Sicko

Last night I watched one of those talking head news shows and they were discussing Michael Moore’s latest movie Sicko. One of the talking heads was arguing the 47 million Americans without health care. His argument was a good example of how to lie with statistics. First he said the govt. had gotten the 47 million down to 45 million. I thought whoopee doo! Then he said that 14 million of them were eligible for free health insurance but hadn’t applied or taken it….hmmmm…. and then he said that left 31 million of which 40% were just currently unemployed so they didn’t count because within 6 months they would probably have jobs and have insurance through the job. That to him left only 12 million Americans uninsured. Wow! Talk about playing with numbers!

So, let’s see how this works. Michael Moore’s movie comes out and shows the facts that 47 million Americans are uninsured. The govt. played with the numbers and got that down to 45 million. Okay, I’ll give them that.

But to say that there are all these other millions out there who don’t apply for the free insurance is just pulling numbers out of their asses! And then to say that 40% of the remaining will have insurance once they go back to work doesn’t take into account that yes, they are currently uninsured and also that many will not find jobs that quickly, will be on unemployment without insurance, and some of them will have to take minimum wage jobs that will not give them insurance thus leaving them ‘employed’ but uninsured. I won’t pull numbers out of my ass and make up percentages, but just use common sense and it all makes sense.