come down here for the health service.

lol...I've heard the opposite.

Just don't visit Martin Luther King/Drew Medical Center's E.R. in Los Angeles:

LOS ANGELES — New 911 tapes released Tuesday reveal that dispatchers refused to send help to a woman ignored by hospital staff as she lay dying on the floor of a Los Angeles emergency room.

Edith Isabel Rodriguez, 43, died after dispatchers on two 911 calls refused to contact paramedics or an ambulance to send her to another facility, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday. The second dispatcher went so far as to argue with the caller over whether it was a real emergency.

Rodriguez died of a perforated bowel on May 9 at Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital. Her death was ruled accidental by the Los Angeles County coroner's office.

In the calls — posted after they were released by the county Sheriff's Department under the newspaper's California Public Records Act request — callers plead for help for the woman left bleeding from the mouth and writhing in pain for 45 minutes on the hospital's floor.

"I'm in the emergency room. My wife is dying and the nurses don't want to help her out," he said in Spanish through an interpreter.

"What's wrong with her?" a dispatcher asked.

"She's vomiting blood," Prado said.

"OK, and why aren't they helping her?" the dispatcher asked.

"They're watching her there and they're not doing anything. They're just watching her," Prado said.

The dispatcher told the man to contact a doctor and then said paramedics won't pick up his wife because she already was in a hospital. Later, she told Prado to contact county police officers at a security desk.

Experts have said Rodriguez could have survived had she been treated early enough. The head of the county's Department of Health Services, which oversees the facility, has called her death "inexcusable."

A second 911 call was placed eight minutes later by a woman bystander who requested that an ambulance be sent to take Rodriguez to some other hospital for care.

"She's definitely sick and there's a guy that's ignoring her," the woman told a different dispatcher.

During the brief call, the dispatcher argued with the woman over whether there really was an emergency.

"I cannot do anything for you for the quality of the hospital. ... It is not an emergency. It is not an emergency, ma'am," he said.

"You're not here to see how they're treating her," the woman replied.

The dispatcher refused to call paramedics and told the woman that she should contact hospital supervisors "and let them know" if she is unhappy.

"May God strike you, too, for acting the way you just acted," the woman said finally.

"No, negative ma'am, you're the one," he said.

"What's real confusing … was that she was at a medical facility," Sheriff's Capt. Steven M. Roller, who is in charge of the Century Station, which handled the calls, told the Times. "That poses some real quandaries."

Roller told the Times that the second dispatcher's tone was inappropriate.

"As a station commander, I don't like any of my employees getting rude or nasty with any caller, regardless, and in that particular case, obviously, the employee's conduct could have been better," Roller said, telling the Times the employee received written "counseling."

Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital formerly was known as Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center. The name was changed as part of a reorganization after years of problems including patient deaths blamed on sloppy nursing care and hospital mismanagement that has threatened its federal funding.
:eek: Was it because she was poor? See, I never have had faith in that "You can be seen in any ER with or without insurance." Pretty sure you can't if there's a county/government run hospital nearby.

MOORE'S SICK RX

MICHAEL Moore's new film "Sicko," a critique of the U.S. health-care system and paean to socialized medicine around the world, premiered amid great fanfare at Cannes last month. Time magazine reviewer Richard Corliss rejoiced, "The upside of this populist documentary is that there are no policy wonks crunching numbers."

Wouldn't want anyone messing up Moore's fantasy with . . . facts.

The American health-care system undeniably has serious problems, and Moore effectively dramatizes the suffering of people caught up in them. Yet he often exaggerates those problems. For example, he frequently refers to the 47 million Americans without health insurance, but fails to point out that most are uninsured for only brief periods, or that millions are eligible for programs like Medicaid but fail to apply.

Moreover, he implies that people without insurance don't get health care. In fact, most do. Hospitals are legally obliged to provide care regardless of ability to pay, and while physicians don't face the same requirements, few are willing to deny treatment because a patient lacks insurance.

Treatment for the uninsured may well mean financial hardship, but by and large they do get care.

Moore talks a lot about life expectancy, suggesting that people in Canada, Britain, France and even Cuba live longer than Americans because of their health-care systems. But most experts agree that life expectancies are a poor measure of health care, because they are affected by too many other factors like violent crime, poverty, obesity, tobacco and drug use, and other issues unrelated to a country's health system. Americans in Utah live longer than those in New York City, despite having essentially the same health care.

