[Peace] Minutes for July 1, 2007 (Iraq note, and Sicko article)

[Stuart Levy]

On Fri, Jul 06, 2007 at 05:11:11PM -0500, Bob Illyes wrote:
> I shouldn't have offered to take notes, because my old ears are not up to 
> the task.  The following is pretty sketchy. I've included only items for 
> which there was a report or conversation.

Thanks, Bob, for these nice concise minutes.
 
> Minutes for the July 1, 2007 AWARE meeting, which started at 5:10
> 
> Present: Annette, Don, Jessica, Dan, Janet W., Bob I., Bob W., Bob D., 
> Doug, Stuart, Karen (facilitator), Mort, Barbara, Joe
> 
> Main event: short discussion of Carl's brochure. Few had read it before the 
> meeting.
> 
> Farmer's Market: Stuart reported an interesting conversation with a guy who 
> had 3 tours of duty in Iraq. He described extreme disorganization in the 
> military on a day-to-day basis

Minor correction: I spoke with the mother of said guy.  The mother
was briefly visiting C-U from Ohio; the guy himself is still in Iraq, I think.
 
  [...]

> SICKO is highly recommended

Today's commondreams.org includes this article by Michael Moore:
   http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/06/2344/

which begins as follows:

    An employee who works at Capital BlueCross has sent us a confidential memo
    written and circulated by its Vice President of Corporate Communications,
    Barclay Fitzpatrick. His job, it seems, was to go and watch “Sicko,”
    observe the audience’s reaction, and then suggest a plan of action
    for how to deal with the movie.

    The memo, which I am releasing publicly in this email, is a fascinating
    look at how one health care company views “Sicko” — and what it
    fears its larger impact will be on the public. The industry’s only hope,
    the memo seems to indicate, is if the movie “flops.”

    Mr. Fitzpatrick writes: “In typical Moore fashion, Government and
    business leaders are behind a conspiracy to keep the little guy down
    and dominated while getting rich.”

    No. You don’t say! That can’t be!

    BlueCross V.P. Fitzpatrick seems downright depressed about the movie
    he just saw. “You would have to be dead to be unaffected by Moore’s
    movie,” he writes. “Sicko” leaves audiences feeling “ashamed to
    be…a capitalist, and part of a ‘me’ society instead of a ‘we’
    society.”

    He walks out of the theater only to witness an unusual sight: people
    — strangers — mingling and talking to each other. “‘I didn’t
    know they (the insurers) did that!’ was a common exclamation followed
    by a discussion of the example,” according to Fitzpatrick.

No kidding.  It's a fascinating memo, a surprisingly accurate and
even favorable review of the film, followed by thoughts of
how Blue Cross/Blue Shield should respond in order to muddy the waters.
Well worth reading.  BCBSA must be furious.

   Stuart