OPINION&BOOKS
Editorials, F2 Commentary, F3 Books, F4-6
THE BULLETIN • SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012
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www.bendbulletin.com/opinion
COMMENTARY
Do’s and don’ts for debaters By Barbara A. Perry Special to The Washington Post.
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rom Richard Nixon’s 5 o’clock shadow to George H.W. Bush’s glance at his watch, lasting images inevitably emerge from presidential and vice presidential debates. And lines from historic contests can have far more longevity than the speakers’ political careers: Lloyd Bentsen’s “You’re no Jack Kennedy.” Ronald Reagan’s “There you go again!” In its presidential oral-history archives, the University of Virginia’s Miller Center has discovered timeless debate lessons learned by candidates and their advisers.
Show emotion When Bernie Shaw asked that opening question (about the hypothetical rape and murder of Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis’ wife) . . . all of us went: “Huuuh. Oh, my God, what an opener.” Then, when Dukakis gave the answer, which was dreadful, like a robot, unfeeling, no emotions, cerebral, it fit the entire narrative that we were trying to portray him in. Several of us said: “We just won. Not just the debate. This is over.” — David Demarest, campaign communications director for George H.W. Bush, on the 1988 debates
Deflect zingers The debate coverage focused on (Lloyd Bentsen’s) Kennedy line. People came up afterwards and said, “You should have had a lot of comebacks on that.” I said: “OK, fine, you tell me what. The most interesting comeback would have been, ‘Now wait a second, if my memory is correct, you voted for Sen. (Lyndon) Johnson in those days. You weren’t even for Sen. Kennedy when he was running for president, so what’s this buddy-buddy business?’ That was the best one.” — Vice President Dan Quayle, on his 1988 debate with Lloyd Bentsen
Don’t look at your watch — ever At the very beginning of the debate, Carole (Simpson) . . . had said to President Bush, Bill Clinton and to Ross Perot, “Now, there won’t be any filibustering here.” And she said, “That means you, too, Mr. Perot,” because Ross Perot had been cited in the press many times for his tendency to go on and on; that had happened in previous debates. So President Bush, at one point during the debate when Ross Perot was going on at great, great length, looked at Carole — and if you watch the tape, you’ll see he looked at her, then his watch, suggesting clearly, “Hey, Perot’s time is up” — meaning he’s filibustering. The media picked it up and wrote the story as another example that he didn’t get it. — Phillip D. Brady, staff secretary to George H.W. Bush, on the 1992 debates
SUNDAY READER
Russians line up to be
HUMAN GUINEA PIGS • Pharmaceutical companies pursuing drug trials find a gold mine of volunteers, many of whom sign up for a chance at medical care that’s otherwise unobtainable By Andrew E. Kramer • New York Times News Service
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ike a dream patient conjured up in the boardroom of a pharmaceutical company, the Russian grandmother accepted the risks of the drug she was taking without complaint and cheerily endured even extraordinary side
effects. As a test subject in a Russian clinical trial for an experimental weight loss drug, Galina Malinina had to inject herself in the stomach daily. “No problem,” she said. “The needle is thin and the dose is small.” The first time she did this at a hospital where longfaced, white-robed doctors stood by and observed her intently, Malinina soon vomited. After that, she threw up every day for two weeks, yet stuck to the regimen, something valued by companies, as dropouts are expensive. “It’s wonderful,” she said of the test substance, a weight loss serum under development by Danish biotechnology giant Novo Nordisk. In addition to losing 22 pounds in a year, she said, “I became more lively; I walk easier and I have energy.” Malinina’s willingness, like that of thousands of other Russians, to take part in drug trials illustrates a remarkably advantageous development for the international pharmaceutical industry, which is running up against high costs and
recruitment difficulties in the United States and Europe. Russian regulators, Russian doctors and even many patients are increasingly embracing any chance they can get to take part in medical experiments. Patients, as was the case with Malinina, are eager to join trials because often it is the only way to receive modern medical care. That creates a pool of willing test subjects. The government of President Vladimir Putin, eager to diversify Russia’s economy away from oil dependence, welcomes the jobs and high-tech investment associated with clinical trials, and has eased access for drug companies to the Russian patients as an incentive to lure in these benefits. In fact, under a law passed in 2010, ostensibly on
health grounds, foreign drug companies must test medicine on Russians for it to be marketed in Russia. The law has the effect of compelling investment in clinical testing on Russians, trade groups say. And it is working. The number of drugs tested on Russians has shot up over the past year. Russian regulators approved 448 clinical trials in the first six months of 2012, compared with 201 in the same period a year earlier — an increase of 96 percent. Russia is not alone in opening the doors of hospitals in the national health system to drug companies looking for test subjects, in a quid pro quo with the international industry that conducts tests globally for a better demographic representation. See Drugs / F6
“I understand I won’t get any healthier. So it’s important not to get worse. And it hasn’t gotten worse. So I’m thankful.” — Albert Chupikov, 75, cardiac patient, who says a drug trial he enrolled in in Moscow has kept him alive
Feel their pain We talked about when (Democratic nominee Bill) Clinton was asked about the national debt by an African-American woman (in the town hall debate). She said, “How has the national debt affected you personally?” What she meant to say was, “How bad is the economy?” Bush struggled with trying to figure out — and he was so much of a literalist, he kept trying to figure out what it was she was getting at, and then he didn’t give a very good answer. Then Clinton walks right up to her, and he talks about all the people that he knows personally in Arkansas who lost their jobs and their factories, and he’s talking to her like she’s the only person in the universe. It was just such a contrast. It was great. He was incredibly compelling. Clinton also had gone to that site before, and he had talked to his media people. He knew where the camera shoots were, and he knew when they’d be doing an over-the-shoulder cut. He was into that sort of stuff. Bush hated that. He no more would have done that than fly to the moon. — David Demarest, White House communications director for George H.W. Bush, on the 1992 debates — Russell L. Riley is chair of, and Barbara A. Perry is a senior fellow in, the Miller Center’s Presidential Oral History Program at the University of Virginia.
Olga Kravets/The New York Times
Folya Gonopolsky, a cardiac patient, takes part in a drug trial in Moscow for an energyenhancing substance meant to improve stamina. Russian doctors, regulators and patients are volunteering in high numbers to take part in medical experiments.
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