Oh, alright. Michael Moore is fat. Michael Moore is sloppy. You can just imagine him with mustard on the front of his shirt. Maybe that’s why I like him so much.
Plus, he enrages caveman conservatives such as “Six-gun” Purcell in South Carolina. That’s a plus.
Last week, I actually watched Moore’s latest work, “Where To Invade Next?” Like all movies today, it was at least 30 minutes too long and in dire need of sharp editing. Moore is so intent on preaching that he forgets he is in the entertainment business.
But in the week sandwiched between the conventions of the two major political parties, the Moore movie illustrates the failure of both parties to create a fair, modern civilization. Despite the title, there is no invasion involved — just an appreciation of the progress of other, smaller countries.
I hate to admit it, but I am a third-degree addict of the show “Cops.” I enjoy the “cinema verite” quality of the show, but I wince every time the SWAT team bashes in a front door and spread eagles all the occupants — for marijuana. Look at the terrible cost of prosecuting these smokers, then imprisoning them for decades.
On his global tour, Moore stops in Portugal, where drugs have been decriminalized. All drugs. Not just marijuana but heroin and crack. Portugal lets you do what you want to do with your body. The crime rate and prison population in Portugal are a tiny fraction of what they are in the U.S. and its endless “War on Drugs.”
Just sayin’.
At his stop in France, Moore shares the gourmet-style meal served every day in French schools. All French schools. Each school meal has a cheese course. The French chef could not explain what a “sloppy Joe” was. When he was filled in, he would not consider adding it to his menu. The French schools have a very highly involved sex education class that would make a Mississippi reverend blush. The result is an illegitimate birth rate, once again, a fraction of what it is in the U.S.
Could we do better?
Are your kids graduating with a degree and a $100,000 student debt? Not in Germany. In Germany colleges are free to all — even a group of Americans who couldn’t afford tuition in Colorado. So many of the courses are in English that language is not a problem, students said.
Everybody hated homework. I certainly did. You cannot believe this, but Finnish schools have done away with homework and seek to educate the “whole person” rather than teaching students to succeed in a single test. The result? The Finnish schools are rated No. 1. In the world.
The U.S. economy GNP leads the world at $17.9 trillion according to my always shaky research. Slovenia comes in just after Tunisia at $49 billion. But tiny Slovenia had no (zero) college tuition, and efforts to establish it are always met with passionate street demonstrations. American students graduate with a crushing financial load. Moore calls Slovenia a “Magic Kingdom.”
Maybe we could learn something.
After watching “Invade,” many American workers might consider moving to Italy. There the very average worker gets eight weeks vacation each year. Many companies offer a bonus for the vacation period. “No sense taking a vacation if you can’t afford to go where you want,” one worker said.
Conservatives say these benefits are created by a tax rate much higher than the U.S. Moore argues that when you add the fees, tuition, health care costs along with maintaining the largest prison population in the world, we already are paying far more than other countries.
Moore might be fat and sloppy. He might have a mustard stain on his shirt. He stomps all over his message for two hours, but I think it might be productive to study the lessons of other countries if we truly profess to love our own.
The lesson I took is that big business, Democrats and Republicans alike use big government to create the New Servant Class — and you are in it.
Slovenia? Watch the movie.
Emmet Meara lives in Camden in blissful retirement after working as a reporter for the Bangor Daily News in Rockland for 30 years.