By Manila Ryce
Published Friday, July 20th, 2007, 6:08 am
Filed under: Videos: Political, Health, Videos, US Politics

20 Responses to “Colbert Interviews Michael Moore”

1. excellent colbert moore interview tried to get it at youtube no luck

   chrisbradlygabe@yahoo
   07/20/07 at 2:06 pm
   

2. […] LINK […]

   Colbert Interviews Michael Moore By Manila Ryce (video link) « Dandelion Salad
   07/20/07 at 3:26 pm
   

3. please, someone explain to me: how does our health care system in any way resemble a “free market” system?

   either you don’t understand how our health care system operates, or you don’t understand how a free market operates.

   so, what will it be?

   and if you want to know who our *true* masters are, read “the naked capitalist” by skousen. these “capitalists” you so abhor actually funded and promoted some of the biggest left-wing/socialist groups throughout history, for one simple reason: socialism consolidates the wealth of the people into the hands of a few bureaucrats who are always loyal to the interests of the international banking cartel. see also g. edward griffin’s “the capitalist conspiracy” on googlevideo, which is based on the book.

   they are capitalists only on the surface. in reality, they do everything they can to undermine the free market. this includes funding liberal propagandists like moore who agitate for more government controls and more federal regulation of every aspect of our lives, so the bankers can continue to run the show by putting their people in at the top.

   come on. ask yourself: why is michael moore’s film given such a wide screening (or An Inconvenient Truth, for that matter) as opposed to a film like America: Freedom to Fascism? moore is getting his money from the right people, believe me.

   corporations are government created and government sponsored entities that have been given collective rights as “persons.” without this helping hand, they would be nothing more than businesses who must compete with other businesses in an open market. instead, small and local business are regulated and taxed out of existence by the central planners in washington who are the in the pockets of the lobbyists. thus, only the corporate monopolies survive.

   skousen notes in his book, which, in turn, is based on the work of socialist/collectivist historian carroll quigley’s larger treatise “tragedy and hope,” that most, if not all, of the tax-exempt foundations (i.e. the Ford Foundation) are predominantly left-wing in their ideology and are responsible for getting all your favorite Marxist sociology textbooks into your universities, among other things…

   ask yourselves why some of the richest men in wall street funded these groups, and you’ll start to understand that your trendy socialist notions are part of the same historical dialectic on which our two-party system in based and which, together, are controlled by the same cartel that is hell-bent on getting rid of our constitutional republic, where individual rights are protected against the tyranny of the majority, and replacing it with an international corporate collective run by central planning boards and agencies–for the good of humanity, of course.

   they have already installed central banks in every country of the world and integrated them into a one world economy–there is a national department of education turning our public schools into social engineering camps in just about every major country as well–now all we need is a national health care system and they will not only have our money and our minds, but our bodies as well.

   cheers!

   -b-

   Bon
   07/22/07 at 6:56 am
   

4. by the way, in a national health care system with socialized medicine, the doctor still has to call someone else before he treats the patient: he has to get permission from the right bureaucrats and determine whether the patient is top priority or not. the solution is to cut out all the middlemen altogether and restore the doctor-patient relationship so that both have an incentive to keep costs low and services high (i.e. if patients cannot afford treatment, they will get no costumers; and if they don’t provide good services, the patient will go somewhere else). this is how a true free market health care system would work (you know, before HMOs and all that government interference). when a third party pays (whether it be the government or the insurance companies, which are in in bed with each other anyway) costs go up, demand goes up and service goes down.

   basic economics. learn it.

   -b-

   Bon
   07/22/07 at 7:11 am
   
5. 

   Once again Bon, you’re ready to denounce what you think are misrepresentations of capitalism by setting it in contrast to your misrepresentations of socialism. No one is denying that corporations are given dominion by the government. We are well aware of this relationship and blog about it often. Nor is anyone claiming that Michael Moore is the messiah. We are critical of all idols. Still, most of what you’ve said does not contradict the beliefs of most leftists, despite your attempts to blame them for all of it. Your arrogance is hardly justified. I suggest you take your own advice and study more economic systems, not just the one you’ve invested so much reading into.

   Manila Ryce
   07/22/07 at 2:31 pm
   

6. please enlighten me: how am i misrepresenting socialism?

   (i have read the sociology textbooks and marxist masterworks. have you read hayek’s road to serfdom–or anything by rothbard, on the other hand? if you had, you would think twice about making false statements about our “free market” system in health care)

   i was a dedicated socialist until i learned who was really behind collectivist ideology. i am well versed in the literature. just try me.

   remember, Bush is just carrying on FDR’s fascist legacy–pearl harbor, the war powers act, etc. this kind of rabid nationalism is a form of collectivism that could only occur as a result of the socialist consolidation of wealth and power in the federal government–thanks, in part, to new deal and great society type programs.

   to continue blaming “conservatives” and “capitalists” is to miss the point entirely. there are no true conservatives in power to date–with the exception of ron paul, perhaps–and there are no true free market capitalists left either. there are only leftist trotskyite machiavellian neoconservatives and rockefeller/morgan type monopoly capitalists/corporatists who, through all the major tax exempt foundations and organizations like the CFR, are promoting more of the same old leftist internationalist collectivist bullshit.

