{"id":1102,"date":"2019-09-18T13:45:35","date_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/?p=1102"},"modified":"2019-09-18T13:45:35","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:45:35","slug":"settlement-colors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/?p=1102","title":{"rendered":"Settlement Colors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Courtesy Associated Press<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Now that Purdue Pharma has filed for bankruptcy, I wonder if\nIdaho State Attorney General is smiling or wincing. Either way, he\u2019s shown\ncourage and conviction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Purdue Pharma famously produced Oxycontin, a powerful controlled-release\nnarcotic they marketed as a magic pain reliever that wouldn\u2019t lead to\naddiction. At least that\u2019s what I remember their well-dressed salesmen saying\nto me over an expensive catered lunch they provided for all our office staff.\nBut that was in the mid 1990\u2019s. As the body count started to climb in the early\n2000\u2019s they toned back their claims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But this drug made a lot of money for the Sackler family who\n100% own Purdue Pharma. The family net worth is estimated to be over $13\nBillion. And surprise, surprise, recently discovered documents have shown they\nhave hidden billions of assets in preparation for this planned bankruptcy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Purdue\/Sackler have already settled lawsuits with the\nfederal government and states for hundreds of millions. Indeed, some executives\nplead guilty to criminal charges in federal court for misleading advertising. But\na large group of states, municipalities, even tribal governments have signed\nonto a much larger suit that is pending. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Idaho AG Lawrence Wasden joined many other states just this\nlast June in suing Purdue Pharma. It\u2019s Wasden\u2019s second dance with the drug\ncompany in court. He (representing Idaho) was a co-complainant when Purdue\nsettled in 2007 for $19M. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wasden isn\u2019t just focused on Purdue. Idaho has filed\nlawsuits in Federal Court against many other opioid manufacturers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But now Purdue is declaring bankruptcy. Before they filed Sunday night, they offered to settle with the long list of states and entities suing them. It is interesting who agreed to settle and who didn\u2019t. One analyst painted<\/a> a map of the states that agreed and who refused. Idaho stands out as the only Red (Republican) state that refused. I can hear the \u201cRINO\u201d howls already echoing against Wasden. It won\u2019t be the first time. But Red- Blue is the wrong way to look at this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The analyst had some interesting conjecture on the\nrelationships between Republican AGs and a big-time lobbyist for Purdue. It\nseems Purdue contributed three times as much money to the national Republican\nAG Association ($680K) as they did the Dem AG Association ($210K). It\u2019s hard\nfor me to believe this colored their decisions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fundamentally, either Republican or Democratic, I believe an\nelected state Attorney General would want to pursue justice for their\nconstituents; color me naive. Maybe the AG\u2019s who settled were just being\npragmatic and figuring the pot would be reduced dramatically when the imminent\nbankruptcy was filed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, what was Wasden thinking? His only public comment was\nthat he did not believe the settlement was in the best interests of the people\nof the State of Idaho. Since we don\u2019t know all the details of the offers,\nindeed, we probably don\u2019t know where all the money is hidden, it\u2019s hard to\nsecond guess his decision. But he didn\u2019t take the easy off ramp. He\u2019s got a lot\nof work ahead of him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s tempting to look at the bottom line and just see what\nthe dollars would have been if a settlement had been taken compared to the\nroute AG Wasden has steered. \u201cWhat\u2019s in it for us?\u201d Such thinking is driven by\nself-interest, not justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is no doubt our state has suffered. Idaho\u2019s accidental\noverdose death rate has tripled since Oxycontin was rolled out. And there is no\ndoubt some people have profited greatly from that suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I blame Purdue Pharma\/ Sackler for misrepresenting their\nproduct. I blame my profession for falling for their lies. I blame patients for\nexpecting life to be without pain. But all this blame gives me little sense of\nwhere justice lies. I believe Lawrence Wasden has that sense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Now that Purdue Pharma has filed for bankruptcy, I wonder if Idaho State Attorney General is smiling or wincing. Either way, he\u2019s shown courage and conviction. Purdue Pharma famously produced Oxycontin, a powerful controlled-release narcotic they marketed as a magic … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1102"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1104,"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102\/revisions\/1104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}