Watch "SICKO" online for free. (+ dozens of other documentaries)

[allbusinessjoe]

Turns out there are a whole lot of folks coming to the states to get it. QUOTE]

Don't forget there is a whole lot of Americans leaving America to go to India and other countries (They even have a name for it: Medical Vacations) to get affordable surgeries or procedures that insurance companies won't approve or pay for.

It goes both ways.

 

[allbusinessjoe]

Im not going to get in an argument with a Moore fan. I have learned its futile. You have completely misunderstood what Ive said.

"Why do people in the industry that MM is producing a film about NOT want to be interviewed by him?"
Because theyre smart enough to know theyre walking into a trap and no matter what they say will be portrayed out of context.

Yes it happened. But he was dishonest about what he presented. The movie portrayed him walking in, buying a gun, then walking right out with it. The truth is he waited the legal time it took to get the gun then went back to the scene and re-shot him leaving as if he walked right out with it. And it fooled people...like you.

He does these subtle little dishonesties to trick people. Because when you have no good debate value - well, you have to trick people. Hes a con artist.

About Bush's quotes. Yes bush said things. Its easy to quote someone and use it against them no matter what side of an argument you are on.

Moore is VERY intelligent. He knows how to use tricks to fool masses. Its worked great for him.

You mention its "hard to dispute when the words are coming directly out of bush's mouth. (Or Charlton Heston, or a politician, or the health care industry.)" Well, yeah, thats the point. He presents a little bit of the real, and then shows out of context presentations. Con artists are masters at making things seem like they just HAVE to be right and you dont have to bother questioning them, because afterall Moore took the time to do that for you already...right?

Thats the last Im saying about this because I have done this before and I dont want to bother again. As I said its futile.

As I said, he himself declared his movies were not documentaries. Yet his fans refuse to believe it. Its like you want to stick your head in the ground and be lied to. Be my guest.

You're right. Its all lies, tricks with smoke and mirrors. There is no corruption and all of our politicians are always telling us the truth. Health insurance is a true value. And anyone who dares to try to prove otherwise is just using trickery!

Okay. Time to get back to hiding your head where ostriches do.

 

[Cas]

You're right. Its all lies, tricks with smoke and mirrors. There is no corruption and all of our politicians are always telling us the truth. Health insurance is a true value. And anyone who dares to try to prove otherwise is just using trickery!

Okay. Time to get back to hiding your head where ostriches do.

Congratulations. You have completely distorted what I said and misquoted me to a disgusting degree.

I said none of those things.

You have learned well from Moore.

 

[River]

<snip>I have seen Sicko, and I do find it to be quite truthful from my own experiences.

I have a sneaking/sinking suspicion this would be the result of my proposed poll.

In other words, that Bill O'Reilly's spin on this topic would sink more rapidly than a Led Zeppelin.

I think we're being had, folks.

 

[River]

<snip>You have learned well from Moore.

Michael Moore may be a propogandizing douche bag.

Is Pfizer not?

 

[PraXis]

Michael Moore may be a propogandizing douche bag.

I Pfizer not?

Knock on Pfizer all you want, but they actually develop drugs and invest heavily in R&D. All Moore does is bash Republicans and claim Cuba has better health care quality than America.

 

[River]

Knock on Pfizer all you want, but they actually develop drugs and invest heavily in R&D. All Moore does is bash Republicans and claim Cuba has better health care quality than America.

They also make ridiculous profits on the backs of sick people.

That is not "all Moore does". But if you mistake me for a Moore fan-boy, you mistake me quite gravely.

Cuba may, in fact, have better health care than "America" (USA, buddy, USA). How many terminally or seriously ill relatives do you have, BUDZO?

 

[PraXis]

They also make ridiculous profits on the backs of sick people.

That is not "all Moore does". But if you mistake me for a Moore fan-boy, you mistake me quite gravely.

Cuba may, in fact, have better health care than "America" (USA, buddy, USA). How many terminally or seriously ill relatives do you have, BUDZO?

My grandma died from cancer (I think it spread to many places) back in 2000, but from what I remember, she went peacefully.

I think American health care quality is superb, but access is the problem. Insurance companies are assholes, but competition is key. I've mentioned it before:

If you're 25 in NJ (for example) and are looking for a private policy, you have 19 plans to choose from 5 companies.. imagine if you could choose from 1000 plans from 500 companies.. we can't buy across state lines.

I also have family in medicine, from doctors to nurses to the damn coroner.. and I've heard plenty about why they oppose socialized medicine. It'll be as big a failure as Medicaid.

