Sunday, September 24, 2017

TRUMP CRONY SWAMPER LUTHER STRANGE BACKED BY BIG PHARMA PUSING OPOIDS FOR PROFIT DESPITE EPIDEMIC CRISIS IN AMERICA




Luther Strange Backed by Members of Big Pharma Group Pushing Prescription Opioids Amid Epidemic in Alabama



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NEW YORK — During a period he served as Alabama Attorney General, Luther Strange received more campaign contributions than any other U.S .attorney general from members of a controversial lobby group peddling the dangerous prescription pain medication business amid an ongoing opioid crisis in Alabama.

Strange’s benefactors may raise some eyebrows in the White House, after President Trump last month declared the opioid epidemic a national emergency. The designation opens the door for federal and state agencies to provide more resources to fight the scourge.
Backed financially by big pharmaceutical companies, Strange led an effort that culminated in a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) signed by other attorneys general urging the agency not to approve generic versions of highly addictive opioids unless the companies use so-called tamper-resistant or abuse-resistant technology that at the time was mostly available to the major drug companies and not generic competitors.
An investigation by the Center for Public Integrity and The Associated Press previously found that the effort outlined in Strange’s letter essentially left the opioid market for several years to big drug companies like Purdue and Pfizer.
This while the effectiveness of “tamper-resistant” and “abuse-resistant” opioids have been called into question by experts and the FDA itself, which points out that those kinds of pills may limit people from snorting or injecting drugs but the medication does little to stop patients from becoming addicted by taking drugs the most common way, swallowing them whole.
The issue of opioid prescription is critical in Alabama, a state that has the highest rate of prescription opioid use in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Also, in July, a report found that Alabama members of Blue Cross Blue Shield evidenced alarming trends of opioid prescription rates.
Blue Cross Blue Shield is the 12th largest donor to Strange’s Senatorial coffers, accordingto Open Secrets, contributing $15,000.
The local Al.com reported on the massive Blue Cross Blue Shield opioid prescription rates:
Alabama members of Blue Cross Blue Shield receive more opioids for longer periods of time and report higher rates of substance use disorder than patients in almost every other state, according to a report released Thursday.
An analysis of claims filed by Blue Cross members ranked Alabama in the top three for opioid prescriptions filled, long-term painkiller use and diagnoses of opioid use disorder. More than 26 percent of Blue Cross Blue Shield members in the Yellowhammer State filled prescriptions for opioids in 2015, compared to the national average of 21.4 percent.
Pain Medication Lobby Group members donated to Strange
Strange was appointed to the Senate in February, after Jeff Sessions vacated his seat to become U.S. Attorney General. Prior to his appointment, Strange served for six years as Alabama’s Attorney General.
The AP and Center for Public Integrity report found that members of a major drug lobby group called the Pain Care Forum donated more money to Strange than to any other attorney general during a nine year period.
The report revealed:
Since 2006, Pain Care Forum participants have given more than $600,000 in campaign contributions to attorneys general candidates, and another $1.6 million to the Republican and Democratic attorneys general associations. Purdue, with $100,000 in 2015 alone, tied with four other entities for top contributor to the Democratic Attorneys General Association; it was among the top 10 donors to the Republican group, giving more than $200,000.
… Strange has received $50,000 in campaign contributions from Pain Care Forum members, more than any other attorney general from 2006 through 2015, with more than $20,000 of that coming from Pfizer.
Strange’s current Senate race is also backed by Pfizer.
The Morning Call, the third largest newspaper in Pennsylvania, characterized the Pain Care Forum as an “opaque group of more than 100 drug manufacturers and advocacy groups that coordinates efforts to influence legislation concerning prescription pain medications on both federal and state levels.”
The Forum has repeatedly lobbied against legislation that would limit the prescription of opioids, reportedly spending at least $14 million alone on state-level lobbying.
In March 2013, Strange spearheaded an effort that sent a letter signed by himself and 47 other attorneys general to then-FDA Commissioner Margaret A. Hamburg encouraging the development of “tamper- and abuse-resistant opioid products.”
Strange defended his effort. “As Attorney General, I will not apologize for my efforts to protect Alabamians from a drug abuse epidemic that is claiming more lives than automobile accidents in my state,” he stated.
An FDA blog post defines so-called tamper-resistant drugs as “tablets or capsules that are designed to deter abusers from crushing them into a powder for swallowing, snorting or injecting to create a faster, more intense high.”
The AP and Center for Public Integrity report notes that so-called tamper-resistant drugs are actually more profitable to big drug companies:
Now, pharmaceutical companies are directing their lobbying efforts to their new legislative frontier in the states — medicines known as abuse-deterrent formulations. These drugs ultimately are more lucrative, since they’re protected by patent and do not yet have generic competitors. They cost insurers more than generic opioids without the tamper-resistant technology.
Experts have questioned the effectiveness of abuse-resistant drugs.  Indeed, the FDA itself warns that abuse-resistant prescription drugs “have not yet proven successful at deterring the most common form of abuse—swallowing a number of intact capsules or tablets to achieve a feeling of euphoria.”
“Moreover, the fact that a product has abuse-deterrent properties does not mean that there is no risk of abuse,” relates the FDA in an April 2015 paper titled, “Abuse-Deterrent Opioids — Evaluation and Labeling.”
Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio.” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook.
Written with additional research by Joshua Klein.




