The NEA May Be About to Endorse Hillary Clinton Without Input From Majority of Members
September 21, 2015
stevenmsinger
Tags: AFT, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, Labor, NEA, Politics, President, Unions2015, 2016, AFT, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, labor, NEA, Politics, President, teachers, unions

The largest labor union in the United States may be about to endorse Hillary Clinton for President without a poll of its membership.

Leadership at the National Education Association (NEA) has been making troubling moves toward endorsing Clinton that could commit the organization to supporting the Democratic presidential hopeful with no regard for the wishes of its 3.2 million members.

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Last Wednesday NEA Directors were invited to an hour-long conference call with Clinton. Few directors were allowed to ask questions and only if those questions had been submitted in advance. After Clinton left the call, only three state presidents had a moment to speak; all gave positive reflections on Clinton and how she supports teachers and public education.

Despite the fact that several Democrats have been courting the NEA’s endorsement, only Clinton was invited to this call.

Last summer, the NEA invited all presidential candidates to participate in the union’s endorsement process. Only Clinton, Martin O’Malley, and Bernie Sanders did so. Each made a video statement that was shown at the summer’s RA meeting and posted by many to their local groups. Though more candidates have entered the race since then, none have chosen to interview with the NEA.

Ironically, at the same RA meeting, the assembly voted specifically NOT to ignore rank and file membership before endorsing a Presidential candidate. New Business Item 79 states:

NEA, as an organization, will actively engage in conversation and outreach on the NEA endorsement process with all 2016 Presidential campaigns prior to the consideration of a primary recommendation.

The move is doubly troubling because of the strong-armed manner in which the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) endorsed Clinton in July.

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https://gadflyonthewallblog.wordpress.com/2015/09/21/the-nea-may-be-about-to-endorse-hillary-clinton-without-input-from-majority-of-members/

Christopher Hayes ?@chrislhayes 6m6 minutes ago Manhattan, NY

Tonight: @BernieSanders on the latest outrage over drug prices and his bill that would reform drug pricing. (Also: his thoughts on the pope)

Bernie Investigating Drug Price Gouging Before CEO Raised AIDS Drug Price: Here are the Details

— September 22, 2015

While the media and politicians are jumping on the train to crucify the CEO who raised the price of a crucial AIDS medication from $13.50 per pill to $750 per bill, Bernie Sanders was investigating the issue long before the media became aware of the problem.

It turns out that Martin Shkreli, the 32-year-old CEO who raised the price of the AIDS drug, is part of a new shoddy and immoral practice of investors buying the rights to older drugs and then raising their prices sharply. This might be news to everyone else, but not Bernie Sanders.

Bernie, along with Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), have been vocal about the problem for some time, and have been sending letters demanding more information from companies that do it. Last week, they sent a letter to a company called Valeant, who raised the price of a heart drug more than 500 percent the day it bought the rights to it. Last year, Bernie and Cummings went after the company that raised the price of Doxycycline, a common antibiotic, from $20 a bottle in 2013 to $1,849 by 2014.

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Ask yourself whether you want a President who is clueless and simply acts outraged when the media exposes an issue, or would you rather have a President who knows about an issue way before the media and has been investigating it?

http://ringoffireradio.com/2015/09/bernie-was-investigating-recent-drug-price-gouging-long-before-ceo-raised-price-on-aids-drug-now-bernies-invesigating-ceo/

That Guy Who Is Price-Gouging AIDS Patients Also Did It to Kids with Kidney Disease
By Jeremy Stahl

"THEY SEE ME ROLLING..."

— Martin Shkreli (@MartinShkreli) September 16, 2015
https://twitter.com/MartinShkreli/status/644222084651069440/photo/1

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The former hedge fund manager whose pharmaceutical company has come under withering attack for allegations of egregious price-gouging on life-saving medication is the subject of a $65 million lawsuit by his former employer for alleged stock manipulation—and it turns out he once tried a similar price hike scheme with that company. During Martin Shkreli's tenure as CEO of Retrophin—the company that is now suing him—the company increased prices on a decades-old kidney medication by about 20 times its original cost, a move similar to the controversial price increase by his new company reported by the New York Times on Sunday.

