"First it was Fast and Furious. Then there was Solyndra. Now get ready for the Smallpox scandal. Today's Los Angeles Times reports that the Obama Administration aggressively pushed through a no-bid $440 million contract to produce 1.7 million doses of smallpox vaccine.
The Times notes that smallpox was eradicated in 1978 and the U.S. already has "$1 billion worth of smallpox vaccine" at $3.00 a dose. But the drug to be produced under Obama's no-bid contract costs $255 a dose, and "cannot be tested for effectiveness in people because of ethical constraints -- and no one knows whether animal testing could prove it would work in humans."
So why was it approved? Surprise, surprise -- the company that won the bid is controlled by billionaire Ronald Perelman, a major Democrat Party donor.
Cronyism and corruption could be a major campaign theme in 2012. A new book out by Peter Schweizer of the Hoover Institution shows that fully 80% of grants made by the Obama Administration for "green jobs" projects have gone to companies "run by or primarily owned by Obama financial backers.""
Gary Bauer
Campaign for Working Families
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