Bryson Pushes TennCare, Consults for Pfizer
Republican State Senator Jim Bryson appeared on Knoxville talk radio station WNOX-FM this past weekend to bash the Bredesen Administration and call for additional TennCare reform. Political observers will recall that Bryson, during the closing days of the 2005 legislative session, submitted a bill that would have sent tens of millions of dollars in additional taxpayer money to major drug companies. What Bryson failed to disclose is that his Nashville research firm, 20/20 Research Inc., counts among its clients Pfizer Inc., the nation’s largest drug maker. (Observers also will recall that former House Majority Leader Tre Hargett earlier this year flirted with a lobbying job with Pfizer after helping the company weaken the year’s most pivotal pharmaceutical-reform legislation.)
Meanwhile, Bryson also pledged to renew his efforts to import to Tennessee a right-wing Colorado ballot measure that caps government spending at artificially low levels. The Rocky Mountain initiative known as “TABOR” has led to severe funding problems for K-12 schools and now threatens to shut down community colleges and force the early release of inmates. The net effect: Even Colorado’s most fiscally conservative politicians now are warning other states to steer clear of the idea. Colorado’s Republican Governor Bill Owens last week told the Los Angeles Times that public education opponents like Bryson are “wrong on this one.” According to Owens, “They are dealing with this esoterically, as a philosophical exercise. I’m dealing with it as a conservative governor who understands directly the real costs of their theories.”