   -b-

   Bon
   07/22/07 at 4:58 pm
   
7. 

   Ah, an apostate with a booklist. Good for you. And I do mean that sincerely. However, unless the intention of your last comment was to start a book club, I have no desire to get into a game of cross-swords with you. Take that confrontational insecurity elsewhere. At an age since passed, perhaps I would’ve battled you with equally impressive tales of readings I’ve conquered. Frankly, I don’t have the desire, nor as much time for ego stroking with drawn out replies.

   Our system is not some idealized free-market system, free of interference. This is quite obvious to everyone, but it’s your right to state the obvious if you so choose. I was clearly not arguing that our health care system is currently such a system, but you can be forgiven for that misinterpretation. We can also agree that there are no true free markets, but I’d contend that there are indeed plenty of free market capitalists and detrimental aspects of that system which ought not trump basic human rights. That was the spirit of the video description which I’d thought was quite apparent. My apologies if it wasn’t.

   Regardless, the greater hypocrisy comes from your tangent when you claim our woes are due to socialism. You can not argue that true socialism exist anymore than a true free market. How you can write page after page denouncing some communist conspiracy based on the fact that there is no theoretical ideal of a free market in existence is absurd when you do not also blame some capitalist cabal for the lack of any true socialist system. If you truly comprehended the most basic ideals of classic liberalism, or the origins of the many ideologies regarded as socialist, you should not be attributing the rise of corporatism to the essence of either philosophy. We have socialism for the rich. That is not socialism. I could also remind you that socialism and statism are not synonymous terms. Libertarian socialism is one form which stands in contrast to your characterization. There are of course others, which I’m sure you had to encountered in your readings. Now if you’d like, we can argue further over who is the kettle and who is the pot.

   Manila Ryce
   07/23/07 at 3:32 am
   

8. I have read some of the comments and it aounds like an HMO wrote some of the comments.The idea of profit driving the system is the problem.To all the bogeyman out there ask if people on medicare are happy with it.Medicare is socialized medicine only it kicks in at 65.So if you do not like or think mediicare works you have a valid arguement.But to other 99% in America we think it works and we like it.

   THOMAS BILLIS
   07/23/07 at 1:24 pm
   
9. 

   I agree with Thomas. We currently have socialized health insurance, albeit at a limited capacity, and by most accounts it works for how little is actually put into it. It would take some doing in order to make it universal, but the fact of the matter is that we already have the mechanism in place. And while I don’t like the idea of another government bureaucracy, I think the not-for-profit idea would be perfectly suited for this issue. That’s why Kucinich’s plan for a government sponsered, privately run non-profit nation health insurance just makes sense. The only real reason it’s meeting so much resistance is because the so-called “free-enterprises” stand to lose their shirts by the very mechanism they claim to protect; Competition.

   PapaFigue
   07/24/07 at 2:55 am
   

10. yes, i understand libertarian socialism. but this could only occur in a free market, where labor is allowed to organize voluntarily on its own terms without federal restrictions. however, we are talking about national health care vs. free market health care, in other words, state socialism vs. classical liberalism. i didn’t think i needed to spell it out for you.

    yes, i can blame this kind of socialism for our ills. we have implemented nearly all the “planks” in the communist manifesto, to date: progressive taxation, income tax, a central bank (the fed), social security, government-run (i.e. “public”) schools, etc. etc. i could go on. and we have the best of mussolini’s central planning agencies (i.e. “corporations”) as well, thanks to all those folks out there who made it impossible for small and local businesses to thrive with their taxation and regulation/licensing schemes (yes, let’s raise that minimum wage even higher and then complain when starbucks replaces all the local coffeeshops in your neighborhood because they can no longer pay the low wages baristas are willing to work for in exchange for decent tips)–once again, your attempts at forcing “fairness” on the masses has resulted in a world where only the giant corporations survive and end up colluding with the bureaucrats you have so enthusiastically empowered in the departmental micro-management of our daily lives.

    i love it when leftist media gatekeepers (i.e. amy goodman) whine about bush’s dictatorial power, when it is a logical outgrowth of the kind of governance they have been agitating for through people like moore and gore and chomsky…remember, the police state is just the nasty side of the nanny state, i.e. if the state gives you everything it also has the right to tell you to *do* anything, and you need a “strong leader” to make sure everyone has put their energy-saving light bulbs into place.

    and since our republic is rapidly becoming a democracy (thanks, again, to you folks) *all* your rights and property can be voted away by the majority in the name of “social justice” and “equality”–which, in effect, is another sort of tyranny.

    i think i remember someone saying if you trade liberty for security, you get neither. well, this doesn’t only apply to the war on terror, folks. it’s the velvet glove on the iron fist. and since it’s all about “we” rather than “me” (as michael moore loves to put it), don’t complain if after the next terror attack “we” vote *your* rights away in order to protect the Homeland!

    so yeah, cheers!

