Thread: President Donald Trump

Pfizer puts price hikes on hold after Trump complains
In a surprising turnaround, Pfizer said Tuesday that it will defer raising prices on multiple drugs after heavy pressure from President Donald Trump.

The pharmaceutical company's announcement came after Trump tweeted that he spoke with Pfizer's CEO and his own Health and Human Services secretary,
"Pfizer is rolling back price hikes, so American patients don't pay more. We applaud Pfizer for this decision and hope other companies do the same," Trump tweeted.

The company said it made the decision "following an extensive discussion with President Trump."

Pfizer, which hiked prices on nearly three dozen drugs on July 1, said it will give the administration more time to work on its plan to overhaul the pharmaceutical supply chain.

The prices will revert to what they were before July 1 "as soon as technically possible," according to Pfizer. The new prices will remain in place until the end of the year or until Trump's plan goes into effect, whichever is sooner, the company said.

The day before, Pfizer stressed that it was only "modifying" the prices of about 10% of its medicines and vaccines, including reducing the cost of some. It also noted that most insurers and patients don't pay the list price thanks to manufacturer rebates.

The pharmaceutical industry has been under assault in recent years because of the ever-increasing cost of drugs. Trump has ramped up that pressure. He promised to lower drug prices during his presidential campaign and after he took office.

However, his administration did little until May, when it rolled out its 44-page "blueprint" for increasing competition, reducing regulations and changing the incentives for all players in the drug industry.
While the plan contains some concrete steps the administration can take to lower prices, it was criticized by industry observers as containing more ideas for consideration than actions to take. Also, experts said it didn't do enough to rein in the list prices of drugs.


Still, the president kept focusing his attention on the issue. At the end of May, he said big drug companies would announce "voluntary massive drops in prices" in two weeks. That didn't happen.
But then on Monday, Trump took up the matter again.

"Pfizer & others should be ashamed that they have raised drug prices for no reason," he tweeted. "They are merely taking advantage of the poor & others unable to defend themselves."

Donald J. Trump
✔@realDonaldTrump




Just talked with Pfizer CEO and @SecAzar on our drug pricing blueprint. Pfizer is rolling back price hikes, so American patients don’t pay more. We applaud Pfizer for this decision and hope other companies do the same. Great news for the American people!

Speaking with CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Tuesday, Azar called the company's decision "constructive, professional [and] appropriate."

Pfizer is far from alone in raising pharmaceutical prices this year. Manufacturers increased the cost of 104 drugs in June and the first two days of July alone, according to a Wells Fargo Securities report.
And while Pfizer agreed to temporarily halt its July increase, it did not roll back the price hikes it implemented early this year on popular medications like Viagra, Lipitor, Xanax and Chantix.
The list price for Viagra, for example, was $1,846 for 30 pills last year, but then Pfizer raised it 9.44% on January 1 to $2,021. The July 1 hike brought it to $2,211. Tuesday's move will take it back down to $2,021.

Some industry experts were not impressed with Pfizer's move, since it only temporarily delayed the most recent price hike. Calling it a "nice gesture," Stephen Schondelmeyer, a drug price expert at the University of Minnesota, questioned whether the company would reverse earlier increases or forgo future ones.

It also remains to be seen whether the move by Pfizer, one of the nation's largest drug maker, will prompt its peers to do the same.

https://money.cnn.com/2018/07/10/new...red/index.html

Originally Posted by happynz

The Hammonds started the fires to try and cover up their illegal poaching on public lands.

Good grief, Mark. Try not being a tiresome lunkhead.

Cattle ranching in Harney County predates the 1908 establishment of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, with some cattle trails, including those used by the Hammond family, dating back to the 1870s

In 1999 Steven started a fire, intending to burn off juniper trees and sagebrush, (and cover up deer hunting) but the fire escaped onto BLM land.

During a break in jury deliberations, partial verdict were rendered finding the Hammonds not guilty on two of the charges, but convicting them on two counts of arson on federal land.[20] Striking a plea bargain, in order to have the four remaining charges dismissed and for sentences on the two convictions to run concurrently, the Hammonds waived their rights to appeal their convictions.

