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What You're Missing in Our Subscriber-only CounterPunch Newsletter JAMES WEBB: IF THE DEMOCRATS WANT A POPULIST, IT'S HIM, FOR BETTER AND FOR WORSE JoAnn Wypijewski on how Webb really talks on his home turf in Virginia and on the two faces of populism, dark and lite. The New Yorker helped sell the war in Iraq. Now see how it shills for the drug companies at home. Fred Gardner finds Malcolm Gladwell, at the bottom of the New Yorker's deep barrel. David Petraeus is the favorite general of Bush and the New York Times. Alexander Cockburn on how the salesman of surge sold himself. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now Get CounterPunch By Email for Only $35 a Year

Today's Stories February 6, 2007 Diana Johnstone Frenzy in France Over Iranian Threat February 5, 2007 Dave Zirin Super Bore: When Hawks Cry Uri Avnery The Fatal Kiss: Wars and Scandals Ron Jacobs The Looming War on Iran: It's Not About Democracy Paul Craig Roberts The Real Failed States Newton Garver Bush and the Old Hands: Decider vs. Negotiator Bruce Anderson The Genocidal Namesake of the Hastings School of Law Saul Landau The Golden Globes After a Mud Bath Ralph Nader The Good Fight of Molly Ivins James T. Phillips Road Outrageous: Tailgating and Iraq Mike Whitney Quarantine USA: Bird Flu Panic and Profiteering Kenneth Rexroth Clowns and Blood-Drinking Perverts: Imperial History According to Tacitus Website of the Day Richard Thompson's Anti-War Song: "'Dad's Gonna Kill Me" February 3 /4, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Who Can Stop the War? Tao Ruspoli CounterViews: a Conversation with Dr. Susan Block on Sex, Censorship and Liberation Jeffrey St. Clair The Thrill is Gone: the Withering of the American Environmental Movement Patrick Cockburn Iraqis on the Run P. Sainath They Take the Early Train Sen. Russell Feingold A Symbol of a Timid Congress Diane Christian Dying Well: Why Killing Saddam Backfired on Bush Brian Cloughley Space Missiles Away!: the Irony of Bush's Indignation Diana Barahona How to Turn a Priest into a Cannibal: US Reporting on the Coup in Haiti Timothy J. Freeman The Iraq War Hits Hawai'i: the Stryker Brigade and the Watada Case Conn Hallinan The Vishnu Strategy John Ross Felipe's First Fifty Days Greg Moses The Government Blinks: Freedom for the Ibrahim Family Missy Beattie No More Rebukes or Non-Binding Resolutions Joshua Frank Unsafe in Any Seas: Cruising with Ralph Nader? Evelyn Pringle "These Drugs are Poison to Some People" Stephen Fleischman Let's Hear It for Chuck Hagel! Muhammad Idrees Ahmad Iraq in Fragments Poets' Basement Holt, Engel, Ford and Saavedra Website of the Day Flamenco Dali February 2, 2007 Chris Kutalik The Meanest Industry R. Gibson / E. W. Ross Cutting the Schools-to-War Pipeline Pam Martens America's "Money Honey" as Corporate Matchmaker: Maria Bartiromo and the Co-Branding of CNBC and Citigroup John Feffer Picturing the President Daryll E. Ray Why the Family Farm is Good for Rural America Ronald Bruce St. John Apartheid By Any Other Name Mitchel Cohen Listen Gore: Some Inconvenient Truths About the Politics of Environmental Crisis Website of the Day The Real Issue is Empire February 1, 2007 Diane Farsetta An Army Thousands More: How PR Firms and Major Media Military Recruiters Marjorie Cohn Bush Targets Iran: Cruise Missile Diplomacy Mark Scaramella Our Founding War Profiteers Ranni Amiri Senator Prejudice: the Day Joe Biden Threatened to Kick My Ass Christopher Ketcham Die, TV! Winston Warfield Art Panic Hits Boston! Corporate Crime Reporter Jailing the Artists, Not the Executives: the Great Boston Art Panic, Turner Broadcasting and the AG Who Won't Pursue Corporate Crime Thomas P. Healy Adios Molly Ivins: Populist Journalism and Never Dull Website of the Dau The Ordeal of Gary Tyler   January 31, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Waco of Iraq?: US "Victory" Cult Leader was a "Massacre" Jean Bricmont What is the Decisive "Clash" of Our Time? Tao Ruspoli CounterViews: a Conversation with Dr. Susan Block on Sex, Politics and Liberation James T. Phillips Flashbacks de Jour: Photographing War William Johnson Worker Reistance at Smithfield Foods Tim Wilkinson A Hawk in Drag: Dershowitz and the Iraq War Evelyn Pringle The Judge, the Reporter and the Secret Zyprexa Documents Joshua Frank What America Really Needs to Hear Ramzy Baroud Shameless in Gaza Mickey Z. Nader Still in the Crosshairs Website of the Day What's Goin' On? January 30, 2007 Werther Slapstick on Jenkins Hill: DC's Botoxed Golems Kathy Kelly Engagement with War Uri Avnery "If Arafat Were Alive" Franklin Spinney Embedded Without Blending: Humvees and Tactical Madness in Iraq William S. Lind The Real Game in Iraq Pariah An Iron Curtain is Descending--and Most Americans Don't Know Mike Whitney The Mother of All Bubbles Rev. William E. Alberts Hiding America's Surging Militarism Behind Children Fran Shor Shadow of a Resistance: Can the Anti-War Mvt. Dismantle the War Machine? Anthony Arnove The Logic of Withdrawal: There's Nothing Precipitous About It Website of the Day Our Boys in Iraq January 29, 2007 Nurit Peled-Elhanan "We Are All Victims of the Occupation" Patrick Cockburn Raid on the Soldiers of Heaven JoAnn Wypijewski The Demo in DC: Chirpy Slogans, Empty City Ron Jacobs Our Fire, Congress's Feet Dave Lindorff The Missing Word at the Anti-War Demo Kevin Zeese A Republican Peace Candidate?: Chuck Hagel's Challenge to America Reza Fiyouzat Iran, Bush and the Banging of the Ironsmiths Pat Williams Turnout and Same-Day Voting: Did It Sink Conrad Burns? Website of the Day Galloway's Indictment of Blair   January 27 / 28, 2007 Diana Johnstone Do We Really Need an International Criminal Court? Eliza Ernshire Exiled from Palestine Patrick Cockburn Slaughter in Baghdad's Bird Market David Rosen Pay-to-Play: the Double Life of Prostitution in America Greg Moses Children Without a Country: Maryam Ibrahim Remains in a Texas Jail Bernard Chazelle Bush the Empire Slayer Tao Ruspoli CounterViews: a Video Interview with Jeffrey St. Clair, Part Two Hermán Uribe Murdering Journalists in Latin America Ralph Nader Democracy in Crisis Paul Craig Roberts Why Can't Americans See What's Coming? Fred Gardner The Suppression of Collective Joy: Barbara Ehrenreich at the Commonwealth Club Brian Cloughley Dying for Lies James Abourezk The High Cost of Congressional Trips to Israel John V. Whitbeck The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine: Ilan Pappe and the Nakba Deniers Seth Sandronsky Peace-In Politics: Localizing the Anti-War Movement Alan Cabal Mayday from the Circus Tent Pam Martens America's Money Honey Does Davos Website of the Weekend Gil Scott-Heron: Winter in America January 26, 2007 Charlotte Laws Are You the Terrorist Next Door?: AETA and the New Green Scare Mike Ely / Linda Flores The Workers at Smithfield Joe DeRaymond Paying for Health Care and Not Getting It Phil Donahue Get Sarah Olson! Zia Mian The Three US Armies in Iraq: Grunts, Contractors and Laborers Jeb Sprague Haiti Struggles to Defend Justice Evelyn Pringle Eli Lilly, the Habitual Offender Missy Beattie Inside the Criminal Mind of George Bush: He Thinks; Therefore, It is So Martha Rosenberg Cloned Food: From Designer Hens to the Transgenic Omega-3 Pig Website of the Day Save Grand Canyon from Glen Canyon Dam! January 25, 2007 Patrick Cockburn What's Really Going on in Baghdad John Ross Mexico Under Calderon: Fake Left, Rule Right Jeremy Scahill Our Mercenaries: Blackwater, Inc and the Privatization of Bush's War Machine Frida Berrigan "Hearts Ruptured with Sadness:" Protesting Gitmo Paul Craig Roberts Bush's State of Deception Jason Yossef Ben-Meir Iraq Reconstruction Failure Christopher Brauchli Why Bush is Arming Fatah: When in Doubt, Start Another Civil War Holger W. Henke Cuba at the Crossroads? Dave Lindorff Falling Dominos and Failing Presidencies Julia Landau From Your Young Cousin Website of the Day The Mighty Edwards Sisters   January 24, 2007 Tao Ruspoli CounterViews: a Filmed Interview with Jeffrey St. Clair Paul Craig Roberts The Empire Turns Its Guns on the Citizenry Lt. Gen. William Odom What Can be Done in Iraq? Sharon Smith Health Care Reform for the Insurance Industry Brian M. Downing Two Americas: the Grunts and the War Profiteers Heather Gray Surviving War Ron Jacobs SOTUS Quo James Brooks Out of Europe, Out of Time Robert Day Translating Snow Website of the Day Defend Sarah Olsen January 23, 2007 Trish Schuh Lebanon on the Brink of Civil War, Again Robert Bryce The Politics of Cheap Oil Stephen Soldz Aliens in an Alien Land John Blair King Coal's Latest Con Job: Clean Coal is Not Clean Gloria La Riva Miami: a Place of Refuge for Anti-Castro Terrorists Joshua Frank Turning Silence into Gold: Hillary and Israel Lobby Patrick Cockburn In Iraq, All Foreigners are Targets Ralph Nader Questions for Bush on Iraq Dave Lindorff Pelosi and Iraq: Blunder or Treason? Uri Avnery Israel and Apartheid Website of the Day Down By the River   January 22, 2007 Manuel Garcia, Jr. China's New Chip in Space War Poker Jen Marlowe Trapped in Darfur: the Ordeal of Suleiman Jamous George McGovern War of the Belligerent Professors: Get Out of Iraq Paul Craig Roberts Only Impeachment Can Save Us from More War Norman Solomon The Pentagon vs. Press Freedom Amira Hass Life Under Prohibition in Palestine Mike Whitney A Fool's Errand in Baghdad Ramzy Baroud The Things We Take for Granted John Walsh Support Jimmy Carter in Boston! Website of the Day The Hagelian Dialectic   January 20/21 2007 Alexander Cockburn First Bomb Carter; Then Nuke Iran! Gail Dines I Was Ambushed by Paula Zahn Newton Garver Evo Morales' First Year Gilad Atzmon 100 Years of Jewish Solitude Seth Sandronksy New Push For Social Security "Reform" Raphaelle Bail Where Nicaraguans Go to Work Jim Goodman Round Up the Usual Experts: Make Them Live on a Dollar a Day Larry Portis Chouraki's Oh Jerusalem Website of the Weekend Press Poodles Play it Safe January 19, 2007 Jonathan Cook Jimmy Carter Doesn't Tell the Half of It Glen Ford Barack Obama: The Mania and the Mirage Dave Lindorff Bush Blinks on Illegal Spying--Don't let him off the hook Larry Portis Zionism in the Cinema: Part Two Website of the Day For Whistleblowers January 18, 2007 William Peace Protest From a Bad Cripple Virginia Tilley The Steady March to War on Iran: What It Would Take to Stop It Michael Donnelly The Real Reason I Can't Stand Obama B.R. Gowani Democracy: Everywhere and Nowhere Larry Portis Zionism in the Cinema: Part One Jason Hribal A Horse is Worth More than Riches Website of the Day Baghdad Clampdown January 17, 2007 Franklin Spinney Why Time is not on Bush's Side John Ross Oaxaca's Rising: Vibrant as the Paint on the Walls Susan George Can World Trade Ever Be Fair? Back to Keynes! Paul Craig Roberts Attacking Iran: What's In It For Bush Joshua Frank Obama and the Middle East David Lindorff Towards Oil at $200 a Barrel January 16, 2007 Col. Sam Gardiner Escalation Against Iran Marjorie Cohn Stimson's Outrageous Threat Saul Landau Gore Vidal in Havana: Part 2 Ron Jacobs Welcome Back to 1965 Susan Block From Snowjob to Blowjob Ken Couesbouck Year of the Pig Website of the Day Amazon's Hit on Jimmy Carter January 15, 2007 Roger Morris Another War the Voters Hoped to End Paul Craig Roberts Bush Must Go Kathy Kelly Umm Heyder's Story William Blum The Anti-Empire Report Ralph Nader The Class War's New Map Saul Landau Gore Vidal In Havana January 12 / 14, 2007 Patrick Cockburn "21,500 More Troops": Will America Ever Leave Iraq? David Rosen Bush's Domestic Sex Policy: the Teen Abstinence-Only Crusade William S. Lind Less Than Zero Laith al-Saud The Ironies of Bush and Iraq Paul Craig Roberts Surge and Mirrors: What Bush Really Said John Ross Celebrating the "Sum of the World" in Chiapas George Ciccariello-Maher The Case of Venezuela's RCTV: Not About Free Speech Christopher Brauchli How to Avoid an IRS Audit: Become a Millionaire! Robert Buzzanco Rogue State, Redux Evelyn Pringle The Secrets in Eli Lilly's Cabinet Peter Rost, MD. Promises, Promises: Playing Politics with Drug Reimportation Mike Whitney Baghdad Crackdown Yifat Susskind Beyond the Surge: Demanding an End to Bush's Wars Saul Cohen Latin America's Real Mr. Danger: Negroponte's Latest Gig Missy Beattie A Day of Action and Questions Stephen Lendman Holiday Hypocrisy Website of the Weekend Bruegel on Bush War Plan   January 11, 2007 Ismael Hossein-Zadeh The Profits of Escalation Paul Craig Roberts Carter's Inconvenient Truths Kathy Kelly Refugee Dreams Dave Lindorff Blood for Face Jeff Leys The War Widens Richard W. Behan Barrels and Bodies Col. Douglas MacGregor Surging Right Into Al-Sadr's Hands Website of the Day An Explanation from Google Speech of the Day Is There Even One Politician Alive Who Could Give This Speech? January 10, 2007 Peter Linebaugh A Walk in Oaxaca Robert Fantina Punishing Deserters: Prosecution or Persecution? Patrick Cockburn Why Troop Escalation Won't Bring Peace to Iraq Paul Craig Roberts Distracting Congress: Troop Escalation and Iran Col. Dan Smith Why U.S. Policy is Failing Ben Tripp The Politics of Bad Karma Evelyn Pringle How the FDA Protects Big Pharma Ron Jacobs Coalition of the Lunatics: Trying to Create the Next World War Mike Ferner If Not Now, When? Dave Zirin Judgment of the Juiced: Why McGwire Wasn't Elected to the Hall of Fame Website of the Day Revolting Students! Bootleg of the Day Bob Dylan: Live at Scotia Bank Place January 9, 2007 R. T. Naylor The Somalian Labyrinth Jonathan Cook Israel's Purging of Palestinian Christians Mike Ely and Linda Flores The Smithfield Strikers: No Longer Hidden, No Longer Hiding Joshua Frank The Democrats and Iran: More Bellicose Than Bush Norman Solomon The Headless Horseman of the Apocalypse Sen. Russell Feingold An Open Letter to President Bush: So Now You Want to Snoop Through Our Mail? Joe Allen Justice for the Omaha Two: Black Power, Racism and COINTELPRO in the Heartland James T. Phillips "Lasciate Ogne Speranza, Voi Ch'Intrate": The Hell That is Iraq Brian Concannon Resolutions for Haiti Leonard Peltier When the Truth Doesn't Matter: 30 Years of FBI Harassment and Misconduct Website of the Day Kick Out the Jams, MFers!: Meet the New RRC   January 8, 2007 Werther Why We Fight Jeff Leys The Occupation Project: a Campaign of Civil Disobedience to End Iraq War Funding Paul Craig Roberts Nuking Iran Shulamit Aloni Israeli Apartheid: Sorry, This Road is For Jews Only Dave Lindorff The Party of Invertebrates Reverts to Form Sunsara Taylor The Democrats' First Day: Same As It Ever Was Seth Sandronsky Syndicated Error: George Will and the Minimum Wage Dr. Susan Block Baghdad Cockfight Ends in Snuff Film Website of the Day Watch CounterPuncher Sunsara Taylor Take on Bill O'Reilly! January 6 / 7, 2007 Alexander Cockburn The War and the NYT Franklin C. Spinney Stalingrad on the Tigris Paul Craig Roberts The Urge to Surge Ralph Nader Democrats in the Spotlight Walden Bello Globalization in Retreat? Marleen Martin The Needle and