And when you compare the outcome for specific diseases, like cancer or heart disease, the United States clearly outperforms the rest of the world. When former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi needed heart surgery last year, he didn't go to an Italian hospital or to France, Canada or Cuba. He came to the Cleveland Clinic.

While overly critical of U.S. health care, Moore overlooks the flaws of national health-care systems. He suggests, for example, that Canada's waiting lists are mere inconveniences, interviewing apparently healthy Canadians who claim they have no problem getting care. Yet nearly 800,000 Canadians aren't so lucky. The Canadian Supreme Court has pointed out that many Canadians waiting for treatment suffer chronic pain and, "Patients die while on the waiting list."

Similarly, Moore shows happy Britons who don't have to pay for their prescription drugs. But he didn't talk to any of the 850,000 Britons waiting for admission to National Health Service hospitals. Every year, shortages force the NHS to cancel as many as 50,000 operations. Roughly 40 percent of cancer patients never get to see an oncology specialist.

Delays in getting treatment are often so long that nearly 20 percent of colon-cancer cases considered treatable when first diagnosed are incurable by the time treatment is finally offered. Perhaps Moore could have talked to some of these folks?

Visiting France, Moore waxes ecstatic about the government's willingness to pay for nannies to help care for newborns. He apparently doesn't notice that the taxes necessary to pay for such a system have given France one of the lowest rates of economic growth in Europe or that many of the country's best and brightest are fleeing.

Moore also slides over the facts when he implies that the French system is "free." It's funded through a 13.55 percent payroll tax, a 5.25 percent income tax and other taxes on tobacco, alcohol and drug-company revenues. And the system is still running a $15.6 billion deficit.

And French patients still have to pay high copayments and other out-of-pocket expenses, and physicians can bill patients for charges over and above what the government reimburses. As a result, 92 percent of French citizens have private health insurance to complement the government system. Yet there remain shortages of modern health-care technology and a lack of access to the most advanced care.

America needs to have a serious debate about how to fix our health-care system. But Moore's demagoguery and refusal to address the numbers will do little to contribute to that debate. Maybe he could've used a few policy wonks after all.


NY Post
Michael Tanner is director of health and welfare studies at the Cato Institute.
:eek:

Ok, so to me, it looks like Mr. Moore doesn't like the US. So WHY THE HELL DOES HE LIVE HERE? Go move to France.

No, I don't. But the heath care in this country is not what it should be.


AMEN!!!

:eek: Was it because she was poor? See, I never have had faith in that "You can be seen in any ER with or without insurance." Pretty sure you can't if there's a county/government run hospital nearby.
That hospital treats a majority of poor people in the E.R., so I can't say that it is because she was poor. However, it seems that because of that fact, the people are treated horribly.

What makes this more horrible is that she was suffering from something that had to do with her stomach lining. She was treated THREE TIMES previously in that same E.R. and she was prescribed IBUPROFEN. You don't give someone a pain killer that can irritate an already irritated stomach lining problem. Each time she took a pill, all it did was further the damage to what was already wrong. It was causing more bleeding. Basically, she was slowly being killed. Had they seen her immediately she could have been saved.

That hospital treats a majority of poor people in the E.R., so I can't say that it is because she was poor. However, it seems that because of that fact, the people are treated horribly.

What makes this more horrible is that she was suffering from something that had to do with her stomach lining. She was treated THREE TIMES previously in that same E.R. and she was prescribed IBUPROFEN. You don't give someone a pain killer that can irritate an already irritated stomach lining problem. Each time she took a pill, all it did was further the damage to what was already wrong. It was causing more bleeding. Basically, she was slowly being killed. Had they seen her immediately she could have been saved.
Oh man...I can't tell you how many times I've been told by pharmacists alone that ibuprofen eats at your digestive tract. Doctors and nurses HAVE to know that! Damn...they sure have some quacks at that hospital. Her husband should definetly sue. The hospital and that little twit at 911.

http://www.creators.com/comics/37/6649_image.gif

I wish that everyone would focus on the subject of this movie rather than who made it and what movies he's made before. Maybe you don't agree with him, but I think it's always worth giving the film a chance. THEN feel free to judge if you really think he skewed the facts. I think our healthcare system is problematic and i'm glad it's getting publicity, no matter WHO made the movie.

Maybe you don't agree with him, but I think it's always worth giving the film a chance.

No, it's not worth giving it a chance when it's propaganda which distorts facts instead of a real "film."


THEN feel free to judge if you really think he skewed the facts.

