Work-at-home, with meetings on the computer Friday, and woo-hoo, we made it almost all the way through another week. Christmas is nigh–Lord–but the end of the year always seems to come in a rush, doesn’t it? I mean, college football’s regular season is already over (although, given how LSU did this year, it seemed to last a really long time), and basketball started up again last month. It’s also almost collegiate gymnastics time, too. The SEC will be really interesting with perennial power Oklahoma added to the conference this year. The Grand Prix of Figure Skating final is this weekend, so we’ll probably spend some time with that, too. I think I want to watch whatever that new Alien1 movie is, too. I’ve not seen all the movies, but Alien and Aliens remain favorites of mine, so I am always interested whenever they release a new one. The shoddy state of my memory, however, has made reading or watching series (movies, television, books) a tad more challenging.2 But I shall persevere.
It is cold this morning; right now it’s thirty-eight degrees outside. I slept really well last night, so it was most likely pretty cold last night, too. I was exhausted when I left work early yesterday, and so when I got home, my brain wasn’t functional enough to even read, let alone do anything more creative or enjoyable. I am probably not going to leave the house today other than run to get the mail and to get something to make for dinner tonight (no clues on that score, so will have to figure something out). Paul’s going to be gone for most of the day once he gets up. I’m going to try to get my chores done while working (I can go do laundry when taking breaks from data entry and on-line trainings) today, before I dash out to run those two errands and then come home to edit and write and read and clean. Sounds like a good plan. I am hopeful to get some things done while also getting some good rest.
So, the CEO of the absolute worst health insurance company in the country, United Healthcare, was assassinated on the street in New York the other day, which led to some interesting reactions. Some–the vast majority–people celebrated his death; his shitty insurance company successfully denied 32% of claims last year. I’ve never had the pleasure of being covered through that insurer, but working in a clinic and talking to clients about their health insurance–I get to see (and hear) firsthand how bad their coverage is. Some have astronomical deductibles; still others can’t get their (expensive) PrEP labs3 covered by it4, etc. When I saw the news break, I was only surprised that it’s taken this long for an health insurance “profit above people” company executive to be murdered. A few people on social media (you know the ones–the tireless morally superior assholes who love to try to shame everyone else for their very valid feelings) were very quick to excoriate people for celebrating the murder of an asshole who was definitely the last rung on the ladder of responsibility for a lot of people’s pain, financial ruin, and death, wagging a finger in everyone’s face and letting them know that they are the horrible people in this instance. I block tiresome scolds. You’re not my mom, you’re not my priest, you’re not my employer and you’re a total stranger. Maybe you’re lovely in your every day life, but pulling moral superiority in this case? Will you scold people for being happy when odious garbage like Kim Davis or Mitch McConnell die, too? Go fuck yourself, and get the fuck out of my world. As for their mourning loved ones, why is their pain more valid than that of United Healthcare’s victims? They certainly didn’t mourn or feel bad when United’s cruel profit policies killed, ruined, or bankrupted their clients, did they? No, they spent that money and lived high on that ten million dollars a year (plus bonuses) salary, so miss me with their pain, okay?
And in other, predictable news about the murder, apparently they have images of the killer’s face from security cameras, and people swooned and thought he was handsome and hot. Just like the Boston Marathon bomber and Ted Bundy and so many other “hot” criminals. It’s weird. He is handsome, at least the guy whose face was shared from those images–which also made me think he’s a professional assassin; I mean, who else could flirt with someone on their way to killing someone else? Although it does make for an interesting idea–the hot sexy hit man. Maybe a gay one? (See how my mind is?) Anyway, the assassin is kind of becoming a folk hero, which should give all insurance executives pause. In the wake of the murder, Blue Cross Blue Shield–which has just announced a horrific, draconian new policy about anesthesia, quickly reversed itself and removed all the executive and board of directors’ names on its website.
Read the fucking room. The people are not happy. It’s astonishing how these company monsters don’t realize how hated and despised they are…or at least, didn’t. They do now.
It also occurred to me last week–and not just me; someone posted on social media about it yesterday, which made me think about it again–that what we are actually lurching toward is Ayn Rand’s capitalist heaven of no government regulation, no taxes, and completely unfettered capitalism; the billionaires taking the place of her ridiculous notion of “the men of the mind” who, by virtue of their ambition, intelligence, creativity, and drive5, deserve to be in charge of everything because being good to their employees and their customers is “in their best interest.” Hmm, how has that been working out in the last few decades, Ayn? Atlas Shrugged was such complete and total bullshit, as was everything she wrote and the philosophy she embraced, the virtue of selfishness. I was interested in her because I read Anthem in high school, and it reminded me of another, similar type book (I can’t recall the name of it); that interested me enough to read the other novels and her essay collections. I was intrigued, as so many young white men are, by this interesting way of looking at the world–but at the same time, I also quickly saw right through it as utter and total bullshit; what she described as selfishness was actually self-interest, which are not the same things. I’ve long wanted to write about Ayn Rand and her damaging theories, and how the Right embraced her (except for her atheistic hatred of religion), which is part of the reason why we are where we are now as a country. in thrall to billionaires who don’t care a fig for the rest of us. I also wanted to do a compare/contrast essay about Atlas Shrugged and another conservative author’s railroad book, Taylor Caldwell’s Never Victorious, Never Defeated–which came from the completely opposite direction of Rand’s tome…but writing about Rand means rereading her, and shudder, who has time for that?6
Seriously, I don’t need to write about it that badly. Once was enough. Although what I really want to do is totally deconstruct and destroy her essay about literary arts (like anyone who’s ever read any of her work would think she had the right to theorize anything about art). She has a collection of essays about art called The Romantic Manifesto, which, like everything she wrote, is overwritten, pretentious, and more than a little condescending–not to mention completely wrong about everything. That actually might be fun–I do remember how in the essay about literature she raved about Mickey Spillane…if that tells you anything.
And on that note, I have to get ready for my first meeting. Have a lovely Friday, Constant Reader, and I’ll probably be back later.
- Alien Romulus, to be exact. ↩︎
- As well as editing, as I mentioned yesterday. ↩︎
- Since the ACA requires insurance companies to cover PrEP, this is their way around the rule–the labs are incredibly expensive. So, they will cover the medication but not the labs required for the prescription to be written. Never forget, health insurance is the biggest legal scam in American history. Almost like flood/hurricane insurance: “oh, sorry, that damage was caused by a hurricane” which then becomes “Oh, sorry, that was caused by a flood, not a hurricane.” ↩︎
- This is nothing more than anecdotal information; I’m just always surprised that my shitty insurance is actually one of the better ones, which is frightening. And inevitably, whenever I ask my clients who their shitty insurer is, it tends to be United–which was one of the options my day job considered for this year. ↩︎
- Amongst all the insanities and idiocies in her pseudo-philosophy, her definition of “men of the mind” are people who built companies and wealth by creating a product that revolutionized whatever industry–people like Henry Ford (blech), Andrew Carnegie, etc. Since she worshipped money, I imagine she’d be on board the Musk/billionaire worship train–but they aren’t really “creators” and “men of the mind” as she saw it. Her brains had myopia, alas. ↩︎
- A very dear friend of mine once said of Ayn Rand, “Her writing was the least of her crimes.” Succinct and to the point.
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Queer and Loathing in America 