When Shkreli was CEO of Retrophin, the company purchased a kidney medication approved by the FDA in 1988 called Thiola and increased the cost from $1 per pill to $30 per pill. That drug treated cystinuria, a lifelong disease for which there is no known cure and which afflicts about 20,000 patients in the United States. Forbes health care contributor Steve Brozak described the disease last year when news of the price increase broke:

Patients are usually diagnosed with the disease at a very young age and have an abnormally high concentration of an amino acid called cystine present in their urine. The excess cystine crystallizes regularly into stones that painfully travel through the kidneys, ureters or bladder. Imagine having a kidney stone form or pass once a month, tearing through your organs as it tracks its way out of your body.

There was no alternative drug for cystinuria sufferers, Brozak reported, and the 20-fold hike raised the price to about between $54,750 to $109,500 per year. At the time, Brozak argued that Retrophin was “turning patients into commodities like barrels of oil,” while University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine Associate Professor of Urology Benjamin Davies called it a case of “predatory capitalism on the backs of the sick and silent.” Writing for Science Transnational Medicine, pharmaceutical columnist Derek Lowe said the Thiola increase was the “most unconscionable drug price hike I have yet seen.”

Shkreli is currently going on business news programs arguing for the current price hike on Daraprim by saying that it is necessary for future research and development. Last year, Retrophin made the exact same argument in a http://www.retrophin.com/pdf/ThiolaInvestorCCPresentation.pdf" target="_blank">since-removed business presentation on its website to justify its price increase on Thiola, saying that it “plans to develop a long-acting version of Thiola® for once daily dosing.” (In a hilarious and perhaps not atypical legal notice about the “anticipated development, timing, data readouts and therapeutic scope of programs in our clinical pipeline,” the proposal warned “these forward-looking statements may be accompanied by such words as ‘anticipate,’ ‘believe,’ ‘estimate,’ ‘expect,’ ‘forecast,’ ‘intend,’ ‘may,’ ‘plan,’ ‘project,’ ‘target,’ ‘will’ and other words and terms of similar meaning. You should not place undue reliance on these statements.”)

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Read the rest here: http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/09/22/martin_shkreli_price_gouging_the_hedge_fund_bro_pulled_drug_price_hike_scheme.html?wpsrc=sh_all_mob_tw_ru

Top unions put brakes on Clinton endorsement

SEIU and AFSCME decide to hold off, in part because of a prospective Joe Biden candidacy.

By Annie Karni

09/22/15, 01:08 PM EDT

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The decisions are a setback for Hillary Clinton, who has been courting the labor giants in the hopes of an early lock down of two powerhouse unions that can organize millions of members and resources on the ground. And they come against the backdrop of a Clinton campaign show of force -- in terms of establishment donors, delegates and endorsements -- as Biden weighs his options. Adding the support of two of the most muscular unions now would have sent a powerful message there is little room in the race for the vice president.

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Both unions, however, chose to put off any decision and remain uncommitted in the 2016 race. "We are determined to take the time necessary to make sure every voice is heard," an AFSCME official told POLITICO.

Supporters of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders hailed the delay as a victory, and attributed it as much to Biden’s influence on the race from the sidelines as Sanders’ momentum.

“The hesitation on their part is likely due as much to Bernie as to Biden -- he throws uncertainty into the mix,” said Rand Wilson, communications director for SEIU local 888 in Boston, who personally supports Sanders. “This gives more time for the supporters of Sanders to work hard to win their national leadership’s support. It’s very positive.”

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Top union officials are also looking to avoid the revolt among rank-and-file teachers who publicly called on the American Federation of Teachers to withdraw its endorsement of Clinton last July, claiming there had been little internal discussion with teachers before the union backed Clinton.

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http://www.politico.com/story/2015/09/hillary-clinton02016-unions-delay-endorsements-213922