“This is another case of Washington ramming something down our throats.”

Fantastic choice of words! Thank you for that, Sarah.

This reminds of the old joke when Richard Nixon was President. It involved the film Deep Throat, his having seen it several times, to make certain he got it down Pat.

Why are we giving Viagra to sex offenders?

And her name is Steelman. This has the potential for so many more bad jokes….

Wow Tony, you have reached an all time low in my book. She votes for a medicaid bill with federal mandates in it, and you still manage to twist it so it looks bad. Viagra was on that bill because of D.C. Are you ever going to be a real reporter?

This vote was to benefit Pfizer, not little old men with a hitch in their “giddy-up”. You can’t get any more Republican than helping the pharmacueticals.

“Hard fought” … “ramming something down our throats” … “planted its own flag” …

So many double entendres and such embarrassing nonsense from both Steelman and Hulshof. The GOP is really pulling a boner on this issue.

Yeah Garrison those hated drug companies that develop medicines to allow people to live longer and overcome a laundry list of diseases. I sure hate them.

The problem with the pharmaceutical companies is that they have become so focused on life-style drugs like viagra because these are the “money-makers”.

Of course PHARMA trots out immediately to say that these subsidize the other drugs such as flu vaccines and other catastrohpic disease drugs.

Given the money orientation of the drug companies now, I doubt seriously if Salk and Sabin would have been able to come up with their polio vaccines. They probably would have had to work on an acid reflux medicine.

Still, we need to forward the Steelman-Hulshof Viagra story as written to Jay Leno.

Looney…I didn’t know 4 hour erections made you live longer?
Unnecessary prescription drugs are the fastest growing part of this nations health care bill. Pharmaceuticals spend more on marketing than research. Many drugs have a 1000% mark-up price. The deadly Vioxx drug continued to be prescribed by doctors who had a vested interests even after the recall….Addictive Prilosec made Merck $5 billion in 2004. AstaZenaca paid $280 million in civil penalities and $63 million in criminal penalities to the federal government after the company paid kickbacks to doctors and coached hospitals how to cheat Medicare…

The pharmaceutical lobby gave the Republican National Committee (Pacs) over $14 million to congressional candidates just in 2006. More than twice the amount they gave Democrats….I wonder why? Ask Hulshof.

You mean those “hated” drug companies Looney?

Wow….. on the same day that Jay Nixon is sandbagging in Hannibal the Republican candidates are arguing over Viagra. Do Steelman & Hulshof honestly think that’s how to best serve the people of Missouri?!?! Unbelievable…..

demgal, you can bet your last dollar that Nixon didn’t spend more than a little while sandbagging.

Garrison, How about the numerous drugs developed to fight cancer, high blood pressure, AIDS, or to provide you your estrogen replacement. Those don’t count, huh?

Here’s a few points for the ignoramuses who are bashing pharma companies here:

1. Viagra was initially studied for use in hypertension and angina pectoris (related to heart disease).

2. While it is certainly true that drugs are the fastest growing portion of healthcare spending, how do you figure your comment on “unnecessary drugs”? Drugs are prescribed by physicians, who, with rare exception, have a medical basis for doing so. Unnecessary prescriptions should, in fact, be extremely rare.

3. I had a friend with debilitating arthritis (had to give up a career as a reporter for a major newspaper) who took Vioxx before it was withdrawn. She was VERY upset that it was withdrawn - it was the only thing on the market worked for her. To her, the small risk of a heart attack was worth the relief of constant pain. But the trial lawyers make it impossible for people to make such decisions.

4. Garrison - Of course the drug companies give money to politicians, that industry is very regulated. Actually, though, $16 million isn’t that much. How much do you think labor unions have given to the Democrats?

The fact is that people live longer and better than ever before because of advances in modern medicine. And pharmaceutical products play a large role in that advance. If you lefties want to live without the products of evil companies like Merck and Pfizer, it’s fine with me … there’ll be that many fewer liberals in the world.

Lawd knows it would take more than Viagra to lend substance to these two flaccid, foolish mediocrities. Can’t the MO GOP do any better?

Nick -
I am not one who wants people who truly need medicines that help to alleviate their pain, or reduce their cholesterol levels, or reduce the likelihood of heart attack or stroke.

My main point is that the pharmaceutical companies over the past 20 years have been chasing more after the “money making” drugs, than researching medicines which may actually help a greater number of people. The whole debacle around the HIV medicines costing more in the US than just about anywhere else in the world caused needless suffering.

My thought would be that any university medical research facility that comes up with a vaccine or drug (along the line of the Salk/Sabin vaccine) be granted the patent license to help fund further research. Imagine if the competition for the HIV vaccine or cholera or malaria or dengue fever, etc. were to be between major universities around the world.

We could do this in the US with a “President’s” prize to be awarded to the US university coming up with one of the above.

No, there has to be something more important than poor health issues due to overeating and smoking and wanting to have an erection like you did when you were 18.