In a big win for the pharmaceutical industry, the Senate on Tuesday killed legislation that would have made it easier for Americans to buy their prescription drugs from abroad, where prices are generally much cheaper.

The final tally was 51 to 48, nine shy of the supporters needed to overcome a filibuster. Thirty Democrats and Independent Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut voted to kill the provision. Both Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin and Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley voted in favor of the measure.

The amendment, sponsored by Sens. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, has been a week-long thorn in the side of Democratic leaders — not because they opposed the provision, but because it threatened to undermine a deal cut earlier in the year between the White House and the nation’s pharmaceutical companies. Under that agreement, the drug makers pledged up to $80 billion toward health-care reform over the next decade if Democratic leaders would withhold their support for several proposals that would cut further into the companies’ profits, including the drug re-importation provision. As a result, White House officials in recent days had urged Democrats to oppose the Dorgan-Snowe amendment, with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) writing a letter to senators warning that the agency “does not have clear authority over foreign supply chains.”

Under the provision, Americans would be allowed to buy FDA-approved drugs from certain countries with well-established drug-safety regimes, such as Canada, Australia, Japan and those in Europe. Supporters say it will save U.S. consumers roughly $80 billion over the next decade. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the federal government would save an additional $20 billion over the same span, the result of savings to federally funded programs like Medicare.

The reason is clear: Americans pay more for pharmaceuticals than any other country in the world. Dorgan pointed out that the same Nexium prescription that costs $424 in the U.S. would cost just $67 in France, $40 in the United Kingdom, $37 in Germany and $36 in Spain.

“We shouldn’t be paying the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs,” Dorgan said. “I think it’s flat-out unfair.”

Grassley, who had signed on as a co-sponsor of the amendment, said its passage would mean the pharmaceutical industry “would no longer have free rein to force American consumers to pay more than their fair share of the high cost of research and development.” He also said he considers the idea a free-trade issue.

Opponents of drug re-importation argue (1) that there’s no good way to ensure that imported drugs are safe for American consumers, and (2) that the resulting loss in drug-maker revenues would curb the research conducted by those companies, leading to the discovery and development of fewer new innovative drugs.

Critics of the latter are quick to point out that the pharmaceutical industry is perennially among the most profitable. Indeed, last year it ranked third among all industries, reaping 19.3 cents in profits for every $1 in revenues, according to Fortune Magazine.

Senate lawmakers Tuesday also killed a weaker substitute to the Dorgan-Snowe amendment, sponsored by Sens. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., and Robert Menendez, D-N.J. Both argued that the Dorgan amendment simply wouldn’t guarantee that the imported drugs were safe. Strangely enough, both also voted in 2007 in favor of proceeding to a similar Dorgan-Snowe bill.

“It’s regressive,” Menendez said Tuesday. “It harkens back to a time when the lack of sufficient drug regulation allowed people to sell snake oil and magic elixirs that promised everything and did nothing.”

Critics in and out of the Capitol, however, say the substitute was so stringent that it will effectively prohibit drug importation. The AARP, which for years, has endorsed the Dorgan-Snowe amendment, argued that the Lautenberg-Menendez provision represents “a thinly veiled effort to undermine importation and preserve the status quo of high drug prices.”

The substitute amendment was shot down by a count of 56 to 43.

The debate proved difficult for President Barack Obama, who had endorsed reimportation on the campaign trail but was forced to change his tune this year for fear of losing the pharmaceutical lobby’s support for the underlying health-care reform bill.

“When you become president, you realize that the sound bites don’t always work in reality,” Ken Johnson, senior vice president of the Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America, told The Washington Post this week.

The money that the drug makers have pumped into Congress in recent months couldn’t have hurt their case. Indeed, the industry has contributed roughly $7.5 million to lawmakers this year, with 57 percent going to Democrats — up from 33 percent in the 2006 cycle, and 50 percent in the 2008 cycle – according to the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP).

In terms of lobbying, the dollar figures are even higher. CRP found that PhRMA, which represents the brand-name drug makers, has spent more than $20 million lobbying Congress this year alone.

“It’s really regrettable that the special interests prevail, and the power of the pharmaceutical lobby,” Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said Tuesday. “It’s not one of the most admirable chapters in the history of the United States Senate.”

