It seems the man who killed UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson has been arrested. Authorities charged Luigi Mangione with the murder after catching up to him at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania. He had in his possession a gun and silencer, multiple fake IDs, and what many are calling a manifesto.
New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch described it as “a hand-written document that speaks to both his motivation and mindset.” It’s believed he kept it on his person in case he was killed by the feds. This way, we’d all have a good explanation for why he did what he did.
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Well, now a journalist named Ken Klippenstein has published what he claims is the entire manifesto. It has since been corroborated by other reporters who have seen it — remember, multiple outlets quoted it right away.
So… why isn’t the full thing being published by mainstream news outlets? Klippenstein asked The New York Times, CNN, and ABC — they didn’t respond. Hmm. Let’s dive in and find out…
First, it’s hardly a “manifesto.” It’s a quickly written letter, seemingly written just in case, an afterthought. Luigi begins by addressing the agents who would have caught or killed him with some of the how of what he did:
“To the Feds, I’ll keep this short, because I do respect what you do for our country. To save you a lengthy investigation, I state plainly that I wasn’t working with anyone. This was fairly trivial: some elementary social engineering, basic CAD, a lot of patience. The spiral notebook, if present, has some straggling notes and To Do lists that illuminate the gist of it. My tech is pretty locked down because I work in engineering so probably not much info there.”
He moves on to declare his intent:
“I do apologize for any strife of traumas [sic] but it had to be done. Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming.”
Parasites. Plural. That’s interesting. Did he intend to kill again? To hit multiple CEOs? Is that why he didn’t get further away?? Altoona is only about 280 miles from NYC.
In any case, he moved on to describe the why. And this is probably why corporate-owned media outlets aren’t interested in putting it out — because it’s a call to arms. Luigi wrote:
“A reminder: the US has the #1 most expensive healthcare system in the world, yet we rank roughly #42 in life expectancy. United is the [indecipherable] largest company in the US by market cap, behind only Apple, Google, Walmart. It has grown and grown, but as our life expectancy? No the reality is, these [indecipherable] have simply gotten too powerful, and they continue to abuse our country for immense profit because the American public has allowed them to get away with it.”
Whoa.
“Obviously the problem is more complex, but I do not have space, and frankly I do not pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out the full argument. But many have illuminated the corruption and greed (e.g.: Rosenthal, Moore), decades ago and the problems simply remain. It is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play. Evidently I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty.”
We believe he’s referring to Elizabeth Rosenthal‘s book An American Sickness: How Healthcare Became Big Business and How You Can Take It Back. And possibly Michael Moore‘s heartbreaking 2007 documentary Sicko? Both focus on how profits have become the focus of our system of healthcare instead of helping the most people. It’s a system that confounds the rest of the world, but everyone stuck inside it — particularly the generations who have never known anything else — just keep suffering in silence.
It’s a silence clearly most would prefer continue. But even if you can’t condone Luigi’s act of violence, the people are fed up. And they’re not being silent about it anymore.
What do YOU think of this “manifesto”?
[Image via NYPD/Twitter/PA Department of Corrections.]
