Michelle Malkin » Axelrod’s profits: Uh, who’s on the take from the drug lobby again?!?!

Axelrod’s profits: Uh, who’s on the take from the drug lobby again?!?!

By Michelle Malkin • August 18, 2009 11:03 PM

I’ve reported several times over the last few months on Team Obama’s hefty funding from the health care industry/drug lobby — see here and here — as well on the deep pockets behind the Astroturf HCAN/SEIU/ACORN campaign.

Culture of Corruption also homes in on the cozy cash deals involving Michelle Obama, Valerie Jarrett, Susan Sher, and David Axelrod to create faux grass-roots support for the University of Chicago Medical Center’s patient-dumping scheme.

Now, Bloomberg’s Timothy Burger brings news about Axelrod’s latest health care conflicts of interest that will come as no surprise to those who have fully informed themselves of the Chicago way. While White House press secretary Robert Gibbs assails the motives of grass-roots activists by falsely smearing the movement as corporate-funded shills, Barack Obama’s own senior adviser and chief Astroturfer raked in millions of dollars from Big Pharma.

Two firms that received $343.3 million to handle advertising for Barack Obama’s White House run last year have profited from his top priority as president by taking on his push for health-care overhaul.

One is AKPD Message and Media, the Chicago-based firm headed by David Axelrod until he left last Dec. 31 to serve as a senior adviser to the president. Axelrod was Obama’s top campaign strategist and is now helping sell the health-care plan. The other firm is Washington-based GMMB Campaign Group, where partner Jim Margolis was also an Obama strategist.

This year, AKPD and GMMB received $12 million in advertising business from Healthy Economy Now, a coalition that includes the Washington-based Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America, known as PhRMA, that is seeking to build support for a health-care overhaul, said the coalition’s spokesman, Jeremy Van Ess.

You won’t be surprised to learn that the HEN coalition also includes left-wing Families USA, the sellouts at the AARP, and the Purple Army at the SEIU.

What’s Axelrod’s old firm — which employs one of his sons– up to now? When exposed to sunlight, reconstitute, rename, and spin hard:

Axelrod was president and sole shareholder of AKPD from 1985 until he sold his interest after Obama’s victory, government records show. The firm owes Axelrod $2 million, which it’s due to pay in installments beginning Dec. 31. Axelrod’s son, Michael, still works there. He didn’t return a phone call. The firm’s Web site continues to feature David Axelrod’s work on the Obama campaign.

…At the White House, Axelrod’s role in the health-care debate ranges from Sunday talk show appearances to meetings with House and Senate lawmakers…

Van Ess said HEN is now dormant. PhRMA and three other members of HEN, plus the Washington-based Federation of American Hospitals, have created another coalition, Americans for Stable Quality Care, which last week announced a new $12 million ad campaign to promote health-care overhaul. GMMB and AKPD are also working on the new coalition’s ads.

Hey, Bobby Gibbs: Tell us again. Who’s funded by the evil health care industry? And who’s motives should you be questioning now? According to Bloomberg, AKPD continues to work with Axelrod “on ’strategy and research’ for the Democratic National Committee.” Why no full disclosure until now? Why didn’t Axelrod recuse himself from his Obamcare lobbying TV appearances given the strong, interest-conflicted odor emanating from 1600 Pennsylvania?

Hey, White House Reality Check: Smell anything fishy, yet?

***

Darleen Click :

Let’s run this again … Man owns firm, man takes government job, man sells firm and firm owes man $2 million (if firm goes bust, man out $2 mil), firm lands multi-million dollar contracts from organizations doing business with the government on a top issue for the person man works for and man is out advocating for.

Doesn’t pass the smell test, no matter how many times it’s being run through the washing machine.

Michelle Malkin is going to have to add another chapter to her book.

Yep.

