[tewall]

You have a strong enough hand to re-raise pre-flop. AAxx is very strong pre-flop, but many flops can miss it, so you'd like to eliminate people pre-flop if you could.

On the flop I'd have re-raised all-in. The flop hit you pretty hard and the raise might have won the pot without a fight. If you got called, there's a good chance it would have been by just one player, and you would likely have many outs against that player. Combining the equity of someone folding and having to cards to hit your hand, your hand is easily strong enough to go all in. What you don't want to have happen is get stuck half-way by calling and then get put all-in on the turn (which is exactly what happened).

You want to be careful calling with draws. In big-bet poker you generally want to take the intiative with them or get out. Calling is often the worst of 3 alternatives.