Guest Blogged by Alan Breslauer
Following on yesterday’s Michael Moore smackdown of Wolf Blitzer, Sanjay Gupta, and CNN specifically and the MSM in general, Moore and Gupta had it out tonight on Larry King Live after Moore fact-checked Gupta’s so-called “Reality Check” from the evening before.
The Moore/Gupta appearance is below, broken into three parts…
Part 1
Parts 2 and 3 of the Moore/Gupta appearance on Larry King Live follow below…
Part 2
Part 3
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I’ve been looking forward to this, thanks Alan!
Sanjay loves staring at the beautiful trees as the forest around him burns. As a doctor, he knows exactly what’s wrong, as a reporter he forgot all about it.
I find it amazing that they have to ask “why do you get upset that people say you lie to make money?”.. W..O..W..!
If he [Moore] points out “facts” from different sources, why is that “fudging”??! There is NO one source out there that has “all the facts”, and some times you have to take what you can get from one report, and something else from another (perhaps A, B, and C are in one report, but D and E are not.. then you have to take info from 2 reports..right?). And, when you CAN, you take information from the most “reliable” source, and in this case, you’d take the U.S. info when you can.
Now, if they showed, for example.. the Cuba data ($251) and American (~$7,000) were both in a single report.. let’s say XYZ claims Cuba was $2,500 per capita and the U.S. was $3,000.. and ZYX said Cuba was $251 and America $450, and PDQ said Cuba was $4,500 and America $7,000.. and the end story said “America $7,000 and Cuba $251”, then SURE, you could say he “cherry picked” the data. but the U.S. info isn’t tracking Cuba, that’s a world org that did that.. When it comes to taking info from that same report, or picking AMERICAN generated numbers, which do you do?
Basically, $251 wasn’t a number in OUR reports, but “about 7 grand” WAS.. Michael took a number that was REASONABLE and applied it. That is NOT fudging, not even close!
But, more importantly, let’s look at why Michael SHOULD be pissed. 99% of Americans (well, we’ll forget the richest 2% that would rather let you die than even have to spit in your direction) would -happily- pay “$251 for all their health care”, as opposed to “-anywhere near- $7,000”.. right? duh? Does that $800 – $1,200 range on top even matter? We’re talking at LEAST 25 TIMES as much money here, in America, for “2 notches above” care? and not even in the top 25? top 35?!? WTF?!
People don’t have $7,000 each for health care. Dropping that amount, even a LITTLE is a GOOD idea.. couple that with NO out of pocket costs at the time of treatment??!! Talk about a load off! And, add 47 MILLION people back to being able to live like normal human beings? go to the doctor when puss is eeking out of whatever? 18,000 LESS deaths a year? FOR LESS MONEY OVERALL?!?!
and that fuck Sanjay keeps spewing “but, Michael, it’s not -free-“.. DUH? FUCKNUTS? neither is what we have NOW.. /sigh
I hate Republicans.. I really really do.
My dear friend from childhood, now a generally right-leaning ER doctor, suggests that American ERs are already serving as the place that Americans go when they’re desperate for treatment. Yet the ERs often don’t want to see folks who don’t have an obvious emergency, so they send them away if they have no insurence.
He suggests that the government begin the road to full medical coverage by simply paying the ERs to treat all the people who come in, whether they are insured or not…
Not a bad first step, eh?
shw
Please read: Doctor Sanjay Gupta disinforms the public.
One thing that Moore missed out on when Gupta was criticizing Medicare as a system going bankrupt. I think a nice remark to Gupta would have been, “Maybe if we didn’t have congress critters allowing the pharma companies writing the bills they legislate that restricts the government from negotiating bulk discounts of pharmaceutical drugs, we wouldn’t be overspending so much on this program in giving gifts to these companies, and Medicare would be in better financial shape! That’s another reason Americans go over to Canada and Mexico to get drug prescriptions filled.”
I’m french and I work in France.
I pay about 150 Euros each month for the national health system. 65% to 100% of my costs are paid directly.
I’ve got a private insurance which pay the difference to 100% (about 90 Euros for the all family :
2 + 2kids=4).
But the new elected french republicans are working on it (privatization).
Sanjay’s a funny guy. Let’s see, would you rather A) wait 6 days for a cardiac procedure or B) receive it within hours in the U.S.?
It’s fun to frame questions leaving out the 47 million Americans who answer C) can’t afford the cardiac procedure and must die.
– Tom
Man, I wish I could somehow help Mike on his next project, even if it doesn’t go after the CMSM as I think his next project should. He’s one righteous man, and we’re fabulously lucky to have him among us. Until our media are once again free of commercial pressures, our America has been lost. This man is a tower (OK, a pyramid) of strength.
Just watched Larry King’s shootout between Michael Moore and Dr. Gupta. Michael Moore came off as a Cherry Pickin’ Coward. So afraid of being called out for his tactics because he feels it’ll hurt his PROFITS. Dr. Gupta EXPOSED Michael for his SELECTIVE use of statistics from varying sources.
