I’m sure you’ve heard that some Southern congressman actually heckled the President of the United States on the floor of the House of Representatives tonight. But the culture of hatred goes much deeper than that, and directly impacts what our President was speaking about.
A friend of mine is a longtime member of a service organization that you’ll generally see on a sign at the city limits of nearly every town in America.
Welcome to Hatetown
Recently, while working on the insurance rider for a charitable event, officers of that organization received the following email from a Vice President of their insurance company, from his office in Bloomington, Indiana, on — as you will see — the company account.
The company? The Hyland Group, which is a diversified insurance company that also includes health insurance. According to the Huffington Post, the officers of that company gave almost exclusively to Republicans in the last presidential campaign, with the exception of one broker who gave $2,300 to Hillary Clinton.
My family has very old roots in Indiana. We were in the territory by at least 1810, when my great-great-great Grandfather Williams was born near what is now the Ohio border (OK, we were there BEFORE there was an Indiana). My great great Grandfather served the Union in the Civil War, and fought under General Thomas at Chickamauga, and was one of the troops that saved the entire Army of the Cumberland, and earned Thomas the nickname “Rock of Chickamauga.” He was disabled for life because of that war. My great grandfather (whose name I bear, as IV) planted an orchard on the Michigan border, which is still there, and still in my family. So this kind of pernicious racism coming from Indiana is EXTREMELY disturbing to me personally.
In that context, I present the letter IN FULL, with recipients’ information removed to protect their privacy, and the privacy and integrity of the service organization (in whose youth auxiliary I was a member in high school).
NOTE: I have resized the images to fit your browser. Click on “view image” to view full size images, unretouched and unaltered in any way.
—– Original Message —–
From: Denny Flahault
To: ***
Sent: September 01, 2009
Subject: FW: more 4 the rightYou’ll love these. See below.
Denny
Denton K. Flahault, AAI, CIC, CPIA
Vice President
Hylant Group Of Bloomington
100 South College Avenue, Suite 230
P.0. Box 1337
Bloomington, IN. 47402-1337
Voice: (812) 339-1980
Toll Free: (800) 876-0361
Fax: (812) 333-3068
Mobile: (812) 322-5655 or (812) 202-1252
Email: D enny .Flahault@Hylant.com
And that’s it. Concluding with the President of the United States as a Muslim, pissing on Missouri. (I wonder what Denny has against Missouri?)
According to my source: “when **** objected, Denny did not apologize for what he sent, only that **** was offended by it.”
Now, the normal journalistic song and dance would be for me to call the corporate office, email them this, and ask for comment.
But we already know what that answer will be, no matter WHAT the truth actually is. Hylant Group are big boys and girls, and can defend themselves.
[And the corporate lawyers will vet it, come up with a lawyerly response (bear in mind that in the Say-owth, "lawyer" is pronounced "liar") and Hylant Insurance group would reply that this isn't their corporate policy, that Denton K. Flahault, AAI, CIC, CPIA, Vice President, Hylant Group Of Bloomington shouldn't have sent this out on corporate letterhead, and proper "disciplinary" actions would be taken. etc. etc. etc.]
And we won’t know a damned thing more than we already do.
Therefore, I will dispense with that portion of the song-and-dance. Hylant will undoubtedly issue that statement, all right, but not in this posting. Here, we will stick with the truth.
Now, what is Hylant’s “official” position on health care? That might shed some light. Well, checking the website that Mr. Flahault lists gets “can’t find server” until you add the WWW to the link: http://www.hylant.com
Then, after confirming that there IS a Bloomington office (more on that later), we find this on the rather prominently placed HealthCare page:
Our Position
Hylant Group believes in responsible health care reform that addresses three key areas: reducing costs, increasing access and increasing quality. We do not believe a public health option run by the government will successfully address these issues. As the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) states, Congress should not erode what works to fix what is broken.What You Can Do
Have your voice heard. Have your voice heard. [sic] Write to your members of Congress – let them know your perspective on health care reform and whether you feel a public health plan is the answer. If you agree with our position, you can download a sample letter, below.Members of the House and Senate are expected to begin voting on health care reform bills as early as September. Now is the time for our community to engage and share opinions on this important topic.
To find the name of your representative and senators and their fax numbers, click on the following links:
- Click here for a list of senators by state.
- Click here or a list of representatives by state.
- For help finding your representative, click here and enter your zip code in the top left search field
When writing to a member of Congress, please list their address as follows:
Senate:
Honorable (insert name)
The United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510House of Representatives:
Honorable (insert name)
The United States House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515To download a copy of our sample letter in Microsoft Word format, please click here.
And here is the text of that letter:
DATE
The Honorable _____
The United States Senate / House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20510 / 20515Dear _____:
As you consider comprehensive health care reform legislation, I urge you to oppose any efforts to create a public health insurance program that undermines the employer-provided system. As an employer, I am proud to offer my employees quality health insurance through a private system that helps my company attract and retain a quality and competitive workforce. I believe your reform efforts ought to focus on reducing costs, and fear that a public health insurance plan would increase costs for my company and employees, and result in a struggle to continue providing coverage.
