Why can't the U.S. be Moore like us?

where-to-invade-next-13916-largeMichael Moore's latest film, Where to Invade Next, is a tour of European countries - Italy, France, Germany, Norway, Finland, Slovenia, Iceland - and Tunisia, to see if he can find one thing they have got right, in their welfare system, their penal system, in their general attitudes to Society, that he can take back home. One can argue that it is easier to do certain things in small countries than in large ones, and that he self-confessedly cherrypicks the best things from these democracies while illustrating the worst in his own. But the film's message is inspiring nonetheless: that all it takes to improve the well-being of your fellow citizens is to care about what is done in your name. As it happens, the UK was not one of the countries Moore visited, and as we sit a week away from professing, potentially, our desire to cease to be part of this enlightened continent that is Europe, one cannot help but take pause. Could we end up becoming, bit by bit, more like the U.S.?

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