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TechnoratiLawmakers Reveal Health-Care Investments
Key Players Have Stakes in Industry
Almost 30 key lawmakers helping draft landmark health-care legislation have financial holdings in the industry, totaling nearly $11 million worth of personal investments in a sector that could be dramatically reshaped by this summer's debate.
The list of members who have personal investments in the corporations that will be affected by the legislation -- which President Obama has called this year's highest domestic priority -- includes Congress's most powerful leaders and a bipartisan collection of lawmakers in key committee posts. Their total health-care holdings could be worth $27 million, because congressional financial disclosure forms released yesterday require reporting of only broad ranges of holdings rather than precise values of assets.
Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), for instance, has at least $50,000 invested in a health-care index, and Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), a senior member of the health committee, has between $254,000 and $560,000 worth of stock holdings in major health-care companies, including Bristol-Myers Squibb and Merck.
The family of Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), a senior member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee drafting that chamber's legislation, held at least $3.2 million in more than 20 health-care companies at the end of last year.
The reports come on the eve of what is sure to be a dramatic health-care debate in Congress, beginning with a key Senate committee hearing Tuesday. With several proposals floating on Capitol Hill, the legislative battle could overhaul an industry that represents nearly 20 percent of the national economy.
While no congressional rules bar members from holding financial stakes in industries they regulate, some ethics experts suggest that it often creates the appearance of a conflict of interest, particularly if there is a chance that the legislation could result in a personal financial boost.
"If someone is going to be substantially enriched by the consequences of the vote, particularly if it represents a meaningful amount of their net worth, then there is a problem," said Harlan Krumholz, a professor of medicine at Yale University. "This is such important legislation that you don't want to be tainted by any conflict."
But many legal experts say the health-care industry is so predominant that it is impossible for lawmakers to avoid financial ties to that sector, suggesting that the best antidote is a clear disclosure system that makes every lawmaker's finances publicly available. Robert L. Walker, a Washington lawyer and former House and Senate ethics counsel, said that in many cases, members of Congress are "simply one of perhaps thousands or more" investors in a single corporation and such investments are not "prohibitive conflicts."
In many cases, the lawmakers' health-care holdings represent a small fraction of their assets. Harman, whose husband, Sidney, is the founder of electronics-maker Harman International Industries, is one of the wealthiest members of Congress, with a minimum net worth of almost $120 million.
The new data come from yesterday's release of financial disclosure forms for the House and Senate, though most of the House forms were accidentally posted online Wednesday, and subsequently the data were captured and posted online by congressional watchdog LegiStorm.
The first big congressional moment on health care comes Tuesday in the Senate's Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, which will consider a liberal-leaning proposal that includes the creation of a "public plan" meant to be a government-administered alternative to private health insurance.
On that 22-member panel, at least eight senators have financial interests in the health-care industry worth a minimum of $600,000 -- and potentially worth as much as $1.9 million. The investors include Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), a senior member of the panel, who holds at least $165,000 in pharmaceutical and medical stocks, and freshman Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), who holds at least $180,000 in investments in more than 20 health-care companies.
The hearings will be led by Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), who is filling in for Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the committee chairman, who is battling brain cancer. Dodd's wife, Jackie Clegg Dodd, serves on the boards of four health-care companies, receiving more than $200,000 in salary and stock from her service in 2008, according to the Associated Press.
Dodd's aides say his wife's financial interest will not have any impact on his leading role in the health-care debate, noting that she is not a lobbyist and has never represented clients before any branch of the federal government.
"Jackie Clegg Dodd's career is her own; absolutely independent of Senator Dodd, as it was when they married 10 years ago," Bryan DeAngelis, Dodd's spokesman, said in a statement. "The senator has worked to reform our health care system for decades, and nothing about his wife's career is relevant at all to his leadership of that effort."
Reid's aides also said he could be a fair arbiter of the legislative debate, pointing to a letter enclosed in his disclosure from his investment manager at Wells Fargo declaring that neither the senator nor his wife has any role in choosing financial moves. "All decisions on purchases, sales and retention of assets in the above mentioned investment management accounts . . . were made in the sole discretion of Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., without input from Harry and Landra Reid," the letter said.
