Perry has deep financial ties to maker of HPV vaccine

The Washington Post ^ | 09/13/2011 | Dan Eggen

[Rational Thought]

Texas Gov. Rick Perry bristled at accusations during Monday’s GOP debate that he had done the bidding of a corporate donor by ordering schoolgirls to use a new vaccine.

“The company was Merck, and it was a $5,000 contribution that I had received from them,” Perry said. “I raised about $30 million.

(snip)

But campaign disclosure records portray a much deeper financial connection with Merck than Perry’s remarks would suggest.

Perry’s gubernatorial campaign, for example, received nearly $30,000 from the drugmaker since 2000, most of it prior to his decision in 2007 to order young girls to obtain Merck’s vaccine against the human papillomavirus, or HPV.

Merck has also given more than $355,000 in donations to the Republican Governors Association since 2006, which was the year that Perry began to play a prominent role in the Washington-based group, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics.

Perry served as chairman of the RGA in 2008 and again this year until he decided to run for president. The group also ranks among Perry’s biggest donors, giving the Texas governor’s campaign at least $4 million over the past five years, according to Texans for Public Justice.

(snip)

One of Perry’s closest confidantes, former chief of staff Mike Toomey, was working at the time as an Austin-based lobbyist for Merck, which was in the midst of a multimillion-dollar campaign to persuade states to make the vaccine mandatory.

Toomey, who has declined to respond to requests for comment, has since gone on to help found Make Us Great Again, a pro-Perry super PAC that can accept unlimited donations from corporations and wealthy donors. Media reports indicate that the group plans to raise as much as $55 million to help Perry win the GOP nomination

[familyop]

I’m actually in favor of shutting down government-funded education (along with all federal funding to local governments) and unreasonable taxes against oil companies. I’m also in favor of traditional family structure for all (not only for the elite), and would like to see fewer regulations and more manufacturing in the USA. Competition is healthy. That puts romantic/feminist/pathological/homosexual Republicans and Democrats both very much against my interests.

So let the default process continue, and we’ll see smaller government and the demolition of political correctness ahead after that. On to free technocracy, administered by us “Neanderthals.”

[familyop]

I’m actually in favor of shutting down government-funded education (along with all federal funding to local governments) and am against unreasonable taxes against oil companies. I’m also in favor of traditional family structure for all (not only for the elite), and would like to see fewer regulations and more manufacturing in the USA. Competition is healthy. That puts romantic/feminist/pathological/homosexual Republicans and Democrats both very much against my interests.

So let the default process continue, and we’ll see smaller government and the demolition of political correctness ahead after that. On to free technocracy, administered by us “Neanderthals.”

[Sioux-san]

I have a problem with it because it involves children who have parents who are supposed to be responsible for them. A sexually active promiscuous adult could benefit from Gardasil, so go get it. If Perry was just looking out for poor Texans with sexually promiscuous children (and not Merck), then God bless him...but he still tried to overstep parental authority/responsibility, which was wrong. The State knows what’s best for us all and can’t have parents interfering.