Parties for the Parrots!!

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Remember those Republicans and Democrats who took Roche/Genentech’s script and inserted it, barely touched, into the Congressional Record?

It will surprise none of you that there were parties involved.

Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) was scheduled to attend a breakfast fundraiser at the Phoenix Park Hotel on May 7.  The event was hosted by lobbyists David Jones and former Senate Finance Committee staff director James Gould, who count Roche as clients.

Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX) held a fundraising breakfast at Bistro Bis on September 17. Lobbyist hosts included Darin Gardner and Anna Sagely, who lobby exclusively for Hoffman-La Roche,  as well as lobbyists Mat Lapinski, Chris Myrick, and Christine Pellerin, who have Roche on their client lists.

Darin Gardner and Christine Pellerin, legislative assistant to former Congressman Henry Bonilla (R-TX), also hosted Rep. Mike Conaway (R-TX) for breakfast at Bistro Bis, also in May of this year.

Finally, Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) held a cocktails and cigars fundraiser for Women Impacting the Nation, a project of her leadership committee Common Sense Common Solutions, on September 21. More than two dozen lobbyists hosted the event, four of whom represent Roche:  Darin Gardner, Christine Pellerin, Anna Sageley and Mat Lapinkski–the same lobbyists responsible for the Conaway and Poe events.

The same post notes that Roche/Genentech has hosted parties for 26 members of Congress since their merger in March.

This Congressing thing sounds like great fun! You get invited to all sorts of swell parties, people shower you with money, and they even do your homework for you. A lark! So long as you don’t care about people suffering.

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24 replies
    • BoxTurtle says:

      You’d flip ’em the bird, eh? :-)

      The very least a congresscritter can do with that office budget we give ’em is hire their own speechwriters!

      Boxturtle (Have any of the parrots had comments written for them yet?)

  2. skdadl says:

    EW got twice as many links as the NYT! Good goin’, EW.

    For some reason, those lists have left me with an overwhelming desire to make French toast with maple syrup and bacon for supper.

  3. bmaz says:

    You people up there in the Great White North general area keep talking about yer flapjacks, syrup and other fun food. Drives me nuts; all I gots is dried cactus spines…..

  4. bmaz says:

    I guess Ross is going to make a tidy profit on this deal. Jeebus:

    Bucking a trend in the car manufacturer exodus from Formula One, Daimler announced Monday that it would buy a controlling interest in the reigning world champion Brawn team and race under the name Mercedes Grand Prix next season.

    The German car manufacturer, which is buying the team in a joint deal with an Abu Dhabi investment company, also announced that it would sell back its 40 percent ownership of the McLaren team to that team, ending a 10-year partnership. But it will continue to provide engines to McLaren, which it is has powered since 1995 and with which it has won four world titles with since 1998.

    Daimler said the company was buying 75.1 percent of the team with Aabar Investments, which is based in Abu Dhabi and is the largest shareholder in Daimler. Daimler will take 45.1 percent of the team, Aabar will take 30 percent, and the remaining 24.9 percent will remain with the team’s current owners.

    • skdadl says:

      Srsly? Well, if it were up to me, you could stay indefinitely, but I have to warn you that we have some nasties running the show these days — you wouldn’t like them, although you would recognize them.

  8. dugsdale says:

    In all seriousness, we have GOT to have public elections in this country. I enjoy calling them stooges & parrots & stuff too, but the fund-raising pressure on these guys is just huge, and the lobbyists know it.

    The struggle for a sickly, ineffective public option has been monumental (at least it feels like it, and the jury’s still out on whether even the weak tea we’re fighting over will make it into the final bill).

    The struggle to get corporate money out of politics will be even bigger, and it’s just possible that the future of our democracy depends on it.

    On another note: Bmaz, what’s on your automotive reading list to keep up with stuff like you mentioned?

    • Bluetoe2 says:

      That could be a reality by the time of your great great great grandchildren but unlikely in the foreseeable future. A system so corrupt and ossified is incapable of reforming itself. Look at Russia in the early 20th Century or China of the 30′-40’s.

  13. freepatriot says:

    JEBUS

    parrot sketches an crazy pete letters ???

    and what the hell kind of topical control is this ???

    Bilichik has a brain fart, and this place goes to shit

    this thread is all over the fookin map

    how am I supposed to hijack disorganized comments and retread python skits ???

    btw, I recommend the Norwegian Blue

    jes sayin

    (duckin & runnin)

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