I already know he skewed the facts. Janice posted some examples earlier in this thread- I guess you skipped reading over that! ;)

Even so, I'm sure he makes some valid points in the film, and those are what I want to see. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on it...I'll let you know what I think of the movie once I see it this weekend, though!

I'm not opposed to seeing it. If someone buys me a ticket, I'll go. It's just that I'd much rather see Live Free Or Die Hard or Knocked Up.

Even so, I'm sure he makes some valid points in the film, and those are what I want to see. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on it...I'll let you know what I think of the movie once I see it this weekend, though!
"Even so?"
That's like saying a doctor, due to his blunders, who has killed a few of his patients is still a good doctor in other areas.

How can anyone learn anything or believe what he's saying when there are many known errors in the film?

I can spend 2 hours doing something (anything) much better.

Frankly, I don't think either system is ideal right now.
I agree, but I believe overall Canadian heathcare is better even though it's far from being perfect.

you should personally tell michael moore how you feel about the movie...he's doing a live chat (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/7/6/94342/72898) right now. extremely interesting!

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/07/06/2007-07-06_more_lies_from_moore.html (http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/07/06/2007-07-06_more_lies_from_moore.html)

More lies from Moore

Be Our Guest

In "Sicko," Michael Moore uses a clip of my appearance earlier this year on "The O'Reilly Factor" to introduce a segment on the glories of Canadian health care.

Moore adores the Canadian system. I do not.

I am a new American, but I grew up and worked for many years in Canada. And I know the health care system of my native country much more intimately than does Moore. There's a good reason why my former countrymen with the money to do so either use the services of a booming industry of illegal private clinics, or come to America to take advantage of the health care that Moore denounces.

Government-run health care in Canada inevitably resolves into a dehumanizing system of triage, where the weak and the elderly are hastened to their fates by actuarial calculation. Having fought the Canadian health care bureaucracy on behalf of my ailing mother just two years ago - she was too old, and too sick, to merit the highest quality care in the government's eyes - I can honestly say that Moore's preferred health care system is something I wouldn't wish on him.

In 1999, my uncle was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. If he'd lived in America, the miracle drug Rituxan might have saved him. But Rituxan wasn't approved for use in Canada, and he lost his battle with cancer.
But don't take my word for it: Even the Toronto Star agrees that Moore's endorsement of Canadian health care is overwrought and factually challenged. And the Star is considered a left-wing newspaper, even by Canadian standards.

Just last month, the Star's Peter Howell reported from the Cannes Film Festival that Mr. Moore became irate when Canadian reporters challenged his portrayal of their national health care system. "You Canadians! You used to be so funny!" exclaimed an exasperated Moore, "You gave us all our best comedians. When did you turn so dark?"

Moore further claimed that the infamously long waiting lists in Canada are merely a reflection of the fact that Canadians have a longer life expectancy than Americans, and that the sterling system is swamped by too many Canadians who live too long.

Canada's media know better. In 2006, the average wait time from seeing a primary care doctor to getting treatment by a specialist was more than four months. Out of a population of 32 million, there are about 3.2 million Canadians trying to get a primary care doctor. Today, according to the OECD, Canada ranks 24th out of 28 major industrialized countries in doctors per thousand people.

Unfortunately, Moore is more concerned with promoting an anti-free-market agenda than getting his facts straight. "The problem," said Moore recently, "isn't just [the insurance companies], or the Hospital Corporation and the Frist family - it's the system! They can't make a profit unless they deny care! Unless they deny claims! Our laws state very clearly that they have a legal fiduciary responsibility to maximize profits for the shareholders ... the only way they can turn the big profit is to not pay out the money, to not provide the care!"

Profit, according to the filmmaker-activist, has no place in health care - period.

Moore ignores the fact that 85% of hospital beds in the U.S. are in nonprofit hospitals, and almost half of us with private plans get our insurance from nonprofit providers. Moreover, Kaiser Permanente, which Moore demonizes, is also a nonprofit.

What's really amazing is that even the intended beneficiaries of Moore's propagandizing don't support his claims. The Supreme Court of Canada declared in June 2005 that the government health care monopoly in Quebec is a violation of basic human rights.

Moore put me, fleetingly, into "Sicko" as an example of an American who doesn't understand the Canadian health care system. He couldn't be more wrong. I've personally endured the creeping disaster of Canadian health care. Most unlike him, I'm willing to tell the truth about it.

Pipes is the president and CEO of the Pacific Research Institute and author of "Miracle Cure: How to Solve America's Health Care Crisis and Why Canada Isn't the Answer."

