Germ Boys and Yes Men

[Guest guest]

http://www.alternet.org/story/28141/

 

 

 

Germ Boys and Yes Men

 

By Jeremy Scahill, The Nation. Posted November 14, 2005.

 

 

 

The man Bush appointed to handle federal response to a flu pandemic or

bioterror attack is just a well-connected Republican lawyer with zero

medical expertise.

 

 

n early November, George W. Bush, struggling to claw his way upward in

polls that had acquired the consistency of quicksand after two months

of blunders and disasters, launched a new PR blitz. The Administration

declared it was taking charge of the nation's health and security with

an all-out war on the flu (to be conducted with vaccines provided by

well-connected pharmaceutical companies).

 

" Our country has been given fair warning of this danger to our

homeland, " Bush declared. " It's my responsibility as President to take

measures now to protect the American people. "

 

But if Bush hoped to wipe away the stain of Katrina -- and the memory

of a hapless Michael Brown steering FEMA in circles while New Orleans

drowned -- he should have thought twice about bringing up the specter

of a public health emergency, because the man responsible for

coordinating the federal response to a flu pandemic or bioterror

attack could well be the next Michael Brown.

 

Meet Stewart Simonson. He's the official charged by Bush with " the

protection of the civilian population from acts of bioterrorism and

other public health emergencies " -- a well-connected, ideological,

ambitious Republican with zero public health management or medical

expertise, whose previous job was as a corporate lawyer for Amtrak.

 

When Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff for Secretary of

State Colin Powell, recently speculated, " If something comes along

that is truly serious…like a major pandemic, you are going to see the

ineptitude of this government in a way that will take you back to the

Declaration of Independence, " many of those professionally concerned

with such scenarios couldn't help thinking of Simonson.

 

They recalled his own unsettling words at a recent Homeland Security

subcommittee hearing on government response to a chemical or

biological attack: " We're learning as we go. "

 

" Great. What we need in the middle of a crisis is somebody learning on

the job at that high level of government, " says Jerry Hauer,

Simonson's immediate predecessor at the Office of Public Health

Emergency Preparedness (OPHEP) and a veteran public health expert who

served as Rudy Giuliani's director of emergency management from 1996

to 2000.

 

" If I was in charge, he wouldn't be in that position, " says Dr. Irwin

Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at

Columbia University. " We don't have the best and brightest in the key

positions, and this leaves us in a very, very precarious situation. "

 

So how is it that Simonson ended up in a position that could impact

the lives and health of millions? Simonson's qualifications can be

summed up in two words: Tommy Thompson. Simonson was a protégé of the

former Health and Human Services secretary and longtime Republican

governor of Wisconsin. Thompson hired him out of the University of

Wisconsin Law School in 1995 and put him on the political fast track,

eventually naming him as his legal counsel. Thompson then used his

influence as chair of Amtrak's board to place Simonson as the rail

service's corporate counsel.

 

When Bush named Thompson as HHS secretary, Simonson again went with

him, and he has been rising through the ranks of the Administration

and the Republican Party ever since. " He's a political hack, a

sycophant, " says Ed Garvey, a prominent Wisconsin attorney and the

state's former deputy attorney general. " People just laughed when he

was appointed to Amtrak, but when the word came out that he was in

charge of bioterrorism, it turned to alarm. When you realize that

people's lives are at stake, it's frightening. It's just one of those

moments when you say, Oh, my God. "

 

What is particularly disturbing to public health professionals and

others is that Simonson is in charge of insuring that the country has

adequate vaccines and antivirals to combat an avian flu outbreak. " Mr.

Simonson is a lawyer, not a medical expert, " declared Representative

Henry Waxman, who highlighted Simonson in a list of five

" inexperienced individuals with political connections. "

 

The California Democrat warned that the appointment of people like

Simonson has " led to legitimate public concern that those in

government, particularly those who are relied upon to keep us safe

from harm, are not competent or independent in their judgments. "

 

As evidence of this, Waxman cited Simonson's July appearance before

the House Government Reform Committee, where Simonson " claimed he had

sufficient funds to purchase influenza vaccine and antiviral

medication for the nation. The next day his office submitted a funding

request to Congress seeking an additional $150 million for flu vaccine

and antiviral medication. "

 

But it is Simonson's acquiescence in the Bush Administration's

reordering of priorities in the name of the " war on terror " that has

most distinguished him throughout his career at HHS. Shortly after

9/11 Thompson and Simonson began plans to create an office within HHS

dedicated to combating terrorism, which became OPHEP.

 

" When Stewart came into this, he was deputy counsel to the secretary

and a very close friend of the secretary's, " says Donald " DA "

Henderson, named by Thompson as the founding director of OPHEP, who

was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Bush. " Within a short

period of time, this became all [simonson] was doing -- without a title. "

 

In mid-2002, as the White House aggressively sought to convince the

world that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, it was engaged

on another front of the propaganda war at home: convincing Americans

that Saddam was poised to deploy biological weapons in an attack on

American soil. It was a battle that would pit Vice President Cheney

and his now-indicted chief of staff Lewis " Scooter " Libby against a

team of public health experts at HHS, led by then-OPHEP chief Jerry Hauer.

 

Inside HHS it was Simonson who emerged as the White House's key

strategic ally. From his days as Defense Secretary during the Gulf

War, Cheney was intensely interested in biological warfare. Libby, who

worked for Cheney as an under secretary from 1990 to '92, shares his

boss's obsession with biowar. Known in the Administration as " germ

boy, " Libby was obsessed with pre-emptively vaccinating the entire

population against smallpox. (The fixation even extended to Libby's

1996 novel, The Apprentice, about a smallpox epidemic.)

 

Shortly after 9/11, Cheney and Libby were briefed on a war game called

Dark Winter, which simulated a smallpox attack on the United States.

Interestingly, New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who penned a

book called Germs, had taken part in the exercise, playing a reporter

covering the attack.

 

" It's a dramatic briefing, " Libby told the Washington Post, " but we

were well on this road already. " Libby said that Cheney advocated " a

forward-leaning position on protecting Americans from this threat. "

 

Many in the public health community regarded Cheney and Libby's calls

for mass smallpox vaccinations as fearmongering. Hauer, who also took

part in Dark Winter, was among those asking uncomfortably probing

questions. Hauer butted heads directly with Libby and his deputy on

homeland security, Carole Kuntz.

 

Another veteran of the first Bush Administration, Kuntz was Libby's

special assistant at the Pentagon when Cheney was Defense Secretary.

" The risks of vaccinating the whole country were greater than what we

saw as the threat, " says Hauer. " You're so focused on smallpox you

lose perspective on all the other planning you're trying to do and

nobody could make a good medical or public health case. "

 

Hauer, who ultimately would have been in charge of implementing

Libby's program, says he had no choice but to oppose the plan. " There

were times I felt you had to not be a yes man. You do an enormous

disservice when you do that. " Hauer says that when he raised

objections to mass smallpox vaccinations, Kuntz became " downright

offensive. " Hauer adds, " It was very clear that I was not giving her

the answers she wanted or telling her what she wanted to hear. "

 

Like so many other instances when expert knowledge was discarded in

the run-up to war, the bioterror obsession could well have long-term

consequences. " It has been four years of throwing money at a perceived

threat with very little to show for it, " says Columbia's Dr. Redlener.

 

Many public health experts say that the billions spent preparing for

these imagined threats have left the country dangerously unprepared

for actual ones, including the very real possibility of an avian flu

outbreak, which is only now being addressed. Cheney's office was

eventually forced to back off its call for universal vaccinations, but

the Administration persisted in hyping the threat of a bioterror attack.

 

In early 2003 Bush announced a major biodefense initiative during his

now infamous State of the Union address, laced with references to

Iraq's alleged WMDs, including the fraudulent evidence about Iraq

attempting to import uranium from Niger. Bush spoke of the prospect of

terror attacks with anthrax, botulinum toxin, Ebola and plague. " We

must assume that our enemies would use these diseases as weapons, " he

told the nation.

 

The $6 billion plan was called Project Bioshield. Bush named Cheney as

his point man on the project; at HHS it was Stewart Simonson.

Bioshield quickly became the main focus of OPHEP's work. For eighteen

months, according to current and former HHS officials, Simonson worked

diligently with Cheney's office to win Congressional approval for the

program. Cheney scared up support for the plan, personally telling

lawmakers Bioshield was " life on the planet stuff. "

 

Henderson says that Simonson's close contacts at the White House were

" very helpful working with the Bioshield legislation. " At the time,

Hauer was still heading OPHEP, while Simonson was Thompson's deputy

legal counsel. According to former and current HHS officials, a power

struggle developed between Hauer -- who had already angered the Vice

President's office with his opposition to the smallpox plan -- and the

well-connected Simonson.

