J&J gave money in return for positive drug studies, court documents say

Johnson & Johnson gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to a research center run by an influential child psychiatrist explicitly to generate data to help expand sales of the company's antipsychotic drug Risperdal in children, according to court documents.

The documents shed new light on Johnson & Johnson's close relationship with Joseph Biederman, a Harvard University psychiatrist at the center of a controversy involving the dramatic increase in antipsychotic drugs, including Risperdal, prescribed for children, often for unapproved uses.

Johnson & Johnson spent at least $700,000 to fund the Johnson & Johnson Center for Pediatric Psychopathology at Massachusetts General Hospital. The purpose of the center, according to an internal company e-mail contained in the court documents, was to "generate and disseminate data supporting the use" of Risperdal in children and adolescents.

Risperdal is used to treat bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

The e-mails were from 2001 and 2002, long before the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Risperdal for use in children in 2006. Physicians are allowed to prescribe drugs for unapproved uses or patients, but drugmakers are barred from marketing drugs for such off-label uses and can face civil charges and steep fines.

Officials at Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc., the Johnson & Johnson subsidiary in Titusville, N.J., that makes Risperdal, said they funded the center "to conduct rigorous clinical trials to clarify appropriate use and dosing of Risperdal in children."

The company said it promoted its products "only for their FDA-approved indications."

Biederman did not return a phone call.

The documents were provided by plaintiff lawyers pursuing a class-action suit against Johnson & Johnson, contending that such a powerful drug should not have been widely recommended for children.

The court papers show Johnson & Johnson:

Budgeted $6.4 million to hold "educational summits" and sponsor advisory panels in part to counter negative media reports on the research, diagnosis and treatment of children with mental illness;

Was actively involved in drafting research that Biederman was to present at a medical conference and asked him how to deal with unfavorable research results suggesting that a placebo worked as well as Risperdal;

Discussed clinical trials for drugs as "growth opportunities" and tied trial proposals to sales potential.

Biederman is a Harvard researcher and psychiatrist whose work has fueled a rapid rise in diagnoses of bipolar disorder in children. His studies, often on small numbers of children and funded by drug companies, have expanded the use of what are known as atypical antipsychotics in children.

Children are believed to be much more vulnerable to the side effects of these drugs, which include weight gain, breast milk production in both sexes, facial tics and muscle tremors.

Last Tuesday, a panel of federal drug experts said antipsychotic medicines were overused in children and urged the Food and Drug Administration to do more to warn doctors of their risks.

Besides Risperdal, atypical antipsychotics include Zyprexa, made by Eli Lilly & Co.; Seroquel, made by AstraZeneca P.L.C. and others.

The documents, which resulted from discovery efforts in the lawsuits, portray Biederman as using his influence to get money out of Johnson & Johnson.

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Former Hitler Youth author angers both right, left

A new book by a former Hitler Youth, which condemns totalitarian fascism and communism, has drawn angry reactions from both the American political left and the political right.

The book is "Defeating the Totalitarian Lie: A Former Hitler Youth Warns America" by Hilmar von Campe.

In an appearance on Michael Savage's nationally syndicated talk-radio program, von Campe pointed to similarities between the rise of totalitarianism under Adolf Hitler and the current social and political trends inside the United States, specifically mentioning the policies of Barack Obama as being similar to national socialism, which von Campe lived through.

Get Hilmar von Campe's "Defeating the Totalitarian Lie: A Former Hitler Youth Warns America."

On the right, Michael C. Moynihan writing for Reason Online downplayed any parallelism, writing, "Now that Naomi Wolf's breathless tale of America's collapse into fascism has been further repudiated (unless, that is, Hitlerian countries routinely elect people like Barack Obama), perhaps it's time for the hysterics on the right to tremble in fear at the forthcoming machtergreifung. First, the psychopathic radio host and 'world famous herbal expert' Michael Savage hosts former Hitler Youth member Hilmar von Campe 'to discuss similarities between President-elect Obama and the rise of totalitarianism under Hitler.' Not much you can say to that, except to point out that beyond the big, excited crowds, there are absolutely no similarities."

On the left, Mother Jones was quick to join in, referring to von Campe as "one of a bevy of conservative authors who in the weeks before the election whipped up the fear that Obama was the modern-day version of the Nazi dictator. In an Oct. 28 WorldNetDaily column, he wrote, 'Socialist Hitler destroyed free society in a few months. Socialist Obama is close to his steppingstone.'"

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Naomi Klein on the Bailout Profiteers and the Multi-Trillion-Dollar Crime Scene

AMY GOODMAN: World leaders from nearly two dozen countries met in Washington over the weekend to discuss plans to increase regulation of international financial activity. They acknowledged that a failure of market oversight in countries like the United States had precipitated the financial crisis.