    -b-

    Bon
    07/26/07 at 7:05 am
    

11. i would have no beef with a system where socialized medicine was allowed to compete with private hospitals…say, a bunch of people got together VOLUNTARILY and payed into a universal healthcare pool vs. those of us who prefer to interact with our doctors privately without all the middlemen…but this could only take place in a free market where one system wasn’t subsidized at the expense of another…kucinich wants to implement his system on a national level, which would pretty much destroy any opportunity for the alternative to exist…and that is what is wrong with you people, you give a virtual monopoly to the government on pretty much every issue, then you complain when the government isn’t doing its job properly…like you said, it’s all about competition, and we should free up the resources/possibilities, not narrow them.

    why do you constantly complain about corporate monopolies, by the way, but government monopolies are ok? i’ve never understood this way of thinking.

    is it because in a truly free market your ideas would be exposed for their intellectual bankruptcy and the only way to get around this is to have them forcefully implemented by the state?

    yeah, i thought so.

    -b-

    Bon
    07/26/07 at 2:35 pm
    
12. 

    First off, I’d like to reiterate that your arrogance is ridiculously unjustified yet again. You’ve interchanged libertarian socialism with anarcho-capitalism and individualist anarchism during your many tirades on this site. And yes, before your many tangents led us here, we were talking about state socialism, but not in comparison to “classical liberalism” as you incorrectly identify it. One contradiction in your reasoning is that corporatism is the rational result of socialism and classical liberalism in general. Your lengthy argument in favor of this classification is easily defeated by anyone who understands that they have more control over a democratic government than the tyranny of corporatism. That you attribute the formation of a new bourgeoisie to Marxism is perhaps a more obvious failure in your logic. Additionally, the idea of “Red Bureaucracy” was denounced by Marx himself, who described such a system as a single giant corporation. Reread your manifesto.

    In a previous thread, I also recall that you described the reasoning that state socialism would be required as temporary protection while transitioning to libertarian-socialism as “naïve”, before you realized it was Chomsky who endorsed such an idea (someone whom you claim to have a firm understanding of). And no, not even the Soviet Union was a socialist state. To quote Lenin, the Soviet Union’s idea of socialism was a “state capitalist monopoly”. The idea that state capitalism was tantamount to socialism was a lie perpetuated by the Leninists to gather support from Russians, as well as by the West to make socialism look fascist, so as to instill obedience to our own capitalist institutions. As is evident by your comments, this red scare has had long-lasting effects. Ask yourself why this socialist classification of the Soviet Union was the one issue in which the world’s two propagandist superpowers were in agreement. Lenin and Trotsky were able to justify the rule of the Party while destroying genuine socialist factory committees, while the West was able to denounce any popular dissent towards a more free society as a treasonous action. What we had in the Soviet Union was simply a different kind of capitalism in which the working class was still exploited by a master class. This militarized corporate dictatorship was a form of fascism. There was no workers’ control, and hence, no socialism. I suggest you stop taking your definition of this term from Lenin or Trotsky.

    Speaking of intellectual bankruptcy, McCarthyism went out of style in the 50’s. You’re either blaming all our woes on socialism out of ignorance, or in an intended effort to mislead.

    Manila Ryce
    07/27/07 at 12:33 am
    

13. no, i’m blaming all our woes on collectivism, the idea that the group is more important than the individual, that the group can vote away the property and/or rights of the individual through coercion and looting on behalf of the state–socialism, communism, fascism, nazism are all variants of this idea, no matter which way you cut it. we may not agree on some of the definitions of the above terms, but when you drill down to fundamentals, this is what you get.

    and while i may not agree with some of mccarthy’s methods…i think, in the end, history will show that he was right. we are on a fast track to world-wide corporatist collectivism thanks to the globalization schemes of the eastern establishment/wall street/cfr-trilateral commission think-tanks, and mccarthy was right to raise the alarm when he did.

    -b-

    Bon
    07/27/07 at 11:09 pm
    
14. 

    Democracy is bad, liberals are Nazis, we all live in a vacuum, and there are no such things as human rights, only ownership rights. Got it. We’re done here.

