House Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner has gone after the
pharmaceutical lobby PhRMA for signing onto the Obama health care
takeover plan.
Wrote Boehner to PhRMA head (and former Republican congressman)
Billy Tauzin:
Appeasement rarely works as a conflict resolution
strategy. This is as true in the arena of policymaking as
it is in schoolyards across
America. When a bully asks for your lunch money, you may
have no choice but to fork it over. But cutting a deal
with the bully is a
different story, particularly if the "deal" means helping him
steal others' money as the price of protecting your own.
The simple truth is, two wrongs don't make a right. And
the short-sighted health care deal PhRMA struck with the Obama
Administration at your urging provides confirmation of this
time-tested maxim on an epic and tragic scale.
The blood is starting to flow. When the Democratic betrayal
comes--and betrayal is inevitable--the pharmaceutical industry
might find few friends left on the GOP side of the aisle willing
to come to its aid.
About the Author
Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and the Senior Fellow in International Religious Persecution at the Institute on Religion and Public Policy. A former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is author of Beyond Good Intentions: A Biblical View of Politics (Crossway).