Meanwhile, here at home, it's been a month into the Bush administration's more than $700 billion bank bailout. Last week, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson outlined a new bailout strategy intended to boost consumer borrowing and promote financing for companies that give out loans. President-elect Obama's transition team is reportedly working on improving the management of the bailout come January 20th.

But that's two months away and according to the Washington Post, with $290 billion already committed, the Bush administration has taken no action to fill congressionally-mandated independent positions to oversee how the bailout is used.

According to Naomi Klein's latest article in The Nation, “The more details emerge, the clearer it becomes that Washington's handling of the Wall Street bailout is not merely incompetent. It is borderline criminal.” The article is called “In Praise of a Rocky Transition.”

Naomi Klein, investigative journalist, author of The Shock Doctrine, joins us now from Toronto, Canada.

Welcome to Democracy Now!, Naomi.

NAOMI KLEIN: Thanks so much, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: “Criminal”? Explain.

NAOMI KLEIN: Well, there's a few elements now that are being described as illegal that we're finding out. First of all, the equity deals that were negotiated with the largest banks and also some smaller banks, representing $250 billion worth of the bailout money, this is the deal to inject equity into the banks in—to inject capital into the banks in exchange for equity. The idea was to address the so-called credit crunch to get banks lending again. The legislation that enabled this was quite explicit that it had to encourage lending. Barney Frank, who was one of the architects of that legislation, has said that it violates the act if the money is not going to that purpose and is instead going to bonuses, is instead going to dividends, going to salaries, going to mergers. He said that violates the acts, i.e. it's illegal. But what we know is that it's going precisely to those purposes. It is going to bonuses. It is going to shareholders. And it is not going to lending. The banks have been quite explicit about this. Citibank has talked about using the money to buy other banks.

Then there's other aspects of this that are borderline illegal. We found out that in the midst of the crisis, the Bush—the Treasury Department pushed through a tax windfall for the banks, a piece of legislation that allows the banks to save a huge amount of money when they merge with each other. And the estimate is that this represents a loss of $140 billion worth of tax revenue for the US government. Many tax attorneys who were interviewed by the Washington Post said that they felt that the way in which the Treasury Department went about this by unilaterally changing the tax code was illegal, that this had to be—this had to include Congress. Congress only found out about it after the fact.

There's another piece of this puzzle that is also borderline illegal, which is that in addition to the $700 billion that we are discussing, the $700 billion bailout, there's another $2 trillion that's been handed out by the Federal Reserve in emergency loans to financial institutions, to banks, that actually we don't really know who they're handing the money out to, because, apparently, it's a secret. They could be handing it out to a range of other corporations—I think they are—but they're saying that they won't disclose who has received these taxpayer loans, because it could cause a run on the banks, it could cause the market to lose confidence in the institutions that have taken these loans. Once again, that represents an additional $2 trillion.

The other thing that the Fed won't disclose is what they have accepted as collateral in exchange for these loans. This is a really key point, because, of course, at the heart of the financial crisis is—are these so- called distressed assets. The value of these assets is enormously controversial. They may be worth very little. So if the Fed has accepted distressed assets as collateral in exchange for these loans, there's a very good chance the taxpayers aren't going to be getting this money back. So Bloomberg News has launched a lawsuit in federal court to find out who has received the loans and what has been accepted as collateral, because they believe that this lack of transparency is illegal. So that's why we're calling this the “trillion-dollar crime scene” or the “multi-trillion-dollar crime scene.” And they're really challenging lawmakers to call them out, the Treasury is.

And I think, you know, Amy, the last time I was on Democracy Now!, we were talking about Henry Paulson's original three-page proposal, the $700 trillion stickup, where he basically said, “Give me $700 trillion. Don't ask any questions. I can never be challenged by any arm of government or any court of law.” Now, that aspect of the bailout was supposedly dealt with, and we were all reassured that there was going to be transparency, accountability, legality. But now we're finding out that, in fact, Henry Paulson has achieved his original goal by stealth, because there is no accountability, and lawmakers are very hesitant to challenge this, because they're afraid of causing a run on the banks, of causing more market instability. So, essentially, what the Bush administration has done is said, you know, “We dare you to challenge us and be responsible for the great depression.” And the Democrats, not known for their firm spines, have so far failed to challenge them in anything other than rhetoric.

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Norman Spinrad: Only Chaos is Real

Title song from the Heldon album, video by Norman Spinrad using available public domain footage. "I've written songs, recorded songs, performed them live, but this is my first attempt at creating a music video."


Agent of Chaos (1967)
A novel by Norman Spinrad

First published in the 1960s, Spinrad was one of the first writers to perceive the totalitarian implications of the cradle-to-grave welfare state. But at the same time he was too organically a radical ever to be confused with a conservative. Result: "Agent of Chaos!"