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/07/06/2007-07-06_more_lies_from_moore.html (http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/07/06/2007-07-06_more_lies_from_moore.html)

More lies from Moore

Be Our Guest

There's a good reason why my former countrymen with the money to do so either use the services of a booming industry of illegal private clinics, or come to America to take advantage of the health care that Moore denounces.

What's really amazing is that even the intended beneficiaries of Moore's propagandizing don't support his claims. The Supreme Court of Canada declared in June 2005 that the government health care monopoly in Quebec is a violation of basic human rights.
More lies... :lol:

Micheal Moore has made a living off of taking a serious issue and then making a Mockumentary out of it. He puts these movies out as documentaries but only shows half truths and reports only the facts that support his stance.

He certainly has some valid points and if he would stick to just the truth his movies might actually carry some weight (pardon the pun).

I have several friends who are nurses here in Canada and have seen the pros and cons on both sides. The US went through a massive recruiting phase here last year trying to get nurses to come over to work in the US. One of my friends went over for a year and was horrified. If you have money then certainly the US has some of the best and fastest care in the world. However my friend told me how people were turned away on a daily basis who had serious and sometimes even life threatening injuries. Why? Because the hospital would not treat someone who did not have coverage or the money to pay for it. My friend had to track every item she used when treating patients (towels, needles, bandages, etc) as they bill everything to the patient.

Certainly there needs to be improvements made there.

Canada though is far from an ideal Health Care system either. It is not free as MM seems to like to report, we actually pay $54 per month per person for basic medical coverage ( most people have additional extended health care for prescriptions, Physio, Chriro, etcc...). This does cover Dr.s appointments and Hospital surgeries BUT the massive wait lists to get treated have forced people to go to the US to get treatment faster. I had to wait 1 1/2 years to get an MRI for torn tendons in my forarm, I understand it is not a super priority but 1 1/2 years???? There was an article in the local paper here several months ago about a family flying thier child to the US because they had been on a wait list for over 6 months for heart surgery.

When I snapped my leg in Feb, I spent 2 days in the hospital hallway as they could not perform surgery without having a bed available. I was sent home with 103 fever and still sick from anesetic because they could only hold a bed for me for 4 days due to over crowding. It is very common that people who have just given birth or had "minor" surgery (apendectomy, tonsilectomy) are being sent home the same day they are admitted due to over crowding.

I think Both systems have serious flaws and a medium between 2 or combination of systems would be ideal. I think bringing awareness to this issue is good. However Micheal Moore's reasons for this are far from altruistic, this guy feeds on peoples fears and makes money from it. I think this guy is a leach, I wonder how much of the money he makes from the movie will go to help the US health care system or the people who are being deprived of health care.

I think Both systems have serious flaws and a medium between 2 or combination of systems would be ideal.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/20/Pg79fig1.jpg
Joe Clark, left, Stockwell 'Doris' Day (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockwell_Day) holding handwritten "NO 2-TIER HEALTHCARE (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-tier_health_care)" sign/"personal briefing notes" during the 2000 leaders debate.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/20/Pg79fig1.jpg
Joe Clark, left, Stockwell 'Doris' Day (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockwell_Day) holding handwritten "NO 2-TIER HEALTHCARE (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-tier_health_care)" sign/"personal briefing notes" during the 2000 leaders debate.
Both of those guys are fools

I was originally not a fan of a 2 tier system either but wih the extreme waits for surgery and hospital beds, a second tier would allow the people with the resources to get things immediately (which they do by going to the US anyway) and this would also result in lightening the wait for the others.

(WENN) Filmmaker Michael Moore launched into an 11-minute rant on American TV on Monday, during which he blasted the media for misrepresenting his new healthcare documentary Sicko. The controversial director was appearing on CNN show The Situation Room when he blasted both the network and host Wolf Blitzer for having a "poor track record" as journalists. Moore had been invited onto the program to counter a report made by CNN's chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, which pointed out alleged false information and statistics in Sicko, which takes aim at the U.S. health care system. Moore blasted, "That report was so biased, I can't imagine which pharmaceutical company ad is coming up right after our break. All the statistics show that we have far worse healthcare than these other industrialized countries. We're the only ones that don't have it free and universal." Moore also accused the network of covering up the truth about the American healthcare system and the country's military involvement in Iraq. He said, "You're the ones who are fudging the facts. You've fudged the facts to the American people now for I don't know how long about this issue, about the war. And I'm just curious, when are you gonna just stand there and apologize to the American people for not bringing the truth to them that isn't sponsored by some major corporation?"

