Political Quotes

“Madam President, Senator Grassley and I share a passion that I think most Americans do in that it is time that we end this stranglehold that the healthcare industry has on all of us because they pose as free enterprisers, but there is nothing free about the way they actually operate. ``Free enterprise'' means you embrace competition. You are not putting up barriers to entry. You engage the consumer so that they can see what you are charging them. That does not occur. The alternative will be as clear on the other side of the aisle; they want to make government the business partner of healthcare. If the industry doesn't get with it and start doing what all the rest of us do when we go to the marketplace--embrace competition, be willing to compete, don't ask for barriers to entry, and, yes, we tell the customer what we charge them before they buy it. That doesn't happen in healthcare. The market is opaque and complex. There is nothing free about it, except that drugmakers are free to charge whatever they want. The market is dependent on government-sanctioned rebates and monopolies by the FDA exclusivities and patent abuse. It is time to fix this. PBM may not mean much to the public, but it stands for pharmacy benefit managers. This is a structure of middleman that is not present in other industries.…”