Posted in: Health care, Tea Party

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#782566

On August 19th, 2009 at 3:43 pm, T-Bone said:

How about Axelrod having dubious connections and an obvious conflict of interest situation? Is that real or are we all just ill informed?
#782588

On August 19th, 2009 at 3:53 pm, Kingfish said:

What did Mark Twain say about the three categories of lies?

Now I remember:

1. Lies
2. Damn Lies
3. Statistics

Roll that in your bell curve
#782590

On August 19th, 2009 at 3:55 pm, dadinseattle said:

Every post by the lgm types on here reinforces the obvious. Liberals believe they are smarter, better informed, and rightfully entitled to rule the masses.

My question is surely by now at least one of us should have defected to that side, surely one of us could have been convinced by now that we are foolish to resist the overwhelming evidence of their truth?

Poor Michele Malkin, all of us that follow her writing are hopelessly dense!

Is that about right lgm?
#782621

On August 19th, 2009 at 4:14 pm, T-Bone said:

Notice how he left. He can not defend his claims so he hides behind the internet. We are waiting for the debate from your end. Axelrods actions ok with you? Of course, you lose again.
#782632

On August 19th, 2009 at 4:24 pm, Bicyea said:

Cavuto will be talking about this story in a few minutes.
#782748

On August 19th, 2009 at 6:32 pm, PatriotRider said:

Other than blah, blah, isn’t the annointed one a hunk, blah, blah, it’s Bush’s fault, blah.

lgm said:

I’m smarter than all of you and nothing you say, no facts, not even rational discourse will change my mind. Because anything you all say does not match with what I’ve been taught and have taught about the American people. I refuse to pull my head out of my backside to experience what freedom of thought smells like because I’ve grown accustomed to the smell of the socialistic crap I’ve been fed. I refuse to open my eyes to reality because I might actuall have to take responsibility for my own actions. The goverment will protect me from myself.

There! I think I understand LGM’s spew.
#782776

On August 19th, 2009 at 6:52 pm, Pasadena Phil said:

Wadya know! AP has just picked up on “friends in cahoots to engineer a grass roots result.”

I would say that South Side Barry is heading into an even bigger storm.
#782893

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:23 pm, Dimsdale said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 1:42 pm, lgm said:

Rather than answer these nutty claims one by one, as I have in the past, I will simply post that, statistically speaking, you are the most ill informed demographic in America.

“Self identified Fox News watchers” on a liberal/socialist web site.

Are you sure you are in mathematics?
#782906

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:33 pm, CW4_KGP said:

lgm? Low Grade Mentality? Lost Gigantic Moron? I am so trying to figure it out. I know there is a key to it all….in the interim, lgm, please partake of a Drano enema and see if that doesn’t give you a better perspective on reality.

You are such a tool, I would almost consider you a portable power tool…minus the battery. Then, truly, every problem is a nail because you are nothing but a tack hammer. Not even good enough to drive a real nail home.

Go home and sleep on it.
#782911

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:38 pm, CyberCipher said:

Great job on Hannity, Michelle. I left work early so that I could make certain to catch that segment.

My collie says:

Keep the pressure on.
#782916

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:41 pm, Dimsdale said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 12:54 pm, lgm said:

Of course, this goes both ways.

I have yet to see the type of violence typified by liberal/socialists at these demonstrations. Do you have examples? Something in a retiree beating up an SEIU thug, perhaps?

Chickenhawk conservatives don’t dare post on the substance of health care reform. They don’t dare debate whether US health care is better than in Canada or France — at least not with statistics. They don’t say that governments in Europe have established “death boards”.

If health care is so great in Canada, why are insurance companies there offering waiting line insurance? http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2008/10/01/bc-medical-wait-list-insurance-bcaa.html

Canadian Health Care We So Envy Lies In Ruins, Its Architect Admits

By DAVID GRATZER | Posted Wednesday, June 25, 2008 4:30 PM PT

The government followed his advice, leading to his modern-day moniker: “the father of Quebec medicare.” Even this title seems modest; Castonguay’s work triggered a domino effect across the country, until eventually his ideas were implemented from coast to coast.

