So I finally sat down this week to confront the movie that I knew I needed to watch but really did not want to watch... Michael Moore's, 'Sicko'. 123 minutes, and I wasn't sure that I could stomach wasting two hours of my life on this, but I did. To hear the media and other describe it, I was expecting a documentary. Not exactly how I would describe it.
For those of you who aren't familiar with the film (and I stress FILM, not documentary), Moore addresses a number of individual situations of people/families in dealing with their insurance coverage and the health care received, here in the U.S. He takes a close look at these examples and demonstrates how poor our health care system really is. He outlines how insurance companies have used and abused the insured, finding every way possible not to cover claims. He even finds an example of an employee of an insurance firm that says the employee with the fewest claims paid would earn the highest bonus. He then takes his message to Canada, Britain, France, and Cuba (yes, Cuba) to enlighten us as to how effective universal health care would be in the U.S.
All in all, I will say that Moore makes some strong points about the structure of our health care model here, and that it needs to improved. That is where our agreements end. He consistently uses the term, as do the people in the movie, that universal health care is 'free'. I guess if you say it enough, then it must be true, right? Canadians that I have worked with told me that they pay over 51% of their income to federal taxes. So if you have a salary of $70,000 annually, then over $36,000 is being taken by Uncle Same and going right into government coffers. So some may say that this is ok, because the care costs no more. Valid point. But, what the movie does not tell you is how long most citizens have to wait to be seen by a doctor for simple procedures, due to the fact that EVERYONE is at the doctor for anything, because, hey, its free!!
To further expound on the issue, universal care would require the federal government to manage even more of our earned income for us. Give me one example of where our federal government properly manages money and finances...... still waiting. Ever heard of Social Security, welfare, Medicaid???? Can't really say that these departments are solvent. We are over 7 trillion dollars in debt as a nation and hemorrhaging even more every day, and this would only multiply that figure. I want the government taking less of my money, not more. And if that means that I have to be a responsible individual and find quality coverage on my own, then I am all for it.
More so than any other country, we as Americans are individuals, not collectivists, and it is my responsibility to secure the future of me and my family, not some Senate aide that is writing legislation. I do agree that the system needs fixing, just not in the methodology. The insurance companies and health care providers have to be held accountable for their actions, but complete government control is not the answer.
Moore goes on to compare universal health care with fire, police, EMS, and library services that our government provides. The comparison is absurd. What Moore leaves out is that these departments are run locally, either at the county or city level. The power is at the local and state level, which is where most power should be anyway, and where our founding fathers envisioned it. Our government was established to protect us, not take care of us.
And as a final thought, Moore also uses this platform to drill the Bush Administration on the Iraq War about 10 times. This film is pure propaganda, and I hope that anyone watching it has enough of a brain to see it for what it is... a movie.