The option of creating a public health program has appealed to some as a means to control costs and increase quality, but evidence demonstrates that the practical impact of a public health insurance program results in higher costs for individuals remaining in the private system. The result of the Medicare and Medicaid payment system, which a public plan is suggested to be modeled after, demonstrates that artificially regulated payments do not cover the cost of delivering care, and providers increase charges on private insurers to cover the difference. The end result is a higher premium for my company’s group plan, in an economic climate in which we already struggle.
I support your efforts to decrease costs, increase access and increase quality in the health care system. I also strongly believe that creating a public insurance program is a counterproductive strategy to achieving your goals. Please contact me if you have any questions or would like to further discuss my concerns.
Sincerely,
YOUR COMPANY NAME
YOUR NAME
YOUR TITLE
All right. Now I am enough of a journalist to contact the service organization in question. I spoke to an officer, who was unwilling to go on the record regarding the email, but confirmed that he had seen it.
Hylant Group, Bloomington, Indiana Office
And, I contacted the Hylant Group’s Bloomington office to verify that our hate emailer works there. Here is the very interesting email exchange from this morning:
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hide details 10:46 AM (1 hour ago)
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To Whom It May Concern:
Does Denny Flahault work at this office?
–
Bests,
Hart Williams
To which I received this reply:
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hide details 11:20 AM (50 minutes ago)
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Yes! I have included Mr.. [sic] Flahault on this reply so that he can respond as well.
To which I replied, (and this is where the fun begins):
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hide details 11:32 AM (41 minutes ago)
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Dear Ms. James:
Thank you very much for your prompt reply.
–
Bests,
Hart Williams
Which drew this reply (because, evidently, Mr. Flahault doesn’t know the difference between “reply” and “reply all” — the original reason that the hate email went to multiple service organization officers):
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hide details 11:34 AM (41 minutes ago)
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Still wonder who this guy is and what he wants. I’ll just wait and see a a bomb arrives. If the package doesn’t look like wine or come from a winery, don’t accept it or open it!!Denny
Denton K. Flahault, AAI, CIC, CPIA
Vice President
Hylant Group Of Bloomington100 South College Avenue, Suite 230
P.0. Box 1337
Bloomington, IN. 47402-1337
Voice: (812) 339-1980
Toll Free: (800) 876-0361
Fax: (812) 333-3068
Mobile: (812) 322-5655 or (812) 202-1252
Email: Denny.Flahault@Hylant.com
Notice that his email signature is EXACTLY the same as the signature on the hate mail above.
So, you tell me, is this the Hylant corporate culture, or is it just one seemingly paranoid, hate-filled corporate Vice President in Indiana?
One who thinks that emailing this stuff around to clients is “funny”? Or, in his words:
You’ll love these. See below.
There has been a long-running debate as to whether racism is at the root of this viciousness from the right. But it’s always hidden in codes. Mr. Hylant seems to have inadvertently let slip the mask, and, while he is certainly guilty of indiscretion on a monumental scale: is this the tip of an iceberg within the insurance industry that paints our first Black president in the ugliest terms possible?
We have blasphemy, painting Obama as Hitler, pissing on America (literally); we have communist, Muslim, socialist, failure, stupid … and the beat goes on.
Mr. Vice President of a Health Insurance provider seems to be grasping for a concept or a word. What word could that be, do you suppose?
To save you time in future, Mr. Hylant Group Vice President, the word you seem to be grasping for with your “humor” is spelled n-i-g-g-e-r, which is as offensive now as it was when then-Senator William Seward of New York said this to Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois:
– Thesaurus of Anecdotes, By Edmund Fuller,
Crown Publishers, New York, p. 77
Courage.
—————————-
NOTE: Mr Williams’ investigative reporting is currently being referenced by The Economist, “Rootless Cosmopolitans,” from his Friday report “MSNBC Misses the Astroturf in its own Building.” In 2006, he “outed” the Howard Rich gang’s multi-state initiative scheme.
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I’ve written the Hylant Group board a polite email reminding them that the large majority of their insureds voted for Obama.
Thank you. Please let us know what their reply, if any, is.
You should be aware, though, that Hyland’s health insurance seems to be specialized in selling group coverage to employers, so while their “bottom line” may be the employees, their “constituency” is the employers.
I wrote the group with CC to Denny Flahault. I told them that
employers who buy their health groups coverage represent their constituency and that many of them voted for Obama. I also expressed my outrage and that this racist hate mail was being ditrisbuted hoping that the media will cover. I asked what they plan to do re: the matter.
Thank you Monique. Please let us all know what their reply is. (If any.)
I am reliably informed that this article has been circulating through the leadership of the service organization in question. Certainly to the top officers and board members.