"ILL" Gotten Gains

The recent killing of Brian Thompson, the CEO of United Healthcare has truly been a shock here in America. At least it has been for the capitalist class who believe themselves to be worthy of worship in the world. The rest of us aren’t too terribly surprised by this event. What is surprising is that it didn’t happen long before now. A young man has been arrested and charged with 2nd degree murder for the killing, but this entire situation could have been avoided if we lived in a society that cared enough about its people to eliminate the mental and financial torture that gets worse by the minute in America because of capitalism. This is one of the few times in my life that I have felt like a terrible something that someone did was not a crime so much as the only result that could follow an ongoing abuse that was put upon the perpetrator and countless others who knew of no other response to their trauma. Three other instances of justifiable crimes were the ordeals of Patty Hearst, Francine Hughes, and an elderly man in California who killed a neighbor for constantly terrorizing and threatening everyone in the neighborhood. I am sure that there are thousands more incidents like these that just didn’t make it to the national news. Their circumstances are different, but fear and abuse were at the core of all of these tragedies. There always comes a point when a human being can no longer manage the torture being forced upon them. When your health and wellbeing and your very life are threatened and controlled by uncaring others, a break will inevitably come.

Filmmaker Michael Moore’s documentary “Sicko” gave us a very hard look at the health insurance industry in America years ago and it was not a pretty sight. It was the first documentary of his in all the films that he has made that quickly brought me to tears. How humans can treat each other with such disregard and a “don’t give a shit” attitude when it comes to some of the most basic of human needs such as health and wellness is inconceivable to me. They absolutely can and do, though, and there is one man out there who said loudly to them “how dare you!” last week.

I was very surprised that it was a McDonald’s employee who called the police on the suspect. There are probably thousands of people in this country who would hide this man in their homes or give him resources to prevent his capture or swear in court that he was with them at the time of the shooting playing video games or watching Netflix. If the shooter goes to trial for this, few people will want to convict him. You can’t blame them. With the exception of Wendell Potter (who blew the whistle on the insurance companies years ago) and Michael Moore, there has really not been anyone here who has bothered to do anything about the “legalized extortion” that has frustrated, traumatized, prolonged illnesses, and been responsible for the deaths of possibly millions of people like the insurance industry has. Our government turns a blind eye to it all and hungrily accepts their payoffs when the insurance moguls say “frog." (for those who may not be familiar with this old saying, it is a reference to calling out people who can be bought, as in, when the people who are offering money to get a pass on their unacceptable behavior call upon you to cover their asses all they have to do is say “frog” and you will say “how high?” meaning you are more than willing to jump as high as they would like you to in order to collect the cash for doing it.) I am sure that most Americans are hoping that this event will shake up the country enough to bring about a total change in the healthcare industry now and create a national single payer system for everyone. I am afraid that I cannot be that optimistic. I would love to be, but I cannot imagine monied people suddenly finding their better angels now and vowing to do right by others just because one millionaire capitalist was killed for his apathy toward the people that he screwed over and caused the death of for his own profit. As it turns out, this man was one of the lower paid millionaires in the industry. His salary was only 10 million per year. Most of the other CEOs in the large insurance companies make more than 20 million per year. They might be afraid of being gunned down by an “at-the-end-of-their-rope” citizen, but they are most likely too arrogant to believe that it could ever happen to them. Pretty sickening to know that, and even more sickening to know that our heartsick illness isn’t covered in any insurance plan. Having arrested someone for the shooting so quickly pretty much means that not enough time will have elapsed for there to be any sort of wakeup call or remorse on the part of the insurance companies toward their guilt at causing an incident like this to have happened.

So, with Christmas being two weeks away is there any hope that the elitists and capitalists in this country will now do an about face like Ebeneezer Scrooge did when he got a look at how uncaring and cruel, he had been to others, and become the kind of people who will make amends for all of their past crimes against humanity? The “miracle of Christmas” that they talk about in literature and film would have to go quite a stretch to bring that about, but I would love to believe in the possibility. We could all ask the Universe to send them three spirits to show them how they have wronged us. We could also send them a link to the song below and pray for a humbling of their hearts. We need to bring about a miracle because talking hasn’t made any difference. The man who was arrested will now suffer the modern-day equivalent of a crucifixion for what has happened. Some people are calling on President Biden to pardon him, but I wouldn’t even bet a nickel on that. Jesus had the remote opportunity to be saved if the citizens had wanted it but they didn’t. They chose to save the career criminal Barabbas instead. So many people have no idea how much unnecessary trouble they continuously cause in the world by not understanding who they are, what they are, and why they are here. There is a connectedness between all of us that mostly goes unspoken and unheard. Suffering is always the outcome of this ignorance. What a shame that it always takes catastrophe and death to knock some sense into us, and even then, it never resonates with everyone.