Orrin Hatch’s charity a $170,000 pharm money runaround.
From The Raw Story:
A charity founded by a senior Republican lawmaker who was a key ally to the pharmaceutical industry received more than $170,000 in 2007 from drugmakers, far in excess of campaign finance rules had the money been donated to him directly, leaked documents show.
The senator, Orrin Hatch (R-UT), founded Utah Families Foundation, the recipient of the gifts, though he doesn’t serve on the foundation’s board. But his son is now the chief lobbyist for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), the industry’s lobbying group.
Hatch has received more money from the pharmaceutical industry than any other group, raking in $1.25 million since 1998. The latest sums, however, dwarf that of previous donations from individual corporations. In 2007, the foundation received $25,000 from Eli Lilly, $30,000 from Barr Pharmaceuticals, $25,000 from AstraZeneca and $40,000 from PhRMA.
I’ve been following to this smug, arrogant holy roller for many years, since he appeared on the national scene as one of Clinton’s Senatorial prosecutors during Monica Lewinsky. He’s developed a particular style that his constituents are obviously fooled by, but the rest of us are not. His strategy as always is to fein shock at a particular event-bill-action, present himself as an honest broker courtesy of his Mormon faith, and then follow the Republican line 100% of the way and become the obstruction that will not cease. He was the primary obstacle during the Clinton Administration regarding Supreme Court Appointments. It looks like he’s planning to do the same thing now.
He is a lobbyists wet dream. He’ll publicly express disdain for gambling, drinking and smoking, but gets a shitload of money from each lobby every year. He has publicly denounced homosexuality in the most unusual way (Slate):
Hatch was a more one-dimensional figure when he arrived in the senate almost 30 years ago. A fire-and-brimstone values crusader, he introduced a constitutional amendment to overturn Roe v. Wade and was prone to saying things like, “Democrats are the party of homosexuals.” In his early career, he routinely tallied one of the most conservative Senate voting records. His intensity rankled even his GOP colleagues, one of whom later admitted he thought Hatch was an egomaniac with an irritating “save-the-world complex.”
Appears to have supported polygamists, if not polygamy:
“I’m not here to justify polygamy,” Hatch said. “All I can say is, I know people in Hildale who are polygamists who are very fine people. You come and show me evidence of children being abused there and I’ll get involved. Bring the evidence to me.”
Now, it seems, some of the chickens have come home to roost. Just like Tom Delay, Newt Gingrich, Larry Craig and the other morally and financially corrupt Republican standard-bearers, the general public is getting wise to these guys.
Maybe, in private life, Hatch believes himself to be an honest, upstanding citizen working for the public good- and in 2007 he was - being one of the few Republicans backing CHIP (Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) Reauthorization Act) - but most of the time I’ve seen this right-wing shill his sanctimonious act just pisses me off to no end.
