MOsanthrope

Posted by Chris on March 13, 2006 at 2:37 pm.

Republican small business owners from Texas:

WASHINGTON, March 12 - Pharmacists say they have been losing money under Medicare’s new prescription drug benefit, and they have taken their concerns to the White House, forcing the administration to confront political problems caused by the rocky start of the program.

In a meeting last week with Karl Rove, the president’s senior adviser, the druggists said many independent pharmacies might have to shut their doors because they were not being paid adequately or promptly under Medicare. In the last two months, they said, pharmacists have given away millions of dollars’ worth of medications for which Medicare drug plans should have paid.

The pharmacists who visited the White House were all from Texas. Several have close ties to Mr. Rove and President Bush. But their concerns are shared by retail pharmacists across the country, who said that Medicare drug plans were paying them less than it cost to fill prescriptions for the beneficiaries.

* * *

“Most independent community pharmacists are small-business Republicans,” the report said. “Pharmacists want to be supportive of this administration, and they can play an active role in the midterm elections. But pharmacists need to be able to point to some corrective actions being taken by the administration.”

Never mind the fact that the President’s trillion dollar, deficit-funded handout to the pharmaceutical industry may bankrupt the country; do you think that your grandmother could pick up the phone and summon Karl Rove to a White House meeting to discuss her concerns about the program?

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