November 03, 2009 08:12 PM UTC

Foot Shooting: It's Not Just for Republicans!

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• by: Colorado Pols

Republican Gubernatorial candidate Josh Penry has been actively shooting himself in the foot lately, but he’s not the only Colorado politician with that same talent.

A Pols reader sent us this newsletter from Democrat Cheri Jahn, who is running for Senate in SD-20 (Moe Keller is term-limited), and, well, let’s just say it opens up a wound you might have thought Jahn would have preferred closed:

Washington just doesn’t get it!  An amendment was added to the Health Reform bill that would drastically increase the cost of medications for many Americans. I was outraged when I read the news. This amendment would extend brand-name prescription drug exclusivity from five years to twelve years, and in the process block affordable generics from being developed. Working families and our elderly would be hit especially hard with the increased costs of their medications if this amendment isn’t stripped from the House version of the Health Care Reform Bill.

Too many Coloradans can’t afford to pay the premium prices on brand name medication just to fatten the wallets of the big pharmaceutical corporation executives. We need to be working to make prescriptions MORE affordable – not less! In the Colorado State House I worked to do just that, and in the State Senate I’ll keep fighting to make sure that everybody can afford the medications they need to stay healthy. [Pols emphasis]

That’s all well and good, except that Jahn’s vote essentially killed a prescription drug reform bill when she was in the State House in 2006:

The state House on Tuesday rejected a key Democratic measure to lower the cost of prescription drugs for some uninsured Coloradans.

The 35-30 defeat of House Bill 1100 raises doubts about whether Democrats will be able to deliver on their promise to provide discounted drugs to the uninsured…

…Democrats had planned to send both Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 1100 to Owens with the hope that at least one would become law. But the leadership lost support for House Bill 1100 when pharmacies, HMOs and a business coalition joined lobbying forces against it.

Democratic Speaker Pro Tempore Cheri Jahn said she opposed the bill because not all the groups affected were involved in the negotiations.

Besides, she said, the bill offered discounts that are already available in the private market.

“I do not think it’s fair to ask one industry to pay for the bill – pharmacies,” she said. [Pols emphasis]

Whoops!