Moore vs. CNN

CNN responds to an irate Michael Moore after it ran a piece that questioned some of the "facts" presented in "Sicko." I guess Moore got mad because he is used to having his ass kissed by Keith Olberman: (link)

"It's ironic that someone who has made a career out of holding powerful interests accountable is so sensitive to having his own work held up to the light by impartial journalists, as we did in our examination of 'Sicko,' " the (CNN) spokesperson said.

One of the people Moore whined about was CNN's chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta because he took issue with how Moore sourced his "statistics" in the movie. Predictably, Moore accused Gupta of being an apologist for the medical industrial complex.

Later, however, Gupta got the opportunity to bitch-smack Moore on Larry King Live (link) and in his blog (link):

... is important to get the facts absolutely right and to be transparent about the sources of those facts. Michael knows that I took issue with the "cherry picking" of some numbers to try and bolster his argument. He cited an unsourced BBC report when talking about per capita Cuban spending. That same report also talked about US per capita health spending, but he apparently didn't like that number, so instead he used a projected number from a different study. I worry that comparing apples and oranges purposely, and perhaps needlessly, muddy the argument...

..I also worry that Michael, who is an accomplished film maker, tried to leave people with the impression that health care is free in many other nations and there is a state of utopia. True, Michael did talk about increased taxes in his film, but he also kept calling it "free," which made it nebulous. No question, there are many valuable things to learn from other health care systems, but we should know all things before wholeheartedly endorsing one system over another. We should know that taxes will be much higher, as is the case in France where they are crippled by their health care system. We should also know that a significant number of people in these countries still buy supplemental insurance, apparently unhappy with what the government alone can provide. We should also remember that Medicare, an example of a limited national health care plan in the United States, is expected to go bankrupt by the year 2020.

You've been served.