Republicans Try to Deep Six Democracy

By SAM URETSKY

Al Gore
Got very sore
When the right wing Supremes
Said “Al, in your dreams.”

(Not that it’s relevant, but July 10 was National Clerihew Day, the birth anniversary of Edmund Clerihew Bentley, the creator of this poetic form. The main conventions of a clerihew are that it is only four lines and has an AABB rhyme scheme. The first line is normally the name of a famous, or at least well known person. The remainder of the verse may or may not be relevant.)

Among the well known people who might be honored with a verse is Minority Leader of the Senate Mitch McConnell, whose proudest achievement was probably giving the Republican Party control of the federal judiciary, the branch of government which was intended to be above politics. Having achieved this goal, he went for a victory lap when, on June 30 he tweeted: “Let me be perfectly clear: there will be no bipartisan USICA as long as Democrats are pursuing a partisan reconciliation bill.”

USICA stands for US Innovation and Competition Act of 2021 According to Sen Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) “USICA will boost US competitiveness with China and help reindustrialize America, make investments in manufacturing and research, provide seed money to create good, new jobs. Importantly, it includes $52 million for research and designing and manufacturing semiconductor chips.” It’s a good bill. We’ve seen what happens when the United States becomes too dependent on foreign products. Because most of our computer chips are imported from China, a supply shortage shut down production at Ford and General Motors. With no new cars coming off the assembly line, the prices of used cars were raised dramatically. USICS was intended to make the US less dependent on the Chinese exports.

Meanwhile, the Democrats, while they had failed to pass the more ambitious parts of President Biden’s programs, did introduce HR 3, the Elijah E. Cummings Lower Drug Costs Now Act. Speaker Nancy Pelosi wrote, “The soaring price of prescription drugs is crushing Americans at the pharmacy counter, driving up health insurance premiums, and creating unaffordable costs for taxpayers who finance Medicare and Medicaid. Instead of using their multi-billion dollar windfalls from the GOP tax scam to either lower prices or to invest in research, Big Pharma used the money for stock buybacks – further evidence that out-of-control drug prices are padding corporate profits instead of fueling the search for new cures.”

The bill would allow Medicare and Medicaid to negotiate drug prices with the manufacturers, “… the law currently forbids Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices, even as drug companies raise prices on seniors and beneficiaries without any limit. That ends with H.R. 3, the Elijah E. Cummings Lower Drug Costs Now Act.” In a nation where Amazon’s Prime Day has almost achieved the status of a national holiday, the health programs for the poor and aged are about the only ones paying list price.

The Democrats had hoped to use the reconciliation process to achieve the implementation of the drug cost act. In this, representatives of the House and Senate try to find a compromise – with the benefit that the passage in the Senate requires only a 51 vote majority. The use of reconciliation is limited to budget bills – it’s not all purpose, but there was reason to hope that the bill to protect industry (computer chips) and the bill to benefit the poor and/or elderly could be combined. The provisions of the Drug Cost bill included, as Speaker Pelosi wrote:

• Gives Medicare the power to negotiate directly with the drug companies

• Makes the lower drug prices negotiated by Medicare available to Americans with private insurance, not just Medicare beneficiaries.

• Stops drug companies ripping off Americans while charging other countries less for the same drugs

• Creates a new, $2,000 out-of-pocket limit on prescription drug costs for Medicare beneficiaries

• Reinvests in innovation and the search for new cures and treatments

Senator McConnell has made it clear that the bill to protect industry from Chinese competition on computer chips will not be approved if the Democrats try to cut drug costs.

Mitch McConnell
Was a friend of the Donald
He practiced hypocrisy
To deep six democracy

Sam Uretsky is a writer and pharmacist living in Louisville, Ky. Email sdu01@outlook.com.

From The Progressive Populist, August 15, 2022

Populist.com