the Damage Done: Tortured in the Death Chamber Brian Cloughley We Do What We Like: Return Our Rapist or Else ... Uri Avnery The Kiss of Death Saul Landau Fidel Castro in the Fields Ron Jacobs From Cointelpro to the Patriot Act: a Legacy of Torture Joseph Nevins Crimes Against Humanity from Ford to Saddam William S. Lind A State Restored? Somalia and 4GW Gary Leupp Attention John Conyers: Impeach the President! Elisa Salasin Bringing Life to Numbers George Ciccariello-Maher Beyond Chavistas and Anti-Chavistas: Deepening the Bolivarian Revolution Stefan Wray Confronting Recruiters: the Story of the Bush Street Raiders Michael Leonardi Toward an International Moratorium: Italy's Crusade Against the Death Penalty Richard Rhames Reality TV: Triumph of the Thugs Jeffrey St. Clair Playlist: What I'm Listening to This Week Barbara LaMorticella Two Poems Website of the Weekend FBI Witch Hunts Song of the Weekend End Times: a Soundtrack January 5, 2007 Jorge Mariscal Growing the Military: Who Will Serve? John Walsh Clash of the Elites: Beltway Insiders vs. Neo-Cons! Christopher Brauchli The Great Relaxer: Bush and Federal Regulations Travis Sharpe No More New Nukes, Please Tom Barry Hawk for Hire: Roger Noriega's New Gig Linda Schade / Kevin Zeese Americans Voted for Peace: Has the New Congress Already Let Them Down? Tiffany Ten Eyck Workers' Centers and Unions: a New Alliance Mahmoud El-Yousseph A Challenge to Pelosi Lucinda Marshall 3003 Funerals: "And They're Still Burying Ford!" Website of the Day Van the Man: Warm Love January 4, 2007 Patrick Cockburn The Martyrdom of Saddam Hussein Winslow T. Wheeler A Guide to Earmarks: Will the Democrats' Reforms Do Anything to Curb Pork Barrel Spending? M. Shahid Alam Has Regime Change Boomeranged? Raed Jarrar So This is Plan B? The US Attack on Saleh Al-Mutlaq's Headquarters Bert Sacks Can the US Legally Kill Iraqi Children?: a Challenge to the Supreme Court Kathy Rentenbach Report from Oaxaca Stephen Fleischman The Rain of Riches: Bonuses, Then and Now George Bisharat Carter's Truths Peter Rost, MD Hail the Hangman, Jail the Cameraman! Evelyn Pringle Can Eli Lilly be Held Criminally Liable for Zyprexa? Website of the Day Courage to Resist   January 3, 2007 Kathy Kelly Wrapped Around a Bullet Paul Craig Roberts His Last Hurrah: Bush Cuts and Runs from Reason William Johnson No Worker is Illegal: SEIU Members Push Their Union to Change Its Policy on Immigration Stan Cox Under a Brown Cloud: Money vs. the Monsoon Trita Parsi A Lose-Lose Situation with Iran Declan McKenna Ireland's Slavish Hostility Toward Cuba Joe Bageant Dispatch from the Chinese Landfill Nicola Nasser Somalia: New Hotbed of Anti-Americanism Missy Beattie Dead Wrong Website of the Day Pharmed Out January 2, 2007 Michael Watts Oil Inferno Amina Mire Return of the Warlords: Death and Destruction for Somalis James Brooks Pushing the Wedge in Palestine Alevtina Rea The Tyrant is Dead! Long Live ... ? Al Krebs Global Food Security: a Call to Action Peter Rost Invitation to a Hanging: the Saddam Hussein Execution Video Niranjan Ramakrishnan A Deadly December John Stanton Appetites for Destruction Website of the Day Out Now: Petition   January 1, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Iron Man, Tin God: the Meaning of Saddam Hussein Uri Avnery What Makes Sammy Run? Joshua Frank Eliot Spitzer's Constitutional Hang Up: Architect of New York's Patriot Act         Subscribe Online

February 6, 2007 Even the Insurance Companies are Bailing Eli Lilly's Toughest Sell: Innocence on Zyprexa? By EVELYN PRINGLE Eli Lilly is having trouble obtaining and retaining insurance coverage for Zyprexa litigation because apparently insurance companies are no longer willing to buy its wide eyed innocence routine when it comes to the company's fraudulent off-label marketing schemes. In filings with the SEC, Lilly admits that it is having problems and that the company may end up having to pay its own Zyprexa costs, but blames it on the insurance industry stating: "We have experienced difficulties in obtaining product liability insurance due to a very restrictive insurance market and therefore will be largely self-insured for future product liability losses." As for the insurance that Lilly does have to cover past and future Zyprexa lawsuits, the filing reports that carriers have raised defenses to their liability and are seeking to rescind the policies, and Lilly further warns that, "there is no assurance that we will be able to fully collect from our insurance carriers on past claims." Some internal Lilly documents recently leaked to the press, that Lilly somehow managed to have sealed with a court order, reveal that Lilly hid the side effects of Zyprexa identified in its own clinical trials a decade ago and engaged in wide-ranging off-label marketing schemes to make a drug approved by the FDA only to treat adults with schizophrenia and bipoloar disorder into its top selling product bringing in a reported $30 billion thus far. In light of these insurance problems, Lilly