Four decades later, as the chairman of a government committee reviewing Quebec health care this year, Castonguay concluded that the system is in “crisis.”

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=299282509335931

For those of you that like a more domestic example, today’s Wall Street Journal has an article about the crashing failure of TennCare:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125046457087135327.html
#782918

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:41 pm, Dimsdale said:

Here is an interesting article for you “there’s no death panel” groupies:

END OF LIFE TREATMENTS WITHHELD IN EUROPE

Life-prolonging treatment is either not given or is withdrawn at the end of life for a substantial proportion of patients in six European countries, a survey of doctors has found. Although the figures varied by country, in most places medicine was the treatment most often not given, followed by fluids or nutrition.

The report in the February 28 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine about how frequently care was withheld or withdrawn at the end of life demonstrated dramatic differences among six European countries.

* Italy had the lowest percentage of deaths associated with “non-treatment” at 6 percent.
* In five of the six European countries decisions not to treat were made in more than 20 percent of deaths.
* In Switzerland, a wealthy country with a very sophisticated, modern medical system, non-treatment was reported in 41 percent of deaths.

Although the United States was not included in the study, LeWine suspects that doctors in our country withhold or withdraw treatment even less frequently than the Italians.

Why are things so different in America? According to LeWine, one can point to many possible explanations, such as the positive, optimistic, never-say-die American spirit (overall a very good attribute for society); the incredible medical advances that we hear and read about every day; the dramatic medical saves in the movies and on television; and how the rare story of a person waking up from a prolonged coma overshadows the thousands kept alive by tube feedings.

Source: Howard LeWine “Treatments Withheld at End of Life,” Intelihealth.com, March 1, 2005; and Bosshard et al., “Forgoing Treatment at the End of Life in 6 European Countries,” Archives of Internal Medicine, Vol. 165, Issue 4, February 28, 2005.

For text:

http://www.intelihealth.com/IH/ihtIH/WSIHW000/24479/36146/413074.html?d=dmtContent
#782956

On August 19th, 2009 at 10:14 pm, jsmiddleton4 said:

Misrepresentation dim….

At the end of life IV fluids can be painful and create all kinds of problems for dying patients and can be quite cruel. If you have a patient who is dying and the chart shows they did not get IV fluids, that does not therefore mean a patient was killed, as you imply with your article, by inappropriately denying treatment.

In fact not giving IV fluids might have been and often is caring and humane.

The assumption is everyone who is dying deserves to have all sorts of “stuff” done to them and if you find statistics that show “stuff” was not done to them, those statistics prove we need to be afraid of “death panels” is the kind of bait and switch use of statistics the left uses all the time.

Same for nutrition. As a human body dies the insides die and shut down as well as the symptoms of death and dying you see on the outside. If you dump a bunch of nutrition into a dying person’s body you bloat their gut and overwhelm their digestive system and create a great deal of discomfort including dumping syndrome and uncontrollable diarrhea.

So if all you death panel folks come near the folks I love or myself and force me or them to take IV fluids or nutrition so that you feel better, I’ll kick the living crap out of you dude for causing pain and suffering to those I love or myself.

The group of folks who are driving this death panel stuff have crossed over into the kind of warping and misrepresentation that is disgusting. As a group you folks need to get some facts straight before the scare tactics.
#782988

On August 19th, 2009 at 10:28 pm, Leatherneck said:

Only persons with morality should be in office. These Lefturd/CFR types are a curse on this nation.
#783023

On August 19th, 2009 at 10:54 pm, Dimsdale said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 10:14 pm, jsmiddleton4 said:

Point taken. But why the national disparity?
#783041

On August 19th, 2009 at 11:18 pm, Republicanvet said:

On August 18th, 2009 at 11:22 pm, ThackerAgency said:

The problem with the debate is the approach. The media and left talk about health care as it relates to health insurance premiums.

The problem is not the premiums. The problem is the claims.

