Gleeful about the potential for the Affordable Care Act to be rendered unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, insurers are trying to put their best foot forward (of course, spending lots of your premium dollars on jazzy marketing) and frame themselves as being on the side of Americans, and not, as we know from Wendell Potter that they really are, on the side of their Wall Street overlords.
One of the individuals that is taking this new big-profit insurance effort to heart is Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini. He's now one of the few CEOs actively engaging with 'customers' (it pains me to write 'customer' next to anything related to a human need such as health care) on Twitter.
Aetna, of course, is far from an exemplarly corporate citizen -- in its history it has supported slavery, rescinded the policies of thousands of individuals, and denied the claims of countless more.
Why, then, don't we reach out -- in a very respectful and professional manner so as not to discredit our movement -- to Mark with some ideas and arguments regarding single payer health care?
His Twitter handle is:
@mtbert
.
And we would probably be wellserved by tweeting to:
@aetna and @cigna as well.
Again, folks, let's keep it civil, but there's no need for insurance companies to 'win' the public relations battle by
sugar coating the immoral and unethical business that they engage in on a daily basis.
Suggested hashtags are:
#singlepayer #p2 #hcr #aca #obamacare and #publicoption. It would be best, though, to make #singlepayer a daily trend on Twitter -- that would generate media attention.
If Mark is serious about showing
his commitment via Twitterto 'make health care reform real and tangible for people', then he should be happy to engage in #singlepayer dialogue.
This is something that Mark, if his WSJ interview is to be believed, is asking us to do:
I have to be willing to interact when things are difficult. We’ve got to a point where people [on Twitter] are saying ‘I need this done,’ or ‘this is happening to me,’ and I get them to the right people.