could be likened to a dog chasing its tail. While on one hand, it is being sued for illegally marketing Zyprexa off-label, if it stops the illegal conduct profits will plummet and it won,t have the money to pay the litigation costs. However, Lilly has apparently decided to take the low road, because to date, settling with 26,500 Zyprexa cases out of court by paying out over $1.2 billion has done nothing to lower the off-label sales figures for Zyprexa. In fact, in 2006, sales of the drug increased 12%, according to SEC filings. In 2003, the FDA ordered warning labels on all atypicals, of an increased risk of high blood sugar and diabetes and said blood sugar surges in some patients were associated with life-threatening medical conditions or death. In 2005, the FDA added the strongest warning available, a black box, stating that the drugs increased the risk of death in elderly patients with dementia. The warnings did nothing to slow off-label prescribing of Zyprexa. It is still being freely prescribed for uses never approved or intended. On April 25, 2006, Bloomberg News reported that in 2005, nearly 7 children out of one thousand were taking an antipsychotic, and among senior citizens 65 and older, antipsychotic use was 21 per 1000. Per patient antipsychotic costs for children 19 and under have increased 196%, or nearly triple 2001's total, according to Bloomberg. An assessment by Christoph Correll, Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Clinics of North America, January 2006, in USA Today, shows Zyprexa to be the worst of the atypicals for children and lists side effects of diabetes and weight gain with Zyprexa as "severe." Zyprexa is not approve for any on-label indication for children but even if it was, schizophrenia is extremely rare in children at about 1 in 40,000 under the age of 18, according to the National Institute of Mental Health, and psychiatrists do not even agree on what criteria should be used to diagnose children with bipolar disorder. Yet the rate of children treated with atypicals "is growing dramatically faster than the rate for adults," Robert Epstein, chief medical officer for Medco Health Solutions, pharmacy benefit managers, told USA Today. Medco did an analysis of outpatient prescriptions for USA Today and found that, in a sampling of about 2.5 million of its 55 million insured members, the rate of children 19 and under with at least one atypical jumped 80% from 2001 to 2005. And that number only represents privately insured kids, and not those in foster care or covered by Medicaid. In what outraged critics called an unethical and dangerous experiment conducted by Lilly on children, on May 1, 2006, the New York Times, reported that "psychiatric researchers have been experimenting with a bold and controversial treatment strategy: they are prescribing drugs to young people at risk for schizophrenia who have not yet developed the full-blown disorder." The study, co-funded by Eli Lilly and the National Institute of Mental Health, and published in the May 2006, American Journal of Psychiatry, involved 60 patients, mostly adolescents, who supposedly scored high on a scale that assessed the risk for psychosis. The scale rated the severity of over a dozen symptoms including categories such as grandiosity, suspiciousness, and bizarre thoughts. The researchers claimed that from 20% to 45% of the people who scored high would go on to develop full-blown psychosis, in which the symptoms would become extreme. In the first year of what was scheduled to be a 2-year trial, five of the 31 patients on the drug developed full-blown psychosis, compared to 11 of the 29 who were on placebos. However, by the end of the first year, more than two-thirds of the patients had quit, making it impossible to interpret any differences between the 2 groups. The only definite finding of the study was that patients taking the drug gained an average of 20 pounds, once again documenting a side effect that has been known for 15 years. Experts say the rapid weight gain is the most worrisome side effect of Zyprexa because obesity leads to so many other serious health problems like diabetes, hypertension and heart disease. Public health programs are throwing good money after bad paying for Zyprexa. A recent study published in the October 12, 2006, New England Journal of Medicine, funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, found atypical use with Alzheimer patients was no more effective than a placebo for most patients and put them at risk of serious side effects including confusion, sleepiness and Parkinson like symptoms. According to the report, about a third of the roughly 2.5 million Medicare beneficiaries in nursing homes have taken atypicals, and their use accounts for an estimated $2 billion in annual sales, much of it paid by Medicare and Medicaid. All that said, Lilly cannot claim to be unaware of the continued off-label sale of Zyprexa in the US, because it buys the detailed prescribing records for every doctor in