Ten years after President Bill Clinton first proposed expanding Medicare coverage to include prescription drugs, the lobbying on the issue has fundamentally changed, lobbyists on all sides of the issue say. For 10 years, major pharmaceutical companies stymied drug legislation. Insurance companies often stood in the way, while senior advocates such as AARP simply pleaded with Congress to act.
This time, competing interest groups realize, Congress is serious.
The well-financed, increasingly powerful pharmaceuticals lobby has made perhaps the most dramatic shift in position -- from outright opposition to cautious support. With Republicans in control of the White House, House and Senate, the industry has decided this is the time to lock in the best deal it can get, one GOP pharmaceutical lobbyist said.
Although the prescription drug coverage may prove too skimpy for many seniors, legislation will at least take the pressure off Congress temporarily to impose more draconian price controls, the lobbyist said.
Feed big pharma, get the voters off their backs, put the whole thing on federal plastic because of the tax cut for the rich, and get out of Dodge before the bills come due. Does that sum up Thug policy on this?
aWol steals the Dems clothes on this one, and triangulates against his paleo ("government shouldn't help people") base. It's positively Clintonian! I could come to love aWol, if only I didn't know who--and what--he is.