Mike Lillis covers Congress for The Washington Independent, a Center for Independent Media site. ]]> http://iowaindependent.com/23813/drug-import-legislation-fails-in-senate/feed 0 http://iowaindependent.com/22855/health-care-primer-a-snapshot-of-the-toughest-fights-ahead http://iowaindependent.com/22855/health-care-primer-a-snapshot-of-the-toughest-fights-ahead#comments Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:23:57 +0000 Mike Lillis http://iowaindependent.com/?p=22855 Senate Democrats will return to Washington Monday to begin a long-awaited floor debate on the health-reform bill they hope to pass before Christmas. But it’s hardly the last battle they’ll be forced to wage on the health-care front.

As tough as the upper-chamber debate promises to be, many of the thorniest conflicts will likely be re-contested when Democratic leaders in both chambers meet, probably in January, to iron out the differences between their bills. The legislative disparities revolve around such high-profile topics as the public option and coverage of abortion, but also include lesser-noticed issues, like whether to honor a White House deal with the pharmaceutical industry and how to approach the Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Senate Republicans are also eyeing many of these hot-button issues, with hopes of using them to divide the Democrats in order to kill the larger bill. But with the considerable House-versus-Senate discrepancies awaiting conference negotiators, fending off opposition from Senate Republicans in the meantime could prove to be the least of the Democrats’ troubles as they attempt to pass the most consequential health-care reforms in generations.

Who Pays?

Chief among the differences between the Democrats’ bills is how each chamber has proposed to pay the considerable cost of covering tens-of-millions of uninsured Americans. The House pays the freight largely with a 5.4 percent tax on the nation’s highest earners — individuals making more than $500,000 per year, and families pulling in more than $1 million.

The Senate, on the other hand, has proposed an excise tax on the highest-cost insurance plans — those exceeding $8,500 for individual coverage and $23,000 for families. The Senate bill would also apply a 0.5 percent Medicare payroll tax to individuals earning more than $200,000 and families earning more than $250,000.

Liberals and labor unions have supported the House approach, arguing that an unprecedented tax on insurance plans would erode decades of work to secure comprehensive, employer-sponsored health-care coverage for workers. Conservatives, meanwhile, are warning that higher taxes on the wealthy will only exacerbate the nation’s economic troubles in the middle of an employment crisis.

Coverage vs. Care

Both the House and Senate bills rely heavily on a Medicaid expansion to cover the country’s poorest uninsured residents. The House would extend eligibility to 150 percent of the federal poverty level (net income), while Senate eligibility would expand to 133 percent of poverty (gross income).

The more significant difference, though, revolves around Medicaid reimbursement, which is so low in some states that many doctors and dentists now refuse to see Medicaid patients. The House bill recognizes the problem, bumping up Medicaid payments for primary care services to 100 percent of Medicare rates by 2012. Despite an effort to get similar language into the Senate legislation, a controversial funding proposal kept the provision out of the final bill.

The reimbursement increase doesn’t come cheap. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the provision would cost $28.7 billion over the next five years and $57 billion over the next 10.

Abortion

Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) lit a firestorm earlier in the month when he amended the House bill to prohibit abortion coverage under subsidized exchange plans. The Senate bill would also ban federal funding of abortions, but would allow women receiving exchange-plan subsidies to segregate their premiums and co-payments in order to access abortion services. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) has already said that he’ll offer the Stupak provision on the floor, though supporters will have the difficult task of rallying 60 votes to pass the measure.

Indeed, the Stupak provision is poised to cause more havoc in the House than the Senate, with some House liberals vowing to oppose the larger bill if the language survives the conference negotiations, while Stupak and other anti-abortion Democrats are hinging their support on the provision remaining intact. Satisfying both camps for the sake of the bill’s passage will likely require some delicate wording from Democratic leaders.

Illegal Immigrants

Both chambers propose to screen exchange-plan applicants to ensure that illegal immigrants don’t receive the federal subsidies available to those living below 400 percent of poverty. The Senate bill, however, goes a giant step further, proposing to exclude illegals from purchasing even unsubsidized insurance coverage on the exchange. That provision has riled a number of lawmakers and immigration advocates, who are wondering how allowing folks to buy insurance coverage from private companies with U.S. dollars could harm the country, fiscally or otherwise.

