One of the interesting things you discover if you really look into the details of radicalization and religious terrorism is that it’s not the poor and downtrodden, generally speaking, who strap on suicide vests or fly planes into towers. People who are economically struggling at the margins of society are working two and three jobs just to keep a roof over their heads and feed their kids. They don’t have time to consume political propaganda or plan attacks.
No, the people who get radicalized are almost entirely middle to upper-middle class, largely men in their 20s. They’re the ones with free time on their hands. They can look out their windows, observe, ponder, reflect. They can read books, articles, websites, watch videos. They can meet at the coffee shop or the university quad with their fellow sympathizers, discussing their beliefs, working themselves into a lather. Those are the people who either radicalize themselves, or who make themselves vulnerable to recruitment by organized terrorist groups.
So, in retrospect, it’s not at all surprising that there’s some money behind this kid who had weeks and weeks to (apparently) plan and rehearse this act, and to write a manifesto (such as it was) to be found in his pocket. We should expect exactly more of the same.
If you are in immediate danger of death you can get emergency care. Diabetic and need insulin? No one is obligated to give it to you if you can’t afford to pay, you’ll just sit there until you’re in extremis THEN you’ll get emergency care. Rinse and repeat until your feet are gangrenous? You’ll get emergency amputation, but not rehab or prosthetic or even a wheelchair if you’re indigent (well, someone might give you one).
Cancer? No one is obliged to give you treatment is no one is paying and you are unable to pay. Just sucks to be you.
Granted, there’s a threadbare patchwork of charities that fill some of this gap… but a lot of people fall through a lot of cracks until finally they’re in the ER in a state where they HAVE to be cared for and wind up spending a long time in a hospital bed, often in a situation that could have been entirely prevented. But the health insurance companies don’t care because they’re still not footing the bill, the hospital/doctors/whoever just have to eat the loss. The politicians don’t care, they have the best health care coverage in the nation. The rich don’t care - it’s not their money and they have enough money to take care of their own.
Correct. I have a friend with type 1 diabetes and health insurance issues. At one point, he was having trouble getting his insulin approved, and he had to have an extensive argument with someone (probably the pharmacy? I forget the exact details) that he wanted to buy the insulin even though he didn’t have insurance coverage for it. I’m sure he had to convince them he really could afford to pay for it. Here in the capitalist US, they don’t just give you what you need if you can’t pay for it.
And this goes back to one of the points I’ve been trying to make. Repressing the masses can mean more than killing them. It can mean, for instance, crippling medical debt.
Exactly. 17% of diabetics report rationing insulin. So here’s an example of how someone might die due to an insurance issue. I’m not saying 17% of diabetics have their insulin restricted by their insurer. Just showing it’s a mechanism that fits the description.
Here’s another way. You have chest pain. You can’t afford to pay a big medical bill. Yes, if you go to an emergency room they will treat you, but you’ll be billed. So you go to bed and hope it feels better tomorrow. Except you die of the heart attack.
A square dance caller i used to dance to died that way. I know, because he was calling at an event with another caller that i see every week, and the other caller tried to talk him into seeing a doctor.
I just read of a cancer case where the doctor recommended 35 chemotherapy sessions, but the insurer capped payments at 28 sessions. If that is true, I can see where that would cause harm. Does anyone with experience know?
YouTuber LegalEagle has a video discussing the charges against Mangione. It seems the prosecutor is bringing terrorism charges. Devin’s guest, former federal prosecutor Mitchell Epner, thinks this is a mistake. It seems an attempt to bring first degree murder charges rather than second degree murder charges (due to how New York murder laws are written). Epner think murder two is a slam dunk easy case that will see Mangione in prison likely for life whereas adding terrorism to the mix complicates things a lot and gives Mangione a defense.
But the way, i recently went to the local emergency room for chest pain. It turns out to have been a combination of a pulled muscle from hauling leaves, hot flashes, and a sense of dread around the recent election results. And i left with a recommendation to take ibuprofen for the pain. The pre-insurance bill was $1200. The bill after insurance was $255. That included some blood tests, an ekg, and a chest xray, so, deal! But if you have to fight with your insurer, or if money is right, that’s a significant financial burden.
What bothers me is they’re treating this guy like he’s some kind of Batman villain while probably totally ignoring the recent subway killer as well as dozens of other killers.
For better or worse he was arrested and placed into custody; the government is now responsible for his safety– especially considering the hue and cry that would go up if he were Oswalded.
He killed a CEO, somebody that they regard as an actual human being. They want to make a show of how much they disapprove of that. Those other killers just kill us subhumans, so the authorities don’t really care. A million commoner deaths would not equal one CEO death. Or one CEO hangnail, for that matter.
Authorities said on Saturday the motive was not clear. However, the Magdeburg prosecutor, Horst Nopens, said one possible factor could be what he called the suspect’s frustration with Germany’s handling of Saudi refugees.
The suspect, a 50-year-old psychiatrist who has lived in Germany for almost two decades,
Um, i think we’ve decided there’s no good way to count the number of people who die rather than seek care for their heart attack because they are afraid of the cost of treatment. Is United health care more responsible for that kind of death than any other part of the US healthcare system? If they are really denying payment at twice the national average, they almost certainly are. So… I wouldn’t say it’s exactly been debunked.
(I took the liberty of correcting a typo on my own quote.)
The FBI defines mass shootings as “Four or more murders occurring during the same incident, with no distinctive time period between the murders. These events typically involve a single location, where the killer murdered a number of victims in an ongoing incident.”
No,
The term ‘serial killings’ means a series of three or more killings, not less than one of which was committed within the United States, having common characteristics such as to suggest the reasonable possibility that the crimes were committed by the same actor or actors.
Earlier this week in Seattle, a man unloaded a can of pepper spray on a city bus, then dragged the driver out of the bus and into an alley and stabbed him to death.
Despite there being video footage and a witness, it took the cops a full day and a half to release a photo of the killer or even give a description other than “man wearing a blue jacket”, and when they did publicize his name it turned out he had stabbed his roommate to death the year before and wasn’t even charged.
Just goes to show how highly they prioritize solving crimes when the victim isn’t a billionaire.