It's like buying anything. If I can get the same thing cheaper elsewhere, companies will compete. If there is a damn monopoly on your selections, insurance companies can get away with bs such as denying care and pulling the "pre-existing conditions" nonsense.

Gov't is a cancer. It is not the answer. Especially during an inevitable depression.

Edit: It's true that pharma companies have a nice profit margin (30%-ish?), but that's what keeps them going. Drugs are EXTREMELY expensive and time consuming to come to market (thanks, gov't regulation), so Viagara needs to make $$$$ so Pfizer can finance R&D for another drug.

 

[05jrock]

the UK hospital bit is pretty accurate. i've had lifelong health problems and have always had very good care. yes, we pay part of our salaries as National Insurance, which helps to pay for this. no, i don't resent that at all.

The system in NZ is pretty ok.I spent all last year not working an was getting 80% of my wages from the previous year because my job made me sick.They paid for any tests that had to be done andsent me on a couple of corses to help choose a new career and get me back into the workforce.

 

[allbusinessjoe]

The system in NZ is pretty ok.I spent all last year not working an was getting 80% of my wages from the previous year because my job made me sick.They paid for any tests that had to be done andsent me on a couple of corses to help choose a new career and get me back into the workforce.

Isn't your system absolutely horrible? Don't you want health care like in the US? In the US, if you have a pre-existing condition you can't get coverage. Some conditions are auto-decline. While other milder conditions are what is called a "rate-up" where you pay a close to what your mortgage or rent is every month.
Of course in America, if you are sick and cannot work due to serious illness, you will lose your house and go bankrupt. This is the cause of 52% of our bankruptcies.

We've got it all worked out over here in the US!

 

[PraXis]

Isn't your system absolutely horrible? Don't you want health care like in the US? In the US, if you have a pre-existing condition you can't get coverage. Some conditions are auto-decline. While other milder conditions are what is called a "rate-up" where you pay a close to what your mortgage or rent is every month.
Of course in America, if you are sick and cannot work due to serious illness, you will lose your house and go bankrupt. This is the cause of 52% of our bankruptcies.

We've got it all worked out over here in the US!

Smaller countries like NZ work out ok in their systems, but they do not have nearly the amount of PARASITES that we have in America. For f's sake, almost 50% of people don't pay income taxes. How the hell are they going to fund all of this?!

 

[KSG_Standard]

MM is a liar, an activist,a propagandist, a hypocrite and a fool. That's my opinion, and there is quite a bit of information available to support my opinion.

In America, we already have a "safety net" for health care...it's the public hospitals and clinics. It is against the law for a hospital or healthcare provider to deny lifesaving care. It is standard procedure and almost always the law, for public hospitals to treat any and all patients that show up in thier emergency room for care.

This isn't perfect, but it's just about the same thing as what passes for "government" health care in much of Europe. You get sick and go to the hospital and wait in line until it's your turn, the dr. helps you and you pay no out of pocket expenses...You either pay for the service via taxes...or your neighbors pay. When your gov't runs low on funds, they ration care and medication. The government weighs the cost of treatment against how "worthy" you are to get said treatment.

The US system has problems...there is no doubt about that. However, I can't imagine that more, larger government...made up of the same thieves, liars and assmonkey's, will offer a better, cheaper system. The federal gov't does not have a good track record of success to point too...the intentions of the law makers is always good, but the execution and management of their well intentioned programs ALWAYS leaves much to be desired.

I'd like to be able to offer a helping hand to folks that need assistance...but when the gov't offers an entitlement (and that's what they want healthcare to be), they create a system that is expensive, frought with corruption, abused, and bloated. The private system that we have has created some of the best doctors and nurses, some of the best procedures, equipment, training and pharmaceuticals that have ever existed. As a consequence, America has the highest survival rates for cancer in the world...

In order to pay for a single payer system in America, which has over 350 million people, we will have to raise taxes on individuals and corporations...If you live in California or N.Y. or N.J., combined tax rates are already around 50% of your income. We already tax corporations at just about the highest rate of ANY industrialized country...

When will it end? WTF do you think the gov't owes you? Remember, the gov't doesn't have any money of it's own...all of the money that they spend comes out of the taxpayer's pockets! So when you get something from the gov't, you are really getting it from your's and your neighbor's work and effort...if you don't pay income taxes, then your neighbors are carrying your freight! Why don't we eliminate some of the other entitlements and use the money saved to pay for healthcare?

