my letter re: Chris Murphy v. Nancy Johnson in 5th Cong. District

[wordpix2]

Please help, CT! This promises to be a tight race closely watched by pols around the nation. We need to unseat Johnson, who's been pro-corporate and pro-BushCo in Congress for most of her 23 yrs.

Dear Editor:

LOL: Laugh out loud! Despite Congresswoman Nancy Johnson’s acceptance of millions of dollars from pharmaceutical, health and insurance companies while she’s been the 5th District’s representative, two local Republicans had the audacity to write your paper recently to rail against her Democratic challenger, Chris Murphy, for legally accepting campaign contributions while the State Legislature is in session. Mr. Murphy is a state senator and Chairman of the Public Health Committee in Hartford.

Heaven forbid these Johnson fans should tell the whole truth: Nancy Johnson’s close ties to the drug and insurance industries are long-standing and money has flowed freely from her corporate sponsors into her campaign coffers for years. Johnson voted to prohibit the federal government from bargaining for affordable prices on drugs and she helped write legislation to benefit Big Pharma & Insurance contributors, even as they were handing her lots of campaign dough. Chris Murphy has stated, “Nancy Johnson accepted half a million dollars from the drug and insurance industries during her 2002 re-election campaign, and then she wrote and passed this deeply flawed Medicare drug program. That was bad enough. But now we have learned that she was raking in contributions from the drug and insurance industries at exactly the same time as she was shepherding this bill through the House.”

What Johnson did is unethical and could be illegal but to Nancy Johnson, it’s business as usual. Federal Elections Commission reports reveal:

• Johnson accepted $211,317 in contributions during the 2002 election cycle
• Johnson was the number one recipient of money from insurance companies in the 2002 election cycle, accepting $313,847 in contributions, and ranked first or second in insurance money in the 1998, 2000 and 2004 cycles, too
• Since the 1990 election cycle, Johnson has accepted $1,358,149 from insurance companies, and $495,407 from HMOs and Health Services companies
• Since the 2000 election cycle, Johnson has accepted $506,630 from pharmaceutical and health products companies.

What’s more, despite wrapping herself in a mantle of environmentalism, in October 2005 Johnson helped the indicted, disgraced former House Majority leader, Tom Delay, pass legislation to enrich oil companies by weakening environmental laws under the guise of increased refinery capacity. Among other provisions, the legislation gives oil companies protection from lawsuits against them for misconduct and pollution.

Also in 2005, Johnson accepted $17,900 from The Nature Conservancy for a trip to Ecuador and Galapagos Islands, claiming that part of the trip’s purpose was to learn about issues affecting Ecuador and its people. LOL again. Johnson ranks 38th out of the 633 Members of Congress in the past 5 years in the amount of money she’s taken in free trips. Leaders of the Ecuadorian community in the Fifth District revealed that Johnson rejected their offers to meet with them in Connecticut and it’s hard to see how an $18,000 trip to the Galapagos helps people in our district come up with solutions to urban sprawl and environmental degradation here at home. Johnson’s justification of her trip is simply disingenuous and unbelievable.

In February of this year, Johnson voted for a Bush budget that slashes student loans, Medicare and Medicaid, jobs creation, and child support enforcement. This budget offers a $22 billion giveaway to HMO companies, thanks to Johnson’s own Ways and Means Committee, of which she is a powerful member.

Nancy Johnson is a friendly, grandmotherly type but don’t let the façade fool. It is clear who Johnson is working for, and it’s not middle class workers, seniors, students or those who want to keep their jobs from going overseas. Go to www.murphyforcongress.org to learn more about our incumbent congresswoman, her cozy relationship with Big Pharma, Big Insurance and Big Oil, and her support of disastrous Republican economic policies putting the nation $9 trillion in debt. Compare her to Chris Murphy and his honest, sincere, effective efforts to help those Johnson long ago abandoned.

Ours is a nation of, by and for the people and not the corporations. The selling of America and culture of corruption must end. Chris Murphy is the man to lead the Fifth District now into the future.

Sincerely,

Wordpix

[truckin]

1. Excellent letter! I may borrow some of that if you don't mind.

[wordpix2]

2. go ahead and borrow---I borrowed a lot from Chris Murphy's website

[NewJeffCT]

3. good letter - however -

I would put Big Oil first (in the cozy relationship category), as many people in CT have ties to the insurance industry, and not just Republicans.

See if you can find more on Big Oil as wel as Tom DeLay.

[wordpix2]

4. I'll be writing more letters, however, this one's in response to talking

points Johnson apparently gave her buddies for LTTE emphasizing Murphy's (legal) acceptance of health care companies' money while he's a state senator.