Goodlatte Defies Bush on Farm Bill Vote

Nothing like a little election year competition, to focus politicians on getting results for their home district.

House Passes 2007 Farm Bill - Includes Funds for Chesapeake Bay Clean Up

May 14, 2008

The House of Representatives passed a version of the farm bill yesterday that would double the federal government's funding for cleanup of the Chesapeake Bay, adding about $440 million over five years, congressional officials said.

The $290 billion farm bill, which covers items that include crop subsidies, school lunches and ethanol, needs approval from the U.S. Senate. President Bush has threatened to veto the bill, saying that it pays out too much to farmers in a time of very high food prices, but the bill's backers say they might have the votes to override the veto.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-VA-06

Our 6th District Representative Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), voted in support of the bill. The results of from entire House vote and all of the Virginia representatives are shown below.

110th Congress: House Vote #315 (May 14, 2008)
H.R. 2419: Food and Energy Security Act of 2007 (Vote On Passage)

Ayes: 318 (73%) == 218 Dem / 100 Repb / 0 Indep


Nays: 106 (24 %) == 15 Dem / 91 Repb / 0 Indep


No Vote: 10 (2%) == 2 Dem / 8 Repb / 0 Indep


Virginia
Aye VA-1 Wittman, Robert [R]
Aye VA-2 Drake, Thelma [R]
Aye VA-3 Scott, Robert [D]
Aye VA-4 Forbes, James [R]
Nay VA-5 Goode, Virgil [R]
Aye VA-6 Goodlatte, Robert [R]
Nay VA-7 Cantor, Eric [R]
Aye VA-8 Moran, James [D]
Aye VA-9 Boucher, Frederick [D]
Nay VA-10 Wolf, Frank [R]
Nay VA-11 Davis, Thomas [R]

The cost breakdown of the 2007 Farm Bill




Looks like it’s “Veto-proof” - by a vote of 318 to 106

… new five-year farm bill [passed] by a vote of 318 to 106, a margin large enough to override President Bush's promised veto of the nearly $300 billion measure.
The bipartisan show of support came after intense lobbying by a coalition that included farm groups, anti-hunger advocates, environmental organizations and the biofuels industry. While continuing traditional farm subsidy programs, the bill increases spending on nutrition programs such as food stamps by $10.4 billion.
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Congressional backers were elated by the 3 to 1 vote ratio. "After this vote, it's pretty much clear that we can override," said House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.).

Chesapeake Bay clean-up funding …
No Go One Year Ago?
Last year this is what Mr. Goodlatte had to say about the Chesapeake Bay clean-up funding proposed to be included in 2007 Farm Bill:

see previous post - Goodlatte & Shenandoah Valley Water Quality

U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-6th, says the measure has the backing of several members in both the House and Senate. But the conservation plan known as Chesapeake’s Healthy and Environmentally Sound Stewardship of Energy and Agriculture Act of 2007, or CHESSEA, is too costly and lacks the broad support it needs to pass as part of the 2007 Farm Bill, Goodlatte said.
"Unfortunately, [CHESSEA] is extra expensive," said Goodlatte, who does not support the proposal. "The last time I looked at that bill, not a single member of Congress outside the Bay region had co-sponsored it."

DNRonline.com May 2007

What a difference a year makes...

"We're playing major catch-up," trying to clean the bay's waters after years of pollution, said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). "But what this does is provide a historic boost in federal funding."

The idea for an increase in federal spending was floated last spring by a coalition of legislators from around the bay watershed. More than a year later, they haven't received as much as they asked for, getting about $88 million a year in new money instead of $200 million. But legislators said that the bill would fund several programs aimed at farms, which are the source of more than 40 percent of two of the bay's most pernicious contaminants.

Van Hollen said one program, getting $188 million over five years, would focus on Chesapeake tributaries. It would pay for measures that keep pollution from running off the land and into creeks and streams. These measures might include "cover crops" planted to keep soil in place, or forested buffer zones that would serve as natural filters along rivers.

He said the bill would also increase funding for several nationwide programs that would help the Chesapeake region, among others. These include programs to conserve wetlands and plant forested buffers near farm fields.
"It's not going to give us a perfectly clean bay," said Doug Siglin of the nonprofit Chesapeake Bay Foundation. "But it's a great step in that direction."

Candidate Sam Rasoul, D-VA-06
Sam Rasoul video

Some Competition this year...
An 8-term, predictable “Rank & File” Republican, Rep. Bob Goodlatte, is known for not straying far from the Red Team flock. He is apparently feeling the heat from Sam Rasoul’s strong, grass-roots, populist campaign over the last year. Mr. Rasoul’s appeal to small business people and family farmers, is gaining traction in this major Agriculture region, a highly-productive farm belt that spans the Shenandoah Valley, from Front Royal to Roanoke. Pressure from a diverse cadre of regional environmental groups, farmers needing help to deal with NPS water pollution, and the deep-pocket Ag PAC / Bio-fuel lobbyists, have created “a perfect storm”, spooking Goodlatte to bolt from the Republican flock on this vote. This action will likely bring him some unfavorable blowback from his side of the aisle.

He’s caught between the proverbial “Red” Rock and a Hard Place (6th D voters).

