No Good Deed Goes Unrewarded

Congressman Billy Tauzin has decided to hang it up for a more lucrative gig with the lobbyist group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.

The former chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee, who earlier this year ended negotiations to head the pharmaceutical industry's top lobby after critics questioned the ethics of the move, has now accepted the post, the group said on Wednesday.

Democrats criticized him for considering the high-profile post leading the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), which lobbies Congress on behalf of drug companies, while he was still chairman of the committee that regulates the drug industry.

His qualifications? (Beyond being the man who chaired the committee that supposedly reglulates the drug industry that is...surely that can't be what why the drug companies had him in mind, could it?)

His experience as a patient[he's been treated for a bleeding ulcer] was also a factor, Tauzin said, adding that he "will be a strong patient voice for the industry because I have been one."

Well, then I should seriously be considered for a job as the CEO of Nike because I've worn Nikes before.

This really isn't an anti-Republican spiel, so much as it's an anti-politician spiel. The fact that he had to be persuaded not to consider this job while he was till the chairman of this committee says alot about politics these days....or well, ever. It's disheartening, but hey, these are the guys we elect.