Check this out. It's a video at My Left Nutmeg, showing a man clearly affiliated with the insurance company Anthem, protesting health care reform at the meeting held yesterday by Democratic Congressman Chris Murphy.
The audaciousness is pretty breathtaking, wouldn't you say?
Update: Thanks to ctblogger at My Left Nutmeg for capturing the footage.
In case you can't view the video, the man in question is wearing a polo shirt with an Anthem logo on the sleeve. He's holding up a sign that reads, "We Don't Want Gov't Run Healthcare," and you can hear him telling the woman next to him:
"Just a little handmade sign, nothing sponsored by anybody."
Nothing sponsored by anybody? That wouldn't be the same company that made close to $2.5 billion in net income last year?
The good news is: If the opposition isn't smart enough to leave their insurance company gear at home, we're in good shape.
The bad news: This is the same company, a division of the insurance giant Wellpoint, that recently announced its proposal to raise rates on the self-insured in CT by up to 32%. They're gouging small business and the self-employed in the state, and think they can continue to get away with it. We can't let them.
From the Hartford Courant a few weeks back:
Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Connecticut, which covers nearly one in three state residents, on Monday proposed raising some health insurance policy rates by as much as 32 percent.
Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and a legal representative of the state's Heathcare Advocate office both argued against the proposal during a daylong hearing before the state Department of Insurance.
Blumenthal called Anthem's request "a rate increase that will be catastrophic, not only for our consumers but for our economy."
Anthem asked the Insurance Department for permission to raise rates by 20 to 32 percent -- averaging 23.4 percent -- beginning Oct. 1.