Is this the tipping point?
The shooting and killing of that health care corporation CEO in New York the other day, I mean. We may characterize 2024 America as one huge pissing match between two gangs that detest each other, otherwise known as polarization. And that’s true. But, on the other hand, the lot of us are unified, perhaps as never before, in our common hatred of the corporate monoliths that reign over pretty much every field of industry including the aforementioned health care, grocery stores, mass media, fast food, soft drinks, pharmaceuticals, household cleaners, diapers, and, for pity’s sake, just about every single consumer product and service you whip out your credit card for these days.
Not only that, as much as we loathe the big shot corporate bosses and the eight- or nine-figure pay they rake in each year, we despise politicians even more. Seemingly every once well-respected authority figure of the past — the president, the governor, the senator, the chairman of the board, the professor, and the priest — all now rank low in the nation’s esteem standings.
This has been going on — and getting more pronounced with each passing year — for more than a half century. Beginning with the debacle in Vietnam and proceeding through Watergate, the Ford Pinto, Three-Mile Island, Iran-Contra, the Big Tobacco scam, the Catholic church’s ongoing molestation scandal, and even Major League Baseball’s steroid era, we’ve come to a point where nobody trusts nothin’ anymore.
Today, anybody who can be considered a leader, an expert, a maven, a pundit, or a maestro is automatically looked upon with suspicion. Suspicion, hell — most of us simply assume anyone in a position of power or authority to be unholy. All politicians are crooks. All businessmen are out to screw us. All scientists are bought and paid for. The priests are sinners. The cops are corrupt and the criminals get off scot-free.
The death of that big boss of the health insurance giant, who was gunned down on a New York City street Wednesday morning by an as-yet at-large and unidentified assassin, has not elicited a tidal wave of sympathy and/or grief. In fact, acc’d’g to a CNN story this Friday AM, tens of thousands, at least, are gleeful over his tragic demise:
In one stark example, a Facebook post by UnitedHealth Group expressing sadness about UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson’s death received 62,000 reactions – 57,000 of them laughing emojis.
Along a similar vein, Matt Ford of The New Republic today writes:
As Americans have fewer and fewer lawful means to peacefully address social and economic issues or resolve disputes among themselves, targeted killings like this may only become more common.
Make no mistake, Thompson’s killing is an act of insurrection, as ideologically driven as the January 6th US Capitol attack. The spent shells found at the scene of the Thompson attack were engraved with the words Deny, Defend, and Depose — an obvious variation inspired by the insurance industry’s strategy of Delay, Deny, Defend whenever you or your neighbor makes a claim.
A recent social media meme purports to show a letter written by a doctor protesting a health insurer’s alleged denial of coverage for a child’s anti-nausea medication while the kid was undergoing chemotherapy. Here it is:
Frankly, I don’t buy it. I can’t imagine any universe where a doctor would pen and send such a letter. No matter, one hell of a lot of people posted the meme, apparently believing it to be the real deal. Just as the January 6th insurrectionists believed the 45th President really won the 2020 election with all their hearts, millions…, no, tens of millions of us believe health insurers gleefully deny medications to cancer-stricken kids just for the sport of it.
(A re-perusal of the social media pages of the people I know who posted the meme turns up no trace of those posts; the bots that police soc. med. for truth must have blasted it into infinity.)
The reason health care insurers exist is to make money for their investors. Providing coverage for cancer-ravaged kids experiencing chemotherapy nausea is nothing more than a means to that end. Just as the safety and lives of Pinto cars was a secondary concern for the people who ran Ford Motor Company in the 1970s, or causing lung cancer in millions of people was simply an unfortunate cost of doing business for the likes of Philip Morris, RJ Reynolds, and Lorillard.
People are tired of getting fucked, regardless of whether the fucking is real or not. That’s the reason why so many people voted to put the 45th President back in office, believing him to be their champion versus the bad guys lying to them, taking their money, and swiping their dignity. They are spiritual brethren of the hooded guy who killed the United Healthcare CEO.
Should the two heretofore polarized parties come to the realization they’re fighting the same enemy, the entire American business and politics establishment might be upended.
Right now, it’s a toss-up as to whether history will view the guy as a lone nut or the man who fired the second Shot Heard Round the World.
Time will tell.