The reason any semblance of a public option is a non-starter for conservatives is that everyone on the public option will become a LIABILITY of the government budget.

If the government option doesn’t bring in enough money to pay claims, the taxpayer will have to bail it out. . . private insurance companies would be bankrupted.

Public option increases government LIABILITY that future generations will be required to pay. The current generation should never KNOWINGLY force the next generation to pay for their mistakes.

I bet the same thing happens with a public option that happened with GM and the UAW. They kept giving themselves better and better benefits while ignoring the piling up of the unfunded mandate.

Zombie voters will keep voting better and better care for themselves until it too would be ruined.

Can you imagine 535 + 100 members of Congress all slipping in their amendments to a bill to provide additional coverage for their pet groups?
#783053

On August 19th, 2009 at 11:33 pm, Republicanvet said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:50 am, Flyoverman said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 9:18 am, imjustsaying said:

This is reminiscent of the cozy relationship that Halliburton had with Bush/Cheney.

Well that’s good you feel that way. Based on your indignation and profession of moral equivalency I am sure you will not care that we have a full investigation of this by an independent counsel.

Calling Patrick Fitzgerald………

Investigations of any ties between Cheney, Halliburton and whether anything cozy went on between them after Cheney got to the WH went on throughout Bush’s ENTIRE TERM.

IIRC I read a news article just a couple months ago on one of the last issues they were digging into…and found nothing.

imjustsaying should shut off Mommie’s computer and go to bed.

This will not garner much in the drive-by media, and will be totally off the radar in a week.
#783062

On August 19th, 2009 at 11:53 pm, Republicanvet said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 12:19 pm, Mainah said:

Zeke Emanuel has supposedly been misquoted and misunderstood on rationing healthcare. Notsomuch

http://www.ncpa.org/pdfs/PIIS0140673609601379.pdf

WOW. To see people in such positions to so coldly and flippantly discuss such things is truly shocking.

…and published in January 09.

Yet BHO and his sycophants claim there would be no death panels or rationing.
#783066

On August 19th, 2009 at 11:58 pm, Republicanvet said:

On August 19th, 2009 at 1:11 pm, GladzKravtz said:

Lgm, you know this health care ‘reform’ as so far proposed will hurt you too.

There just won’t be enough doctors/nurses/techs to handle the additional people. It’s a very simple concept. You will be hurt too.

lgm is too stupid to realize that. I am sure he/she/it firmly believes he/she/it is part of the elite that will not be affected by the thugs policies.

…or he/she/it will just blame Bush.
#783078

On August 20th, 2009 at 12:19 am, Roland said:

The group of folks who are driving this death panel stuff have crossed over into the kind of warping and misrepresentation that is disgusting. As a group you folks need to get some facts straight before the scare tactics.

YOU have just badly misrepresented the point about the death panels. NO ONE here is talking about MAKING people accept care, and I haven’t heard it anywhere else either.

It is about not letting the GOVERNMENT decide whether we get the care.

Pay attention.
#783101

On August 20th, 2009 at 2:16 am, Danceswithdachshunds said:

Well well, looky who has kind of joined the chorus here, (day late dollar short )… Associated Press

Firms with Obama ties profit from health push
#783103

On August 20th, 2009 at 2:27 am, Danceswithdachshunds said:

lgm said:

Challenge to lgm – Give us just one good reason the American People should not be fearful of a government run health plan that the Elitists in Power, (aka democrats in Congress), have EXEMPTED THEMSELVES from being forced to use?

Lord knows constituents have asked that very same question to their representative democrats at hundreds of open forums across the country over the last few weeks – AND NOT ONE HAS ANSWERED IT THUSFAR…

Can you?
#783181

On August 20th, 2009 at 7:58 am, Dimsdale said:

lgm? lgm? Bueller? Bueller?

Can’t say much for a guy that comes in, craps, then leaves, without so much as an admission that he is wrong in Obama proportions.