(WENN) Filmmaker Michael Moore launched into an 11-minute rant on American TV on Monday, during which he blasted the media for misrepresenting his new healthcare documentary Sicko. The controversial director was appearing on CNN show The Situation Room when he blasted both the network and host Wolf Blitzer for having a "poor track record" as journalists. Moore had been invited onto the program to counter a report made by CNN's chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, which pointed out alleged false information and statistics in Sicko, which takes aim at the U.S. health care system. Moore blasted, "That report was so biased, I can't imagine which pharmaceutical company ad is coming up right after our break. All the statistics show that we have far worse healthcare than these other industrialized countries. We're the only ones that don't have it free and universal." Moore also accused the network of covering up the truth about the American healthcare system and the country's military involvement in Iraq. He said, "You're the ones who are fudging the facts. You've fudged the facts to the American people now for I don't know how long about this issue, about the war. And I'm just curious, when are you gonna just stand there and apologize to the American people for not bringing the truth to them that isn't sponsored by some major corporation?"
Just another crazed liberal who rants and raves and shouts the other person down. Nothing to be proud of there. When this idiot isn't pulling factoids out of the air he's pulling them out of his gigantic arse.

(Studio Briefing) Michael Moore, whose documentary Sicko, attacks the U.S. health care and health insurance systems, defended the film against a recent attack by CNN medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta on CNN's Larry King Live Tuesday night. Moore said that his staffers sent Gupta an email message backing up claims made in the movie that Gupta questioned in an earlier broadcast -- but that Gupta ignored the message. Gupta denied Moore's charges, accusing the filmmaker of "cherry-picking data from different reports." In the end, however, Gupta acknowledged that overall the movie "strikes at the irrefutable fact -- [the U.S. health system] is broken." Gupta, who continues to practice medicine, was asked by Moore whether he himself didn't find the current health-insurance system cumbersome. The surgeon replied, "It's a shameful system, especially when I'm dealing with some of my patients." Moore's film is due to expand into 756 theaters on Friday.

I don't know. It's hard to know who believe when it comes to medical advice. A world-renowned neurosurgeon (Sanjay Gupta) or a 400-pound propagandist (Michael Moore). Tough one. :D

I don't know. It's hard to know who believe when it comes to medical advice. A world-renowned neurosurgeon (Sanjay Gupta) or a 400-pound propagandist (Michael Moore). Tough one. :D

Well, considering that one of the main themes of the movie is that healthcare professionals care more about money than they do about making sure their patients get the best health care possible...I'd have to say that it really is a "tough one." You should give the movie a chance, not because Moore made it, but because this IS a real issue that deserves some attention.

Well, considering that one of the main themes of the movie is that healthcare professionals care more about money than they do about making sure their patients get the best health care possible...I'd have to say that it really is a "tough one." You should give the movie a chance, not because Moore made it, but because this IS a real issue that deserves some attention.
Riiight, as if I'm going to line that fat liar's pockets to hear how wonderful healthcare is in Cuba. When's the last time you heard of someone saying that they were so sick that they HAVE TO GET TO CUBA for healthcare?! :crazy: :lol:

Sicko is the best movie I've seen all year and the best one of Moore's. I'd reccomend it to anyone

Sicko is the best movie I've seen all year and the best one of Moore's. I'd reccomend it to anyone
I haven't seen it. By the title I assume it's an autobiography. :D

The truth about Cuban heathcare.

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

It all boils down to this: Those who are succeptible to accepting propaganda as fact will like it. Those who know the harsh REALITY will hate it.

By reality, I mean, the sources that matter. What people don't realize in the real world is that doctors are like small business owners. If the government provides them with what they think this or that is worth, then they will be in trouble.

Here's the REALITY (and that's a word I don't just throw around like some do).

In hospitals, Doctors RENT to practice there. In a way, you can say that a hospital is like a shopping mall for the health care system in which many practice their trade.

Doctors get stiffed a lot. If someone decides not to pay their bills, then someone else will have to compensate for the losses, and so doctors have to drive up their prices.

Doctors do make a profit. It's about time we stop demonizing them for it. They practice medicine for 8 years or longer, and should be able to live well.

Government, especially sought by the left-wingers, is all about control. Control over you, control over what you say and do, and so on. If Government decides how much a procedure should cost, then doctors will either leave their practice, or become mediocre (perhaps even hostile to its' patients.. because, after all, patients are voters who made things the way they are).

