From the Center for American Progress:

In his new documentary SiCKO, filmmaker Michael Moore exposes the deplorable tactics practiced by some health insurance and pharmaceutical companies who deny coverage to individuals who are insured.

Moore is now facing “a multifaceted counteroffensive” from front groups supported and funded by the insurance and pharmaceutical industries.

FreedomWorks, for example, recently launched a new campaign claiming that under policies favored by Moore, “healthy individuals” would “wind up subsidizing people like Moore, who are overweight and and/or live decidedly unhealthy lifestyles by frequenting fast-food restaurants, smoke, or use drugs.” Several health care industry members serve on the FreedomWorks board of directors, and the group is run by former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, whose PAC has received significant contributions from the health care industry.

The Cato Institute, which has written numerous pieces attacking Moore’s film that argue that he “ignores the positive side of American health care,” receives funding from multiple insurance and pharmaceutical companies, including Amerisure Insurance, Pfizer, and Merck. Additionally, a senior fellow at The Manhattan Institute, which receives funding from multiple pharmaceutical giants such as Bristol-Myers Squibb, started a site called Free Market Cure, which argues SiCKO is “set to inject a large dose of misinformation and propaganda into our national dialog about health care policy.”

Other health care industry front groups — such as the Galen Institute, Pacific Research Institute, and the Heritage Foundation — have also recently launched their own attacks on Moore’s film. The health insurance and pharmaceutical industries clearly view Moore’s film exposing some of their misdeeds as a serious threat, and they have no shortage of funds to try to attack it.

Of course, the very same DLC-infested Center for American Progress is urging one of those nice, incremental solutions where they protect corporate interests - and they’ve already bought into the right-wing talking points.

For instance, that it’s “all about wellness.”

Well, no. Not as much as you’d think.

For instance, we now know that lots of prescription medicines cause weight gain. (You know, people who do “take care of themselves.”) We know that asthma is a result of environmental pollutants, and we know that the ever-present fructose (the cheap sweetener favored by Big Agriculture) actually affects your blood sugar and your pancreas in a way regular sugar doesn’t.

We know that disposed pharmaceuticals (or those passed on through urine) are tainting the water supply, even causing serious hormonal changes in fish - and humans. Many people have serious allergies to genetically-engineered food. I could go on, but you get the idea.

In other words, corporate statism is as least as dangerous to your health as anything you can control.

I like the way Michael Moore responds to a healthcare lobbyist he invited to a screening of “Sicko” when she blames bad health on the people who have it: