Does anyone outside of the Hollywood circlejerk that puts the show together care?

The movie was good, but not that good. I particulary liked the first part of the movie. That was when he concentrated his efforts on the flaws or holes of the US-system. That was real.

The other half of the movie was much weaker.

I highly doubt it. I think “No End in Sight” has it locked up. Then again, you never know....

Why not, if he can con enought members of the guild into voting for it..... But didn’t he try that trick before?

I’m surprised he hasn’t pulled his film from contention and nominated himself for a Lifetime Achievement Award.

If I were going to be optimistic, I’d say, cheer up; with the Writer’s strike, we probably won’t be subjected to the Oscars anyway.

If I were going to be optimistic, I’d say, cheer up; with the Writer’s strike, we probably won’t be subjected to the Oscars anyway.

If they have no writers and no stars show up, they’re going to pad out the time with something even more masturbatory than the usual: showing clips from the Oscars since its inception as a big Hollywood congratulatory party. ZOMG the red carpet in black and white aren’t you EXCITED?!?!?!?!?

Kimpost
I particulary liked the first part of the movie. That was when he concentrated his efforts on the flaws or holes of the US-system. That was real.

Your objectivity is so...phantom-like…

On the subject of documentaries, my brother just brought home a copy of “Devil’s Playground.” It wasn’t released last year, but it is so much better than anything moore has ever done.  Ever.

I highly doubt it. I think “No End in Sight” has it locked up.

Bingo, Donna.

Though I admit I haven’t seen “no End in Sight” myself,
I’ve heard nothing but rave reviews about it.

On ‘Rotten Tomatoes’, it’s gotten a 96% positive reception.
Out of 77 reviews, only 3 were “rotten”, while 74 were “fresh”.
(That’s RT’s version of the ‘thumbs-up/thumbs-down’ thing.)

But, errr… of course, I would never, ever underestimate the sheer vapidity of the Hollywood left.
(Just so we’re clear.)

I’m commenting on whether i found the movie good or not. The truth is that I found the first half of the movie good. It dealt with real cases. Actual problems with the US system. People with insurance who get hosed by insurance companies.

The other half of the movie is about glorifying universal healthcare in UK, France and Canada. That was just weak. And the Cuba part was just plain silly.

It dealt with real cases.

That Moore fabricated details of.

It doesn’t matter how well the movie was made but how well the message is shown to viewers, so that it has a bigger impact. I have seen some pretty crappy movies but they still get the message across.

I’m commenting on whether i found the movie good or not. The truth is that I found the first half of the movie good. It dealt with real cases. Actual problems with the US system. People with insurance who get hosed by insurance companies.

You must have missed the posts here that have dealt with the deception Moore utilized in those “real” cases.  And there’s also the part where you cannot check out the claimed facts of these cases due to doctor patient confidentiality.

My impression of things is that a fairly large majority of people in US agrees on that the healthcare industry in your country has some serious flaws

And that the debate was about if universal healthcare is the best way to fix said flaws?

It doesn’t matter how well the movie was made but how well the message is shown to viewers, so that it has a bigger impact. I have seen some pretty crappy movies but they still get the message across.

I completely agree.  For instance, Triumph of the Will was a brilliantly produced documentary, and had a tremendous impact on the populace.

[/Godwin]

And that the debate was about if universal healthcare is the best way to fix said flaws?

Just for clarification, you’re not implying that Moore is interested in (or even portrays) debate...?

Moore’s got an agenda. I’m not sure if he wants debate or if he just wants US to suddenly ‘go euro’ without one.

I believe that he basically is a welfare state kind of guy. You know; tax the rich, universal healthcare, less military spending, soft on crime, less border control, handing over more power to the UN, ratifying Kyoto, white mans burden etc etc.

Within that frameset he seeks personal fame and success.

Jesus, are we really going to have to go through this SAME old debate with a Mooretard?

Kimpost should know better but obviously doesn’t.  Afterall he thought the first part of Sicko was great but was wrong once it started extolling the perfection of the euro systems?  He knows that the first part must be the truth but when its showing the other stuff its wrong.  But the first part of the movie just has to be true and can’t consider that maybe its not.

Yes. Since I’m quite ignorant I find the first part of the movie good, and the later part bad, because I know about europe, and I don’t know anything about how things work in US…

You can’t rely on Michael Moore to tell you how things work (or don’t work) in the U.S.

Still, I guess that’s all irrelevant, since AMPAS has the gall to nominate him for Best Propaganda… again.

Kimpost
Yes. Since I’m quite ignorant I find the first part of the movie good, and the later part bad, because I know about europe, and I don’t know anything about how things work in US…

If the second part of the movie is wrong and is about something that you know, what makes you think that the first part of the movie is right because it’s about things that you admittedly know nothing of?  That line of “reasoning” is as illogical and devoid of critical thought as anything I’ve ever heard or read.

What leads you to believe that moore would only lie or be wrong about half of the things in his movie?  How could lies and/or mistakes only manifest themselves in the half of his film that’s about Europe with not even a hint of it in the segments about the U.S.?  I think that you demonstrate that you’re willing and able to believe the worst about the U.S. and are reluctant to question or research negative claims about the U.S. for fear of finding out that your preconceptions are wrong.

Posted by Kimpost on 01/24/2008 at 10:42 AM (Link to this comment | )

“My impression of things is that a fairly large majority of people in US agrees on that the healthcare industry in your country has some serious flaws”

Its one of those weird (but common) situations where almost everyone (in surveys) is ‘ok’ with their healthcare but thinks the system is broken for other people… because of stuff like Sicko…

You see the same thing with the economy…

It’s the type of thing you get when one partisan group controls the media… I’m okay but it seems everything is f-ed up… from what I hear….

