For most of his career, however, he’s been associated with the Republican Party. There really is very little difference between the libertarian (even Libertarian) perspective today and the Republican Party of Goldwater et al. Even Reagan was very libertarian minded, except for the incursions into foreign conflicts of and the war on drugs.

The new GOP of Bush 43/McCain et al, however, is starkly different. That’s why Ron Paul looks so different than the current crop of Republican candidates.

With Ron Paul,.. anything is possible!!

Skeptic - what you describe sounds like a lot in academia too.

Re: politics, I’m still Obamish, primarily because of the Supreme Court and other appointed judges (which appts and their impact long outlive the Prez), and because of the war and the need for a recreation of image of this country worldwide. Yes, race matters. Like JFK, who was also flawed in a variety of ways, O has the capacity to inspire people, especially young people, and that matters to me too.

Beyond that, I hope people don’t get so focused on the Prez that they forget the critical importance of Congress and their own reps and Senators. Most of these guys/gals have records and can be held accountable for them. I hope to do that at any good opportunity!

How to tie this back to pharma … It strikes me that “Obama” has potential as a drug name, perhaps something you take to recover from a hang-over.

Originally I was pro-Obama. Now I think I’ll throw my vote away and vote for a 3rd party candidate.

The only point I would add, having worked for 4 different pharmas, is that there is some variation among companies on how dissent is expressed. Some have a high tolerance for spirited debate; others less so, but I would agree with Atlex that once a decision is made, all are supposed to be on board. This does not rule out subversion of the group consensus through somewhat passive-aggressive behaviors, which are usually covert.

Going back to a point I made another time, another thread, I remain concerned that the pharma blockbuster operating model with highly decentralized decision-making results in companies having conflicting positions at times on strategy because there is no central body willing to state enforceable company policies. This seems odd, but it’s a phenomenon I’ve witnessed many times.

Colleagues of mine who have been much more privy to internal documents than I have tell me the Bayer case is quite typical. But I very ready to reserve judgment.

Personally it is less important to me what it typical, then the institutional processes involved when theings go profoundly wrong.

I will say this. My impression based on cases with which I have some familiarlity is that, in an official and potentially public context, companies play it very straight. Systems are put into place that diffuse responsibility and make it easy for senior managment to assert deniability if “problems arise.” Indeed, there may a good deal of what can quite accurately be called carefully managed theatre (which which I also have professional experience) involved in creating the appearance of propriety.

How often that is a deliberate strategy remains, for me, an open question.

There’s a time and a place for dissent. In many corporations, internal dissent when making decisions is fully acceptable. However, once a decision is made, everyone is expected to support it; for the dissenters, that may or may not mean publicly endorsing the decision, but it usually means not speaking out publicly against it. Of course, the dilemma is when unethical or potentially illegal decisions are made. For the most part, these are incredibly unusual and rarely “black and white.” I can think of few times when a major pharma intentionally and blatantly broke the law. Maybe this BMS case involving Apotex is one example. In most circumstances, even the most publicized cases were in their genesis unintentionally illegal.

We in the US pharmaceutical industry are probably the most regulated of any industry in the world. Operating in a highly regulated environment unfortunately involves educated guesses (called “legal opinions”) as to whether particular actions are illegal or not. When operating in a gray area where government regulation changes regularly, some actions that are initially viewed as acceptable end up on the wrong side of the line. In addition, well meaning individuals, in their desire to achieve, do, at times, go beyond the line. When that happens, punishments are well-deserved. Believe it or not, most major pharmaceutical companies have very strict guidelines regulating behavior and do punish violators through termination. This happens far more often than penalizing someone for blowing the whistle internally; I am well aware of employees being terminated for threats of reprisal against another colleague. I’m sure that there are cases of reprisal, but I haven’t seen one.

Overall, I know that critics on this site assume that most illegal actions have the blessing of management, but in reality, most of the time the perpetrators are operating on their own.

Atlex