“It makes no sense for anybody,” said Jonathan Blazer, public policy attorney with the National Immigration Law Center. “Nobody’s willing to defend it on policy grounds.”

If the Senate language emerges from the conference negotiations, it will likely lead to a showdown with House members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, who early in the debate had threatened to vote against the House bill if it excluded illegal aliens from unsubsidized exchange coverage.

CHIP

Though largely unmentioned throughout the health reform debate, the House bill would terminate the Children’s Health Insurance Program at the end of 2013, shifting those kids into Medicaid or private plans on the exchange. House leaders — who had championed CHIP for the past 12 years — say their proposal will expand coverage by getting kids and parents under the same plan.

But some children’s health-care advocates have raised alarms over that strategy, arguing that the private plans will likely be more expensive, thereby discouraging low-income parents from getting their kids any coverage at all. And Sen. Jay Rockefeller agrees. The West Virginia Democrat — who successfully amended the Senate bill to reauthorize CHIP through 2019 — is vowing to fight to keep the program intact.

“Health care reform should improve the coverage children have,” he said, “not take their coverage away.”

Rockefeller, though, has been a lonely voice in support of preserving CHIP, leaving the ultimate fate of his amendment in question.

The Big Deal with Big Pharma

In June, Democratic leaders in the White House and Senate caused a stir when they announced a deal with the pharmaceutical lobby. Under that bargain, the drug companies promised $80 billion over the next decade to close Medicare’s drug-coverage gap (partially) if the lawmakers agreed to oppose efforts to empower states to negotiate drug prices for residents enrolled in both Medicare and Medicaid. The Senate bill keeps that agreement intact, with Finance Committee members shooting down an amendment allowing such price haggling for the sake of closing Medicare’s donut hole altogether.

House Democrats, on the other hand, have said all along that they weren’t a part of the discussions with the drug makers, and they don’t feel bound to any deal they never agreed to. As evidence, the House bill allows states to negotiate drug prices on behalf of their lowest-income seniors — a provision the CBO estimates would save more than $42 billion over the next decade.

The Public Option

At the heart of the debate over health-care reform this year has been the public option — a strategy, popular among liberals and consumer advocates, to create a public, non-profit insurance plan to compete with private companies. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) surprised many political observers last month when he proposed to create such state-based plans in the bill he weaved together from the different proposals passed by the Finance and health committees. Reid’s bill would empower the plans’ administrators to haggle directly with doctors, hospitals and other health-care providers over reimbursement rates, but it would also leave states the option not to participate.

The House bill is similar, but creates a national insurance option rather than numerous state-based plans. Additionally, the House bill doesn’t include the state opt-out language.

Unlike the other topics mentioned here, the toughest fight over the public option seems destined to occur on the Senate floor, rather than in conference. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) has repeatedly vowed to filibuster any bill that includes a public plan, whether it’s opt-out, opt-in, trigger-based, or any other configuration. Meanwhile, some upper-chamber liberals — including Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Roland Burris (D-Ill.) — are hinging their vote for the health reform package on the inclusion of a strong public option.

“This legislation cannot simply be a huge subsidy to private insurance companies that will get millions of new customers and be able to raise their rates as high as they want,” Sanders said in a statement last week. “I strongly suspect that there are number of senators, including myself, who would not support final passage without a strong public option.”

All of this, of course, could change. Although the House passed its health-care reform bill earlier in the month, the Senate proposal is just hitting the chamber floor today. The upper-chamber is expected to debate the measure through most of December, with hundreds of amendments likely to be offered from both sides of the aisle.

Democratic leaders hope to pass the bill out of the Senate before the holiday recess, pushing the conference negotiations to sometime in January. That 2010 is an election year won’t make those discussions any smoother.

Mike Lillis covers congress for The Washington Independent, a Center for Independent Media site.

The Respect for Marriage Act was introduced Tuesday by Reps. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Jared Polis (D-Colo.). The bill, which has 76 House sponsors, would also provide same-sex couples with federal benefits if they receive a marriage license in a state where same-sex marriage is legal. DOMA, signed by Bill Clinton in 1996, allows states to disregard same-sex marriages contracted in other states and bars federal recognition of those unions. It also prevents same-sex couples from filing their taxes jointly, from receiving spousal benefits under Social Security, from taking unpaid leave to care for a sick or injured spouse and from receiving employer-provided family health benefits without tax penalties.

