August 24, 2009
Whole Foods Heresy: Squabbling Besets Democrats over Health Care
Campaign & Advocacy
Nothing is uglier than when a family member turns on its own. That's what we’re witnessing with the virulent attacks on and calls for a boycott of Whole Foods, once a card-carrying member of the cultural left and liberal Americans’ favorite supermarket. The heresy: John Mackey, its free thinking founder, broke from liberal orthodoxy by writing an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal questioning the wisdom of a single payer health insurance program.
The missive sent the liberal blogs and pundits into fits, leading to the boycott, first launched on Facebook, that has already signed up tens of thousands of once rabid fans of Whole Foods.
Mackey, who has evolved into a libertarian in recent years, had the audacity to propose an alternative to the Obama plan, which, independent of its virtues, is dead in the water. He’s not an obstructionist; just the opposite. He’s a fervent reformer, which means he wants a practical solution and is not intent on mouthing ideological talking points. In other words, he’s a sober, solution-minded businessperson. Whole Foods offers a unique hybrid health insurance program for its employees that combines elements of traditional and high-deductible health insurance plans with health savings accounts (HSAs). Add in tort reform and a few other adjustments and we have a program that certainly deserves serious discussion.
That is, unless you stand on the far left of the political spectrum, which eats their own when the first signs of rational dissonance appears.
Martha Nichols, a contributing editor of the Women’s Review of Books, and a liberal minded free-thinker (don’t call her a liberal) has her thoughtful take on why Mackey’s independence makes lefties squirm.
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