The sellout prez
Lobby E-Mails Show Depth of Obama Ties to Drug Industry
By PETER BAKER, NYT
WASHINGTON — After weeks of quiet talks, drug industry lobbyists were growing nervous. If they were to cut a deal with the White House on overhauling health care, they needed to be sure President Obama would stop a proposal by his liberal allies intended to bring down medicine prices.
On June 3, 2009, one of the lobbyists e-mailed Nancy-Ann DeParle, the president’s top health care adviser. Ms. DeParle sent a message back reassuring the lobbyist. Although Mr. Obama was overseas, she wrote, she and other top officials had “made decision, based on how constructive you guys have been, to oppose importation on the bill.”
Just like that, Mr. Obama’s staff abandoned his support for the reimportation of prescription medicines at lower prices and with it solidified a growing compact with an industry he had vilified on the campaign trail the year before. Central to Mr. Obama’s drive to overhaul the nation’s health care system was an unlikely collaboration with the pharmaceutical industry that forced unappealing trade-offs.
The e-mail exchange that day three years ago was among a cache of messages obtained from the industry and released in recent weeks by House Republicans — including a new batch put out on Friday morning detailing the industry’s advertising campaign in favor of Mr. Obama’s proposal. The broad contours of the president’s dealings with the drug industry were known in 2009 but the newly public e-mails open a window into the compromises underlying a health care overhaul now awaiting the judgment of the Supreme Court.
(More here.)
By PETER BAKER, NYT
WASHINGTON — After weeks of quiet talks, drug industry lobbyists were growing nervous. If they were to cut a deal with the White House on overhauling health care, they needed to be sure President Obama would stop a proposal by his liberal allies intended to bring down medicine prices.
On June 3, 2009, one of the lobbyists e-mailed Nancy-Ann DeParle, the president’s top health care adviser. Ms. DeParle sent a message back reassuring the lobbyist. Although Mr. Obama was overseas, she wrote, she and other top officials had “made decision, based on how constructive you guys have been, to oppose importation on the bill.”
Just like that, Mr. Obama’s staff abandoned his support for the reimportation of prescription medicines at lower prices and with it solidified a growing compact with an industry he had vilified on the campaign trail the year before. Central to Mr. Obama’s drive to overhaul the nation’s health care system was an unlikely collaboration with the pharmaceutical industry that forced unappealing trade-offs.
The e-mail exchange that day three years ago was among a cache of messages obtained from the industry and released in recent weeks by House Republicans — including a new batch put out on Friday morning detailing the industry’s advertising campaign in favor of Mr. Obama’s proposal. The broad contours of the president’s dealings with the drug industry were known in 2009 but the newly public e-mails open a window into the compromises underlying a health care overhaul now awaiting the judgment of the Supreme Court.
(More here.)
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