Before CT Governor Dannel Malloy (D-Aetna) capitulated to the wine-in-hot-tub-drinking CEO of Aetna, the state of Connecticut was on track to implement a first-in-the-nation public option called SustiNet. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, please click the preceding link. This really was an ingenious, consumer-centered and business-friendly public option.)
Click here, here or here to see -- in the course of just three weeks -- how Malloy chose to cynically (in an incredibly transparent and appalling manner) disregard the law of the land in CT at the behest of the big-profit insurance company bloodsuckers in Hartford.
Upset? Ready to throw in the towel? Well, the Universal Health Care Foundation of CT is fighting back on Wednesday, and they need your help.
A little background: two years ago the SustiNet public option campaign was launched at Hartford's downtown Amtrak station.
So, it's appropriate that the following rally will take place there this Wednesday, April 27th at 6 PM:
What: Rally in Support of SustiNet
Where: Great Hall at Union Station in Hartford, followed by a march to the Capitol and rally on the North steps. Supporters are expected to ring the Capitol.
When: Wednesday, April 27 at 6 p.m.
The event is expected to draw 1,000 supporters to Hartford’s Union Station as they ask Governor Dannel Malloy and legislative leaders to Get on Board for SustiNet.
Expected speakers include:
-- Juan A. Figueroa, President, Universal Health Care Foundation of Connecticut
-- Christopher Donovan, Speaker of the House, Connecticut House of Representatives
-- Don Williams, President Pro Tempore, Connecticut Senate
Wendell Potter told us we would need to fight back hard against the big-profit insurers -- so let's make him proud!
Let's make Madison look like nothing! It's time to tell Aetna and CIGNA in their own Hartford backyard that we will not be silenced by their condescending lobbyists who claim we are naive idealists:
Keith Stover, a lobbyist for the Connecticut Association of Health Plans, said the SustiNet agreement rightly focuses the state on meeting the requirements of federal health reform.
"I think the focus right now is precisely where it should be, and that is on implementation of federal reform and the creation of a robust, progressive exchange," he said. "I think, quite frankly, continuing to have wishful, hopeful feelings about the public option really saps energy and resources from the main goal, and that is to get people insured."
It's our job to show "Keith" that we are not wishing for a public option, but that we are demanding a public option, and we will not rest until the citizens of CT are emancipated from the bloodsucking profiteers in Hartford's most luxurious office buildings.
I'll say it again: we need the spirit of Madison in Hartford on Wednesday night. Are you ready?
Again, this is why we rally, this is why we fight: