by Omagus

Created on: January 23, 2008

To call Michael Moore a divisive figure would be putting it extremely mildly. Even someone like me, who quite often agrees with many of his points, at times gets tired of the arrogant way he often presents said points. At the same time, I find it interesting how people who disagree with him often do exactly what they accuse him of: ignoring or hiding the facts. Instead of addressing his points they'll make remarks about his appearance, or talk about his "followers" or accuse him of being anti-American. Or my favorite: they'll accuse him of being hypocritical because he's wealthy (which I find interesting because, as far as I know, he's never said there's anything wrong with being wealthy; he seems to disapprove of ultimate wealth at all costs because that invariably leaves a portion of the population in a perpetual state of poverty (alliteration rules)).

I think SiCKO is quite possibly Moore's greatest achievement yet. I've appreciated his self-appointed mission since I first had to study Roger & Me in college. And more so than any movie in history, Fahrenheit 9/11 made documentaries popular and relevant to the general population. However SiCKO is the first time that we get the impression that he actually cares more about the people that he supposedly represents than he does about the cause du jour that he's championing. He also does an excellent job of putting faces on this particular epidemic. It is one thing to rationalize private health care when one is just looking at numbers and statistics. It is something else entirely when you have to enter the lives of the people who have to live with their particular ailment.

To be sure, Moore continues to use his most common magic trick of asking you to focus on what is in his right hand while ignoring what's in his left: he never talks about the taxes paid by people in socialized health care systems; for all we know, the doctor in London that he interviews might be the wealthiest practitioner in all of the United Kingdom; and I don't care how he tries to make it look, I can't imagine that there is a large percentage of people who would rather go to a hospital in Cuba than they would one in the United States.

That being said, there are many facts that he presents that cannot be denied, no matter how strong a critic of Moore one is:

- in the nations he visits, if you're sick, you WILL have access to a doctor for virtually no out of pocket cost;
- child mortality rates in the United States ARE higher than those in Cuba.
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