{"id":1731,"date":"2009-08-18T09:40:28","date_gmt":"2009-08-18T16:40:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp\/2009\/08\/greg_palast_says_it_so_well\/"},"modified":"2009-08-18T09:40:28","modified_gmt":"2009-08-18T16:40:28","slug":"greg_palast_says_it_so_well","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2009\/08\/greg_palast_says_it_so_well.html","title":{"rendered":"Greg Palast Says It So Well"},"content":{"rendered":"

$80 billion of WHAT?<\/a><\/p>\n


\nBackground:<\/p>\n

On June 22, President Obama said he’d reached agreement with big drug companies to cut the price of medicine by $80 billion. He extended his gratitude to Big Pharma for the deal that would, “reduce the punishing inflation in health care costs.” <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Comparison:<\/p>\n

For perspective: Imagine you are in a Wal-Mart and there’s a sign over a flat screen TV, “BIG SAVINGS!” So, you break every promise you made never to buy from that union-busting big box — and snatch up the $500 television. And when you’re caught by your spouse, you say, “But, honey, look at the deal I got! It was TWO-PERCENT OFF! I saved us $10!”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Explanation:<\/p>\n

The Big Pharma kingpins did not actually agree to cut their prices. Their promise with Obama is something a little oilier: they apparently promised that, over ten years, they will reduce the amount at which they would otherwise raise drug prices. Got that? In other words, the Obama deal locks in a doubling of drug costs, projected to rise over the period of “savings” from a quarter trillion dollars a year to half a trillion dollars a year. Minus that 2%.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Conclusion:<\/p>\n

What did that cost us? The New England Journal of Medicine<\/em> notes that 13 European nations successfully regulate the price of drugs, reducing the average cost of name-brand prescription medicines by 35% to 55%. Obama gave that up for his 2%<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First kicker:<\/p>\n

What else went down in Obama’s drug deal? To find out, I called C-SPAN to get a copy of the videotape of the meeting with the drug companies. I was surprised to find they didn’t have such a tape despite the President’s campaign promise, right there on CNN in January 2008<\/a>, “These negotiations will be on C-SPAN.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Second kicker:<\/p>\n

When Dick Cheney was caught having secret meetings with oil companies to discuss Bush’s Energy Bill, we denounced the hugger-muggers as a case of foxes in the henhouse.<\/p>\n

Cheney’s secret meetings with lobbyists and industry bigshots were creepy and nasty and evil.<\/p>\n

But the Obama crew’s secret meetings with lobbyists and industry bigshots were, the President assures us, in the public interest.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Third kicker:<\/p>\n

We know Cheney’s secret confabs were shady and corrupt because Cheney scowled out the side of his mouth.<\/p>\n

Obama grins in your face.<\/p>\n

See the difference?<\/p>\n

The difference is 2%.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

–30–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

$80 billion of WHAT?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1731","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-rV","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}