Later this month the Senate Finance Committee will take up the debate, with at least a half-dozen senators on the panel holding stakes in health-care companies. Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) and his wife, ketchup heiress Teresa Heinz Kerry, hold at least $5.2 million in companies such as Merck and Eli Lilly.
Sen. Michael D. Crapo (R-Idaho), one of the few lawmakers who listed the specific values of his stock holdings, held $16,879 worth of stock in companies such as St. Jude Medical at the end of last year.
Health care is not the only industry that is both heavily regulated by Congress and heavily invested in by lawmakers. As The Washington Post reported Thursday, more than 20 members of the House leadership and the House Financial Services Committee hold investments in companies that received more than $200 billion in federal bailouts.
On the Senate banking committee, at least a half-dozen senators had significant investments in companies that benefited from the $700 billion bailout legislation that the panel helped draft last fall. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) reported $18,000 to $95,000 in investments in Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae bonds, and also that he sold at least $15,000 in Fannie "step-up" bonds at the end of last year. The committee's ranking Republican, Sen. Richard C. Shelby (Miss.), reported holding $260,000 to $850,000 in money market and retirement accounts with Countrywide, Citigroup and Wachovia.
Staff writers Dan Eggen, Garance Franke-Ruta, Carol D. Leonnig, Sarah Lovenheim and Ben Pershing, along with research editor Alice Crites, staff researcher Madonna Lebling and graphics editor Karen Yourish, contributed to this report.
36 Comments so far
Show AllAmerica is a country run by and for business interests. So it doesn't make any difference who you vote for - they're nearly all bought and paid for. Few in elected federal government speak for the interests of the working class - which is most of us. Mister Obama is just another in a long line of business class shills. They may lean to one business interest over another - financial businesses over manufacturing, for example, but they all represent the business class as a whole (or they wouldn't be allowed to get anywhere near public office) and will gladly sacrifice 'us' for 'them'.
Therefore, targeting the government for anger, like so many on the 'right', is pointless. Changing the faces in government does nothing to change the business monopoly over our lives.
The business sector has been propagandizing us for decades that the government is the problem, knowing all the time that the government is their stalking horse. Directing our rightful anger against government, instead of the business sector who are the real problem, is very much in their interest and guarantees that the corrupt system will continue.
For all its flaws, the government is the only institution we as people can have any control over. Private businesses are private tyrannies and can and will do what they want unless prevented from doing so.
"Government is the shadow of business on society." John Dewey.
Then there's this item: Report: Health Insurers Hold Billions in Tobacco Stocks
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/6/12/report_health_insurers_hold_billions_in
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/6/12/report_health_insurers_hold_billions_in
Jeevee
IT'S TRUE, MORE THAN EVER: YOU CANNOT SERVE TWO MASTERS—GOD AND MONEY.
You can if you're a tele-evangelist since god and money merge so neatly.
Investors have to have somewhere to put their money. Privately run jails are a good place in addition to the sickness industry. The more people we have in jail and the more sick people we have, the more money these people can make. What else is there to the U. S. is there besides making money? We don't have any industries that make stuff that is of value, so the only investments are in banks, jails and sick people.
Maybe the making of money has some proper limits as to what is a legitimate investment.
Is it proper that I should make money based on someone else being sick?
Should I make money based on having more people locked up in jail?
Is there someway that I can make money by investing in corporations that promote death?
If I was an oligarch and I wanted to buy my spoiled little shit of a son a toy that would make him laugh and laugh for hours, I'd buy him a middle-class American. Because Americans are funny the way all dupes and chumps are funny. You can trick today's Americans time and again, and they always fall for it. And when you trick them, they stomp around dramatically and make a lot of blustery noise about "the people" who allegedly "aren't going to stand much more of this" because "our founding forefathers bla bla bla" and of course the ol' "you can fool some of the people some of the time, buttcha can't fool bla bla bla..." Basically, if you've seen your Elmer Fudd, then you've seen your American sucker in all of his cartoon comic-foil glory: a sentimental buffoon, a harmless chump whose guns don't fool anyone but himself.
Be vewy, vewy quiet!
· Yr Obd't Servant
Haven't dropped in here for a long time.
On a mission now. Single Payer. This is it. Last chance.