Roy Moore Looks to Dominate Among Rural Alabama Voters




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MCINTOSH, Alabama – If the forgotten man and woman were who propelled Donald Trump to the White House last November, a similar dynamic could be playing out in this week’s special election between Roy Moore and Luther Strange.

Last month’s GOP U.S. Senate primary showed that former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore was strong in more than just a single region or select counties. Instead, his popularity was high in a unique kind of place — the less densely populated areas.
Saturday, with the sounds of folksy bluegrass music in the background, Moore addressed hundreds of people at the 15th annual Chestang gospel sing, while sporting a cowboy hat and an American flag tie.
The setting for the gathering was in rural Washington County, AL, a socially conservative county that — with the exception of its county seat of Chatom — is a place where alcohol sales are not allowed.
Washington County is not unlike many other rural Alabama areas–all of which were places where Moore performed exceedingly well in the primary.
Out of Alabama’s 67 counties, Moore was the top vote-getter in 59 of the 62 least populated counties. Given that it was in a contest that had 10 candidates on the Republican ballot, Moore could even improve upon his rural vote totals going head-to-head against Sen. Luther Strange (R-AL) in Tuesday’s runoff.
During his speech Saturday, Moore lamented the negative advertising Strange’s allies have marshaled against him. He struck a populist chord, however, by saying that despite the millions in advertising, the people of Alabama could not be bought.
“This has been a very hard time for me, for my family, for my wife,” Moore said. “To suffer through $30 million according to MSNBC of negative ads, attacks, things that were untrue – simply because they want to buy the people of Alabama. Well, I’m here to tell you – the people of Alabama are not for sale.”

Roy Moore Supporter at McIntosh Event, 9/23/17
According to Moore, such a stand by the so-called establishment in this Alabama election was a result of fear that the results could send reverberations around the country and threaten the status quo.
“This election determines the course of politics in America–whether we let the Washington establishment come down to Mississippi, Texas, Florida, Nebraska, wherever and buy the people. If they fail here, they have failed, and they know it. They will know that other younger men and women will come and stand up for the values we want to take to Washington,” Moore said.
“I promise you that when we get to Washington, they will hear about the Constitution of the United States,” he added, to applause and cheers.
As this chapter in this election campaign winds down, the rural versus urban dynamic is playing out given where the two campaigns are spending the remaining days.
Moore’s public appearances have been scheduled outside of McIntosh and Fairhope, whereas Strange’s have been in the state’s urban centers of Huntsville and Birmingham, albeit accompanied by President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence.
State Auditor Jim Zeigler, who attempted to instigate a shouting match with Strange at a debate in Montgomery on Thursday, told Breitbart News at the Washington County event that he expected Moore to dominate in rural precincts.
“Judge Roy Moore will carry the smaller towns and rural areas by a heavy margin,” Zeigler said. “Unfortunately, Luther Strange is liable to carry Jefferson and Shelby Counties. That’s his home areas. If he doesn’t carry those, he is in serious trouble. Turnout will be the key. Are the Roy Moore grassroots voters more motivated to go to the polls? Or are those voters influenced by 30-second spots with inaccurate accusations? Are they voting? If that is how it turns out, Roy Moore will win.”
Long-time Moore ally Orange Beach, AL businessman Dean Young also sees Moore as having an ability to draw the rural voters of Alabama.
He argued that attraction didn’t stop at the city limits sign, but he acknowledged it would be vital for Moore to do well in the less-populated precincts.
“Very important – Judge Moore appeals to these people because they believe in God and country in that order,” Young told Breitbart News at the McIntosh event while adorning a red “Make America Great Again” ballcap.
“We got a lot of Vietnam veterans that are here,” Young continued. “You got a lot of people that really believe that our country is falling apart and if we don’t do something and I mean do it fast, we’re going to lose out nation as we know it. If we don’t get back to God and the Constitution that made this country great, they’re going to destroy it up in Washington. Roy Moore is the guy that can get us back to where we need to get.”

