To the surprise of — well, absolutely nobody I guess — Harry Reid is rolling in drug money. Tim Carney reports that “no incumbent is receiving as much air support from the drug industry as is Reid, who championed a health care bill that pads drug company profits.”

It’s impossible to counter Schweitzer’s argument. Indeed, it wasn’t so long ago that the Montana Governor was delivering the official Democratic radio address on this subject. The PhRMA deal in the Affordable Care Act has been universally recognized as ugly; just yesterday the AP credibly alleged that the drug lobby basically won out more than any other stakeholder. And even though Montana’s own Max Baucus can be credited with engineering the deal, Schweitzer continues to press for fair treatment for his constituents and a fair price for their medical care.

SENATOR DORGAN: The amendment we are offering, a bipartisan amendment dealing with the price of prescription drugs, is a very important amendment. We are going to get our vote on that, but then there is also going to be a vote on a poison pill amendment that nullifies it. It says if you pass the second amendment, it means nothing happens and prescription drug prices keep going through the roof.

Sen. Byron Dorgan’s taking a “don’t mourn, organize” approach to his last year in the Senate.

Is it possible that 31 Senators in the Democratic Caucus traded away $106 billion dollars in savings for consumers — and $19 for the federal budget according to CBO — for an empty promise that hasn’t even been agreed to?

After last night’s epic cave-in on the Lieberman health care bill, here’s a big-picture view of where we’re at right now.

The big story here is not that the White House wants to crush Byron Dorgan’s reimportation amendment and hold up their deal with Big PhRMa – that’s been clear for a while. The big news is that Dorgan’s fighting back. . .

A deal between the White House and the pharmaceutical industry is holding up a bipartisan amendment to allow the importation of cheaper prescription drugs from abroad. . .

Harry Reid uses his control over procedure to do what Harry Reid wants to do. (Tell that fish story about “60 votes” and Joe Lieberman being the block to anything to someone else.) And what he wants to do is block Dorgan’s drug reimportation bill, and protect Obama’s PhRMA deal.

For almost a year, President Obama has spent countless hours trying to woo Olympia Snowe to support heath care reform. He has been willing to bend over backwards to give in to almost every one of her demands. It is very unfortunate that Snowe decided to use her new-found power for evil instead of good.