Gay-rights group One Iowa is asking the Hawkeye State’s congressional delegation to support the measure.

Iowa passed a similar law in 1998, but the law was ruled unconstitutional in April by the Iowa Supreme Court. With that ruling, Iowa joined Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts and Connecticut in legalizing same-sex marriage. But because of the federal statute, same-sex couples are still being discriminated against, One Iowa said in a statement.

“Despite April’s unanimous ruling in favor of marriage equality in Iowa, many states continue to use DOMA as their model for discrimination,” the group said. “Repealing DOMA is critical to ensuring that ALL marriages are treated equally by the federal government, including those of same-sex couples in Iowa.”

U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley (D-Waterloo) took part in a congressional hearing about the future of the program Wednesday. Although Braley is hopeful that reauthorization of the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency (CARE) Act will receive bipartisan support as it has in the past, he acknowledges that the current political climate could pose a challenge.

“I have to be frank and tell you that, in light of what we saw happening over August and what we saw on the floor of the House [on Wednesday when President Obama delivered an address to a joint session of Congress], it would not surprise me if there was some partisan opposition,” Braley said by phone Thursday morning. “I’m hoping that the better angels of our nature will win over and we can have a meaningful discussion on the importance of the reauthorization.”

The Ryan White CARE Act, which funds basic care, treatment, education and support services related to HIV/AIDS, disbursed more than $2 billion to states, local governments and advocacy groups during each of the past three fiscal years. Advocates say the funding is indispensable to ensuring that patients with HIV/AIDS get the care they need.

Because distribution of funds through the program can be granted to programs that provide assistance across state boundaries, it is difficult to determine exactly how much funding makes it way directly to Iowans or Iowa-based programs. According to one estimate from the Kaiser Family Foundation, Iowa received roughly $4.5 million in assistance in fiscal year 2007:

The bulk of the money directed to Iowa goes toward helping patients access HIV/AIDS medications, promoting early intervention, and providing services in underserved areas. The 2006 reauthorization of the program required that 75 percent of the funds directed to a state under Part B are spent on core medical services (i.e., medications, ambulatory services, substance abuse treatment and behavioral health services), while the remaining 25 percent could be used for support services (i.e., respite care, outreach and medical transportation), unless the state receives a waiver.

Although no Iowans testified to Congress on the first day of hearings, Prof. Donna Sweet of the University of Kansas School of Medicine and chairwoman of the board of the American Academy of HIV Medicine in Washington, D.C., provided lawmakers an inside look at one Kansas program.

“The HIV Program KU Internal Medicine Midtown provides care and treatment to 1,246 patients as of today,” Sweet said. “Of these, 40 percent would have no coverage if it were not for the Ryan White CARE Act. We provide ongoing, comprehensive care to an ever-increasing number of patients, regardless of their ability to pay. My clinic has an average annual increase of 100 new patients a year — in Kansas, not New York or California. However, we are still working off the same number of Ryan White dollars we have received since 1999. To broadly paint the picture: In the last 10 years my clinic’s patient load has doubled, and my funding has remained the same.”

In order to keep the clinic afloat, Sweet reported that she and the staff have resorted to “Girl-Scout-styled fundraising.”

“There seems to be a commonly held belief that program cuts will only affect administrative functioning and that medical services for the sick will somehow always be available through Ryan White, or Medicaid or some other program; this is a false assumption,” she said.

If the program is not reauthorized, the Kansas facility as well as other programs throughout the nation will no longer have funds with which to operate. By Jan. 1, there would no longer be funds to provide services to 40 percent of the Kansas patients or make payroll for most staff members. In addition, there would no longer be money for case workers or for prescription assistance, a service that Sweet said is used by 80 percent of her patients.

“Over the past 20 years, HIV has become a highly manageable disease with proper care and treatment,” she said.

“Without the Ryan White Program, my clinic would have never been created. Without a timely reauthorization of Ryan White, it may cease to exist. Without my clinic, my patients will not receive the care they need to manage their disease. And without that care, the disease they live with every day may unnecessarily and prematurely claim their lives.”

