Did EpiPen Inject Crony Capitalism into Drug Price Gouging?

There has been an uproar over the exposure of Mylan Pharmaceutical raising the cost of EpiPens over 500% since the company acquired rights for the drug in 2007. These anti-anaphalaxis injection devices spiked to a cost of $600 for a two pack, prompting an exasperated mother to exclaim that her family no longer had a college fund but were saving to pay for Epipens.

After a tremendous hue and cry from the public and calls from many in Congress to investigate EpiPen price gouging, Mylan tried to remedy the medical marketing mess.  First the big Dutch pharmaceutical  announced that low income (families of four making under $97,000) would have no out of pocket costs. When this did not quell the controversy, Mylan later announced that it would produce it's own generic which would cost half as much.

From a public policy perspective, it is worth considering if EpiPen is an example of how crony capitalism injects price gouging.

• Mylan's exclusivity was beginning to erode but the FDA blocked Teva Pharmaceutical's generic alternative by requesting more data.  In addition, Sanofi Pharmaceutical withdrew Auvi-Q because of dosing concerns.  So EpiPen had a virtual monopoly thru 2017
• Under the School Access to Emergency Epinephrine Law (2013), the federal government offers  states a financial incentive for schools to stock EpiPens.,
• Mylan's CEO Heather Bresch is the daughter of West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV), who has been conspicuously silent about the EpiPen outrage
• Mylan Pharmaceuticals has been a significant foreign corporate contributor to the Clinton Foundation and has partnered with the Clinton Foundation since 2009.

One of the consequences of Obamacare is that many heath insurance consumers are being forced into high deductible health plans, meant that consumers could not qualify for volume formulary discounts. 

More and more it seems that there is a nexus between requiring Americans under Obamacare into having high deductible insurance and pharmaceutical profits. 

The only remedies seem to be public outrage aimed at the District of Calamity to alleviate outrages or wait for a total collapse of the Obamacare insurance system.

Obama's Leverage with Iran?

After months of claiming that the Iran Nuclear Deal was on a separate track to the negotiations with Tehran about the four American hostages, now the Obama White House takes a different tact.

The ironically named Obama White House Spokesman Josh Earnest does not deny that the $400 million in cash to Iran served as leverage to release the hostages.

It is telling that now the Obama White House is wearing weakness with the Islamic Republic of Iran as a badge of honor of keeping the "peace", getting deals done and allegedly saving American taxpayers money. 

Yet it seems that President Obama has things inverted, as hostages and cooperating to participate in farcical Farsi conceits seemed to be levers to get Mr. Obama to acquiesce to dumb demands which America will later regret