Michael Moore: ¡Viva WikiLeaks! Sicko Was Not Banned in Cuba
The date is January 31, 2008. It is just days after ‘Sicko’ has been nominated for an Oscar as Best Documentary. This must have sent someone reeling in Bush’s State Department (his Treasury Department had already notified me they were investigating what laws I might have broken in taking three 9/11 first responders to Cuba to get them the health care they had been denied in the United States).
Former health insurance executive Wendell Potter recently revealed that the insurance industry — which had decided to spend millions to go after me and, if necessary, “push Michael Moore off a cliff” — had begun working with anti-Castro Cubans in Miami in order to have them speak out and smear my film.
So, on January 31, 2008, a State Department official stationed in Havana took a made up story and sent it back to his HQ in Washington. Here’s what they concocted:
XXXXXXXXXXXX stated that Cuban authorities have banned Michael Moore’s documentary, “Sicko,” as being subversive. Although the film’s intent is to discredit the U.S. healthcare system by highlighting the excellence of the Cuban system, he said the regime knows the film is a myth and does not want to risk a popular backlash by showing to Cubans facilities that are clearly not available to the vast majority of them.
Sounds convincing, eh?! There’s only one problem — ‘Sicko’ had just been playing in Cuban theaters. Then the entire nation of Cuba was shown the film on national television on April 25, 2008! The Cubans embraced the film so much so it became one of those rare American movies that received a theatrical distribution in Cuba. I personally ensured that a 35mm print got to the Film Institute in Havana. Screenings of ‘Sicko’ were set up in towns all across the country.
But the secret cable said Cubans were banned from seeing my movie. Hmmm.
We also know from another secret U.S. document that “the disenchantment of the masses [in Cuba] has spread through all the provinces,” and that “all of Oriente Province is seething with hate” for the Castro regime. There’s a huge active underground rebellion, and “workers there readily give all the support they can,” with everyone involved in “subtle sabotage” against the government. Morale is terrible throughout all the branches of the armed forces, and in the event of war the army “will not fight.” Wow — this cable is hot!
Of course, this secret U.S. cable is from March 31, 1961, three weeks before Cuba kicked our asses at the Bay of Pigs.