While I haven't seen the movie yet, I highly doubt that it ends with a formal proposal or suggested legislature of how to solve the problem. Perhaps you get handed a binder as you enter the theatre.

Perhaps Mr. Hunter was unaware that most documentaries are documenting an issue or event, not providing a solution. One would think that this would be known to a "reviewer."

I had back surgery on monday morning.
On tues morning at 10am the insurance told the hospital that I would no longer be covered for hospitilization. I had not seen my doctor, had foley, IV and pain pump(morphine drip) in place and had not even been out of bed.

Just minutes ago, I was reading reviews of Sicko on Yahoo Movies and noticed a surge of name-calling/smear reviews giving the film an "F" rating. It's obviously an organized campaign, but there's no indication of who's coordinating it.

See .

Time to fight back.

Diane @ 3:

I had back surgery on monday morning.
On tues morning at 10am the insurance told the hospital that I would no longer be covered for hospitilization. I had not seen my doctor, had foley, IV and pain pump(morphine drip) in place and had not even been out of bed.

So what happened? Did you have to pay out of pocket or did they boot you out all together? Which insurance carrier? Type of plan?

Dave @ 5:

Just minutes ago, I was reading reviews of Sicko on Yahoo Movies and noticed a surge of name-calling/smear reviews giving the film an "F" rating. It's obviously an organized campaign, but there's no indication of who's coordinating it.

See .

Time to fight back.

I was reading that as well. Glad to see the anti-American reich-wingers choose big business over the best interest of Americans. How typical.

Dave @ 5:

Just minutes ago, I was reading reviews of Sicko on Yahoo Movies and noticed a surge of name-calling/smear reviews giving the film an "F" rating. It's obviously an organized campaign, but there's no indication of who's coordinating it.

See .

Time to fight back.

No need to fight back. The more they try to slam it, the more appealing it is to the public. The neo-cons haven't figured this out yet. Their name-calling and smear campaigns that usually never dispute or discuss the issue, only make it seem more interesting.

Think about it, if you saw a child in the candy aisle kicking, screaming and throwing a hissy fit, you kind of want to know what caused all of the commotion. The same applies with Moore's films. I think it was what made his last film the highest grossing documentary of all time.

Mr. Hunter once gave 250.00 bucks to the NRCC… Although he says he was drunk at the time…

Maybe he was hungover and kept using the SnuzNLuz Alarm clock. It's a clock that automatically donates a small amount of money to the charity you hate everytime you hit the snooze button. I like how in the picture it shows "$11 pending to GOP". :lol: :lol:

SnuzNLuz clock: http://www.thinkgeek.com/stuff/41/snuznluz.shtml?cpg=50T

Perhaps Michael Moore cannot fix all that's wrong with the US health care system.

But I would certainly vote for him to cauterize all of Mr. Hunter's hemorrhoids.

Here's the reality....and instructions if you're unsure what to do now that the movie Sicko is out and its getting 'bad reviews' (btw - when it was released in Cannes...Fox News gave it a good review)

If you have a brain and it works...go see the movie and make you're own judgements

If you listen to movie critics before going to see a movie...then you're probably the same type of person that always answers "I don't know" or "I'm not sure" to every poll and you flip a coin when you vote...see it or don't see it

If you're republican...since you're not going to see it anyway...Michael Savage needs his diaper changed and Coulter needs a prostate exam...drive him there

Most Americans think HMO is a premium cable channel.

I guess we have a free press..cause tit-heads like that one can write what ever the hell they want...connected or not to logic.

Documentarians must fix the problems our "leaders" can't!

But...but...but...Moore is fat!

Dear Mr. Hunter:

There is an old saying.......When you have failed at everything else, become a consultant........a critic.....a pundit.......take your pick, you qualify.

Stephen Hunter seems to be moonlighting for the insurance/HMO industry. I wonder if WP knows about his side activities. But as he is a bad publicist, the HMO's will probably fire him before the Wimp Post does.

i saw Sicko last weekend (special preview in philly) and i thought it was simply awesome. it was informative, entertaining, enraging, funny, sad, hopeful, depressing, etc. every emotion--kind of like fahrenheit 911.

and this WashPost review is friggin dumB. as everyone already mentioned, and i repeat again, this is a documentary--not a policy dissertation. moore comes at the subject with a certain POV, namely that for a country that espouses the "family values and world leader" hubbub we sure have a funny way of expressing those values in a health system based on profit and reduction of services for the populace.

people need to start thinking long and hard about what we as a nation value, and what we are willing to do to ensure that all americans don't have to be at the mercy of a health care system that chews people up, spits them out and then sends them a bill.