Braley said, despite partisan challenges and the heated health care debate before Congress, he believes that the program will ultimately be reauthorized.

“The problems that led to the passage of the Ryan White Act have not changed,” he said. “We still have significant needs in the areas of AIDS awareness and prevention, and that’s why I’m confident the bill will be reauthorized.”

On a conference call with reporters on Thursday, U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley (D-Waterloo) ticked off a massive list of meetings and discussions that have been held in Washington to ensure that “meaningful reform” of reimbursement rates does not get lost in the back-and-forths between Republicans and Democrats, between the House and the Senate, and between legislators and the White House.

“Even though there is a short window of time before the mark-up begins (on the health care reform bill), there has been a tremendous amount of activity on this subject,” Braley said.

One of the discussions held Wednesday in Washington included Braley and U.S. Reps. Leonard Boswell and Dave Loebsack, Iowa’s two other congressional Democrats. Braley said the three lawmakers have drafted a plan to tackle the problem together.

But they may face an uphill battle. Because members of the U.S. House are elected according to population, and because the existing reimbursement rates tend to benefit more densely populated parts of the country, the push to reform that part of the health care system could prove difficult.

U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley

“Being outnumbered has been a problem for a long time,” Braley said in response to a question from the Iowa Independent. “If you look at how long Iowa senators and representatives have been trying to change this dynamic, you know it is not because of lack of trying that this system has been allowed to exist. But this is also a game-changing opportunity — a once in a lifetime opportunity — to change the way we provide health care and how we expand the availability of health care coverage to the nearly 50 million Americans without it. That’s why we are working so hard to build coalitions.

“In order to get these bills passed out of each committee of jurisdiction, there is going to be a minimal amount of votes required to pass. And if we can bring enough leverage to the table to insist upon more meaningful reform, I think that we have an opportunity to shape these bills when they come out of each of these committees — that includes Energy and Commerce, Ways and Means, and Education and Labor,” Braley said, adding: “Even if we are not successful in that setting, the continued pushing of this issue within the caucus has certainly caught the attention of leadership, and bringing about a full and informed debate on this subject for the first time in a long time.”

Boswell, who was elected to Congress in 1996, is also acutely aware of the difficulty of changing the current Medicare reimbursement regime, which seems to value quantity of services more than quality.

“For years now, through the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations, I have taken my concerns for Medicare to our nation’s leaders,” Boswell said. “The opportunity to reform health care is before us, but this bill must include improved payments for hospitals and providers. Congress should not mass a bill that will simply perpetuate the problems our nation is attempting to remedy.”

U.S. Rep. Leonard Boswell

Both Boswell and Braley said that changing the existing formula would not only give rural states like Iowa a fairer shake, but that it would help to eliminate wasteful spending and incentivize higher-quality, more efficient care nationwide.

“We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to transform our health care system by rewarding providers who consistently achieve good outcomes at a reasonable cost … to change the flawed reimbursement formulas that penalize doctors and hospitals in states like Iowa, who consistently rank at the top in quality of care and at the bottom in Medicare reimbursement rates,” Boswell said.

Braley said he shares that sentiment and sees some hope for a solution soon. “I think we are making some progress in highlighting an issue that has too long promoted waste in the system and led to less-than-desirable outcomes,” he said. “I believe we are going to have a very full and frank discussion about how we bring about meaningful health care reform and also how we change the way we pay for it.”

As the saying goes, once elected, a member of Congress must raise $10,000 a week to get re-elected. It sounds like hard work, but it doesn’t always have to be.

The nonprofit Sunlight Foundation, which was founded with the goal of increasing transparency in the United States Congress, has tracked down invitations to many of the exclusive get togethers that help fill a member of Congress’ campaign coffers and posted them on PoliticalPartyTime.org for the public to see. It’s surely not an exhaustive list, since the group relies on tipsters sending in their invites. But it does offer a glimpse of the D.C. lives of the Hawkeye State’s congressional team.

