It is never a good idea to get focused on the politics instead of results of your policy. When you do you wind up making bad policy and still get hammered politically.

The brand name prescription drug lobby PhRMA has been holding back on further support for health care reform until they are sure the final reconciliation package is still to the liking of the drug industry. The announcement that PhRMA plans to drop $6 million in a final round of pro-reform ads is a good indication [...]

MIT economist Jonathan Gruber has, for a long time, been the go-to guy for people who want to defend the Senate bill. (Today Sen. John Kerry has an article on the Huffington Post defending the excise tax in which he quotes only one economist, Jonathan Gruber.) Gruber does not just support the Senate bill, he [...]

The New York Times is reporting that the drug companies have dramatically jacked up the prices of their medications this year to lock in profits before reform starts. In the last year, the industry has raised the wholesale prices of brand-name prescription drugs by about 9 percent, according to industry analysts. That will add more [...]