I received a response to my complaint:
Good Afternoon,
We appreciate that as a frequent traveler you have found the current reward structure valuable. We continuously evaluate our reward offers and use member feedback such as yours to identify ways to make them more useful for our members.
Last fall we offered a special promotion to our members, allowing them to redeem e-Rewards currency for AAdvantage bonus miles without the flight requirement. We received a lot of positive feedback from this promotion, and still receive e-mail from our members asking when we plan to remove the flight requirement again. It is largely in response to this feedback that we have changed the American Airlines rewards.
We empathize with your position, and understand how, as a frequent traveler, you would feel that the value of the American Airlines rewards has been diminished. However, for a great deal of our members this change is an improvement. We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this change may cause. We hope that you might take this opportunity to consider redeeming your e-Rewards currency for rewards from our other program sponsors and partners, in addition to claiming the AAdvantage bonus miles.
Sincerely,
Corie Marsh