Freedom Rider: Tauzin Tossed Under the Bus

Margaret Kimberley, BAR editor and senior columnist

17 Feb 2010

by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

When the Obama White House played “Let's Make a Deal” with the drug industry, former Louisiana congressman Billy Tauzin was Big Pharma's chief negotiator. Tuazin blew the whistle on the White House's under-the-table machinations, to the president's great embarrassment. Now Tauzin's out in the cold, and Obama's health care scheme seems sunk, but Big Pharma is awash in profits.

Freedom Rider: Tauzin Tossed Under the Bus

by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

“The pharmaceutical industry wrote into the prescription drug plan that Medicare could not negotiate with drug companies. And you know what, the chairman of the committee who pushed the law through went to work for the pharmaceutical industry making $2 million a year. Imagine that. That’s an example of the same old game playing in Washington. I don’t want to know how to play the game better. I want to put an end to the game playing.” – Candidate Barack Obama

Just how greedy are the nation’s pharmaceutical corporations? The answer is “very.” Like the 800 pound gorilla, big pharma sat any and every where they wanted at the health care reform negotiation table. They made sure they got everything they wanted, a “reform” which insures big profits for them. Months of under the table dealing resulted in nothing more than a plan to mandate health insurance coverage from private corporations. It wasn’t reform for the people of this country, but it certainly was for the drug makers, who were guaranteed millions of new customers. Now this group has forced out its chief lobbyist because they no longer need any deal at all.

The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, (PhRMA), found quite a catch in Billy Tauzin. Tauzin was a congressional Democrat who shrewdly switched sides and became a Republican after the Republicans won control of Congress in the 1994 elections. Tauzin became chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, a position from which he shepherded through the Medicare prescription drug benefit legislation in 2004.

“It wasn’t reform for the people of this country.”

That legislation is best remembered for preventing the government from negotiating prices with the drug companies. Tauzin’s skills did not go unnoticed, and he secured a $2 million per year job as the industry’s chief lobbyist. The corruption was so blatant it inspired the addition of the so-called Tauzin Rule to the House Ethics Code. The rule prevents members from securing employment deals while still on the job.

Of course Tauzin and his bosses at the pharmaceutical companies never really had much to worry about. Obama and the rest of the Democratic Party were already firmly on the side of corporate America. Any anti-Tauzin campaign rhetoric from candidate Obama was meant to get votes and not to promise any change in health care or any other issues for that matter.

Yet the Tauzins of the world don’t get where they are by taking anything for granted. With a Democrat in the White House and Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, the drug companies and their head honcho decided to cut a deal. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus and the White House promised PhRMA there would be no effort to negotiate drug prices or to import cheaper drugs from other countries. PhRMA agreed to give up $80 billion in cost savings over a ten-year period to fund the plan. They also hired AKPD, White House strategist David Axelrod’s old firm, to produce television ads showing PhRMA support for the health care bill.

“Obama and the rest of the Democratic Party were already firmly on the side of corporate America.”

After the dirty deal was agreed upon, a few congressional progressives did manage to add an amendment to the bill which would have allowed Medicare to negotiate drug prices. Tauzin loudly and publicly screamed that he had been robbed. "We were assured . . . . ‘If you come in first, [promising concessions before other health care lobbyists come around] you will have a rock-solid deal.’ Who is ever going to go into a deal with the White House again if they don't keep their word?”

Tauzin’s confession sent the White House into a panic. At first the Obama administration admitted the PhRMA deal, but then backed away from it and from Tauzin.

“Several people involved in the negotiations of the original drug industry deal with the White House said there had been some ambiguity in the original discussions, conducted primarily through the Senate Finance Committee, over whether the overhaul might include the government negotiations of drug prices.”

Tauzin’s glow began to fade. His fate was sealed when the bumbling Democrats couldn’t hold on to the senate seat left vacant by the death of Ted Kennedy. Their 60-seat majority was lost, and now PhRMA knows it doesn’t have to agree to any deal it made with the Obama administration and Tauzin quickly turned to toast. He announced he will retire from his position in June by claiming that he only planned to stay at his very powerful and very lucrative job for five years.

No one is buying that explanation. Obama and the Democrats can’t get their bill passed, and now PhRMA doesn’t need a deal made under the table or on top in the light of day. Their politically cross dressing fixer is no longer needed either. Tauzin’s salary and the $100 million PhRMA spent on pro legislation ads are now seen as a waste of precious profits.

“Now PhRMA doesn’t need a deal made under the table or on top in the light of day.”

They had a good deal, which lowered their costs and promised them new customers who would have to pay for private health insurance. The fact that it was seen as being overly generous is laughable to anyone outside of their industry. But why give an inch when you can get a mile?

The squandered opportunity for true health care reform has never been more obvious than it is now and the lessons of this debacle ought to be clear. Corporate Democrats can’t even deliver on promises made to their corner office overlords. They were ready to sell their voters down the river in order to get buy-in from people who no longer need them. The phony health care reform itself is now a bust. Clearly, the Democrats are not very good at prostituting themselves.

If streetwalkers do a better job at selling themselves than the Democratic Party, perhaps they ought to learn a lesson and stop the illicit activity. Rahm Emanuel and his team aren’t as smart or as shrewd as they are made out to be. They are just crooked yet they can’t even deliver the goods on Capitol Hill or in the voting booth. They and their boss are never to be trusted to act in the interests of the people of this country. Their supposedly brilliant strategies have left us with nothing but the fall of an even bigger crook. The only satisfaction we have is knowing that Billy Tauzin got his comeuppance.

Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgandaReport.com.

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