SiCKO

So yesterday we went to see SiCKO, Michael Moore's new documentary on the sad state of the health care system in the United States. It's pretty good. High-quality muckraking. Maybe not as powerful as Fahrenheit 911, or Why We Fight, but its subject-matter is a little less dramatic. Not less important in the lives of most Americans, but war makes great drama.

The stories of the insurance companies denying coverage to the people interviewed are really moving. It's a great idea to cover the story not from the point of view of the uninsured, but rather from the point of view of the insured. Because, let's face it, lots of Americans with health insurance are reluctant to back universal health care schemes because they don't want to lose what they already have for the benefit of the uninsured. But if you point out that, well, what you already have may not be that good, even if you won't really know whether it is good or not until you need it . . . that's a better case, politically.

Of course, I don't think that we'll get universal health care in the United States through muckraking. I'm skeptical that we'll ever get it, but if we do, it will be through corporate America (the Big Three, especially) getting together to save itself from rising insurance premiums. The problem with that is that it's the insurance industry that is raking in those premiums. So it's big money versus big money.

So, "American exceptionalism" again. Not exceptionally good, though. The film makes that point through coverage of the Canadian, British, French, and Cuban health care systems. Even if Castro puts on a propaganda show for Moore with the Cuban scenes, isn't the real scandal that the U.S. health care system is so shitty that . . . it makes it possible for the Cuban government to do that? The scene where Moore goes through the NHS hospital in England looking for a billing department is classic Michale Moore. When he finds the "cashier," it's classic comedy gold. I won't give the punchline away. Go see the movie.