Michael Moore’s latest crockumentary Sicko opened in the UK last week.  The Times of London columnist Minette Marrin calls it “dishonest” and “misleading” and advises readers not to bother seeing it.  Mr Moore’s glowing portrayal of Britain’s National Health Service is not one she—or British doctors—recognise.

Unfortunately Sicko is a dishonest film. That is not only my opinion. It is the opinion of Professor Lord Robert Winston, the consultant and advocate of the NHS. When asked on BBC Radio 4 whether he recognised the NHS as portrayed in this film, Winston replied: “No, I didn’t. Most of it was filmed at my hospital [the Hammersmith in west London], which is a very good hospital but doesn’t represent what the NHS is like.”

Moore’s biased film completely ignores the rampant scandal, wastefulness, and incompetent management now bedevilling the NHS—all apparently in the interest of encouraging his audience to be outraged at the alleged inquities of the American system.  And there’s more.

However, behind the pleasures of righteous indignation for him and his audience, there is something more sinister. There’s money in indignation, big money. It is just one of the many extreme sensations that are lucrative for journalists to whip up, along with prurience, disgust and envy. Michael Moore is not Mr Valiant-for-truth. He is Mr Worldly-wiseman, laughing behind his hand at all the gawping suckers in Vanity Fair. Don’t go to his show.

Ms Marrin also notes the irony of the famously fat Michael Moore extolling the virtues of the NHS at a time when the powers-that-be are debating whether obese patients should be refused treatment.

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UPDATE (29 Oct.): Follow-up here.