I'm sure most people here have an insurance/hmo horror story to tell. Here's mine:

Last year my daughter had an emergency C-section that almost killed her. The hospital sent her home after 2 days - in spite of the fact that her stitches had broken. Of course, she developed an infection a week or two later and ended up back in the hospital and eventually needed long-term outpatient care which must have cost many times more that what it would have to keep her in the hospital a couple of extra days in the first place.

If I ever learn the name of the pencil pusher who caused her all this pain and suffering I'll give her/him an episiotomy they'll never forget.

Michael Moore is a great spokesman on this issue. I wish that American politicians were equally committed to this vital cause. But I guess our politicians are too busy debating evolution and gay marriage to worry about something as trivial as health care.

Michael moores the kind of guy who gets a person thinking ,its to bad he doesnt do a documentary exposeing the falacy that is 911, talk about explosive !

OT: Hmm Whitehouse scandals brewing, Cheney being exposed for the criminal he is, failed immigration bill, the bloodbath in Iraq gets worse, hmmm how to distract the people??? 2 car bombs found in London! See it works like a charm.

".. turns out to be a fuzzy, toothless collection of anecdotes, .."

Sounds like it has teeth and is already nibbling on a few lobbyist nerves even as we speak.

Gort @ 39:

Yellow Elephant Safari

I hope your daughter fully recovered, but before you take insert that surgical knife to that idiot’s groin area… [tear]… please fill out this form.

Mother and baby are fine, thank you.

And who said anything about a surgical knife? I'd use my bare hands.

Even our very right wing newspaper (Richmond Times Dispatch) gave it a decent review. Michael Moore is a true patriot, a guy who genuinely stands up for the average American and takes a hell-of-a-lot of grief for it. That takes courage. To the idiot in Wapo, he never claimed he had a solution. He's trying to raise awareness. What I've heard him say is that all national health care systems have their pros and cons, and that we should examine them all, then come up with a plan that's suitable to America. Anyway, not only do we need to fight for a national healthcare system, we need to support Michael Moore. The righties are already out in force trying to trash him. Push back hard folks. Let's not let these bullies get the upper hand.

By the way if our government believes in free trade why can't Americans purchase the same high priced prescription drugs we have here at lower costs from other countries? So much for free trade. I guess it's only free when the big corporations can make huge profits.

How about those 4 congress people who helped hammer out the Pharma deal which favors Big Pharma, they all quit congress soon afterwards and got high paying jobs with the Pharma companies. Hmmm nothing fishy there.

Straight Shooter @ 45:

.. Those reduced prices are passed along to those people who are covered by the insurance companies..

Not necessarily - it depends on the policy. Usually a patients co-pay amount is derived from the full retail price and only the insurance company's portion of the payment is based on negotiated prices. In other words, insurance companies benefit much more than people with coverage. But I'll have to wait until I see the movie to understand exactly how Moore presented this issue.

Michael Moore's controversial film SiCKO opens nationwide this weekend. But before the inevitable discussions about the accuracy of the film's portrayal of the U.S. health care system, you can make up your own mind. The summary below includes comparisons of the American health care system relative to other countries and between the states, data on the uninsured, rising health care costs, the woes of Medicare and Medicaid and more.

For all the details, see:
"SiCKO Required Reading: U.S. Health Care by the Numbers."

NBC Standards and Practices (censors): "Cuba Can't Win'

Not surprising that such overt media propaganda isn't just part of post 9/11 thinking.

Furious @ 54:

Everybody know the wheels are falling off and anyone that claims our system is mostly working just fine is someone that is profiting from the current system.

None of you love your mothers as much as I love mine, I mean, I really love my mother.

I was reading some reviews of Sicko the other day and I was just curious, are all the Republican reviewers 8 years old or it that really they way they think? I can't remember how many time I read "if Michael Moore likes Cuba so much he should move there" The brain trust of the Right Wing is amazing.

No RayC that is how they really think. Scary isn't it. And they are raising their children to think the same way.

The have's and the have more's in their minds deserve the best in life because it was God who chose them to be successful. The have not's deserve what we get.

RayC @ 62:

I was reading some reviews of Sicko the other day and I was just curious, are all the Republican reviewers 8 years old or it that really they way they think? I can't remember how many time I read "if Michael Moore likes Cuba so much he should move there" The brain trust of the Right Wing is amazing.

I think that this is actually how they think. That is about as deep as they get.

Of course the politicians will never change the SS wage cap from $90,000.00. It makes too much sense. They make the problem seem so much more difficult then it is and to them us little people just don't understand or comprehend the problem like they do.

American Psycho @ 63:

How to fix the social security problem without privatizing it. Raise the wage cap from $90,000.00 to $250,000.00. See how simple it is.

