Who's minding the "minders?" (part one)

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A glimpse behind the FDA's tapestry of lies

Who's minding the "minders?" (part one)

Time for an update on what I consider one of the most telling and significant stories I've reported in the last year - one you've no doubt barely heard a peep about in the mainstream media until recently...

First, as usual, I want to give you a little background:

As you may recall, back in late May (Daily Doses, 5/28 and 5/30/2006) I wrote a 2-part essay series on Lester Crawford, the crooked leader of the FDA who was forced by a criminal investigation into financial conflicts of interest to step down from his post after less than three months on the job. That was back in September of 2005.

Also as part of that article series, I revealed the sordid back-room details behind his official confirmation as FDA chief after more than a year as acting head of the agency. The most critical of these: A hush-hush deal in which Crawford offered a regulatory carrot (a quick resolution to the hold-up of the "morning after" pill's approval for over-the-counter sales) in return for confirmatory votes from two Democratic Senators - one of them being darling-of-the-left Hilary Clinton...

My point in those essays was that regardless of how we feel about the purpose of any drug (abortion-in-a-pill contraceptives being just one example), such wheeling and dealing of approvals for confirmation votes simply should never happen. There's too much at stake from a public safety standpoint.

Pure, hard SCIENCE should dictate whether a medication gets approved, not politics.

But I digress. Now, more of the story behind the charges that toppled this corrupt leader has come to light - and it's finally getting some ink in the mainstream press. This is a good thing. The more Americans discover about the people they're electing to appoint and confirm heads of government agencies purportedly devoted to public safety (the FDA is just one of them), the more aware they'll be in coming elections of just how corrupt and utterly partial this entire process really is.

To show this more graphically, here's a rundown of some of this now-disgraced head of the FDA's crimes - and his deceptions about them.

According to recent Associated Press reports, Justice Department charging documents maintain that either Crawford himself or his spouse held or perpetrated the following, in direct violation of federal regulations prohibiting FDA bigwigs from owning stock in companies they significantly regulate:
$62,000 worth of PepsiCo's stock - even while Crawford chaired the FDA's Obesity Working Group, a body capable of forcing (or not forcing, more importantly) soda makers to enact stricter controls or post more visible calorie and obesity warnings...

$78,000 in Sysco stock, the mammoth restaurant and institutional packaged food supplier from Houston, Texas - even while his panel hobnobbed with luminaries from the packaged food industry and testified before Congress on issues relating to them...

Failed to disclose income from exercising stock options in Embrex, Inc., a company in which Crawford used to serve on the Board of Directors of - and one who's industry (agriculture biotech) falls directly under the FDA's purview...

Falsely reported in response to federal ethics questions that his (or his wife's) shares of personal care products maker Kimberly-Clark and other FDA-regulated companies had been sold off - when in fact either Crawford or his spouse maintained ownership of shares...
Bottom line: We all got fatter and more medicated while the head of the FDA grew a fatter wallet profiteering on industries he's able to manipulate!

Of course, Crawford is expected to strike a plea agreement in the case, according to the AP, Washington Post, and other sources. This deal will likely plead down his multiple federal offenses to a pair of misdemeanor counts - each of which could carry a maximum penalty of only a year in prison.

More likely still, he'll escape with a slap-on-the-wrist fine, which he'll pay out of the no doubt mega-dollar consulting job in the private sector he's already landed - with a lobbying firm, of course.

Figures, doesn't it?

In the next Daily Dose: A recap of the sinister bargain that installed this quack atop the FDA, plus the price we're paying for the back-room political deal that got him there...

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