First Hit: Very one sided view of other countries and the social programs their governments have implemented to improve their country’s well-being.
Documentarian Michael Moore travels to European countries to see what social programs their governments have implemented that improve their populations health, education and happiness.
In Italy the discussion is about vacation time and that the US has no law requiring minimum vacation time. In Italy 4 weeks is minimum and many have 8 weeks of vacation.
There is Slovenia where all college education is free. Iceland prosecuted all the of bankers that caused their country to go bankrupt (unlike the US).
Finland’s students have no homework. In Norway prisoners are guarded by officers that do not have guns while they endeavor to have as normal a life as possible away from the population of the country.
In most all countries Moore visits prisoners get to vote for elected officials. Lastly, all the countries he visited had free healthcare for all.
Moore also points back to the US where all these ideas had their germination many years ago. It isn’t that none of these things weren’t true, it is that the film doesn't point out the difficulties in each of those countries as well.
One item that stands out is that almost 60% of our tax dollars support "Defense" (think military and war based activities). I was left wondering what we would do with even 1/3 of that money spent for the good of the country’s infrastructure.
Michael Moore is his usual smart and silly self. I thought the planting of the American flag and claiming to take these ideas back to the US seemed contrived.
Overall: It was very interesting to listen to people of other countries about the programs they have in place – you know they believe in what they are doing.