the country and provides them to sales representatives so they can better direct the company,s promotion efforts. Lilly knows exactly which doctors are prescribing Zyprexa, in what dose, and how often, on any given day of the year and that places Lilly in the best position to contact doctors to tell them to halt the off-label prescribing but that obviously has not happened. Allowing Lilly to keep documents that were produced in litigation hidden even after the cases were settled has done nothing to curb the off-labeling prescribing of Zyprexa either. And, the fact that a judge would even entertain Lilly's demands to place the recently released documents back under seal has resulted in outrage voiced by health care professionals all over the US. The pubic health crisis created by Lilly's off-label sale of Zyprexa for 10 years without warning about the health risks is no small matter. On November 16, 2005, USA Today interviewed FDA scientist, Dr David Graham, the man famous for blowing the whistle on the mishandling of the Vioxx disaster, who estimates that there are 62,000 deaths each year from the off-label use of atypical drugs. The allegations made by the plaintiffs in the underlying litigation are all verified in the leaked documents. For instance, the California law firm, Hersh and Hersh, represented plaintiffs in the first settlement, who alleged that Lilly "fraudulently withheld relevant information from potential users of Zyprexa." The lawsuits also alleged a failure to warn doctors and patients that Zyprexa carried potentially lethal risks from weight gain and diabetes, and one of the leaked documents dated 6 years ago, written by a panel of diabetes doctors hired by Lilly to assess the diabetes risk, warned Lilly back then that "unless we come clean on this, it could get much more serious than we might anticipate." According to Leonard Roy Frank, in "Zyprexa: A Prescription for Diabetes, Disease and Early Death, in the August 2005, edition of Street Spirit, if Lilly had issued the warnings, "there undoubtedly would have been fewer cases of diabetes and fewer deaths from taking Zyprexa." "But truthfulness is not one of Eli Lilly's strong suits when profits are at stake," Mr Franks says. "Telling the truth," he points out, "would undoubtedly have cut into sales for its blockbuster drug (the fifth best-selling prescription drug in the world), which, in 2004, produced revenues of $4.4 billion, almost a third of the company's total revenues and more than a third of its profits." This is not the first time that the judge's Zyprexa protective order has been criticized. In 2005, the Swedish Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences journal ran an article titled, "Lilly is hiding negative information about Zyprexa," featuring an interview with Dr Curt Furberg, Professor of Public Health Sciences, at Wake Forest University. Dr Furberg said that he had seen secret documents on Zyprexa in his capacity as an expert witness and stated that the most hazardous effects of Zyprexa were hidden from prescribing physicians and the public. The hidden Zyprexa evidence is said to be worse than that revealed on Vioxx and Dr Furber,s interview provides good insight into why Lilly would early on agree to pay a $690 million settlement to the first round of Zyprexa plaintiffs, which allowed the company to keep the damaging evidence buried. According to Lilly, the company has produced approximately 11 million documents and the court has, without any stated reasons, allowed Lilly to designate all 11 million as confidential pursuant to Case Management Order 3, an August 9, 2004, protective order. Attorneys involved in the case say Lilly was even permitted to designate reports and articles about Zyprexa that appeared in the media as confidential. In mid-December 2006, Alaskan attorney, Jim Gottstein, obtained some of the sealed documents by issuing a subpoena for Dr David Egilman, another expert witness who evaluated the Zyprexa documents for a law firm in the underlying litigation, to appear for a deposition. As soon as he received the documents, Mr Gottstein set out to publicize the information by immediately providing copies to journalists and authors including Dr Peter Breggin, Dr Grace Jackson, Dr David Cohen, Dr Stefan Kruszewski, Judy Chamberlin, Vera Sherav, Robert Whitaker, and Alex Berenson at the New York Times. When articles began appearing in the Times, Lilly obtained an injunction that required Mr Gottstein to return the documents and identify everyone they were disclosed to. After Lilly received the names, on December 29, 2006, the court issued a second temporary injunction to prohibit the dissemination of the documents by Terrie Gottstein, Jerry Winchester, Will Hall, Bruce Whittington, and Laura Ziegler. The injunction also barred the disclosure of the information about Zyprexa by many of the most well-known experts on psychiatric drugs in the US, who are also journalists and authors, to include Dr Peter Breggin, Dr Grace Jackson, Dr