Michael Moore, independent filmmaker and perennial critic of the Bush administration, has criticized the Obama administration for its response to the Haiti earthquake by saying the administration response is clunky and focused largely on Americans in Haiti. Moore also criticized the Obama administration for failing to respond to the offer of the The National Nurses Union to send 12,000 nurses to Haiti calling the lack of response “distressing” and goes so far as to compare President Obama to President Bush.
In an interview with Democracy Now, Michael Moore criticized the Obama administration response to Haiti as “clunky” and distressing. (Emphases mine)
…MICHAEL MOORE: But the response from the—our government is once again this sort of, you know, clunky “we’re too big”—you know the saying “we’re too big to fail.” This is like “we’re too big to succeed.” That’s what it feels like.
Now, I will say this: Obama immediately, within hours, trying to pull the apparatus together and put it into motion, was in marked contrast to what we saw during Katrina and other events during the Bush years. So, on that first day I remember feeling really good about that.
By the second and the third day, when no, you know, real help had arrived, and the concern turned, you know, mostly to how are the Americans doing there, the Americans at the embassy, the Americans at the Montana Hotel, etc., etc.—and naturally, of course, I mean, it’s human nature to care about your own first, but I would hope, by this point, that we’re in a place where we just care about everybody and that we don’t see ourselves as more human or more worthy of life.
AMY GOODMAN: Didn’t you know a group of nurses who wanted to go—more than a group?
MICHAEL MOORE: Oh, my god. Well, this—no, this is the National Nurses Union. This is the saddest thing that’s happened. And I would hope anybody listening to this or watching this would respond and put pressure on the Bush administration. The National Nurses Union—…
And this situation with the National Nurses Union, they went out to their membership. Who would be willing to go to Haiti right now? Over 11,000, almost 12,000 nurses—12,000 nurses—around this country have signed up, who are willing to go right now to Haiti. I don’t know if I heard it on your show last week or someplace else. You know, essentially one nurse could provide help for dozens of people. So just imagine if we could get 12,000 nurses there, with the necessary supplies, how many people could have been helped. I mean, this offer was made days and days ago.
AMY GOODMAN: To whom?
MICHAEL MOORE: To the Obama administration from the executive director of the National Nurses Union. She contacted the administration. She got put off. She had no response. Then they sent her to some low-level person that had no authority to do anything.
And then, finally, she’s contacting me. And she says, “Do you know any way to get a hold of President Obama?” And I’m going, “Well, this is pretty pathetic if you’re having to call me. I mean, you are the largest nurses union. You are, I believe, one of the vice presidents of the AFL-CIO, of the main board of the AFL-CIO, and you can’t get a call in to the White House to get 12,000 nurses down there? I don’t know what I can do for you. I mean, I’ll put my call in, too.”
But as we sit here today, not a whole heck of a lot has happened. And it’s distressing. It’s just one example, I think, of so many things, and you covered a lot of it last week when you were there, that just have fallen through here.
In an ironic twist, when the question was first posed to Moore about the “distressing” lack of response of the Obama administration to the Nurses Union offer, Moore accidentally referred to the Obama administration as the Bush administration. He the goes on to say how dissapointed he is in the Obama administration.
AMY GOODMAN: Didn’t you know a group of nurses who wanted to go—more than a group?
MICHAEL MOORE: Oh, my god. Well, this—no, this is the National Nurses Union. This is the saddest thing that’s happened. And I would hope anybody listening to this or watching this would respond and put pressure on the Bush administration. The National Nurses Union—
AMY GOODMAN: The Obama administration?
MICHAEL MOORE: Yeah, the Obama. What did I say? The—
AMY GOODMAN: Bush administration.
MICHAEL MOORE: Yeah, yeah. We already put pressure on them. They’re no longer with us. But that wasn’t just Freudian. That’s really—that is my state of mind. That is how I’m, you know, feeling, because I won’t accept the sugarcoated difference between the Obama administration and the Bush administration. And you can say, on the surface, just how great things are in terms of compared to the last eight years, but the substance, when it comes to, you know, the rubber meeting the road, I can’t tell you how profoundly disappointed I am at this point.
If Michael Moore is willing to criticize President Obama is such a way, the President may have a bigger public relations problem than he is willing to admit.