The most prolific party host in Iowa’s delegation, according to the Sunlight Foundation, is Fourth District Republican Rep. Tom Latham. He has started hosting his own “Supper Club” every month at different D.C. hotspots. The parties are limited to 10 attendees and feature a different special guest each month, which so far include congressmen from Kentucky, Georgia and California. To attend this months’ event, scheduled for Wednesday night at the ritzy Oceanaire Seafood Room in downtown D.C., will cost $2,500 per PAC and $1,500 for individuals. Latham will also host a golf outing to raise money for North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr and Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss on July 17.

Next up is Third District Democratic Rep. Leonard Boswell. The six-term incumbent has not always been the best fundraiser, a fact that landed him a spot on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “Frontline Program,” which seeks to protect incumbents in potentially vulnerable districts by assisting with organizing and fundraising. Boswell has hosted two fundraising party’s this year at the National Democratic Club Townhouse in D.C., with another scheduled June 3 that could cost as much as $5,000 to attend.

First District Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley has hosted two parties this year, with the last on April 29 at Johnny’s Half Shell in D.C. The “suggested” contribution for those who attend was $1,000. Braley, who this year earned himself a leadership position in the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, helped a fellow Democrat from Oregon raise money in March as part of a fundraiser titled “Comedy Bailout: CEO’s get in Scot-free.”

Second District Democrat Dave Loebsack has hosted two parties in 2009, with a third scheduled for June 16 at the National Democratic Club Townhouse in D.C. Expected contributions range from $500 to $5,000.

Fifth District Republican Steve King hasn’t hosted a D.C. party since September. Before that it was July.

“There are no earmarks in this bill — none,” Braley said during a conference call with reporters.

“I have people come up to me all the time to talk about supposed earmarks that are in the bill. I had a gentleman who told me that there was millions of dollars in the bill that we passed in the [U.S.] House to buy snow-blowers for Minnesota. There were none. So, it is very important for taxpayers and U.S. citizens to separate fact from fiction.”

When asked to name the source of such misinformation, Braley said, “I have no idea where this stuff comes from. I do think it is perpetuated by right-wing talk-radio hosts, who make things up and get it out into the mainstream media, and then it becomes accepted as fact. My office and I deal with these types of of myths everyday. They just aren’t true.”

Braley, a Democrat who represents Iowa’s 1st District, said he will support the bill which has come out of conference despite his disappointment in some aspects of the allotted funding. His support is largely due to the latest White House figures that show employment impact for Iowa at 37,000 new jobs — 6,600 of those in the 1st District.

“I’m going to support the bill because I believe it is absolutely essential given the dire economic circumstance we find ourselves in,” he said.

Braley would have preferred the bill include additional funding for school construction. He is also disappointed with the $100 reduction in tax cuts for working families.

It’s only anecdotal evidence, but Romney earned the Iowa Straw Poll votes of at least two indisputably devout Catholics Saturday. As the band The Nadas, flanked by their Templeton Rye touring bus, entertained Romney’s army of yellow-T-shirted supporters, Sisters Lucilla Oberbroeckling and Blanche Marie Haag of Dubuque sat under the edge of the Massachusetts Mormon’s tent, eating his cookies and barbeque and wearing his campaign shirts over their habits. Oh, and they voted for the Mormon, too.

“I think he’s a good family man and he’s pro-life and he wants to get rid of the illegal aliens,” Sister Oberbroeckling told Iowa Independent.

Over near the entrance to Ames’ Hilton Coliseum, GOP volunteer Hubert Hagemann, a Carroll County farmer known for asking pointed questions on property taxes and ag issues to anyone running for anything in western Iowa, helped credential members of the media (and declined entrance to a member of Newt’s family who didn’t have proper papers). He also found time to cast his straw poll vote for Romney.

“I like his style,” Hagemann said. “I guess I think of all of them he will be the most electable in November.”

Hagemann, who hails from one of the most historically Catholic counties in Iowa, one with landmark churches and family trees full of sisters who take the term to work, too, doesn’t think the Mormon matter is much of an issue.

“No, I don’t,” Hagemann said. “We’re just going through the same thing we did a number of years ago with John F. Kennedy.”

The idea of having a president with a different faith doesn’t concern Republicans like Hagemann as having one who puts her pant-suits on one leg at a time. “I’d rather we have him in there than Hillary,” Hagemann said.