Health care also demands an extremely high tax increase as well. We are so damn spoiled in this country, that we seek to have things that others have, but when others share their experience (i.e. when they actually get sick), they say that America has the greatest health care system in the world.

Go figure.

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/07/06/2007-07-06_more_lies_from_moore.html (http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/07/06/2007-07-06_more_lies_from_moore.html)

More lies from Moore

Be Our Guest

In "Sicko," Michael Moore uses a clip of my appearance earlier this year on "The O'Reilly Factor" to introduce a segment on the glories of Canadian health care.

Moore adores the Canadian system. I do not.

I am a new American, but I grew up and worked for many years in Canada. And I know the health care system of my native country much more intimately than does Moore. There's a good reason why my former countrymen with the money to do so either use the services of a booming industry of illegal private clinics, or come to America to take advantage of the health care that Moore denounces.

Government-run health care in Canada inevitably resolves into a dehumanizing system of triage, where the weak and the elderly are hastened to their fates by actuarial calculation. Having fought the Canadian health care bureaucracy on behalf of my ailing mother just two years ago - she was too old, and too sick, to merit the highest quality care in the government's eyes - I can honestly say that Moore's preferred health care system is something I wouldn't wish on him.

In 1999, my uncle was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. If he'd lived in America, the miracle drug Rituxan might have saved him. But Rituxan wasn't approved for use in Canada, and he lost his battle with cancer.
But don't take my word for it: Even the Toronto Star agrees that Moore's endorsement of Canadian health care is overwrought and factually challenged. And the Star is considered a left-wing newspaper, even by Canadian standards.

Just last month, the Star's Peter Howell reported from the Cannes Film Festival that Mr. Moore became irate when Canadian reporters challenged his portrayal of their national health care system. "You Canadians! You used to be so funny!" exclaimed an exasperated Moore, "You gave us all our best comedians. When did you turn so dark?"

Moore further claimed that the infamously long waiting lists in Canada are merely a reflection of the fact that Canadians have a longer life expectancy than Americans, and that the sterling system is swamped by too many Canadians who live too long.

Canada's media know better. In 2006, the average wait time from seeing a primary care doctor to getting treatment by a specialist was more than four months. Out of a population of 32 million, there are about 3.2 million Canadians trying to get a primary care doctor. Today, according to the OECD, Canada ranks 24th out of 28 major industrialized countries in doctors per thousand people.

Unfortunately, Moore is more concerned with promoting an anti-free-market agenda than getting his facts straight. "The problem," said Moore recently, "isn't just [the insurance companies], or the Hospital Corporation and the Frist family - it's the system! They can't make a profit unless they deny care! Unless they deny claims! Our laws state very clearly that they have a legal fiduciary responsibility to maximize profits for the shareholders ... the only way they can turn the big profit is to not pay out the money, to not provide the care!"

Profit, according to the filmmaker-activist, has no place in health care - period.

Moore ignores the fact that 85% of hospital beds in the U.S. are in nonprofit hospitals, and almost half of us with private plans get our insurance from nonprofit providers. Moreover, Kaiser Permanente, which Moore demonizes, is also a nonprofit.

What's really amazing is that even the intended beneficiaries of Moore's propagandizing don't support his claims. The Supreme Court of Canada declared in June 2005 that the government health care monopoly in Quebec is a violation of basic human rights.

Moore put me, fleetingly, into "Sicko" as an example of an American who doesn't understand the Canadian health care system. He couldn't be more wrong. I've personally endured the creeping disaster of Canadian health care. Most unlike him, I'm willing to tell the truth about it.

Pipes is the president and CEO of the Pacific Research Institute and author of "Miracle Cure: How to Solve America's Health Care Crisis and Why Canada Isn't the Answer."


Janice, there is private clinics in Canada. In fact Alberta has 24- hour clinics that treat everybody. So does B.C. and Ontario. What are you talking about?

Health care also demands an extremely high tax increase as well. We are so damn spoiled in this country, that we seek to have things that others have, but when others share their experience (i.e. when they actually get sick), they say that America has the greatest health care system in the world.

Go figure.

Well that's funny. Our company just hired 55 Americans because we pay higher wages for the same job that would be offered in California.

Thank God for a labour shortage in AB. There is even an American girl I met working at a local gas station up here. The gas station here is paying her $13.00/hour, but in the state of Washington, she would only make $6.00/hour U.S.