Boris Johnson thinks he wants democracy. But in the course of his adventures he discovers that democracy to him means freedom. It's a banned concept from the Millennium of Religion. Like God.

He finds himself dealing with a byzantine political situation worthy of anything from the banned past. The dictatorship is the Hegemony. Opposition is provided by the aptly named agents of C.H.A.O.S. Meanwhile, the Brotherhood of Assassins plays a game that no one can fathom. Whose side are they on? Whose fool are you?

Spinrad explores his philosophical theme in a manner all too rare in contemporary science fiction. The problem is that Order will always try to eliminate any random factors. By its very nature, it encourages opposition and that feeds the forces of chaos. But chaos has built in problems as well. Its victories cannot help but feed the forces of reaction, of order. The heroes in this novel ultimately opt for personal freedom. The villains try to establish a dictatorship over the very nature of reality itself.

And then Spinrad throws in the discovery of aliens. A starship sets forth to meet them, the Prometheus. The Hegemony doesn't like that...


Norman Spinrad & Dona


Science fiction writer and futurist Norman Spinrad, author of about 20 books including "Agent of Chaos," and writer of an episode of the original Star Trek titled the "Doomsday Machine."

~ Norman Spinrad may be found on his homepage and on MySpace ~

Other links:

Allow me to Introduce Myself

Autobiography by Norman Spinrad

Sen. Clinton, if named Secretary of State, can't escape husband's golden tongue

President Clinton's big breakthrough in the Mexican business-class speaking circuit came in December 2002, when he hauled in $175,000 for speaking at an event sponsored by Value Grupo Financiero out of Monterrey.

Grupo Financeiro is a major Mexican financial services company, with operations in Monterrey, Mexico City, Guadalajara, Chihuahua and Morelia. It provides securities trading and asset-management services. (In plain English, they are in the business of making money off of other people's money.)

The company's chairman, Benitez Gomez, is a player in Mexico's banking industry, having held previous executive or director posts with Banco Regional de Monterrey and Banco Agricola Industrial del Norte.

So, it appears President Clinton was in the door.

The following year, in October 2003, he pocketed another $150,000 as a speaking fee for Banco de Mexico in Mexico City — the nation's central bank, similar to the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank. The governor (or chairman) of the bank is Guillermo Ortiz Martinez, who served as Secretary of Communications and Transportation and later Secretary of Finance and Public Credit under Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo.

In 1998, Zedillo appointed Ortiz governor of Banco de Mexico. Ortiz was, upon the recommendation of Zedillo's successor, Vicente Fox, named to another six-year term as the bank's governor in 2004, after receiving a majority vote of approval from the Mexican Congress.

While Zedillo was president, his country's financial system melted down during the infamous "peso crisis" of 1994 and President Clinton authorized a $50 billion loan to Mexico to help bail out Zedillo, the Mexican business class, and U.S. investors who had a stake in the nation's high finances. (The bailout did nothing for the poor, or even many middle class folks and small businesses in Mexico, many of whom lost everything overnight as the crisis struck — a massive devaluation of the peso caused, in part, by lax bank lending policies. (Sound familiar?)

Zedillo took office in 1994 at the same time the free-trade mega-pact NAFTA took effect. He also was president during the Acteal massacre, which journalist Al Giordano described in a prior report for Narco News:

Eleven years ago, on December 22, 1997, paramilitary troops in earshot of a federal military base massacred 45 unarmed civilians - mostly women and children - as they prayed in a Church in the Mexican town of Acteal. The gunmen - every major human rights and media organization now agrees - sliced open the bellies of the pregnant women and shot the 45 Tzotzil-speaking farmers and their children at point blank range. The victims were members of a pacifist Catholic organization known as Las Abejas ("The Bees").

Bill Clinton was the president of the United States, Madeleine Albright his Secretary of State, and the Assistant Secretary of State for the Western Hemisphere was Jeffrey Davidow, a State Department lifer with the dubious record of having been political officer at the US Embassy in Chile during the September 1973 US-backed coup d'etat there.

For more than a week prior to the massacre, non-governmental organizations in Chiapas, Mexico, had warned the US State Department of the impending atrocity. But the deal had already been struck with the Mexican regime that in exchange for its acquiescence to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the US would turn a blind eye to all matters of human rights in Mexican territory.

Zedillo landed on his feet after leaving office in late 2000, however, and eventually scored a cushy job in the states, as a professor of economics at Yale University, where he oversees the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization. (An example of you screw up, you teach others how to do the same.)

In some people's minds, the $150,000 President Clinton took home after his 2003 speaking engagement for the Banco de Mexico might be tainted in a little blood, but then it is what it is.

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