Brian Thompson, CEO of United Healthcare. Apparently there had been threats, and those threats were related to denial of care. Even the Feds thought he was denying too much care (which takes some work, since denying care is the industry profit model.)
He had been chief executive since 2021, during a time in which the parent company and his division were rattled by federal investigations, even as it enjoyed profitable growth. The division has been criticized by congressional lawmakers and federal regulators who accused it of systematically denying authorization for health care procedures and treatments.
I have been expecting, but not seeing, a wave of assassinations of important people in the US and the West for some time. I still think it will happen, it’s just taking longer than I thought.
The bottom line is that people like Thompson get rich by hurting other people. That’s what they do. Billionaires, executives and politicians all make their living plus a lot by taking from people weaker than them. Grocery chains raising prices faster than their costs’ insurance companies denying care to spike profits; banks creating fake documents to foreclose homes; private equity buying profitable businesses, larding them up with debt and then shutting them down.
Politicians making laws to benefit the rich, cutting their taxes, giving them huge subsidies and cutting programs for the poor and middle class. Politicians letting people be homeless and stealing their possessions when they raid homeless camps.
And so on. Entire books have been written about this and been non-exhaustive.
Powerful people get rich by killing, impoverishing and hurting people weaker than them and it’s very odd that more of those people, or their families or friends don’t return the favor with prejudice.
Thompson’s assassination will cause more execs and CEOs to bodyguard up, but that doesn’t matter much. Modern IEDs and drones are very very effective and getting cheaper all the time, though civilian drones are extremely restricted in the US, which has lead to China being the world leader.
I suspect they’re restricted in part to make assassinations harder. Guns are nice, drones are better.
Chinese leaders make the lives of most Chinese much better, not worse, so they aren’t scared of assassination.
Anyway, if you want an economy which works for everyone you can’t ask nicely, powerful Westerners only respond to fear. So if there are more assassinations, if it becomes a “thing”, well that might turn out very well for the majority. (Or it might not, but when the status quo is unbearable, people often lash out.)
This is just an observation of how things work, of course. One should never ever assassinate someone just because they are killing and impoverishing lots of people and would happily kill and or impoverish your friends and family or you because they need a fifth luxury home, third private jet and a second mega-yacht.
That would be very anti-capitalistic and un-American and letting the rich kill and impoverish you is what America is all about. You should be honored to die or live on the street or scream in agony as your health care is denied so some executive can increase profits by .01% and get a bigger bonus.
Die for the American way. Live homeless for freedom!
Update:
Nate Wilcox
United is one of the most loathsome companies in a completely loathsome industry. Attack was professionally executed based on the video footage.
Purple Library Guy
Anyone for a chorus of “Halliburton Boardroom Massacre”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckqgPb3h_k0
Bill H.
The only problem with that is that denying care does not add to profits. Insurance companies are required to pay out 85% of collected premiums in the form of benefits. Denial of one benefit merely is paid to a different person for a different form of care. It does not add to profit. Maybe they can get away with paying out less than 85%, but I would need more than an an undocumented accusation.
I’m not a fan of the insurance companies, but there are too many accusations flying around. Price gouging by grocery stores, etc.
Ian Welsh
You deny claims to get to the loss ratio. After all you wouldn’t want to spend 82%, now would you? (80% is only for some plans, btw.) Also the more insurance you sell, the higher the bottom MLR. So overselling then denying increases profit.
Medicaid does not always require rebates if MLR is not reached.
(Aside: I actually worked in life insurance and am a “fellow of the life management institute.”)
responseTwo
Well said. For-profit health care is a dirty business. Canadians get a health card when their born. No charges. Don’ say the Canadian health care is bad. I’ve worked with several Canadians and they were happy with their health care.
Maybe its gotten worse recently. I don’t know.
Ian Welsh
Canadian health care has gotten quite a bit worse since Covid. Still take it any day over American, however.
Hvd
Just a question. Could the refusal rate be related to being less selective both or either as to customers or care providers? Don’t get me wrong, one way or another they are all able to take excessive profits by being discriminatory while providing very limited services for the enormous profits they reap.
mago
Typical Western approach to disease—treat the symptom rather than the cause.
Scum rises to the top for a reason; gotta kill the reason to effect a cure. Adjusting all the toxic social/cultural and institutional factors would require the force of that new Russian hazel missile and them some.
You can pop the pimple but until you clear the toxins, another is going to rise somewhere else. . .
Just as an aside, the assassin is the one who’s going to ultimately pay—karmically anyway.
Nobody wins the way the game is played in the samsaric world.