Let’s see if this site censors me AGAIN now that I’ve provided a real email address.
{ED NOTE: This site did not censor “Kenneth”. Not sure what he/she’s referring to. The only time we disallow posts is after commenters have violated the few rules we have here, multiple times. Rules such as using a single user name, avoiding personal attacks against other commenters, etc. I’m aware of no “censorship” of Kenneth’s posts. We do NOT ban posters or remove posts simply because they may disagree with the administrators of this site. – BF}
Hey Kenneth Gupta !, could you get me some free samples of some Diovan and coreg ?, I can’t seem to afford to get any more this month.
…you see I got hurt at work and got fucked over too, so now I have to choose between putting food on my family or having meds for myself.
SO GET FUCKED KENNETH !!!
Somewhat related—
Sharp Nurses may strike starting Monday in San Diego:
“Throughout negotiations, Sharp has shown its lack of respect for nurses and our desire to have a stronger voice in improving patient care,” said Corinne Hollings, a nurse and president of the Sharp Professional Nurses Network, the union affiliate at Sharp.
Hey Floridiot,
Michael Moore took the highest or lowest statistics (whichever was more favorable to his case) to tell this story. That’s cherry pickin, SPIN, FUDGING THE NUMBERS! Gupta brought that to light and Michael Moore was SPEECHLESS! He got PWNED!
Democracy NOW! covers Michael Moore bitch-slapping CNN:
MICHAEL MOORE: Why don’t you tell the truth to the American people? I mean, I wish that CNN and the other mainstream media would just for once tell the truth about what’s going on in this country, whether it’s with healthcare — I don’t care what it is. I mean, you guys have such a poor track record. And for me to come on here and have to listen to that kind of crap.
I mean, seriously, I haven’t been on your show now for three years. The last time I was on, you ran a similar piece about Fahrenheit 9/11, saying, “Oh, this can’t be true, what he’s saying about the war, how it’s going to be a quagmire, the weapons of mass destruction.” You know, and why don’t you start off, actually, with my first appearance back here on your show in three years and maybe apologize to me for saying that three years ago, because it turned out everything I said in Fahrenheit was true. Everything has come to happen, everything I said. I mean, I took you in that film to Walter Reed Hospital, and it took three years before you or any of the rest of the mainstream media would go to Walter Reed Hospital and see what was happening to our troops.
So for me to have to sit here and listen again to more crap about socialized medicine or how the Canadians have it, you know, worse than us, and all this — all the statistics show that we have far worse healthcare than these other industrialized countries. We’re the only ones that don’t have it free and universal.
http://www.democracynow.org/art.../07/11/1343221
http://play.rbn.com/?url=demnow...38;start=12:19
I am paying $1000/month for health care benefits. I STILL have to pay co-pays, deductibles, % not covered, and FIGHT with them for every claim. $1000/month is a minimum wage job, so how can someone with a minimum wage job afford health care? What kind of a country IS this? And what kind of people are Wolf Blitzer, Gupta, and CNN???
Why do I have to fight with them all the time, to cover something? When I’m paying $1000/month?
It’s ruining our economy, that all this $$$ we are continually paying on co-pays, deductibles, and % not covered, and denial of claims…for COVERED people paying $1000/month, we could be spending that $$$ on consumer products, instead of for NOTHING!
My thanks to Michael Moore, again, for his entertaining format of investigative reporting. He is SO needed in these times where corporate media refuses to report anything not pre-approved by their owners. Newscasts and reports have sold out to their handlers. M.Moore is one of the few sources of independent journalism available to the public through his movies and discussions such as this one, and because there are so few resources to find the truth, it is one of the MAIN reasons the public is so dumb-downed and not able to learn what’s happening to them. American’s have become sheeple and walk around in a trance worrying about celebrities and sports teams, more so than they consider the plight of the world, their fellow man, or even their next door neighbors. Our politicians and the media are puppets to the heads of corporations. They dictate what we can know, even what rights we can use, and who gets to have health care. The Brit politician in the movie summed up our plight very well. And, Michael’s point in the movie where he says we must become a nation of WE and lose the ME, is so perfect. Changing to this attitude would take care of many ills affecting humankind. It is particularly true right here in the USA.
I guess with the rich getting richer under the “War on Terror” and we get stuck going broke with health care, the news will have more and more stories like this:
Rich buying luxury submarines:
http://yournewreality.blogspot....superrich.html
$165 million dollar house for sale:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6290160.stm
The next time your paying your “co-pay” on your health insurance, think “Yellow Submarine”…
Personally, I think they are suppressing these outrageous stories of “the rich”. This is the first I’ve seen of the “luxury submarines”, via a Raw Story link.
Don’t worry, the economy is going great…according to multi-millionaire “regular guys” Sean Hannity (the “people’s” talk show host) and Rush Limbaugh and Paul Harvey. Don’t forget to buy “LifeLock”!
Hey! Ya gotta spend your excess income SOMEWHERE, right???
