Bruce Hetrick | Tell Hetrick

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Does your private club need a license to kill?

Published

on November 9, 2009

. 2 Comments

Some of the loudest complaints about smokefree-workplace laws involve private clubs, especially those affiliated with military veterans.

“We went to war and fought for our freedom,” the argument goes, “so government shouldn’t take away that freedom by telling us we can’t smoke.”

This manifested itself last week when Marine Corps veteran and Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard told WRTV News, “I’m never going to tell an Iwo Jima vet that he can’t smoke in the VFW. You can take that for what it’s worth.”

If news accounts are correct, it apparently was worth a threatened veto of a comprehensive smokefree-workplace ordinance for our city. Subsequently, the City-County Council tabled the proposal.

But is it freedom-enhancing to defend a veteran’s “right” to commit slow-motion suicide and homicide?

In his 2006 acceptance speech, then-VFW Commander-in-Chief Gary Kurpius argued that VFW posts need to make significant changes—including going smokefree—to remain relevant to current and future generations of veterans.

“Membership drives everything we do, but we won’t get a new generation—or even the older generation—to join us if we don’t recognize and adapt to the changing world,” Kurpius said. “There has to be something more attractive about the VFW than just the bar.”

He called on member posts to create family-friendly services, such as childcare facilities and health clubs.

“But I guarantee you,” Kurpius said, “that no one will want to join a VFW health club, or bring their children to a VFW daycare center … as long as smoking is still permitted indoors.

“We are a democratic organization that is letting 20 percent of the population tell us that the post will fail if people can’t smoke inside. That’s bunk.

“I know many VFW members and spouses who will not attend post meetings or events because of the smoke. I have read many articles about the VFW being the last building in town where indoor smoking is still permitted—and some members quoted in the newspaper are celebrating as if they just won a great battle against government and social interference.

“Comrades, that is not a victory; it is a sad commentary that unfortunately paints all of us with the same brush.”

I’m not a military man (they didn’t want me), but I’m the son of one and the brother of two others.

So I know the VFW’s mission is to “honor the dead by helping the living.” Well, you don’t honor anyone by helping veterans kill themselves and everyone around them with tobacco smoke.

I also know the Marine Corps motto is Semper Fidelis or “always faithful”—to the mission at hand, to each other, to the Corps and to the country, no matter what. The Marine Corps Web site also says “Respect for others is essential” and “Marines are expected to act responsibly in a manner befitting the title they’ve earned.”

Even if you’re faithful to your fellow Marine’s nicotine addiction, what’s respectful or responsible about poisoning the air at the VFW post, American Legion hall (or local tavern) for the bartenders, servers, janitors, caterers, delivery people, sales reps and others who work there—or the guests who visit? Is that really something the few and the proud would do?

If that weren’t cause enough, perhaps our veterans should set a healthy example for today’s troops.

A report released in June by the Institute of Medicine—an independent, nonprofit organization that works outside of government to provide unbiased and authoritative advice to decision-makers and the public—concluded that the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs and Congress “should take stronger steps toward eliminating tobacco use.”

“Because tobacco use impairs military readiness, harms the health of soldiers and veterans, and imposes a substantial financial burden on the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, these agencies should implement a comprehensive strategy to achieve the Defense Department’s stated goal of a tobacco-free military,” said the report.

Toward the same tobacco-free end, the military last month announced that it would ban smoking from Robert E. Bush Naval Hospital at the Marine Corps Ground Combat Center at Twentynine Palms, California—and at the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center in Bridgeport, Calif., and at the Naval Air Weapons Station at China Lake, Calif.

Martha Hunt, Bush Naval Hospital’s health promotions and awareness coordinator, said, “Tobacco use is the leading cause of death and disability in the United States … It is also one of the leading detractors from combat readiness, impacting the healing of injuries, heat stroke, night blindness, [Post Traumatic Stress Disorder], and others.”

All of which begs a question for our elected officials contemplating smokefree workplace laws: Did our troops really fight and die for our country so our veterans could sicken and kill themselves and innocent bystanders here at home?

If so, it’s a sad new definition of “friendly fire.”

A sign of censorship

Published

Bruce Hetrick

on November 4, 2009

in Healthcare and Politics

. 13 Comments

Back in September, my wife Cheri and I walked to breakfast at a downtown restaurant. On our way home, we happened upon the about-to-begin Labor Day parade. Some of the organizers were handing out yard signs that said “Health Insurance Reform Now.” Cheri requested one from a volunteer and put it up in our front yard. As CEO of an organization with nearly all women employees and, therefore, with very expensive insurance, health reform is very important to Cheri.