So she came up here for more money. And she gets heathcare benifits on top of it. :p

Well that's funny. Our company just hired 55 Americans because we pay higher wages for the same job that would be offered in California.

Thank God for a labour shortage in AB. There is even an American girl I met working at a local gas station up here. The gas station here is paying her $13.00/hour, but in the state of Washington, she would only make $6.00/hour U.S.

So she came up here for more money. And she gets heathcare benifits on top of it. :p


Hold on a sec! If she was making $6.00 an hour, then she was either getting jipped, or she was lying about it, because, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, the state of Washington pays out MORE than what the Federal Minimum wage requires. She was supposed to have gotten at least $7.93 an hour.

The numbers are here to research:
http://www.dol.gov/esa/minwage/america.htm

The raising of the Federal Minumum wage is really just a cosmetic, empty political gesture to make it appear as though the politicians supporting it are "for the working guy."

Most of the states in this country pay higher than the Federal minimum wage anyway, but there are some that do not, and only 4 states that pay under.

Now, we have to consider the cost of living aspect. According to a friend of mine who lives in California, it cost her about $800 a month to rent an average apartment. Of course, that was under Grey Davis, so, under Schwarzenegger, I don't know what it is now. But assuming that it is the same, if we nationalized health care, that apartment would skyrocket to about a grand. But anyway, since you live in Canada, the cost of living aspect, the taxes, and so on make it appear as though you are getting a lot ($13.00 an hour), but if you deduct the taxes (which includes health care) and so on, your TAKE HOME PAY (net pay) would probably figure at about the same, or perhaps even less than you would get in America. It's easy to take things at face value when a higher number is staring you in the face. But when you break it down, little by little, you will see that $13.00 an hour isn't all that it's cracked up to be. Just a couple of weeks ago, I heard a union construction worker say that (and this is unusual), "the more I work, the more goes to Uncle Sam." He has to make about $20 an hour.

A woman at my work makes $17.50 an hour, yet she is always trying to save money and be frugal. I'm always thinking, "Geez, you make $17.50 an hour, why are you such a cheap ass?" But if I talk to her, she always harps on taxes, and in Illinois, they are high. In Illinois, the state (and this is a blue state here) was toying with a statewide health care plan, and doctors were threatening to leave. Some actually did leave, and people were complaining that they would not be treated.

Socialized medicine does raise genuine fears that doctors will leave (as is the case in Illinois) and go to another place to practice medicine. Doctors are like rabbits. If you scare them, they hop away. Sure, a national health care plan would force doctors not to move, but that would grant them the opportunity to leave the practice altogether and invest in real estate, buying up six flats and living high off the hog from the rent (which is what some in this country actually do).

But back to Canada; the dollar in America is worth more than the dollar in Canada, so the health care plan does not sound like it would be the salvation of the states. There are Canadians that cross the borders to get treated here. Some call in on some of the talk shows I listen to. If you hear nothing but good things about this health care plan, that would overshadow the negative aspects of it, which would result in many people getting screwed over by it.

Now, I want to know something. I know your health care is funded by taxes, but on your personal paycheck, is what they take out for health care written on your check, or is it just meshed in with your normal taxes?

he wasent saying cuba had better healthcare all he said is cuba was free and willing 2 help those 911 workers that what he said of course america is the best that why it cost so much 2 have it

Moore Surprised To Secure 'Sicko' Nomination

(WENN) Michael Moore is amazed his movie Sicko has received an Academy Award nomination, because he thought he'd never be invited back after slamming U.S. President George W. Bush onstage in 2003. Moore outraged many with his controversial speech, which Oscars producers cut short, when picking up the Best Documentary award for Bowling For Columbine. But the 53-year-old was pleased to hear his film about America's health care problems had picked up a Best Documentary Academy Award nomination on Tuesday. He says, "I'm appreciative that they allowed me back in the building (Kodak Theater). If I'm fortunate enough to stand on that stage again, I will be true to myself and very gracious and grateful for the acknowledgment, but I would start by finishing the last 10 seconds of the previous speech." And the famously unstylish filmmaker adds, "I would thank my wardrobe designer and hair stylist."

I figured he'd never get another nomination, considering Fahrenheit 9-11 wasn't nominated for Best Documentary in 2004 and that was easily the most talked about documentary of the year, if not decade.

I'm surprised Sicko got a nomination at all considering it grossed just 24 million at the box office. The critics loved it though, surprise, surprise!

well, I'm no Moore fan, but $24 million is huge for a documentary, so it's not too surprising. But I figured when Fahrenheit 9-11 was snubbed in the catagory, for sure Sicko would be too

:rolleyes:

Can't believe that...piece...is up for Best Documentary.