 

Hauer was critical of the way Bioshield was being thrown together and

disagreed with Simonson on the priorities emerging within HHS, which

increasingly privileged " war on terror " -related programs over

preparing city and state governments and agencies for disasters, as

well as over plans vital to public health, like preparing for a flu

epidemic.

 

" Bioshield was a disaster, " says Hauer. " It was done half-assed….

Instead of doing it right, they rushed to get it done so that they

could announce it in the State of the Union. " Hauer alleges that while

Bioshield was being developed, the White House political office, led

by Karl Rove, was seeking to undermine his authority.

 

A couple of years before, Hauer, a Democrat, had aroused the ire of

his former boss, Rudy Giuliani, after he publicly endorsed Mark Green

over Michael Bloomberg in the 2001 New York City mayoral race. When he

subsequently went to Washington to work for HHS, his title remained

" acting " assistant secretary because the White House refused to

officially approve his appointment. " The White House was not going to

confirm me, particularly after the folks in New York were calling

saying I supported a Democrat. I'm a Democrat. It was as simple as that. "

 

Still, he says, Thompson backed him and retained him at HHS despite

the political pressure. By March 2003, however, Hauer had been

stripped of much of his authority, and he knew his days were numbered.

Simonson intervened to prevent Hauer from attending a briefing in

Thompson's office on Bioshield. In a March 24 e-mail to Thompson's

briefing coordinator Simonson wrote, " Bioshield does not involve Jerry

so I am unclear as to why he invited [sic]. "

 

With the 2004 election a year away, and the environment at the agency

becoming more hostile, Hauer says he could not in good faith continue

to work for the Administration. " The political side of this White

House is very vindictive, " says Hauer. He says it was made clear to

him that if he was not willing to endorse the President and " attend

events, " it was time to move on. " I don't want to be disrespectful of

the office of the presidency, " Hauer says. " I just felt that things

needed a change, so I could not be part of the Administration and not

support the White House. Plus, the fact is there was enormous

frustration at HHS in large part because of Stewart. "

 

In April 2004, with Hauer out of the way, Bush named Simonson director

of OPHEP. Hauer says that with Simonson the Administration has

" somebody they know will go along with pretty much anything they

want. " On July 21, a day before the 9/11 commission issued its

findings, Bush signed Bioshield into law. The White House released a

statement saying, " Today's action is just the latest step the

President has taken to win the War on Terror and protect our homeland. "

 

Even within the " war on terror " community, Bioshield has proved

controversial. That's because more than 80 percent of the nearly $1

billion allocated under the program has gone to a scandal-plagued

company that has never successfully produced an FDA-licensed vaccine.

In November 2004 California-based VaxGen was handed one of the largest

government vaccine contracts in history. The company is largely known

for its failed AIDS vaccine, and just a few months before VaxGen won

the Bioshield contract, the Nasdaq took the unusual step of delisting

it from trading because of financial irregularities. So why did it get

the contract?

 

" I have no idea why VaxGen was selected, " admits Henderson, who

remains chair of the influential Secretary's Advisory Council at HHS.

" It's not for me to decide whether it's a good idea or not. "

 

But it was for Simonson and his staff. And as with many Bush

Administration contracts, several signs point to cronyism as the

deciding factor -- among them: VaxGen CEO Lance Gordon is a longtime

associate of one of Simonson's top deputies on Bioshield, Dr. Phil

Russell, former chief of Army medical research. Now a powerful group

of Republican lawmakers is pushing " Bioshield 2 " through Congress. The

legislation would strip people injured by vaccines of their right to

sue manufacturers and would virtually eliminate pharmaceutical

corporate accountability.

 

The legislation would also make the newly created Biomedical Advanced

Research and Development Agency the only federal agency exempt from

the Freedom of Information Act. Simonson did not return numerous

messages left for him at his office. But Thompson stands by him, as

does Henderson.

 

" This is not necessarily somebody who has got a lot of depth of

background here, but you can get people who have a variety of

expertise. I would liken it to having a CEO in a company, " says

Henderson, adding that Simonson " may not have been qualified but he is

a real learner… We are where we are today because Stewart pressed this

very hard. He read a lot, he talked a lot, he learned a lot. "

 

Perhaps not quite enough, because where we are today, according to

many public health experts, is unprepared.

 

Jeremy Scahill is a correspondent for the national radio and TV

program Democracy Now!.