Entertainment Weekly, Michael Moore and Healthcare

[kimmylavin]

Well, I've gotten a bit behind on my Entertainment Weekly magazines. (Its one of my guilty pleasures, has been for about 14 years now...)

ANYWAY, there was a sidebar in the June 1st issue that made me just furious.
In the article titled "Ready for Moore", there is a sidebar called "Don't Pack Up for France Just Yet", and the byline reads: "Want a more balanced look at U.S. health care? We dreamt up six scenes to add to 'Sicko.' - Daniel Gross" (The internet line reads: "The Upside of Michael Moore's health-care gripe -- EW explores angles the director didn't")

Then it goes on to list 6 examples of how US healthcare is so great.
What strikes me, though, is that most of the examples don't prove anything great about US healthcare. They seem to prove that because of the FAILINGS of US healthcare, states and private companies have stepped up.

And what strikes me even more is that this was printed.
What in the hell is a healthcare industry apologist article doing in an entertainment magazine?
And why for this article, and this article alone?
There are plenty of other articles. They include Internet-only trailers (red bar, R-rated trailers), with no corresponding sidebar titled "Want a more balanced look at the movie industry - here are this year's PG rated trailers." An article about what TV networks are doing wrong, but no corresponding "Wanna Feel Better About TV?" sidebar.

I know that EW is owned by Time Warner, but I can't imagine that they paid for this. But why is it here? Doesn't it seem wildly misplaced?

Regardless, here's the article: http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20040164,00.html Don't know if you need a password or not. If so, I'll try to post the whole thing in a reply.

[kimmylavin]

1. Article

Think you need a password, so here's the sidebar:

From Entertainment Weekly:

Don't Pack Up for France Just Yet
The Upside of Michael Moore's health-care gripe -- EW explores angles the director didn't
By Daniel Gross

The foibles and failings of the U.S. health-care sector can be heartbreaking and frequently tragic. But there's a real upside to the system, which accounts for about 15 percent of the U.S. economy. Some footage Moore's movie really could have used:

SCENE I:
The Cleveland Clinic. Cleveland
Cameras follow a 68-year-old Medicare patient undergoing triple-bypass surgery. The once-risky procedure, now routine, averts heart attacks and extends life expectancy - all at taxpayers' expense. (Ironic panning shot of the McDonald's in the complex's food court.)

SCENE II:
CVS. Topeka, Kan.
Person-on-the-street interviews with middle Americans dashing in and out of neighborhood drugstore picking up generic and branded versions of U.S.-developed pharmaceuticals (Viagra, Prozac, Lipitor) that improve their sex lives, moods, and HDL counts.

SCENE III:
The human-resources department of Pitney Bowes. Stamford, Conn.
CNBC meets The Office. Handheld narrative on large company trying to cut medical costs through a program aimed at boosting health of employees. Tour of on-site health clinics, smoking-cessation programs, cafeterias with healthy fare.

SCENE IV:
Headquarters of MicroIslet. San Diego
Tiny biotechnology start-up (one of hundreds in the country), backed by venture capital and public investors, conducts research on transplantation therapy for diabetes patients. If it succeeds, the company could make millions, and free diabetics from the need to inject themselves daily.

SCENE V:
New Jersey Commission on Science & Technology. Trenton, N.J.
It's The Apprentice — minus the obnoxious Trumpian overlord and young M.B.A. hotties. Instead, serious research types vie for grants as part of the Garden State's $270 million stem-cell-research initiative. You're hired!

Scene VI:
Residency program, Massachusetts General Hospital. Boston
Big Brother meets E.R. Vérité treatment of the lives, loves, and careers of residents who come from all corners of the globe to work in the Harvard-affiliated hospital's Cancer Center, conducting research and seeing patients. A twofer: highlights the ways in which cancer is evolving from a death sentence into a chronic condition, and the way in which the U.S. health-care system attracts the best and brightest from all over the world to staff our hospitals.

[Warpy]

2. The first case is being covered by "socialized medicine."

You know, MEDICARE, the system the rest of us want to be expanded.

The second case covers the darlings of Big Pill, the lifestyle drugs, the cosmetics of the medical industry. Nothing is actually being cured here, folks, so just move along.

In the third one, companies are being crushed by costs, so they're intruding into the private lives of their employees to reduce those costs. Is it fascism yet?

In the fourth one, they're taking a big risk. Nothing good has happened yet, they're still risking their money in the hope that something will and that they'll be able to make a monopoly's fortune off sick folks.

In the fifth one, scientists who were put out of work by a religious government are vying for jobs in an undercapitalized field. Good luck to them and the Red Sox. What the field needs is FEDERAL funding through NIH grants, not relative pennies from individual states.

In the sixth case, we're shown that a lot of the med school grads as well as other grad school grads in the US are from foreign countries. Folks, wake up, this is nothing to celebrate.

It's just amazing to me that the right wing finds all this stuff proof of some sort of success. To me it's proof the system is falling apart.

[Cleita]

3. The author ordinarily writes about business. He's

probably been hired by the health care industry to write a health care business friendly article about this. They do this all the time for damage control whenever they are threatened by those of us who want national health care. It's really just astroturf. Be ready to see much more of it being spread while "Sicko" is in the theaters and in the news. It seems credible because usually experienced writers are contracted and they are queried to well know publications, which will often print them because the author is well known in certain circles. This guy Gross comes aross to me as a corporate apologist and he's out of his element when it comes to either health care or entertainment.

[librechik]

4. EWs fraid of getting heat from Big Pharma--ever take a look at the ad pgs?

clout is clout, and Time Warner gives lots of money to the Republican Project to Keep Money in Or Pockets Forever.