#14,Kenneth, I didn’t see that at all, what I saw was Moore trying to figure out which Pharma (Gupta) talking point to answer first, the point of the whole hit piece was to discredit Moore by a few dollars here and there and try to avoid the best they could the real story that our healthcare system is messed up beyond all repair.
Theres no doubt about that.
…and did Moore put in his movie that extended vote session with Tom Delay ?
Gupta said something about another country (France?) being billions of dollars in debt.
Well, we’re TRILLIONS of dollars in debt. And they have health care for everyone and we don’t.
What’s debt got to do with it? If we can borrow and deficit spend trillions on wars based on lies, why shouldn’t they deficit spend a measly few billions to make sure none of their citizens die from lack of health care? We have the money to kill innocent people far away, but we never seen to have the money to help our own.
Congress is trying to cut the funds to Cheney’s office because he refuses to comply with U.S. law–what they should do is cut the heartless MF’s health care instead of making us pay for his six or seven heart surgeries while our loved ones die from lack of health insurance or denial of services by insurers. If we didn’t have to pay for health care for him and all the other scum in the White House and Congress, maybe we could afford to pay for our own health care–ever think of that?
Here’s an interesting angle on this: Did Gupta pick a fight with Michael Moore to drag his book sales out of the basement, and BECOME the story he was just supposed to report on?
http://mediabloodhound.typepad....-witnesse.html
Who says WE don’t have long waits in the US. I have several family members and friends who waited weeks after diagnosis of possible cancer for further tests….and then later to die of it. I have seen no evidence of any kind of rush for cancer diagnosis. With good insurance.
I am a physician and tried to leave a comment on Dr. Gupta’s CNN Blog regarding his exchange with Michael Moore ““ unfortunately it did not make it into the published comments:
Dear Dr. Gupta,
I have seen both Michael Moore’s recent interview with Wolf Blitzer and later with Larry King and yourself and I feel that your review on CNN was quite unfair and it would serve you well to admit its shortcomings. You have nowhere made a convincing argument that Michael Moore indeed “fudged the facts” as you claim. If your presentation about mildly different health care cost estimates in the USA or CUBA that you and Moore have found should justify “fudged facts”, it would only be one more of the trivial nit pickings that hardly matter in comparison to your own distortions (like calling universal health care as it exists elsewhere a “Utopia” and “not truly free”) and omissions (Not to talk about the humane and financial benefits of Universal Health Care ) . Instead, your “fact check” parades a conservative hit man for the health for profit industry as an “expert – only associated with Vanderbilt University” and allows him to make unreferenced claims against the film that are hilariously misleading or plain false. I have grown up in Germany under the universal health care system there and worked and studied medicine in Great Britain for many years and can well confirm that Michael Moore’s film presents no “utopia” and that indeed basic health care is unrestricted and rapidly available for everyone. Your “fact check” again repeats the false litany preached to the public by greedy insurers and uninformed doctors about the “long waiting times” in Canada, England, Germany etc. without mentioning that waiting time for emergency access is shorter than in the USA and longer mainly for non urgent (elective) procedures – and this is quite acceptable. In the USA on the other hand, 47 million uninsured Americans cannot get other than emergency medical care no matter how long they wait! The insured rest may also not get it because of a ruthless denial by some HMO cubicle clerk, no matter how long they wait! You even challenged Michael Moore to decide whether he would rather be seen in the USA or elsewhere for cardiac emergency care. As the National Institute of Health has recently concluded, an enormous number of cardiac interventions are done in the USA without proper need and benefit for the patients, possibly because of the wrong kind of incentives. I found the interview with Tony Benn in Michael Moores SICKO the most significant contribution: The British NHS Universal Health Care system was born during and despite the economic hardship of the postwar years because people understood that to take care of each other in such a vital matter as health care should be a human right in an industrialized country – and even Margaret Thatcher never tried to do away with the NHS. I can tell you from my personal experience in Germany and Britain that there are few if any citizens who would want to exchange their Universal Health Care system for some for profit or individualized health care system instead as it is glorified in the USA. America’s Health system needs an aggressive overhaul, bold vision and infusion from good examples elsewhere.
I hope you will join the wave for universal health care for all Americans !
Sincerely
Dr. Walter Rohloff, Renal Medicine, Albuquerque
I like how you liberal nut jobs pooh-pooh the fact that MM fudged his facts yet are all over GW for fudging his facts (about the war). Standard Operating Procedure for you guys. That’s why no one takes you seriously.
I feel sorry that you all have MM as your spokesperson.
Why isn’t Sicko a free movie to watch? Why not make it the same “free” public service he Michael Moore claims the healthcare system should be?
After reviewing the segments again, I agree with Dr Gupta and his assessment of the movie Sicko. Michael Moore, who lives in a multi million dollar home in New York City, is no doubt getting rich on all of our pandering. He has misled the public, even though he knew the correct facts. What has he ever done to help teh common man except get even more wealthy. We should all be ashamed of ourselves. Righteous, my ass.