"The welfare of humanity is always the alibi of tyrants" - Albert Camus

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Scandal du Jour: Siga

You have got to give it to the Obama Administration; they have the uncanny ability to keep going without skipping a beat regardless of how many scandals rear their ugly heads!  (Well, it is not entirely them, of course; it is the media that sees to it that the majority of the public do not become aware of what kind of corruption and thuggery they are dealing with in Washington)

So, what is the scandal of the week, you might wonder?
Now that Fisker, Solyndra, Solexel, Sun Power, Evergreen, Mojave Solar, and god knows how many other scandalous crony relationships costing the taxpayer billions have been mostly swept under the rug, the scandal du jour is Siga.

Yes, another major Obama supporter is sailing in to the sunset with your tax dollars, America. 
As the L.A. Times reported:
Over the last year, the Obama administration has aggressively pushed a $433-million plan to buy an experimental smallpox drug, despite uncertainty over whether it is needed or will work.


Senior officials have taken unusual steps to secure the contract for New York-based Siga Technologies Inc., whose controlling shareholder is billionaire Ronald O. Perelman, one of the world’s richest men and a longtime Democratic Party donor. (emphasis mine)

When Siga complained that contracting specialists at the Department of Health and Human Services were resisting the company’s financial demands, senior officials replaced the government’s lead negotiator for the deal, interviews and documents show.

When Siga was in danger of losing its grip on the contract a year ago, the officials blocked other firms from competing.

Siga was awarded the final contract in May through a “sole-source” procurement in which it was the only company asked to submit a proposal. The contract calls for Siga to deliver 1.7 million doses of the drug for the nation’s biodefense stockpile. The price of approximately $255 per dose is well above what the government’s specialists had earlier said was reasonable, according to internal documents and interviews.
That is over $2.8 billion for a non-existent terror threat, which the country has more than enough doses of vaccines to counter.  Dr. Thomas M. Mack, an epidemiologist at USC who battled smallpox outbreaks in Pakistan and has advised the Food and Drug Administration on the virus called the plan to stockpile Siga's drug "a waste of time and a waste of money."  I call it outright fraud by this Administration.


I just wonder if there is a point where the media (en masse) will not be able to ignore these scandals anymore?  I believe that there is as much a chance of that happening as a jackal developing a sense of honor.

2 comments:

THE ANTI LIBERAL ZONE said...

That is how they do it. Just keep the scandals going so we get numb to it but the trouble is, WE ARE NOT GETIING NUMB to it, it is pissing us off!

Hardnox said...

Well said Gunny. Exactly right, we are pissed.