A few weeks, later, we received a letter in the mail from the company that manages our neighborhood association. The letter was copied to all the members of our neighborhood association. It asked us to remove the sign. It said the only signs allowed in our neighborhood are real estate signs.

During last fall’s election, we had signs in our yard for political candidates. No one complained. But somehow, health insurance reform struck a nerve that neither Republican nor Democrat candidates could match. I also found no reference to signs in my copy of our neighborhood covenants. Nonetheless, out of respect for the offended party or parties, I removed the sign.

Should I have done so? In a nation with guaranteed rights to free speech, should any of us be limited in what we can and can’t advocate on our own property? If so, what’s out of bounds and why?

My Washington day in the war for health reform

Published

Bruce Hetrick

on October 26, 2009

in Healthcare and Politics

. 6 Comments

I awoke long before the alarm sounded Tuesday. It’s not every day one testifies before Congress, so I was eager and anxious.

When the waking hour arrived, I showered, donned a suit and grabbed my briefcase. My son Zach drove me to the airport for my flight to Washington.

Call me sentimental. Brand me patriotic. But I still get goose bumps in Our Nation’s Capitol. Despite cynicism about government and its ability to serve, I’m moved by Washington’s monuments and memorials, by words of wisdom and names of heroes carved in stone.

When my plane landed, I hopped on the Metro and disembarked at Smithsonian Station. On a beautiful fall day with a few hours to spare before I had to be on Capitol Hill, I wanted to walk the Mall and put my cause in context.

I headed first toward the World War II Memorial, one I’d not seen. I walked through tributes to the Atlantic and Pacific theaters. I found the Indiana column with its massive wreath. I read quotations from presidents and generals, admirals and authors—words about citizens who sacrificed selflessly—and as one—for the benefit of all.

The memorial’s announcement stone says: “Here in the presence of Washington and Lincoln, one the eighteenth century father and the other the nineteenth century preserver of our nation, we honor those twentieth century Americans who took up the struggle during the second world war and made the sacrifices to perpetuate the gift our forefathers entrusted to us, a nation conceived in liberty and justice.”

I wondered whether, in today’s divisive America, we could unite behind any struggle or even agree on what gift our forefathers entrusted to us.

A quote from Women’s Army Corps Commanding Officer Colonel Oveta Culp Hobby says, “Women who stepped up were measured as citizens of the nation, not as women … this was a people’s war and everyone was in it.”

I wondered what, if any, people’s war—defense against terrorism, teaching children, fighting poverty, saving lives, enhancing health—would get everyone “in it” today?

In a tribute to the Battle of Midway, author Walter Lord is quoted as saying: “Even against the greatest of odds, there is something in the human spirit—a magic blend of skill, faith and valor—that can lift men from certain defeat to incredible victory.”

As I headed toward Capitol Hill to discuss small-business health insurance costs, I wondered whether—after health-reform defeats dating back to Theodore Roosevelt—the skill, faith and valor of the human spirit will finally bring relief to human health and lives.

Inside the stately hearing room, I sat at a table with two other small business owners and a public-policy expert. In the tiers of seats before us sat nearly a dozen members of Congress—the Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.

As chairman Bart Stupak of Michigan had us stand, raise our right hands and swear to tell the truth, it felt like “Judgment at Nurembuerg”—or at least the Watergate hearings of my youth. But no individual was on trial here—just our nation’s health system and the potential remedies for reforming it.

After each representative made an opening statement—some in sharp disagreement with one another—we witnesses got our moment in the spotlight.

Norman Michael Landauer, who owns a muffler shop in Davenport, Iowa, talked of crippling price increases for health insurance due in large measure to his own medical condition. Next year, he’s pulling himself off the company policy to better control costs for his employees. Because he won’t be able to get insurance elsewhere, he fears that if his health gets worse, he’ll have to sell his business to pay his doctors.

Fred Walker, who owns a glass and mirror company in St. Petersburg, Fla., said that a business downturn had forced him to consider dropping his firm’s health coverage. When he notified his employees, his secretary raced out and got the breast exam she’d been putting off. She had cancer. The broker providing quotes on individual policies said no one would cover her until she’d been cancer-free for 10 years. So Mr. Walker retained his company policy, even though the cost makes his firm’s financial condition even worse.

I explained how our firm’s rates jumped 28 percent in one year largely because of one employee’s illness. But when that employee died prior to the policy renewal date, the price increase dropped to 10 percent. I addressed the need for larger risk pools, more competitive coverage and fairer tax policies.

Because health problems occur one person at a time, they don’t seem as urgent as world wars. But the impact on our lives, health and futures is no less harmful. I don’t envy the House, Senate or White House the difficult decisions they must make. I do know that our nation’s health is a people’s war and—like it or not—everyone is in it.