"Sicko" Marketing Machine Shifts in High Gear with Discrimination Claim

Michael Moore's attorney David Boies is claiming today that this client's criticism of the Bush administration may have prompted the federal investigation into Moore's trip to Cuba for his health-care documentary Sicko (Wait a minute...Wasn't this the read on what was happening all along?) According to AP, Boies has written a letter to the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, headed by Dale Thompson (who sent the original letter to Moore informing him that he was under investigation), which states: "I am requesting that you provide to me information regarding the person or persons who participated in making the decision to send Mr. Thompson's letter, the nature of the discussions that took place, and the knowledge your office had of Mr. Moore and his trip to Cuba at the time the letter was sent." Of course, AP got their hands on this letter in advance of an afternoon news conference at the at the attorney's office by Moore, Boies and Harvey Weinstein, whose company is releasing the film on June 29th.

I appreciate what Moore is trying to do with his docs and I often agree with his politics, but I continually question his methods. Of course, he has every right to be outraged and challenge the investigation (we've seen how the Bush White House likes to punish dissention), but why does everything he does seem like a perfectly timed, self-serving publicity stunt? Why didn't he just announce this a month ago when he was sparring with Fred Thompson? Or later at Cannes? Because, ostensibly, he wants to keep Sicko in the news until it hit theaters. In my opinion, Moore and Weinstein are going about this all wrong. This kind of controversy will not sell this movie. They're wearing people out with too much pre-release publicity.