If you want emails as to what we are doing and possibly what you can do with a template of events already set up then email me at civilsociety at.bellsouth dot net.
I refuse to hand it over. This is where we take our stand.
All of us are going to require health care or already do. We cannot let Congress ride over us on this one.
Who's interested?
June 25 in Washington DC. www.health-justice.org
Know about that one.
We are doing a local West Palm Beach rally in solidarity with it for those of us who cannot attend. We are also doing other things locally to put the heat on.
Anyone interested in our info email me at address in above post.
Quite frankly, with the way moneyed interests have infiltrated the political system and with how heavily reliant a given candidate is upon gaining exposure (Thus the need for more money) , the entire concept of Democracy is suspect.
Until you get Auto_workers, teachers ,plumbers and the like elected to office and in numbers that represent their numbers in the population at large, you will always get the type of Government that only represents the ELITE.
A start would be all elections are publicly funded with each and every candidate having a cap that they can spend to.
A start would be ending the concept that corporations and "Think Tanks" funded by the same have the RIGHT of free speech thus putting an end to the MOVEon.orgs and the the AIPACS.
I would apply these rules to any of the Democracies. I would also call for an end for Political PARTIES to advertise or pay for air time to air their views.
Right now the media here in Canada is bombarded with radio spots paid for by the Conservative party wherein the Liberals and other parties are being attacked for being irresponsible.
End all that....Heres your million bucks Mrs Smith or Mr harper. That is ALL you can spend. Get yourself elected. If you spend more your candidacy is nullified.
Good Comment! Our "democratic government" as it exists today is nothing but a farce and charade! I no longer consider myself as living in a democracy. It is clearly an oligarchy.
It makes one wonder why he should even bother going to the polls to vote when whomever is elected will surely vote only in his/her own self-interst, usually financial in nature.
I'm thoroughly ashamed of my own government!!!
"freshman Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), who holds at least $180,000 in investments in more than 20 health-care companies."
I was wondering where she was hiding all along. It's bad enough that NC has gotten worse despite the economy somewhat booming despending upon which location we're talking about. Man or woman, it makes no difference as very few of them support single payer.
P.S.: I feel a bit angry about single payer going down but most of the main cosponsors of single payer health care are all men. Why no women from either chamber? Please don't mistake me as some misogynist or the likes but when not a single female senator or female house rep stood up to Max Baucus, it just raises suspicion as to who they really are and what they're even there for.
Below are the members of the Senate Finance Committee, all of whom sat there like stumps as Baucus had the physicians who stood up in the audience at the hearing, asking to testify about single payer, arrested.
My senators, Maria Cantwell (who sits on the committee), and Patty Murray, are telling constituents who call their offices about single payer that they haven't decided yet to take a public position.
Someone please remind me why I imagined that contributing to and voting for the bought-and-paid-for Democrats would make any difference at all.
MAX BAUCUS, MT
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, WV
KENT CONRAD, ND
JEFF BINGAMAN, NM
JOHN F. KERRY, MA
BLANCHE L. LINCOLN, AR
RON WYDEN, OR
CHARLES E. SCHUMER, NY
DEBBIE STABENOW, MI
MARIA CANTWELL, WA
BILL NELSON, FL
ROBERT MENENDEZ, NJ
THOMAS CARPER, DE
CHUCK GRASSLEY, IA
ORRIN G. HATCH, UT
OLYMPIA J. SNOWE, ME
JON KYL, AZ
JIM BUNNING, KY
MIKE CRAPO, ID
PAT ROBERTS, KS
JOHN ENSIGN, NV
MIKE ENZI, WY
JOHN CORNYN, TX
What we Libertans call "Republicrats".
"I was wondering where she was hiding all along."
_______________________________________
When I read this line, I had to laugh-- in a "funny because it's true" way.
Not especially about Hagan, who was unknown to me. But, without Naming Names, in 2006 there were several Democratic freshpersons elected to both houses of Congress upon the widely-held misconception that they were landing like D-Day troops on Normandy Beach with the objective of bringing down a tyrannical maladministration.
Instead, when the bright light of Victory flashed forth, these novice champions scurried like cockroaches beneath Reid and Pelosi's petticoats.