It seems to me, that a better way to "fix" healthcare would be to actually address the problems within the existing system and not to add another layer or a gov't funded option.

 

[05jrock]

Isn't your system absolutely horrible? Don't you want health care like in the US? In the US, if you have a pre-existing condition you can't get coverage. Some conditions are auto-decline. While other milder conditions are what is called a "rate-up" where you pay a close to what your mortgage or rent is every month.
Of course in America, if you are sick and cannot work due to serious illness, you will lose your house and go bankrupt. This is the cause of 52% of our bankruptcies.

We've got it all worked out over here in the US!

It works quite well here,Bit on the slow side but is ok.
New govt was voted in last year and 1 of their big plans was to scrap the system and bring in private companies,Could still happen.
It dosnt matter where you get injured,weather it's in a car accident or playing sport you are covered.Just have to get the ok from your family GP(doctor) and it goes from there.

 

[coldsteal2]

Smaller countries like NZ work out ok in their systems, but they do not have nearly the amount of PARASITES that we have in America. For f's sake, almost 50% of people don't pay income taxes. How the hell are they going to fund all of this?!

Yea, smaller countries it can work,
our problem is we have over 300 million people
the size of Europe.
I hear alot of people from countries that use thier
small countries as an example for socialized medicine
but most of those countries have less people than
one of our states, and we have 50 states. The cost
would be hard to put your mind around

 

[coldsteal2]

Don;t forget Moorlies.com, where they just make stuff up and repeat it endlessly.

Oops, the site is down. I guess reality caught up with them. It was fun going there just to see desperate people stepping on each other over minutia that they mostly made up.
Yes, Michael can exaggerate, but I always find people who hate him reading a lot into what he does that is simply not there. Yes he can pull at emotional heart strings and skew the viewpoint. But showing us that Congress simply does not read all or even some of the bills they pass, relying on lobbyists or staff to sort through bills was a good breakthrough for most of us to see.

I'm with the crew that always questions Authority rather than the "Love it or Leave it crew". I'd rather love it AND change it if something stinks. You don't get to see if something is foul unless you question it.

Michael is good at that. He's also human, so he's not perfect. None of us are.

The problem is Michael Moore isnt a trained
investigative reporter, and doesnt live by the rules
of a good journalist. So he is going to twist things
politicaly.
So they arent real documentaries, they are entertainment
for people that hold a grudge against the country and
goverment.
Calling them Documentaries is the biggest problem
they arent they are Mock-umentaries

His first film about Flint and the auto industry was the closest
thing to a real documentary, the rest have just been a joke

 

[geochem1st]

Knock on Pfizer all you want, but they actually develop drugs and invest heavily in R&D. ....

How much did they spend for R & D on Viagra? When there are hundreds of diseases, deadly ones, that go without research. Lupus affects 1.5 million people, is deadly, has no cure, and hasn't had a new drug for treatment in over 50 years. What drugs are used do more damage than good and whose primary use comes from other diseases.... try getting those approved for use and paid for by insurance.

 

[geochem1st]

You know who pays for US Prescription Drug R & D? WE ALL DO, as taxpayers. In addition to that subsidy, there are a plethora of grass roots organizations that fund raise for R&D (again us footing the bill through donations) such as, The March of Dimes, Breast Cancer Society, Cancer Society, AIDS Foundation, MS, Lupus, Alzheimers, etc...... etc.... When the research hits on a drug, it gets passed on to the big pharmaceuticals who then make billions of dollars profit, and never reimburse the government or the foundations that did the leg work for them. Its a subsidized business, subsidized by us.

*******************************************************************

Ralph Nader
P.O. Box 19312
Washington, DC 20036

James Love
P.O. Box 19367
Washington, DC 20036

June 22, 2001

Peter Dolan, President And CEO
Bristol-Myers Squibb
345 Park Ave
New York, NY 10154
(fax)212-546-4020

Dear Mr. Dolan:

I am writing to ask that Bristol-Myers Squibb explain to the American public why it charges US consumers higher prices for is products that it obtains in Australia, Canada, France, Italy, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and other foreign markets. As is well known in your industry, BMS benefits richly from a plethora of US programs, including for example the US tax credits for R&D, the orphan drug tax credit, the US tax credit for manufacturing products in Puerto Rico, subsidized loans from the US Import-Export bank, the pediatric R&D patent extension, and a variety of R&D non-patent regular exclusivity provisions.