I thought he purposely didn't submit Fahrenheit for Oscar consideration.

well, I'm no Moore fan, but $24 million is huge for a documentary, so it's not too surprising. But I figured when Fahrenheit 9-11 was snubbed in the catagory, for sure Sicko would be too
What I meant is that Sicko's take was anemic compared to F-9/11, and its 120 million box office score. I think Moore overplayed his hand this time. Even the most hardcore liberal isn't going to embrace the notion of Cuba's glorious healthcare, lol. It was ridiculous. Seems people are on to him and his creative editing.

I figured he'd never get another nomination, considering Fahrenheit 9-11 wasn't nominated for Best Documentary in 2004 and that was easily the most talked about documentary of the year, if not decade.
True but according to IMDb F 9/11 did win the People's Choice Award for Favorite Motion Picture and the Razzie Awards for Worst Actor - George W. Bush, Worst Couple - George W. Bush & Condoleeza Rice or his pet goat, Worst Supporting Actor - Donald Rumsfeld and Worst Supporting Actress - Britney Spears.

I think F-911 was a fluke in Moore's career and not necessarily the standard to hold his box office receipts up to. There was nowhere the hype nor controversy surrounding Sicko. You can't expect a movie about healthcare to get the same type of attention that a movie bashing the president during an election year can get. F-911 was a once in a lifetime type of success for Moore.

Bowling For Columbine made $21 million, Sicko made $24 million. Which shows that Sicko didn't do so bad after all since Bowling was Moore's most successful movie before F-911. Documentaries rarely play outside of art-theaters, so I don't think you can really call Sicko a flop since it's box office success was in line with what Bowling For Columbine made. Michael Moore's movies aren't supposed to gross as much as Steven Spielberg's.

I've actually never seen a MM movie besides Bowling For Columbine and don't really want to

The only thing I like by Michael Moore is 'Canadian Bacon'. Other than that, he's a bigot.

I think F-911 was a fluke in Moore's career and not necessarily the standard to hold his box office receipts up to. There was nowhere the hype nor controversy surrounding Sicko. You can't expect a movie about healthcare to get the same type of attention that a movie bashing the president during an election year can get. F-911 was a once in a lifetime type of success for Moore.

Bowling For Columbine made $21 million, Sicko made $24 million. Which shows that Sicko didn't do so bad after all since Bowling was Moore's most successful movie before F-911. Documentaries rarely play outside of art-theaters, so I don't think you can really call Sicko a flop since it's box office success was in line with what Bowling For Columbine made. Michael Moore's movies aren't supposed to gross as much as Steven Spielberg's.

I've actually never seen a MM movie besides Bowling For Columbine and don't really want to
There was a time, after F-9/11, when it seemed that if Moore put out a documentary about anything, it would bring in zillions. My point is that he's right back to where he was. Not a bad place, but I thought he had the fanbase who would see anything he made, since F-9/11. He certainly does not. Sicko didn't flop, but I thought it would do bigger numbers. I have a feeling Moore thought so himself. The premise was insane. Moore's become irrelevant. Bush will be out of office in a year, so he'll be losing his target. Then what? I know quite a few liberals who are disenchanted with Moore. People who were big fans. I've even seen it on this site.

The only thing I like by Michael Moore is 'Canadian Bacon'. Other than that, he's a bigot.


That's one of my favourite movies. Some of the scenes are priceless!

what I dislike about Moore is that I don't think he's a very good documentary filmmaker. Bowling For Columbine was an entertaining watch and I agreed with his points on gun control, but... it was nothing but propaghanda to make sure you share the same opinions on gun control as him, and if you don't, you're dead wrong. A true documentary is supposed to let the audience hear both sides of the argument and let them figure for themselves where they stand. I'm not a fan of President Bush but I knew that Fahrenheit 9-11 would just be two hours of hearing "George Bush sucks", it's all propaghanda for Michael to try to make sure everyone shares his opinions.

I Netflixed it the other day. I don't like Moore, but I will admit this movie made me angry at our healthcare system. I can't believe the US healthcare corporations can be so tactless and dismissive toward their citizens, when you see how Canada, France and England treats it's people. The part that really infuriorated me was that Al-Qaida people in custody at Guantonimo Bay get better treatment than the majority of people who live here. America seems like it wants to be the best at everything, so why are rival countries like Canada, France and England treating their sick better than we do?