From the department of Whaaa?

If Michael Moore didn't have such an inflated and annoying sense of social justice he would be the perfect man to bring back the great American circus. But his latest attempt at self-promotion and gimmickry strikes me as the last throes of a man on life support.

To bolster his movie SiCKO, which has quickly fallen well behind the pace of his last two blockbuster documentaries, Moore has introduced a "Take a Republican to See SiCKO Contest." It goes as follows:

Can you imagine someone from the government coming to your home to help you with the laundry?

Well, they do it in France and if you enter the contest this weekend you will have the chance to win the same treatment for a Republican friend of yours from Michael Moore himself.

To enter the contest you have to send in ticket stubs and the name of your Republican friend you took to the movie, and want to make eligible for the prize. As you can see on Moore's website, there is really not much more to it.

First of all, while it's nice that the French government provides a laundry service for those I'm going to assume are under the care of its vaunted health care system, does anybody think it would be a good idea to hand your clothes over to our government? Especially when you are feeling ill, and might lack the strength and determination to track down said garments when they end up in a warehouse in Kentucky.

Secondly, is the idea here to reward your friend for watching the movie or punish them for being a Republican? I'm thinking Moore is under the impression the image of him forced to do the wash would warm the heart of any conservative. But Republicans generally like to present a neat and well-pressed appearance, and Michael Moore might be the most ill-fitted and wrinkled celebrity we have. Making Moore your personal launderer would be akin to allowing Allegra Versace to be your personal chef.

If he wants to offer his humiliation as an appeal to Republicans, Moore would be wiser to run a gimmick where the winner gets to slap a saddle on the propagandist and ride him like a rodeo bull while screeching "giddyup, fatboy." I doubt this would be enough to revive SiCKO, but it sure would be funny.