Isn't $250,000.00 yesterday's $90,000.00? It sure seems to be in Chicago where dinner and drinks for two can easily reach over $150.00, yesterday's $50.00.

jaykaydee @ 69:

To be taken seriously, he needs to keep his (ample) ass behind the camera, not in front of it. His Messiah complex gets in the way of storytelling. They're talking a lot about Moore/Sicko today at Unbound Edition:

http://www.unboundedition.com/content/view/1191/50/

this documentarys not national geografics, someone has to do the dirty job of going after the injustices that hmos are moore fits the bill!!!!get it bill !!!!!!!

heres an idea on the army surviveing ieds have all the troops and vihicals far enough away from them , say back in the usa!

Translation of the sentiment here:

"If you don't have the exact, perfect answer to fix the problem instantly, do not point out that a problem exists."

Yay team amerikkka!

We have egos in this country. Ego trumps heart.

Wow, Jay Leno wasn't an ass. What the hell???

Conservativeslayer @ 29:

I read a couple of the movie reviews at yahoo about Sicko. The ones that hated it are attacking the film with their usual lies about the canadian health care system. Saying you have to wait 9 months for heart surgery. Absolute bull shit. If it's an emergency, you get in right away. I was listening to Thom Hartmann and he was interviewing a doctor that's worked in both the US and Canada. The doctor said the canadian system is far superior. He's never had to justify putting a patient in the hospital there. What a crazy system, letting the doctors determine care, not some penny-pinching HMO bureaucrat. God forbid we let that happen in America. When my grandma had bypass surgery, her insurance company wanted her out the next day. The doctor had to say she had an infection (which she didn't) to keep her in the hospital. Watch for more attacks on the film and more lies about the Canadian healthcare system.

Excerpt from Physicians for a National Healthcare plan:

Won’t this result in rationing like in Canada?

The U.S. Supreme Court recently established that rationing is fundamental to the way managed care conducts business. Rationing in U.S. health care is based on income: if you can afford care you get it, if you can’t, you don’t. A recent study by the prestigious Institute of Medicine found that 18,000 Americans die every year because they don’t have health insurance. That’s rationing. No other industrialized nation rations health care to the degree that the U.S. does.

If there is this much rationing why don’t we hear about it? And if other countries do not ration the way we do, why do we hear about them? The answer is that their systems are publicly accountable and ours is not. Problems with their health care systems are aired in public, ours are not. In U.S. health care no one is ultimately accountable for how it works. No one takes full responsibility.

The rationing that takes place in U.S. health care is unnecessary. A number of studies (notably the General Accounting office report in 1991, and the Congressional Budget office report in 1993) show that there is more than enough money in our health care system to serve everyone if it were spent wisely. Administrative costs are far higher in the U.S. than in other countries’ systems. These inflated costs are directly tied to our failure to have a publicly-financed, universal health care system. We spend at least twice more per person than any other country, and still find it necessary to deny health care.

http://www.pnhp.org/facts/singlepayer_faq.php#canada_ration

Right now 440,000 Americans are forced into bankruptcy each year because of a healthcare crisis in the family. The dirty little secret is that 75% of them had healthcare insurance but the coverage was not enough to cover the costs.

Healthcare costs are projected to double in the next ten years, how many more families are going to find themselves losing everything they've worked for going up in smoke to feed the coffers of big insurance companies.

If we were able to set up a national healthcare system, I would want the Canadians or French to be contracted to run it. I wouldn't trust these money grabing clowns in Washington to run it.

I think it is very telling that the Wash Post, which lets you comment on almost every article, won't let you comment on the review of Sicko. They knew it was a hatchet job. Knew people would be upset. Decided to

Where is Mr. Media Notes Howard Kurtz to cry about all the campaign contributions from this reviewer. The Wash Post continually disappoints.

I just saw "Sicko" and it blew me away. Moore merely gives anecdotes through real people's stories and follows up with a remedy for each person still alive by the end of the movie. Needless to say, the government and health industries will try to stiffel this movie. We can start to change to a universal healthcare system for the benefit of a majority of covered folks that still get screwed by the big boys in denying procedures for inhumane reasons. Of course, folks unable to pay would be covered as well. That could be you and me with one missed paycheck, my friends. Moore explains how the government keeps us in debt so we are glad for any employment that offers healthcare, even if we pay throught the nose when we use the coverage. Even England, in 1948 could afford universal healthcare to this day. Michael Moore is a great patriot. What elected official will be the next patriot that moves us into universal healthcare? See the movie and be transformed.

Retirement and medical assistance, instead of being obligatory function of a democratic state, cartel of corporation & our own elected government officials has turned into money making machine. Capitalism is not Democracy. Capitalism is the name of the monitory freedom given to the private sector in Democracy. But well being of the citizens should be excluded from capitalism.