David Cohen, Dr Stefan Kruszewski, Judy Chamberlin, Vera Sherav, and Robert Whitaker. At Lilly's request, in early January, 2007, more names were added to the injunction including two websites belonging to the consumer protection and patient advocacy organization, the Alliance for Human Research Protection (AHRP), at www.ahrp.org and www.ahrp.blogspot.com, and the web site of the international patient advocacy organization, MindFreedom, at www.mindfreedom.org, and Eric Whalen and his web site at www.joysoup.net. The name of New York Times reporter, Alex Berenson, the only journalist who actually quoted from the documents in the press was not included in any injunction. Lilly in fact never asked for an injunction against the Times, and Judge Jack Weinstein announced in one hearing that he was not going to issue an injunction against the Times. However, for the others journalist, the litigation process has dragged out at snail's pace and Lilly has been successful in getting the court to bar them from discussing or writing about the public health risk created by the continued off-label prescribing of Zyprexa. Attorney, Alan Milstein, representing Ms Sharav, the AHRP, and Dr Cohen, has filed a motion asking the judge to unseal the documents in question from the original protective order on the grounds that they should not have been designated confidential to begin with. At a January 17, 2007, hearing Mr Milstein told Judge Weinstein that the documents are critically important to saving human lives, to prevent human suffering and "this Court should in no way assist Lilly in keeping them from the public." The above statement by Mr Milstein is not an exaggeration. According to recently updated estimates by Allen Jones, a former Medicaid fraud investigator, in considering the $10 billion a year spent on atypicals in the US, the death rate would be close to one patient per $162,000 spent on Zyprexa, or nearly six deaths for every million. Lilly is now seeking civil and criminal contempt charges against Mr Gottstein and Dr Egilman for their part in warning the public, which Mr Gottstein admits will hopefully have a negative impact on the sale of Zyprexa for unapproved uses. Dr Egilman has recently notified Lilly that he will not be attending what could be seen as his own funeral in refusing to testify against himself at a deposition based on his right against self-incrimination under the Fifth Amendment of the US Constitution. Several of the authors and journalists restrained by the injunction have obtained private attorneys to file briefs arguing against their inclusion based on rights guaranteed by the First Amendment and some have testified in person or by phone at court hearings. Attorney, Fred von Lohmann, of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, filed a brief to object to the injunction on behalf of John Doe, referred to as a citizen-journalist who contributes to the Wiki web site and states: "The information that Doe desires to publish on the Wiki (including links to sites where the Lilly Documents can be obtained) plainly relate to a matter of overriding public concern." Lilly apparently believes that showing that there has not been widespread viewing of the documents is important. However, after Lilly told the judge that they were not available on the internet and that a grassroots campaign to disseminate them had "fallen flat," Mr von Lohmann filed a brief saying Lilly "appears to have been incorrect," and supplied the court with affidavits by two persons who said they easily found and downloaded the files on the internet, and in one instance it only took 19 minutes. Ted Chabasinski, the attorney for Robert Whitaker, Judi Chamberlin, and David Oaks, the Director of Mindfreedom, is calling for criminal charges against Lilly executives for illegally marketing Zyprexa for unapproved uses, with full knowledge that thousands of patients were being injured and killed. In his latest brief filed on Feb 1, 2007, Mr Chabasinski says the documents that Lilly claims should be kept secret show this: "Certain executives of defendant corporation, motivated by greed, deliberately engaged in a course of action that they knew would cause, and did cause, the injury and death of thousands of people. "Because of defendant executives' depraved disregard for human life, thousands upon thousands of innocent people were left with their bodies bloated, their health ruined, and their lives severely shortened or rapidly ended." Mr Chabasinski is advising members of the public to contact state attorneys general to direct their attention to the Times articles and the existence of the secret Zyprexa files and a list of current state attorneys general is posted on the Mindfreedom web site. Ms Sharav testified at a January 17, hearing that the public needs to be warned "because vulnerable people such as children and the elderly and disabled people are being targeted to take drugs that are doing them more harm than there is any evidence of benefit. She freely