Michael Moore — “Sicko” (mild spoilers, if you can spoil a documentary)

In recent years, Moore has become a sort of vexed figure. Under constant attack from the right, the left doesn’t quite know what to do with him. He’s a propagandist after all, so there are some sins of omission and some naked attempts to persuade. I feel as though in recent years leftists have maybe taken the right wing critiques of Moore a little too much to heart. He is certainly aiming to paint a different picture than the one provided Fox News, but that’s the point. Moore is a propagandist for our side, and as such, we ought to embrace him for all his imperfections.

I saw Sicko having not read anything about it, and so I was surprised to learn that it was about people who did have healthcare in the U.S., rather than people who didn’t (which is what I thought the movie was going to be about). The stories he tells are absolutely mortifying: insured families left destitute after battles with chronic illness, insurance companies effectively killing children by refusing to cover care in out of network hospitals, companies looking for ways to retroactively deny claims, and on and on. His exploration of other countries’ medical systems does a really good job of shaming the U.S. government, the AMA and the insurance industries. The scene in which he discovers the “cashier” in the British hospital is priceless. True, for the Canadian section, he visits Ontario rather than Quebec, but even though the quality of emergency care in Quebec isn’t as good as Ontario (or many place in the U.S.), it is true that nobody will be charged $60,000 to have a finger reattached. And it’s true that his visit to France misses out on a chance to visit the suburbs. But then Moore isn’t about nuance. And the nuance doesn’t change the overall point: the American healthcare system is morally bankrupt; alongside an obscene incarceration rate, an out-of-control military-industrial complex and a decaying public school infrastructure, healthcare is among the nation’s greatest failures of its citizens.

Amon Tobin

We caught Amon Tobin and Ghislain Poirer at Metropolis last night during jazz fest. Yes, tickets were $40, but we got three solid hours of DJ entertainment. I hadn’t heard Poirer before and liked his stuff a lot — more conventional than Tobin but with a good feel, as he mixed DJing with a live drummer. Except that in the middle of his set a rapper came on. I forget his name The guy struck me as classic Francophone hipster in dress and demeanor, and his vocal style nailed the Jamaican thing that seems so hip right now. But it just didn’t work. Though to be fair, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a rapper in a live performance setting where I didn’t feel like I was in some cheesey ripoff of a music video. “Raise your hands y’all!”

Amon Tobin was amazing. The music was constantly evolving and a mix of sort of ethereal textures, heavy beats and the frenetic stuff he does so well. But the thing that got me was the bass. I don’t go to a lot of DJ shows or sound system battles, so it was new to me. The low end was so deep that the floor just shook. It was weird — super loud in intensity but so low that at times the music almost seemed quiet in the higher registers. Keep in mind I said “almost.” Anyway, it was a great show, no doubt helped by the fact that he was playing to the hometown crowd. His set was just under 2 hours longs. Way longer than any band I’ve ever seen at the Metropolis.

Real Estate Saga: Part I

In June of 2006, Carrie drove by a sign in our neighborhood that said “large loft for sale” (well, it probably said “A Vendre: Grande Loft” or somesuch) and had a phone number. She called the agent to inquire. It wasn’t very large by our midwestern standards. But the agent inquired — how big of a place did we want? When she told him 2000 square feet — give or take — he became very interested. He came over to our place a few days later and we talked for awhile about our interests and anticipated price range. Thus began our search for Montreal real estate. I’m not sure why I didn’t blog about it as it happened. But now, I welcome you to a summertime series on the subject.

It turns out that wanting 2000 square feet in the city puts you in a patently bizarre market segment, or as a colleague at another university put it to me, “you might as well move out to the suburbs if you want that kind of space.” At one point we were looking at a 1500 square foot loft and the developer said “you won’t find that kind of space except for a converted industrial space or the 1st floor and basement of an old victorian.” Not wanting to live in the suburbs, and not wanting to live in a smaller space than we already had, we set out on our epic search of strange old spaces, weird nooks in neighborhoods, weird neighborhoods, places that were never designed to house people — or at least not us — and at least one space that is currently not fit for habitation.

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Here’s the backstory:

The first place we ever owned was in Pittsburgh. By Pittsburgh standards it was a medium sized “detached” house. Montrealers will read the next sentence and weep: For $89,500 in 1999, we got 3 bedrooms, 1600 square feet, plus another 800 feet of usable space in the basement, a 2-car garage (more storage) and 2 porches in great condition, in a nice neighborhood not too far from school (though we did have to drive as public transit wasn’t great). In Vancouver, I’d bet the house would sell for 10 times as much. In Montreal, that configuration of space in that condition doesn’t appear to exist in the city limits.

When we moved here, we had no credit, and therefore no realistic opportunity to buy. Our then-new colleagues suggested all the usual neighborhoods (Pleateau, Mile End, maybe Outremont or NDG, St. Henri if we were adventurous). While they all had something to recommend themselves, we wanted a place where it was easy to get to work at a reasonable price and that wouldn’t make us feel cramped after living in that — what I now realize was — large house. In the end, we rented a 2000 square foot apartment (huge by Montreal standards) a bit east and south of the Plateau. There is much that is great about the place. It’s great for entertaining, not far from school, and has been a comfortable space for guests and for us to get our work done. But we’d never planned to stop owning. Carrie reminded me that when we signed the lease, we told the landlord we’d probably eventually buy something. As time passed, we missed owning, for all the bourgeois reasons I suppose, and wanted to explore other neighborhoods.

As my friend Derek says, we are at that stage of life where talk turns easily to real estate and babies, because that’s what people are up to. Since we’re not having a child, you’ll have to endure a bit of this. Especially because there’s nothing like a series to get a blogger’s creative juices flowing.

A New Spin on Media Effects

I’m not a big fan of media effects theory (other than the 3rd person effect), but my friend Carol Stabile has an interesting article in the works on what would happen if we started applying media effects theory to elite white men in government — instead of to marginalized groups, who are usually its subject.

Yes, perhaps conservative elites are more likely to believe what they see on TV than the rest of us, and to have difficulty separating fact from fiction — two of the main concerns about the effects of television on children, for instance. Don’t believe me? Here’s conservative judge Antoinin Scalia on the TV show 24:

Senior judges from North America and Europe were in the midst of a panel discussion about torture and terrorism law, when a Canadian judge’s passing remark – “Thankfully, security agencies in all our countries do not subscribe to the mantra ‘What would Jack Bauer do?’ ” – got the legal bulldog in Judge Scalia barking.

The conservative jurist stuck up for Agent Bauer, arguing that fictional or not, federal agents require latitude in times of great crisis. “Jack Bauer saved Los Angeles. … He saved hundreds of thousands of lives,” Judge Scalia said. Then, recalling Season 2, where the agent’s rough interrogation tactics saved California from a terrorist nuke, the Supreme Court judge etched a line in the sand.

Full article here until they take it down.

Sure, and Batman saved Gotham City, but I wouldn’t want to make a judicial precedent out of it.