Dean Young at McIntosh, AL Event, 9/23/17
In 2013, Young ran a campaign for an open seat in Alabama’s first congressional district in a race not unlike Moore’s– an off-cycle election with a crowded field on the Republican side. Young made it to the runoff and did well in the rural areas of Mobile, Baldwin Escambia, Monroe and Washington Counties.
Bradley Byrne beat Young. Byrne has held that seat ever since, winning the general election in that cycle. However, even at Saturday’s event, Young seemed to be still very much in favor by the gospel sing audience.
Unlike Alabama’s first congressional district, however, the state in its entirety is not densely populated, which appears to a favor to Moore’s advantage, as indicated by polling data.
The winner of the Moore-Strange matchup on Tuesday will go on to face former Clinton U.S. Attorney Doug Jones in the special election set for December 12.



Emerson Poll: Judge Roy Moore Holds 10-Point Lead over Luther Strange in Alabama Senate Race



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Judge Roy Moore holds a 10-point lead over Sen. Luther Strange (R-AL) just days before Alabamians go to the polls in the Republican Senate primary race, according to a poll released Sunday.

That lead, found in the Emerson College Polling Society poll, is down from 14 points from the last Emerson poll taken at the beginning of the month, as undecided voters appear to be breaking for Strange. But the society believes it unlikely to be enough to carry Strange to victory.
The poll found that with registered voters, Moore leads 50 percent to Strange’s 40 percent, with 10 percent of voters undecided. Among likely GOP voters, that lead shrinks slightly to nine percent.
Strange is likely to have been given something of a boost from President Trump’s Friday night visit to Huntsville, where he backed Strange and urged Alabamians to support him.
But while Trump has said he believed Strange could win the general election while Moore could not, he also said he would still campaign for Moore if he won. He also admitted he “might have made a mistake” by wading into the race and backing Strange.
Moore has also been backed by grassroots conservative heroes such as Sarah Palin and Sebastian Gorka — both who campaigned for Moore on Thursday.
Adam Shaw is a Breitbart News politics reporter based in New York. Follow Adam on Twitter: @AdamShawNY


Pollak: The ‘Resistance’ Is on the Ballot in Alabama, Not California



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When it comes to the so-called “Resistance” — the pretentious, violence-evoking name that Trump’s left-wing political opponents have chosen for themselves — it is clear that the Democrats’ best efforts have failed thus far.

Ironically, the most effective force “resisting” President Donald Trump’s agenda is not the Democratic Party or the institutional left, but the Republican-held Congress and the Beltway political establishment to which it is anchored.
As former White House senior adviser — and Breitbart News executive chairman — Steve Bannon told 60 Minutes recently, congressional leaders promised the President-elect to move quickly to repeal Obamacare, pass tax reform, and approve a new infrastructure program.
None of that happened. Instead, Republicans vigorously investigated the Russia conspiracy theory and rushed to the cameras every time the media decided they did not like a Trump tweet.
Bannon said: “I think Mitch McConnell, and to a degree, Paul Ryan. They do not want Donald Trump’s populist, economic nationalist agenda to be implemented. It’s very obvious.”
Of course, Congress is not a rubber stamp, and McConnell and Ryan have every right to pursue their own agenda. But what is striking is how slow they have been even to promote their own legislation, including bills that passed when President Barack Obama wielded the veto.
In the process, they have stopped President Trump’s agenda as well as their own. As “resistance” goes, they have been more effective than the “Resistance” itself.
As Tim Donnelly noted recently at Breitbart California, the state’s legislators began the year vowing to block Trump at every turn, but have little to show for it:  “For all its bombast at the start, California’s cry of ‘resistance’ has been nothing more than ‘sound and fury, signifying nothing.'”
Meanwhile, among Trump supporters, the frustration with the GOP is palpable. Earlier this month, I addressed a large audience at the Redlands Tea Party Patriots meeting near San Bernardino, California. President Trump had just cut a deal with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to raise the debt ceiling, fund the government through December, and provide Hurricane Harvey relief.
Instead of panning the deal, the audience cheered it. They had not changed their minds about Pelosi and Schumer, nor did they like the idea of a compromise on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. (There were several “Angel Moms” in attendance.) But they were so frustrated with the failure of Republicans to unite and to pass Trump’s agenda that they supported the budget deal as a wake-up call to the leaders they voted into office.
The contest in Alabama, as I noted on MSNBC earlier this week, is not just a battle between the establishment and the insurgent, grass-roots wing of the party. It is also a battle between the agenda Donald Trump promoted on the campaign trail, and the agenda he seems to be promoting today. The new agenda includes a potential capitulation to the Democrats on DACA, granting amnesty to at least 800,000 illegal aliens in exchange for nothing (thus far).
Trump supporters are largely backing Roy Moore against appointed Sen. Luther Strange in the GOP primary — not because they oppose the idea of dealing with Democrats, but because they only favor doing so if it advances the original Trump agenda.
The establishment wants to show Trump’s victory was an aberration, and that they are still in charge. And they may win.
California, the vanguard of the “Resistance,” can only look on with envy from afar.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. He is the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

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