E Pluribus Unum

Salon's Andrew O'Hehir reviews Michael Moore's newest, Sicko, and comes away impressed:

When Americans do get to see "Sicko," Moore says, "They will understand that this was about helping 9/11 rescue workers who've been abandoned by the government. They're not going to focus on Cuba or Fidel Castro or any other nonsense coming out of the Bush White House. They're going to say: 'You're telling me that al-Qaida prisoners get better medical treatment than the people who tried to recover bodies from the wreckage at ground zero?'"

Hmmm. Wonder how they'll spin that?

Oh -- and the part about Moore, a right-wing blogger and his cancer-stricken wife will blow your mind. But you'll have to read that part for yourself.

"I hope this film engenders discussion, not just about healthcare, but about why we are the way we are these days," Moore told us. "Where is our soul? Why would we allow 50 million Americans, 9 million of them children, not to have health insurance? Maybe my role as a filmmaker is to go down a road we might be afraid to go down, because it might lead to a dark place."

Dark but entertaining for sure.

When Moore interviews Tony Benn, a leading figure on the British left, his larger concerns come into focus. Benn argues that for-profit healthcare and the other instruments of the corporate state, like student loans and bottomless credit-card debt, perform a crucial function for that state. They undermine democracy by creating a docile and hardworking population that is addicted to constant debt and an essentially unsustainable lifestyle, that literally cannot afford to quit jobs or take time off, that is more interested in maintaining high incomes than in social or political change. Moore seizes on this insight and makes it a kind of central theme...

I haven't seen the film yet, and/but I have a concern here. If Moore presents this as a shadow-policy, coordinated at the highlest levels, I'm skeptical because everyone knows no one is in charge. But that's a minor point. Either way you cut it, it's a devastating observation.

So I guess this film is going to rile people up. There is certainly something in Moore that brings out the worst in right-wing Bush apologists. They just go...nuts when he pops up on the radar. Of course, maybe there's not so many of them left and the few-and-far-between might finally have learned how to control themselves by now.

As far as the accuracy of my movies goes, [says Moore] I think the record speaks for itself. Maybe people will say: He warned us about General Motors, he warned us about school shootings and he warned us about Bush.

Crikey. This'll definitely drive them around the bend.

I can hardly wait!