From Boston.com:
MONTPELIER, Vt.—The retiring head of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Vermont got a $7.2 million payout when he left.
President and CEO William Milnes, Jr., who retired last year, got the money as part of a retirement payment and salary package when he left Blue Cross after 10 years.
Paulette Thabault, commissioner of the Vermont Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration, tells the Barre Montpelier Times Argus her agency is looking into the payout, since it's so big for a not-for-profit to give.
The payout was first reported by Seven Days, a weekly newspaper in Burlington.
For more info check out the article :
http://www.boston.com/news/local/vermont/articles/2009/03/26/report_retiring_blue_cross_exec_got_72_million/
In doing a little bit of research on Mr Milnes I dug up a fax he received from PETA, the People for the Ethical Treatmentfor Animals. You know the REAL ethical people who were caught throwing dead dogs in dumpsters:
http://www.thisistrue.com/peta.html
Anyhow, check out this .pdf in which Mr Milnes was requested to give vegetarians discounted health care on the backs of evil meat-eaters:
http://blog.peta.org/archives/Letter%20to%20Blue%20Cross%20Vermont.pdf
When are Vermonters going to wake up? When are we going to have an in-state media that reports what's going on up in Montpelier? The government forces out all but two medical insurers, and they, like a classic oligopoly, raise the rates through the roof.
"Under Bill's leadership Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Vermont has grown, strengthened and improved in all areas," said Guy Boyer, chairman of the BCBSVT Board of Directors. No shit! They did it on our backs! With, of course, a lot of help from the lobbyists and their allies in the legislature.
I'll tell you, old Ike tried to warn us about the danger of the military-industrial complex... you know what's a greater danger, at least here in Vermont? The medical-academic complex. Insurance companies and the teacher's unions are destroying this state while the people smile and continue to elect the politicians that make it possible.