ZOMG the red carpet in black and white aren’t you EXCITED?!?!?!?!?

I’d rather masturbate with a cheese grater.

What leads you to believe that moore would only lie or be wrong about half of the things in his movie?  How could lies and/or mistakes only manifest themselves in the half of his film that’s about Europe with not even a hint of it in the segments about the U.S.?  I think that you demonstrate that you’re willing and able to believe the worst about the U.S. and are reluctant to question or research negative claims about the U.S. for fear of finding out that your preconceptions are wrong.

- Nothing, you don’r understand.
- Right or wrong is not important, except for the real cases. If they are false, then all is fine, but if they’re not, we have a problem (in my opinion).
Am not.
- Please direct me to the research that says that the US system is flawless.

Right or wrong is not important

Yuh-huh.

Seriously, guys. Just go to practically any other post here, point this Mooretard at one of the exact same arguments on the subject, and let it go. It would be the height of ridiculousness to do the SAME DAMN THING yet again when it’s already been laid out at least twenty times before.

Please direct me to the research that says that the US system is flawless.

Please direct us to the post someone has made claiming that.

Kimpost, please help us understand.

You don’t know what the U.S. system is like, but you’re sure it’s bad (as revealed in the first part of the movie.) Yet you dislike the second part of the movie, because you know that the European system is flawed.

I’m suffering some cognitive dissonance here.  If the second part of the movie is putting out flawed arguments, why would you assume the first part isn’t?

I’m not as ignorant to the american system as you might think. I am partly using it, via the Swedish system. Generally speaking the best experts in the world work in the US. Partly of course because you are a large country but that’s not the only reason. The parts I have had access to has been nothing but top notch.

What Moore mostly spoke about in the first part of the movie, was about the people that are in the system, but where the system has failed.

The last yera and a half I have become interested in healthcare in general terms, because of my situation. When looking in to things you tend to see serious problems pretty fast. Let’s leave the un-insured out of the equation for a while, that’s a debate in itself. Let’s focus on the people who are insured, but get screwed by the insurance companies.

Let’s start with the followeing two statements:

- Insurance companies enjoy making profits. (Nothing wrong with that, that’s what companies try to do.)

- The profit gets larger if you pay out less money.

The above means that there’s an incentive to try to avoid paying out claims.

Now, as an insurance company you can’t do that too obviously, because that would make you go bancrupt (clients leaving). But you can’t avoid to see that the incentive not to pay up, is there.

So insurance companies do what they can to avoid expensive treatments. Most often the treatments they accept are the best treatments, but sometimes treatments get really expensive. That’s when you start looking for loopholes. Sometimes they refer to the treatments as experimental, while everyone in the business knows that it’s really about the money.

In Sweden, where I live, we have universal healthcare. It has it’s problems. Some of them are really serious too, so I’m not really in to praising it. Cancer patients die here because people stand in line before they can get treatment. When you get access to it, though, it’s right up there with the best in the world. And as I have mentioned - through our system we have access to the best international experts too.

Swedish doctors told me about when they meet american colleages on conventions. Americans discuss healthcare innovations and relate them to costs in a way european doctors don’t. American hospitals have actual numbers on how much, in dollars, a patients treatment should cost. For instance they speak about dollars per year gained. If the amount is too high, the treatment’s not viable.

In Sweden that doesn’t exist. A doctor can get heat here too, if he or she choses too expensive treatments. But the ones with the money are politicians, and politicians like to stay in office. Basically politicians who don’t outspend each other won’t stay in office.

Now, that would lead to super expensive healthcare, wouldn’t it? Tha answer is, it doesn’t. People still hate to go to hospitals. I haven’t had a checkup in years.

The second part of the movie wasn’t bad because it was flawed. I’m sure most of it was true even. As you know Moore seldom lies. He implies things.

What he implied was that NHS is perfect. And it isn’t. Further he lost footing and started to compare overall entitlements(the movie was supposed to cover healthcare), which kind of sucked.

To me, the first part of the movie was quite strong, because it was about real cases. The same kind of cases you see here and there when you look for them. It’s not hard to find people who are not happy with how the american system has treated them. You can argue that the problem is not as big as Moore portrays it to be. And I would probably agree with you on that. But I find it hard to accept that you truly don’t believe you have some serious fixing to to…

I’m sorry for the long rant. Healthcare gets to me. I gotta tell you one thing that I find really frustrating. Michael Moore and the reactions he gets. He’s such a polarising individual. He actually kills debate rather than starts it. Ironic, and in my opinion very sad.

Man, I’m late to this, but I did want to comment on something to bring this back on topic.

I, too, blew the Best Documentary category because I thought No End in Sight had it completely locked.  I had to look up the taxi movie to see what it was about.  (By then, I had flipped the TV station to the local hockey game...I can only handle so much Hollywood mutual masturbation in one night.)

Granted, Moore didn’t win.  (Yay!) And a lot of that had to do with the fact Sicko simply wasn’t that good of a film.  Honestly, truly, no kidding...I saw it in an auditorium with about six other people.  Most got up and walked out.  I checked later and only one person was not supposed to be there (per the attendance the theatre’s computer showed).  I don’t know if the others were paid or on passes, but they came purposely.

That said, there was another significant reason Moore lost.  Simply stated, there were plenty of other anti-American documentaries to pick from!  With a selection of “the Iraq war is wrong and a drain” and “America tortures and is the bad guy,” Hollywood’s Blame America First residents had options.

Stewart’s “joke” at the beginning about Iraq films not making money gave some insight.  They don’t get it.  They’ll continue to churn out the crap because it’s the message they want to deliver.  And they’ll continue to not understand why the typical American is so uninspired and unenthusiastic about the whole genre.