_______________________________________
"There's an old saying in Tennessee. I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee, that says: 'Fool me once... shame on... [pause] Shame on you... [pause] If fooled, you can't get fooled again.'"
· Yr Obd't Servant
We must vow to vote only for candidates who will not merely refuse corporate & lobbyist contributions, but who will, once elected, pass laws to prohibit all contributions except public financing while legally forcing electronic media which uses OUR public airwaves to make their private profits to give free airtime to viable candidates.
Buckley vs. Valeo (1976) is a travesty of democracy which must be overturned. Money should NOT equal free speech. Corporations are NOT "persons" entitled to the rights of human persons, especially not freedom of speech.
Even though I'm an agnostic, skeptic, and freethinker, I find both common sense and subtle wisdom in Christ's aphorism that "no man can serve two masters".
The present health care debacle isn't essentially different from all of the other nefarious business conducted by our self-serving political organized crime syndicate. But as each day passes, it becomes clearer and clearer that our federal government, especially the legislative and executive branches, makes common cause with the corporations and financial vested interests AGAINST We the People.
To most of us who visit here, that's a tragic given. But one can only hope that on this issue, it will become painfully clear even to "low-information", apathetic, and submissive voters that the scandalous and reprehensible actions of both Congress AND the White House SHOUT in no uncertain terms that our elected politicians are slaves to a greater master than We the People.
The Founders were surely concerned with establishing laws to protect the nation from insurrection and treason arising in the populace. But they also attempted to design a government with mechanisms that empowered the People, through their elected representatives, to remove traitorous, tyrannous, and malfeasant elected officials.
I have to conclude that it never occurred to them that a professional elite of political gangsters would unite with such tenacity that it would simply eschew and ignore the Constitutional protections vital to preserving a republican democracy.
It has. And now we are in a peculiar state approaching civil war-- except this time the enemy is not a confederation of rogue secessionist states, but a generally monolithic and despotic political elite that has quite literally separated We the People from its established principles of government enshrined in the Constitution.
The notion that representative government remains sufficiently intact and wholesome to allow incremental progress by supporting the least criminal politicians is, as they say, no longer operative.
Where will the Fort Sumter be that marks the beginning of a new Civil War-- or, if you like, a true Revolution?
· Yr Obd't Servant
Obedient Servant, you and Sioux Rose make good points. We are approaching critical mass here. I see it around me in my neighborhood. Just last night my neighbor across the street asked me for the website address for Commondreams. She's always been apolitical but with considerable encouragement from me is beginning to realize apolitical doesn't work. Of course, she is also ready to join the Mainstream Party. Her family is seriously struggling to keep their noses above water. We are planning a community kitchen garden for next year. I'm thinking of rototilling my entire front yard (lawn) and planting it in hairy vetch this summer. Wouldn't cost any more than constantly having it mowed.
I think Americans have always been big on fairness. And so I think there is a growing sense of outrage around how unfair this grand theft is. I think that's the approaching critical mass. I don't know what will happen if the public gets fed up. I know that ammunition is flying out of stores as fast as it comes in. I think the government is preparing to crack down on "civil unrest". Truly I don't know what is coming.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Sioux Rose
BE FOR KIDS: I left you a long response on the "bank on" post from yesterday. If you have time, please check it out. Another way critical mass can be demonstrated is in reports of major gun/munitions sales, a scary little side item.
Hi Sioux Rose, in response to your post, I gave you my #. You can call me and I might be able to help. Let me know if you lost it.
I read something disturbing a day or so ago. Recently a meteorite unexpectedly whizzed past Earth, within spitting distance, astrally speaking. No one knew it was coming. Then I read that the military has stopped sharing information with incoming meteorites with scientists about 3 months ago. Having developed an extremely suspicious attitude toward those in power, due to many disappointments, I'm seriously wondering what they're hiding. What are they seeing they don't want us to know??
