The Senate Says No To Drugs

As reported in the Boston Globe here, the Senate prevented the Democrats from allowing Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices for senior citizens. The 55-42 vote in favor of the measure fell short of the 60 votes needed to take up the measure on the Senate floor.

Here is the vote on the measure, with the usual culprits doing the dirty work (including John Cornyn of Texas who, along with Kay Bailey Hutchison, ignored their constituents and utterly caved in to the pharmaceutical industry).

As the Globe story notes, though, Max Baucus, Senate Finance chairman and the bill's sponsor, said he will reintroduce an identical or similar measure. This isn’t dead yet, people.

And by the way, this seems to be an appropriate story for linking to this AFL-CIO site where you can tell your own stories if you’ve experienced “the health care hustle.”