U.S. District Judge Michael Robert Hogan independently decided that sentences of that length "would shock the conscience" and would violate the constitutional prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. On his last day on the bench before retiring, October 31, 2012, Hogan instead sentenced Dwight Hammond to three months' imprisonment and Steven Hammond to a year and a day's imprisonment, which both men served

US Attorney Amanda Marshall successfully appealed the sentence to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. It upheld the mandatory-minimum law, writing that "given the seriousness of arson, a five-year sentence is not grossly disproportionate to the offense." The court vacated the original sentence and remanded for re-sentencing. The Hammonds filed petitions for certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court, which the court denied in March 2015.[22][25] In October 2015, Chief Judge Ann Aiken re-sentenced the pair to five years in prison (with credit for time served), ordering that they return to prison on January 4, 2016.[25][29]

NO post would be complete without the love interest and intrigue and crazy conduct of Federal officials and this one is no exception.

In March 2015, Amanda Marshall announced she was taking a leave of absence for health-related reasons. A subsequent inquiry by Willamette Week found she had been suspended by the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) pending investigation she had been in a romantic relationship with a co-worker. Media reports in The Oregonian and Willamette Week claimed that Marshall had been sending numerous text messages and emails to a federal prosecutor under police protection due to threats against his life from the Mexican Mafia. The reports also incorrectly alleged Marshall had been following the prosecutor and his bodyguards outside of working hours.^[11] The U.S. Department of Justice later released the full report from the investigation indicated that news reports from Willamette Week were misleading and that Marshall had had an affair with a subordinate in an on again off again nature for over a year. According to Willamette Week, the incidents had been an open secret in Portland, Oregon, for some time; its discovery by DOJ officials in Washington, D.C., prompted the suspension of Marshall and revocation of her security clearance. The following month, Marshall resigned citing unspecified health issues. According to Marshall, she had been receiving treatment for her unspecified health issues but "it was not sufficient."^[12][13]

In March of 2018 the Oregon Bar Association and former U.S. Attorney Amanda Marshall reached an agreement in which her law license was suspended for 90 days followed by 2 years of probation for lying to investigators during the investigation of the misconduct charges against her. During her probation Marshall agreed to see a mental health care professional.

Note to non Americans from NZ. Why would you care? It was a complicated issue and the farmers and ranchers in Oregon know all about it and have taken care of it. What momma said holds true in this case. Mind your own knitting. I don't attempt to decide complicated tribal issues in some little obscure country in the Pacific region now do I?

Originally Posted by bsnub

As usual it is you who proves to be misinformed. Stop getting your information from poisoned propaganda sources like brietbart. You are a classic example of a brainwashed lemming.

You are repedative bore,please come up with something new to call me.

So were the two ranchers ever charged with covering up a crime seen,illegal deer hunting,or were they just accused. Seems as though never charged only accusation,why if there were credible witnesses were they never formally charged and convicted,seems a lot like the accusations of the US government that the protester assasinated by federal agents pulling a pistol on them before they opened fire. To me none of this holds water.

Has anyone here ever tasted corn fed venison? The ranchers in the West feed deer corn from the crops they grow on their land. When they want a deer they kill one and eat it. Same as when they want a steak they kill a steer and eat it. Some towns have freezers to store the whole deer/elk and when the hunters come up from the South they sell the deer to the hunters who spend hunting time in brothels and casinos and bars rather than tramping around in the woods. I only mention this in case there is a discussion of illegal hunting in the Pacific North West. Hunters and Ranchers have always been at odds over many issues but that is a question better decided locally. There are more deer in the USA now than at anytime in the history of the American continent including colonial times when governed by the British. Lest you think Bambi is an endangered species it is now thriving in the USA.

If you have been following the thread you will know this issue is the reason the whole thing started, that is a conflict between hunters and ranchers. If you have not been following the thread or know nothing about the trials why post?

Originally Posted by RPETER65

Get over the English you really are beating a dead horse

This is an English language forum, it's fair to expect posters on it to use intelligible English.

Your English is not. It's fucking atrocious. Frankly, as a native speaker, you ought to be ashamed of yourself and that you aren't and clearly have no interest in improving yourself doesn't say much for either your intellect or capacity as a person.

Originally Posted by RPETER65

I on the other hand live not to far from their ranch I am also friends of people who live in the immediate area,I am much better informed than you.

Oh yeah, well my next door neighbors dog is best friends with my cousins Aunt who lives on the ranch and last week she emailed me regarding rhubarb recipes.

So I'm far more intimately acquainted with the facts than you.