Cong. Hearings Loom: Pfizer, Halliburton

[Guest guest]

Halliburton I know is O/T - but hey, it's part of the article. This folks - is

how this all works. I'm hoping with a shift in power accountability can start

taking the forefront.

VERACARE <veracare@...> wrote:

From: " VERACARE " <veracare@...>

Subject: Cong. Hearings Loom: Pfizer, Halliburton

ALLIANCE FOR HUMAN RESEARCH PROTECTION (AHRP)

Promoting Openness, Full Disclosure, and Accountability

http://www.ahrp.org and http://ahrp.blogspot.com

FYI

Can it be that we will see a dozen (or so) pharmaceutical industry CEOs testify

under oath about their marketing drugs whose lethal effects they knew but

concealed?

Contact: Vera Hassner Sharav

212-595-8974

veracare@...

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601070 & sid=a8fyOQYvbFQ8 & refer=politics

Pfizer, Halliburton Grab Democrats as Hearings Loom

By D. Salant

Jan. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Pharmaceutical companies and Iraq war

contractors, both heavy Republican contributors, are among the

companies scrambling to hire lobbyists with Democratic ties as they

prepare for congressional investigative hearings next week.

Pfizer Inc., the world's biggest drugmaker, has hired the Glover Park

Group, whose partners include Joe Lockhart, a former spokesman for

President Bill Clinton, and Wolfson, a spokesman for Senator

Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. Roche Holding AG picked as

its lobbyist Clyburn, cousin of the House's third-ranking

Democrat, Jim Clyburn of South Carolina.

The increased hiring coincides with the Democratic congressional

sweep that has sent shudders through corporate boardrooms.

``No general counsel or CEO wants to have to explain to his board why

the company's name is appearing on the front page of a news article

in a scandal,'' said Nick Allard, a partner in the law and lobbying

firm of Patton Boggs LLP, which just landed military contractor

Halliburton Co. as a client. ``Firms and industry groups that have

not yet been represented are talking to firms all over town.''

Representative Henry Waxman, 67, the California Democrat who heads

the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, plans to hold

hearings beginning Feb. 6 on Iraq contractors. The committee has

asked executives from Halliburton to testify.

The Cheney Connection

Halliburton, a Houston-based oilfield services company once headed by

Vice President Dick Cheney, gave 92 percent of its political-action

committee contributions to Republicans for the 2006 campaign,

according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington

research group.

The company's new firm, Patton Boggs, counts Democratic lobbyist

Boggs among its name partners. KBR Inc., a Halliburton unit,

hired the law and lobbying firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP,

whose partners include Democratic former House Speaker Foley.

``Halliburton retains firms with deep experience in the industry, on

Capitol Hill and in the administration to help us navigate the policy

arena,'' Norcross, a spokeswoman for Halliburton and KBR,

said in an e-mailed comment.

Lobbyists with Washington experience are considered particularly

valuable when chief executive officers face nationally televised

hearings. Waxman presided over one of the most famous on April 14,

1994, when seven tobacco- industry CEOs testified that they didn't

add nicotine to their cigarettes.

Raising the Stakes

Public hearings raise the stakes for corporations, said Mark

Paoletta, a lawyer who helped run investigations for the House Energy

and Commerce Committee when Republicans were in control. ``The

company has a much larger risk with respect to its reputation'' than

in civil litigation that can be resolved away from the public glare, he

said.

Some Republican lobbyists are also benefiting from the increased

congressional attention. Paoletta and another Energy and Commerce

lawyer, Snowdon, just joined the Washington office of lobbying

and law firm Dickstein Shapiro LLP.

Mark Corallo and Barbara Comstock, two former Justice Department

officials who have formed their own lobbying firm in andria,

Virginia, are talking to representatives of oil and drug companies.

One of the pair's new clients, security firm Blackwater USA of

Moyock, North Carolina, is scheduled to testify next week before

Waxman's committee, Corallo said. The panel is probing possible waste

and fraud in Iraq war contracts.

`Congressional Crosshairs'

``When we realized that the political winds were blowing the other

way, we understood there would be a market,'' said Corallo. Companies

that ``escaped oversight'' for more than a decade ``are going to find

themselves in the congressional crosshairs,'' he said.

The pharmaceutical industry, which the Center for Responsive Politics

says gave 68 percent of its 2006 campaign gifts to Republicans, may

be the biggest target for investigators. The House voted Jan. 12 to

require the Medicare program, which provides health care for the

elderly and disabled, to negotiate prices with drug companies; five

congressional committees plan hearings into industry practices,

including the generic-drug approval process and drug safety.

Fitzhenry, a spokesman for New York-based Pfizer, and Glover

Park partner , a former Clinton administration and Senate

Democratic staff member, said the group has handled a number of

assignments for the drugmaker for about two years.

First Registration

This year marks the first time Glover Park has registered as the

company's lobbyists, congressional filings show. said the

firm registered `` when it became evident that the inside role was to

require outside contacts'' on legislative matters. Lockhart and

Wolfson, the Glover Park partners, aren't listed on congressional

forms as the firm's lobbyists for Pfizer.

Clyburn didn't return phone calls seeking comment. Roche,

based in Basel, Switzerland, had no immediate comment when asked

about the investigations.

Thousand Oaks, California-based Amgen Inc., the world's largest

biotechnology company, hired two firms in the last two months,

congressional filings show. ``It certainly is a different political

landscape,'' Amgen spokeswoman Kelley Davenport said.

Amgen's new lobbyists include the Duberstein Group, led by

Duberstein, former chief of staff to President Reagan, and

Berman, a veteran Democratic political operative. The company

also hired Lent, Scrivner & Roth LLC, whose partners include former

Republican Representative Norman Lent of New York and Alan Roth,

staff director of the House Energy and Commerce Committee when it was

previously under Democratic control.

Republican Lobbyist

Another Washington law firm, Venable LLP, brought in Shepherd

III, a Republican who is former chief counsel to the Senate Homeland

Security and Governmental Affairs investigations subcommittee, to run

its new congressional-investigation group. Birch Bayh, a former

Democratic senator from Indiana, is a partner at the firm.

Venable's new clients include London-based drugmaker AstraZeneca PLC,

maker of Crestor, the fastest-growing cholesterol medicine.

``In the era of instant news, even the threat of a congressional

investigation can impact a company's brand, reputation, and, just as

importantly, its bottom line,'' said Gloria Dittus, head of Dittus

Communications, a Washington-based public-affairs firm.

----------

To contact the reporter on this story: D. Salant in

Washington at jsalant@... .

Last Updated: January 31, 2007 09:41 EST

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