    Manila Ryce
    07/28/07 at 2:00 am
    

15. nope…”pure” democracies are bad, without constitutional rights that ensure the rights of the individual against the claims of the collective…whether it be some special interest group lobbying for their share of the identity-politics loot, or the state deducting “income” from my paychecks without my consent, or a collective trying to claim my property as part of the “commonwealth.”

    and no, liberals are not nazis…but when they use government monopolies as solutions to all our problems, yes, they have a tendency to stray into nazi territory. like i said before…why would you oppose corporate monopolies and not government monopolies? it just doesn’t make sense.

    who said there are no such things as human rights? i have been trying to say all along that *nothing,* not even a majority, can take your rights away from you. and yes, this includes property rights, upon which every other right is based.

    if i build my own house, grow my own food, and carve out my own existence…neither you nor anyone else has any right to claim ownership of the fruits of my labor. period. end of story.

    all else is a slippery slope to tyranny on the road to collectivism.

    -b-

    Bon
    07/28/07 at 6:10 pm
    

16. you know, it’s very simple:

    yes, soviet russia may have been a state capitalist monopoly in practice, but ask yourself: how did it get there?

    it was by convincing the people that they had to give up their *own* property for the collective good.

    this is the same thing that is going on in our country. we give up more and more of our property through taxes and other liberal redistribution schemes…we give up all our guns to the state in the naive belief that *it* will protect us when we need it…then the bureaucrats consolidate the wealth and give it over to the giant corporate monopolies whom they license with no-bid contracts because, again, the people were swindled into demanding more and more regulations on the “wild untamed market” in the name of the collective good and thus the regulators, now firmly stuffed into every bureaucratic agency in washington, simply use their powers to squash small and local businesses and make sure the corporate lobbyists who keep them in power get all the loot.

    thus, history repeats itself.

    -b-

    Bon
    07/28/07 at 6:23 pm
    

17. […] Healthcare: Its So Hot Right Now! So health care is a pretty hot topic right now, as it should be, and Michael Moore is in the thick of it all thanks to his new movie, Sicko. There’s a pretty funny interview of him on the Colbert Report here. So thats great and all, but then someone passed along this clip from our good friends over at Fox News: […]

    Healthcare: Its So Hot Right Now! « The Cheddar Box
    07/29/07 at 2:00 pm
    

18. wow. that report was a little ridiculous. i hope you aren’t comparing my criticisms to fox news’ assertions equating national health care to terrorism? *wink*

    i just have a fundamental problem with monopolies–period–be they corporate or government monopolies.

    i tend to think government monopolies are more dangerous, however, because they are implemented through force of law. i can choose not to shop at wal-mart if i don’t like their business practices (which is very easy for me to do). and it is sad that we have developed a system where only the corporate monopolies survive, because they are the only ones who can afford to comply with all the rules and regulations and the artificially inflated property values that result from a systematically devalued central-bank issued fiat currency…

    i can’t tell you how many mom-n-pop shops i have watched go under around here because the strip malls come in with their government subsidies (in the best interest of the “community,” of course) and only the usual chain stores can afford a slice of the pie.

    but this is how corporatism works by systematically killing the free market. which is why i don’t want the same thing happening to our health care system.

    -b-

    Bon
    07/29/07 at 4:07 pm
    
19. 

    @Bon:
    I’ve read the dialogue between you and Manilla, and you both make good points. I particularly understand your frustration with the corperate and government assault on the middle class. However, I would only pose that the idea of a Government Sponsored, Privately Run Secular Non-Profit Health Insurance Program, much like the type proposed by Kucinich, could only help the Middle Class. This kind of insurance would not require the annihilation of free market competition, but quite on the contrary only add another competitor.
    It’s very disturbing that when people talk about Health Care, they seem to lump Actual care, meaning facilities, technology, and professionals, with Health Coverage. I feel that the US has one of the most advanced Medical Fields in the world in terms of technology, facilities, and skill, and I wouldn’t want anything to jeopardize this standard. However, the problem with our system is it’s dependence on Corperate Health Insurance. This is the true center of the Health Care Problem in this country. So the question becomes, “Is there a way to decrease the number of uninsured citizens, decrease the cost of health care, and increase the ability of Medical Professionals to do their jobs Without compromising the Quality of care in this country?”
    This is indeed a hard question that has yet, historically, to be answered, but it is not beyond our capacity to solve, or at least it shouldn’t be.

    One thing is certain, we cannot let the fear of the “slippery slope of Socialism” convince us to do absolutely nothing whatsoever, which seems to be the strategy of the Republitarian-Status-Quo crowd.

    PapaFigue
    07/31/07 at 11:33 pm
    

20. […] Michael Moore - The Largest Minority Posted on February 10, 2008 by dandelionsalad from www.jwharrison.com posted with […]

    Colbert Interviews Michael Moore - The Largest Minority « Dandelion Salad
    02/10/08 at 5:30 pm
    

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