| “Free Luigi Mangione” merch is selling like hotcakes on Amazon. Mangione’s lawyer says that supporters have reached out with offers to fund his defense. A sign reading “deny, defend, depose” is on display above a Baltimore highway. And such reactions are hardly relegated to the political left. Even Joe Rogan sounded sympathetic to anti-insurer animus on his podcast. What does all of this say about America?
It says that people have been radicalized by their everyday experience with our awful for-profit healthcare system, writes Natalie Shure. Claim denial happens maddeningly often, with 16 percent of all claims rejected by insurers and 32 percent rejected by UnitedHealthcare in particular. “From the patient’s perspective, the reasoning behind all this can feel damn near inscrutable,” Shure notes. So it’s no wonder people have been cracking jokes with such intensity.
To make things even more complicated, Mangione’s arrest came just as Daniel Penny, the 25-year-old man who killed Jordan Neely last year on a subway car, was acquitted. “When social structures corrode, as they are doing in the 21st century, they can trigger desperate acts like Mangione’s—or the rightist paramilitarism of people like Penny,” writes Caleb Brennan of the two cases.
Meanwhile, in Washington this week, congresspeople jockey for leadership positions. In Philadelphia’s Chinatown, a new basketball court for the 76rs threatens to fill the neighborhood with more traffic and raise rents. And across the world in Aleppo, Bashar Al-Assad’s dictatorship has collapsed.
Keep your eyes peeled for next week. Our first issue of 2025 is on its way!
-Alana Pockros
Engagement Editor, The Nation |