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Sioux Rose
O.S. One of your particularly powerful posts. Thank you. I so agree. The revolution I imagine is one of consciousness, for until the sleeping populace awakens from its chemically-induced & media-enabled somnambulism, there can be no basis for unified action driven by clarifying ideals. The Founders of our nation understood what tyranny was like, recognized the need for a separation between church and state, and ushered in a new mandate that extended to a larger percentage of "the people" an ingenious experiment in self-governance. Currently as the fundamentalist churches spread across the land to promote their particular brand of authoritarianism, added to a media that massages away all calls to meaningful action, this sinister duo works to thwart activism; and it's also aided by the fiscal reality that salaries are receding while life costs increase. Many feel helpless or at a loss for the time, energy, or resources that would guide them to avenues of meaningful change. Sooner or later cosmic justice asserts to alter the paradigm, and I think we have crossed the track to approach that arc that promises "sooner." We've already passed "later."
Their personal investments may prejudice them, but anyone with mutual funds probably has some investment in health-related corporationS. The campaign contributions and lobbying money of big insurance and pharma companies have a more direct influence on most members of Congress. These practices are what must be brought under control.
Where have all the Arianna (Pigs at the Trough) Huffingtons gone? Gone to Obamania every one.
♪ Oh, when will she ever learn?
Oh, when will she ever learn? ♪
· Yr Obd't Servant
ALL these fat cats' reassurances are beside the point. They each have direct financial stakes, regardless of whether it’s their wife’s investment (e.g., Dodd) or the investment choices were made by someone else (Reid). Those are absolute conflicts of interest. The chicanery just gets more and more bald-faced.
Who is to blame? The people continue to vote in these rich bozos.
You can't blame a snake for being a snake. So why blame the politician for being what he/she is, a miscreant?
Unless, there is no free democracy left in this country, blame the people.
Sioux Rose
HOYT: There's a catch-22 you're pretty cavalier about ignoring, and it is that only the rich bozos for the most part can run a successful campaign because in the media-driven advertising world, it takes MEGA BUCKS to get air time to get noticed. And I'm sure someone in the forum can remind us of the individual that conducted a study showing that about 95% of the time the candidate that spends the most wins. Until $ is not the basis for what it takes to run for office in the U.S. it will be the moneyed caste that runs, seizes office; and given the way things are going, sells out the rest of us to bring greater profits to the industries he or she whores for.
So what part is there to vote for? What party did you vote for Hoyt?
http://weknowwhatsup.blogspot.com
Honestly, while the specifics may be news, is anyone at all surprised by the details of this article?
q
i think it's pretty much common knowledge that health care policy in this country is dictated by the for-profit (which means profit over life) corporate interests to "owned" legislators. That must be resolved before there can be any meaningful reform in health care.
Those named in this article, and other legislators who are financially in bed with the for-profit corporations should either divest and donate their gains to free clinics, resign, or be charged with bribery and tried. It's pretty simple.
Corruption flows in the veins of Washington and is now it's lifeblood. Corruption does not eliminate corruption, it enhances it. Corruption knows no limits and ultimately consumes itself, and unfortunately, the rest of us too.
Honesty is a cancer in a corrupt system and is quickly eliminated. Honest people are already eliminated and building an alternative economy based upon the values of localism, cooperation, and reciprocity, enabling them to sustain themselves through the collapse and transition. Go Low.
Nicely stated. Astonishing how the house still stands. In article after article, corruption, war escalation, TARP giveaways, Health industry capitulation, clean coal, mountain top destruction for the coal industry, FISA, occupation, name the issue.
Whatever it is, the disenfranchised get screwed and the elites get their pockets stuffed with corporate cash all in the name of pragmatism. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Sioux Rose
ELOHIM: Agreed until your concluding statement. The thing is things are NOT staying the same, the corruption is escalating and it's doing so at a time when solutions (or changes in how we live) are mandatory, if there is to be a preservation of life as we know it, even remotely! If ever the times called for meaningful changes, innovative strategies, intelligent investments it would be now.
There have always been sell-outs but I can't recall a time when it was the rule, rather than exception. Kind of reminds me of driving on highways these days. It used to be that one a--hole would pass everyone and drive way past the speed limit setting up a potential hazard for others. Today, MOST people speed and drive without enough respect given they're driving a potentially lethal weapon.
Now the notion of conflict of interest means nothing, zilch, nada. Integrity, honor, fairness, balance, decency are as rare in politics as is snow in Mexico.
There are parts of Mexico where snow is fairly common.