When I worked in Washington, the biggest lobby - after Big Oil, and the big military contractors - was the big pharmaceutical companies - Big Pharma. Early in the Bush administration Big Pharma pushed the new Medicare drug benefit through Congress, releasing a $600 billion dollar gusher in their direction. The bill included a guarantee that Medicare wouldn't use its huge bargaining leverage to negotiate lower prices with the drug companies - an extra bonus. If this isn't corporate welfare, I don't know what is.
Nancy Pelosi has announced that one of the Dems first priorities ("first hundred hours") would be to end this ban and have Medicare use its bargaining clout to get lower drug prices for seniors. But Big Pharma is already on the attack. Read on...
By Nicole Belle
— December 3, 2006
