Munich Re is an insurance and reinsurance colossus. A part of its business is selling coverage for oil tankers ferrying petroleum in and out of Iran. An article by Benjamin Weinthal, an American journalist working out of Berlin, was posted in Slate on Friday. It recommended six measures that President Obama could take to influence Iran 1. from continuing its frantic quest for nukes and 2. stopping its rulers' war against the Persian people. Munich Re is a vulnerable target of American policy if only American policy makers would make it so.
But Munich Re also owns Munich Re America which happens to be in the health insurance business. It would be a travesty if in the administration's overhaul of the structure of the American health industry it would permit Munich Re America to (continue to) feed from the fresh new trough now being erected for medical. Either we are setting up a serious sanctions regime or we are not.