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To: Broken_Clock who wrote (241931)	3/23/2010 3:20:25 PM
From: patron_anejo_por_favor	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

Superb piece, puts Kunstler to shame! I love this part: The bill is another example of why change will never come from within the Democratic Party. The party is owned and managed by corporations. The five largest private health insurers and their trade group, America’s Health Insurance Plans, spent more than $6 million on lobbying in the first quarter of 2009. Pfizer, the world’s biggest drug maker, spent more than $9 million during the last quarter of 2008 and the first three months of 2009. The Washington Post reported that up to 30 members of Congress from both parties who hold key committee memberships have major investments in health care companies totaling between $11 million and $27 million. President Barack Obama’s director of health care policy, who will not discuss single payer as an option, has served on the boards of several health care corporations. And as salaries for most Americans have stagnated or declined during the past decade, health insurance profits have risen by 480 percent. ...Obama and the congressional leadership have consciously shut out advocates of single payer from the debate. The press, including papers such as The New York Times, treats single payer as a fringe movement. The television networks rarely mention it. And yet between 45 and 60 percent of doctors favor single payer. Between 40 and 62 percent of the American people, including 80 percent of registered Democrats, want universal, single-payer not-for-profit health care for all Americans. The ability of the corporations to discredit and silence voices that represent at least half of the population is another sad testament to the power of our corporate state to frame all discussions. ... Again with the credits! Stocks going up, corporate heads filling their pockets, pols gorging on backroom baksheesh, the stovepipers in the tank, Big Money controlling the debate ... Earth to Hedges: That's what we're here for! That's the whole point! You're an old Seventies guy, aren't you, Chris? You remember ZZ Top? "Jesus Just Left Chicago"? (If you'll pardon the immodesty.) What do they say? "Taking care of business is his name." They got that right.

To: Broken_Clock who wrote (241931)	3/23/2010 3:42:31 PM
From: No Mo Mo	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 306849

The bill is another example of why change will never come from within the Democratic Party. The party is owned and managed by corporations. The five largest private health insurers and their trade group, America’s Health Insurance Plans, spent more than $6 million on lobbying in the first quarter of 2009. Pfizer, the world’s biggest drug maker, spent more than $9 million during the last quarter of 2008 and the first three months of 2009. The Washington Post reported that up to 30 members of Congress from both parties who hold key committee memberships have major investments in health care companies totaling between $11 million and $27 million. President Barack Obama’s director of health care policy, who will not discuss single payer as an option, has served on the boards of several health care corporations. And as salaries for most Americans have stagnated or declined during the past decade, health insurance profits have risen by 480 percent. Barring the cyber-forum here on SI, I'm way more cynical about Washington than anyone I know. But with stakes that are supposedly so critical, these lobbying numbers don't make much sense. Pfizer alone spends 1,000 times the above amount on R&D every year. It reminds me of the disconnect I felt when everyone was up in arms about Dodd selling out the entire US piggy bank to Mozillo and the rest of the mortgage industry for a discounted mortgage. Drug Industry Daily July 23, 2009 \| Vol. 8 No. 142 Pfizer, Wyeth Combined R&D Spending to Shrink After Merger Pfizer and Wyeth expect to spend less on R&D after their planned merger than their $11 billion combined R&D costs last year. fdanews.com R&D Spending: Numbers for Pfizer, J&J, Merck, Lilly and Bristol Pharmaceutical LabU.S. investment in R&D fell slightly this year, and is expected to start growing again next year, according to a new report out from the Battelle Memorial Institute, a nonprofit group that looks at that sort of thing. A story in this morning’s WSJ has more on the issue; Health Blog readers may be particularly interested in some numbers from the report on R&D spending at big U.S. drug companies. Of course, company-by-company figures like these don’t tell the whole story, in part because of the effects of consolidation. For example, Pfizer’s R&D spending may climb next year because of the Wyeth acquisition, but continuing cuts could mean the company’s R&D spending is lower than this year’s combined R&D spending for Pfizer and Wyeth. Nevertheless, a numbers dump can still be interesting. Here it is: R&D Spending, in millions of dollars Company Q1-Q3, ‘08 Q1-Q3, ‘09 Change Pfizer $5,642 $5,032 -10.8% J&J $5,469 $4,773 -12.7% Merck $3,419 $3,874 13.3% Eli Lilly $2,782 $3,110 11.8% Bristol-Myers Squibb $2,442 $2,590 6.1 Photo: Associated Press blogs.wsj.com