His record of voting for the Red Team Party Line, over the common interests of the voters in the 6th District – will see much more scrutiny in the months ahead.

Nothing like an unpopular President, with a large “lame duckiness” rating, and voter unrest at home, to focus a politico’s mind on cooperation and results.

Still Looking for Adult Leadership in Washington - Part 2

I'll let the data do the talking...

Edwards Endorses Obama!

FDA & Congress Face Off Over China Heparin Data

This is an update on the status of the FDA response to Heparin quality control failures in China.
See previous post: Congressional Hearings - Heparin Disaster

FDA Withholds List of Chinese Heparin Suppliers From Probe
By ALICIA MUNDY
May 10, 2008
Wall Street Journal

WASHINGTON -- The Food and Drug Administration is withholding a list of Chinese heparin suppliers requested by congressional investigators looking into problems with tainted supplies of the blood thinner, saying confidentiality agreements prevent release of the companies' names.

A spokeswoman for the FDA said the agency is looking at finding a way to give the committee the information it requested 10 days ago without violating confidentiality agreements involving proprietary information.

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Members of Congress also are concerned that Chinese heparin manufacturers and their raw-material suppliers didn't fully cooperate with an FDA inspection team in February, after the heparin crisis erupted internationally, and barred the FDA from complete access to some workshops, records and workers.

An FDA compliance official testified to a congressional subcommittee April 29 that the FDA could try to revisit facilities in China, but said, "I cannot say whether they will admit us or not, or whether they will allow us to do a full inspection."

Tensions between congressional Democrats and the FDA over the agency's handling of the heparin problem and its willingness to disclose information have escalated in recent weeks.

"The FDA thinks they have it under control, but they really don't," said the congressman leading the investigation, Rep. Bart Stupak (D., Mich.). The FDA's reluctance to release the Chinese companies' names is a red flag, he said. "If I was the FDA director, I'd shut down every drug coming in from China" until they were deemed safe, he said.

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The Chinese government, meanwhile, has insisted that its products didn't cause American deaths and said this week that Baxter wasn't cooperating in China's investigation. Ms. Gardiner said, "We disagree. We hosted the Chinese in April at our plant in New Jersey and have agreed to provide them with heparin samples."

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The FDA didn't issue a blanket "import alert" legally holding up all Chinese heparin pending successful testing, because it doesn't have the legal authority to do so, FDA officials have said.

The tainted-heparin scare has become one of several cases congressional Democrats have used to criticize the Bush administration.

Janet Woodcock, the FDA's drug-safety director, has said that FDA actions involving the Chinese imports are limited by a Memorandum of Agreement with China. That memorandum helped speed the entry of the FDA to China and helped open lines of communication with Chinese regulators, an FDA official testified.But Mr. Stupak called the memorandum "useless," adding, "I can go to the plant there [China] and look at the paint on the walls, but not be allowed to inspect the lab."

As I said before after viewing of the hearings on April 29, and continue to see the reluctance of the Bush Administration to take a leadership role in this on-going uncertainty of the safety of overseas production of pharmaceuticals and food products imported to the U.S.

The Bush Administration and the Republican leadership in Congress have failed to properly support the FDA, American lives have been unnecessarily lost for the sake of other national priorities.

If you think, only 81 people died and only a thousand were seriously ill; here's some statistics to put this into perspective:

Heparin death rate = 81/500,000 = 160 Deaths per Million people in the dialysis population

Compared this to other common risks or hazards:

Relative Hazard / Risk Comparison
Number of deaths per million persons

All Causes 9,000.0

Motor Vehicle Accidents 210.0
Heparin Event 160.0
Work Accidents 150.0
Homicides 93.0
Drowning 37.0
Poisonings 17.0
Boating 0.6
Tornadoes 0.4
Bites and Stings 0.2

Remember that in 2007 the FDA had 459 India and 497 China generic drug approval applications.

Generic prescription drugs include:

Top Generic Rx Drugs - 2007 in dollars
Hydrocodone/APAP
Azithromycin
Simvastin
Oxycodone ER
Sertraline

Top Generic Rx Drugs - 2007 in units
Hydrocodone/APAP
Lisinopril
Amoxicillin
Levothyroxine
Hydrochlorothiazide

And... what about Over-the-Counter (OTC) drugs ... like acetaminophen, ibuprofen...?

The seriousness of this risk continues to fly-under-the-radar for the major news media sources.

All this makes me wonder... if all that heavy Big Pharma advertising that inundates us on all major media networks, is working very effectively as "hush money". Sadly, more probable is that the American Public is more interested in other trivial news stories and reality shows. In other words, it's not important until one of your loved ones dies or becomes seriously ill. What makes this event especially tragic is people watched their mortally ill loved ones pass away with doctors and nurse in attendance.

This was not an unusual random natural event. It was not due to, what we process engineering folks call, an infrequent processing mistake or "special causes", it was an intentional "common cause" , a systemic problem due to criminal activity. Unfortunately, the FDA is struggling to bring it's full regulatory weight to bear on Chinese producers.

Anyone willing to take bets on the likely passage of proposed Country Of Origin Labeling for Pharma products anytime soon? Maybe we'll see some more progress in 2009, after this year's elections?

Meanwhile... “Caveat emptor!”