expressed her views about Lilly which prompted Lilly's legal team to ask that her comments be stricken from the record but the request was denied. When asked what the secret documents showed with respect to the practices of Lilly, she stated: "In my opinion, this is about the worst that I have seen. It borders on indifference to human life. Eli Lilly knew that Zyprexa causes hypoglycemia, diabetes, cardiovascular damage and they set about both to market it unlawfully for off label uses to primary care physicians and they even set about to teach these physicians who were not used to prescribing these kind of drugs to, they taught them to interpret adverse effects from their drug Prozac and the other antidepressants which induce mania. "They taught them that if a patient presented with mania after having been on antidepressants, that that was an indication for prescribing Zyprexa for bipolar which is manic depression. That is absolutely outrageous and that is one of the reasons that I felt that this should involve the Attorney General. "The sales of a drug that was approved for very limited indications, for schizophrenia and for bipolar," Mr Sharav stated. "Each one of these is about one to 2 percent of the population," she pointed out. "But the reason the drug became a four and a half billion dollar seller in the United States," she testified, "is because they encouraged the prescription for children, for the elderly, for all sorts of reasons." She said her organization had disseminated a video on U-Tube in which a "former Zyprexa salesman tells exactly what they were taught and how they were taught to defuse doctors's concerns who saw their patients as he put it blow up. Ms Sharav testified that she asked Mr Gottstein for 2 copies of the documents because she wanted to deliver one to the New York State Attorney General. Attorney, Richard Meadows, who represented some of the plaintiffs in cases settled out of court was called to testify and attorneys were able to establish that the information contained in the leaked documents is basically nothing new. He admitted that the two central allegations in the underlying lawsuits was that Zyprexa was marketed off-label and that when Lilly sought FDA approval of the drug that Lilly had information that showed that there were dangers in regard to the drug. Near the end of the hearing, Attorney Milstein argued that the foundation for the injunction was that the Lilly documents were trade secrets and "yet in all of the papers they filed, all they do is say, without any kind of support, that they are trade secrets. He objected to the blanket court order for 11 million documents. "You heard the testimony of the plaintiffs' attorney, he told the judge, "who said to his knowledge, that virtually every document produced by Lilly in this case is marked confidential. In one of the latest development in this bizarre legal battle, Judge Weinstein has issued a court order with the word "Invitation" asking Mr Berenson to appear in court, apparently to guarantee him a front row seat at his own hanging, by giving testimony on whether he participated in what the judge called a "conspiracy" with Dr Egilman and Mr Gottstein to violate the order that sealed the secret documents to begin with. On the other side of the coin, if the documents remain sealed, Mr Franks warns that users of the drug, doctors, and the public are still almost totally in the dark about the clinical trials and what he calls, "Zyprexa's shameful history." He says Zyprexa was approved based on the results of a six-week clinical trial that involved 2,500 subjects, and two-thirds of them did not even successfully complete it. "Among those who stuck it out," he reports, "22 percent of the Zyprexa subjects suffered a "serious" adverse effect, compared to 18 percent in the group taking Haldol." Besides severe weight gain, Mr Franks says, other adverse effects included shaking, spasms, sedation, diabetic complications, rapid heartbeat, restlessness, constipation, seizures, liver problems, white blood cell disorders, and decreased blood pressure. There were a total of 20 deaths, including 12 suicides, in the Zyprexa group. Information documenting these deaths was obtained from FDA files using the Freedom of Information Act, by one of the currently muzzled journalists, Robert Whitaker, who wrote that one in every 145 subjects who entered the trials for Zyprexa, and the other atypicals, died in his best selling book, "Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine, and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill." According to Mr Frank, Lilly has another perverse reason for pushing Zyprexa. "It's a cruel irony," he says, "that while the company is filling its coffers by selling a drug that can cause diabetes, four of its top-selling drugs are treatments for diabetes." "Eli Lilly gets the customer coming and going," he states. Evelyn Pringle can be reached at: evelyn-pringle@sbcglobal.net

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