BMS has also benefited more than most from the massive R&D support funded through the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal agencies. BMS products in the cancer and HIV area have benefited enormously from federally funding of R&D, including such products as Hydroxyurea, Bleomycin, Lomustine, Carmustine, Cisplatin, Cisplatin VP-16, Ifosfamide, Carboplatin, VM-26, Taxol, DDI and D4T. As you know, the US government generally is not compensated for subsidizing the costs of clinical trials on these drugs, and does not seek high royalties for licenses of government owned patents. For example, the National Cancer Institute received no royalties from its 1990 CRADA for the commercialization of Taxol, a drug that has generated billions in dollars in revenues for BMS.

Despite the generosity and sacrifices of the US taxpayers, BMS, a corporation charted in the U.S., apparently takes the attitude that it can charge the highest prices in the world here, in the very country where you and your executives live, and where US workers are struggling to obtain health care and high health care costs make our country less competitive in the global economy. How can you reconcile this policy with your patriotism and loyalty to your fellow citizens?

We look forward to your considered response.

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader
P.O. Box 19312
Washington, DC 20036

James Love
P.O. Box 19367
Washington, DC 20036

 

[KSG_Standard]

How much did they spend for R & D on Viagra? When there are hundreds of diseases, deadly ones, that go without research. Lupus affects 1.5 million people, is deadly, has no cure, and hasn't had a new drug for treatment in over 50 years. What drugs are used do more damage than good and whose primary use comes from other diseases.... try getting those approved for use and paid for by insurance.

Stocks Climb as HGS's Lupus Drug Successfully Passes Clinical Trial

By Mike Musgrove
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 20, 2009; 2:42 PM

Shares of Human Genome Sciences Inc. soared Monday following news that the firm's experimental lupus drug successfully passed its latest round of testing.

After trading at around $2.50 for much of last week, the stock soared to nearly $11 in the early afternoon. Analysts have predicted that the company's stock could pass $15 if the drug is eventually approved.

The HGS drug, called Benlysta, has one more major round of testing that it must complete successfully if it is to win the approval of the Food and Drug Administration.

The drug, which aims to reduce the activity of a protein that is overactive in lupus patients, has been in development for nearly a decade. HGS has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to develop a treatment for a disease that has been particularly elusive for drug makers.

Sandra Raymond, chief executive of the Lupus Foundation of America, said the news gives lupus patients a new source of hope. It has been over 50 years since a drug was approved for treating the autoimmune disease.

"People want to know when they can get the drug," she said. "We're being inundated on Facebook and Twitter."

HGS will get the results of its final phase three test for Benlysta in November.

Stocks Climb as HGS's Lupus Drug Successfully Passes Clinical Trial - washingtonpost.com

 

[FrankieOliver]

Also I resent you saying those without health care contribute nothing. That's utter elitist crap. Stop saying it it is wrong.

Honestly, I really don't give a fuck what you resent. I wasn't talking about the working people who do contribute and have no health care. Stop twisting everything around so you can justify your silly ass comments. I'm talking about the people who do nothing and contribute nothing, ever. I could have chosen to do nothing and live off the dole, but I chose to get a job and work. So I'm a fucking elitist because I worked hard for what I have and simply don't believe I should have to give it up for the masses who don't. Hmm? This is sounding vaguely familiar. Em...? Oh yeah: Viva la Revolucion! Guillotine! ...so off with me head for having a dissenting opinion. I somehow deserve it.

 

[Harpozep]

Honestly, I really don't give a fuck what you resent. I wasn't talking about the working people who do contribute and have no health care. Stop twisting everything around so you can justify your silly ass comments. I'm talking about the people who do nothing and contribute nothing, ever. I could have chosen to do nothing and live off the dole, but I chose to get a job and work. So I'm a fucking elitist because I worked hard for what I have and simply don't believe I should have to give it up for the masses who don't. Hmm? This is sounding vaguely familiar. Em...? Oh yeah: Viva la Revolucion! Guillotine! ...so off with me head for having a dissenting opinion. I somehow deserve it.

Now your twisting my words.
In your earlier post:
You insult ALL by insinuating those who would get public health care contribute nothing. You insult working people that do NOT have health care. That is what you said.
You spelled it out, Now you go back on your insinuation. Well maybe you should think before you post. Good idea, eh?

No You are an elitist because you denigrate those who look to a possible public health mandate as not contributing anything. Sure there is dead weight, but not in my working world where folks cannot afford health insurance and employers cannot afford to give it to them. I live in that world, not yours . Glad you have it well, but stop looking down at and lumping all those with no health care together. That is what you did in your earlier post.
Plus there is no need to swear....there's enough of that garbage on the net without it here.