Bukko Boomeranger
Cory Doctorow wrote a novella that was EXACTLY about this! It was titled “Radicalized” and was part of a 4-story book with the same title. In “Radicalized” the short story, an American man whose wife had terminal cancer and was being denied treatment for it by greedy healthcare companies, delved into a Dark Web forum where people with similar plights made plans to kill the business executives who were doing the denial. The story unfolds with lots of pathos, as various doomed Darkwebbers share their stories, than go dark (pun intended) after they knock off their targets. The protagonist tries to moderate their murderous urges, then backs out, but the authorities are on to him and… (not gonna spoil the ending.) “Radicalized” the book is a good read about various aspects of dystopiAmerica, especially the lead story “Unauthorized Bread.” I reckon anyone who reads you, Ian, would like it. I won’t drop a link, but Doctorow makes all his fiction available freely, due to his “information should be free” philosophy. FWIW, when I think about you (something I don’t do much coz I’m not stalky) I envision you being like Doctorow, who I’ve seen in several video interviews.
different clue
I wonder what happens if / when enough people decide that “Jackpot” is a really real thing and is being designed and carried out on purpose. Will a rising number of people wish to ‘ reach out and touch’ the Jackpot-design engineers? And the people who employ them?
Now, I would nehhh-ver ehhh-ver condone assassinating someone merely because they deserve it. But as long as our American Gun Rights remain honored and protected, and especially if ” our American Drone Rights” becomes a thing, perhaps people in the Brian Thompson Class might begin to rethink whether they really want to continue serving the Very Uppest Class no matter how much the Very Uppest Class is willing to pay them for their services.
Bill
I saw this then read your article.
Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield Won’t Pay for the Complete Duration of Anesthesia for Patients’ Surgical Procedures asahq.org
Z
The only reason our rulers have not blamed it on the Russians or the Iranians is because they know it would cause us to like the Russians and the Iranians more.
Z
KT Chong
I saw the news on YouTube. I watched several different videos that reported the assassination. Then I read the user comments under those videos.
Pretty much ALL of the comments agreed that he had it coming… just show what the public sentiment is.
Richard Holsworth
The system rewards the “Best and Brightest:” the very CEOs he referred to as “Savvy Businessmen”. Obama and the killing fields: “I told Wendell in the Fall of 2009 that Obamacare, nothing but a recycled Heritage Foundation scheme, was a guaranteed failure, that it completely undermined single payer reform, and that it would certainly blow up in the face of the Democrats. He responded that as long as the so-called ‘Public Option’ was part of it, it was worth supporting. But the Public Option was stripped out by Obama and the Democrats.”
—-
“While Obama was saying that he thought a public option was a good idea and encouraging supporters to believe his healthcare plan would include one, he had promised for-profit hospital lobbyists that there would be no public option in the final bill.”
”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/miles-mogulescu/ny-times-reporter-confirm_b_500999.html
https://popularresistance.org/the-rise-and-fall-of-obamacare-will-the-inside-story-ever-be-told/
Tc
I thought the wife’s initial comments were strangely matter of fact. The twitter reaction was so so COLD, and spot on.
I know americans and this will not start a trend. Definitely the billionaires will need more security as in Mexico where the rich are under constant threat of kidnapping, etc. Its been 20 years since I used to have a certain job , but back then it was common for really rich Mexicans to have big houses in the US they could use as retreats for family, with less security and an opportunity for more normal existence. I think Anglo America will become more Latin American in that respect. But the violence will be criminal gangs and cartels and a few opportunistic individuals. Definitely not the oppressed masses rising up, and if there are instances like this one seems to be, not an organized one.
Even historically like in NIreland where you had IRA and UDF, a lot of their activity was just crime,. Bank robbery, blackmail, “protection money”…
It would be nice of the masses decided not to accept laissez faire capitalism and the PTB would allow reform, but the violence will just lead to more enshitification. Political and economic violence is more of a right wing tactic , IMO.
BTW “laissez faire” capitalism was a dirty word that even elementary school children like me learned about in the 1970s. I dont know if I have heard it even once since Reagan came along.
Feral Finster
1. “Anyway, if you want an economy which works for everyone you can’t ask nicely, powerful Westerners only respond to fear.”
Sociopaths respond only to reward and punishment.
2. Whoever said that the US will become more an more like Latin America is correct. Think “Brasil”, albeit a Brasil with worse weather, less attractive females, and a more hyperbelligerent foreign policy.
shagggz
@Feral Finster,
I see no reason to single out the females 🙂
mago
Were I to single out the females I’d single out the Cubanas.
Que calientes!
Anon
@shagggz
Ukraine didn’t get the message. Once the war is done, I’m headed straight there.
shagggz
@Anon,
There might not be much of a there there to return to.