Although when it comes to the specific date of our mass death, Harold Camping might as well be talking Chinese nuclear development with Herman Cain, it seems a little bit harder to doubt his general prognostication of doom in the weeks after 56 exotic animals were released into the countryside by the owner of a "private zoo" in Ohio.

Just before he shot himself to death.

If you don't know the whole story by now, to quickly summarize: In a scene that Director Emeritus of the Columbus, Ohio Zoo and television personality Jack Hanna compared to "Noah's Ark", endangered Bengal tigers, grizzly bears, monkeys, and a variety of other animals - 49 in all - were killed en masse by law enforcement.

Make no mistake - this happened because Ohio is one of a handful of states that does not regulate the sale and ownership of exotic animals, and it has been purposefully made that way. Tea Party-sympathiser-cum-Governor John Kasich, upon his election to that office, began his assault on government by letting an executive order expire that had provided actual restrictions concerning who could own and sell these animals in the Buckeye State.

To Kasich, this kind of crazy Hobbesianism would "hurt small business", which presumably includes the particular lunatic who had done jail time for illegal possession of firearms and was cited multiple times for animal abuse - but still had his Animal Farm up and running in Ohio - until he granted his boarders amnesty. Because of the anti-regulation zealots who have taken control of our political culture and institutions, this was the profile of someone still fit to continue to lord over a coterie of dangerous and endangered species, in his own little Jurassic Park.

As Darth Vader would say, "Impressive. Most impressive."

Now if you were to ask the Don King of pizza, Herman Cain, I'm sure he'd have a simple plan to solve this problem, which would probably include a number of 9s and the assumption that Zanesville, Ohio is somewhere in the vicinity of Chiang Mai. But for those of us with a beyond-Perry intellect, the story is as simple as it is sadly quotidian. What led to the death of these exotic animals is the same insanity that crashed Wall Street and allows drug companies to lie to people while killing them: the mass deregulation of America.

If you think the animals have run wild in eastern Ohio, then take a look at what a-not-quite-as-evolved species did on Wall Street, resulting in thousands of zookeepers finally showing up to occupy this land those on "The Street" thought was theirs to defile and despoil.

From the 1980s onward, when we started to "get government of our backs", as Ronnie liked to say, we created a mess that now has awoken 99 per cent of the people who generally can't spare the pocket change for a $10,000 Tiffany towel rod. The apogee of this idiocy was the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which in 1999 repealed one of the great accomplishments of the New Deal, the Glass-Steagall legislation separating commercial and investment banks.

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Mike Papatonio on Ring of Fire, February, 2011

Do you remember a few years ago the ads for the contraceptive Yaz, featuring empowered women punching away at balloons labeled "bloating," "irritability" and other common symptoms of PMS to the tune of Twisted Sister's "We're Not Gonna Take It?" It also was offered up as a treatment for acne. The FDA really didn't like those ads for their upbeat promising of a wholesale cures for all those lady problems without the caveat that the drug was not appropriate for treatment in all cases. They cited parent company Bayer for those ads:

The F.D.A. says that Yaz is approved to treat a more serious condition called premenstrual dysphoric disorder, known to cause anxiety, tension, persistent anger and other symptoms and no evidence that Yaz eliminates PMS symptoms as the ads describe. "The TV ads misleadingly suggest that Yaz is approved to treat women with any severity of the symptoms presented, regardless of whether their symptoms are actually severe enough to constitute PMDD," the FDA letter said.

Both the ads also "suggest that Yaz is approved for acne of all severities when this is not the case," the agency said it is only approved to treat moderate acne.

Another objection by the F.D.A. was the fast-moving images and background music that might be distracting to viewers while information about potential side effects, some potentially life-threatening blood clots, was described. “These complex presentations distract from and make it difficult for viewers to process and comprehend the important risks being conveyed. This is particularly troubling as some of the risks being conveyed are serious, even life-threatening,” the agency said.

But besides this hand-slap, Yaz went on to be one of the most popular brands with millions of women switching to the brand, including Carissa Ubersox:

In 2007, Carissa Ubersox, 24, was fresh out of college and starting her dream job as a pediatric nurse in Madison, Wis. On Christmas day, while working the holiday shift, her boyfriend surprised her at the hospital with a marriage proposal.

Wanting to look and feel her best for her wedding day, Carissa said she switched to Yaz after watching one of its commercials that suggested this pill could help with bloating and acne.

"Yaz is the only birth control proven to treat the physical and emotional premenstrual symptoms that are severe enough to impact your life," claimed the ad.

It "sounds like a miracle drug," Carissa said she remembers thinking.

But just three months later, in February 2008, Carissa's legs started to ache. She didn't pay much attention to it, assuming, she said, that it was just soreness from being on her feet for a 12-hour shift. By the next evening, she was gasping for air. Blood clots in her legs had traveled through her veins to her lungs, causing a massive double pulmonary embolism.

Her fiance called 911, but on the way to the hospital Carissa's heart stopped. Doctors revived her, but she slipped into a coma for almost two weeks.

Carissa's only memory of that time is something she refers to as an extraordinary dreamlike experience. She said she remembers a big ornate gate and seeing a recently deceased cousin.

That cousin, Carissa said, told her, "You can stay here with me or you can go back."

But, she recounted, he told her if she goes back she'll end up blind.

"I just remember waking up in the hospital and I was like, 'Oh, I guess I chose to stay,'" Carissa told ABC News.

Like her cousin in her dreamlike experience foretold, she actually did wake up blind, and remains blind to this day.

No one can say for sure whether Yaz caused Carissa's blindness, but Yaz contains a unique hormone called drospirenone that some experts say may trigger more blood clots than other birth control pills. Clots can cause serious breathing problems, a stroke or even death.

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During the ultimate scene of betrayal in the movie Wall Street, a young stockbroker named Bud Fox learns that his idol, the golden-calf worshipping Gordon Gekko, has not only lied to him but left his father’s company exposed to the whims and hunger of the wolves of Wall Street. In a climactic moment, Fox asks Gekko: “How much is enough? How many yachts can you water ski behind?”

Even though this film was mid-1980s fare, well, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Perhaps not for the actor who played Bud Fox, Charlie Sheen, who should share Natalie Portman’s Oscar for real-time transformation into the Black Swan. But for the rest of us, who have watched as greed has become the foundational structure upon which much of our modern economy is built, it is often difficult to see how we might close the Pandora’s Box and return to saner times. You know, back when being Donald Trump wasn’t considered an asset in a hair-club-for-men commercial, much less a race to be President of the United States.

There is nowhere this greed is more pervasive than among those companies responsible for the health of roughly 300 million of Americans - Big Pharma. You know, the guys who got a better sweetheart deal from George Bush’s Medicare prescription drug benefit than Ana Nicole Smith did from that old rich guy.

Later, re-importation from Canada and bulk negotiation for Medicare prescription drugs were written out of any Obama health-care plan, even though each was at the heart of Democratic Party campaign promises in 2006 and 2008.

Maybe money can not buy you love - but the halls of Congress have a more Heidi-Fleiss-kind-of ethic to them.

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Congressional Democrats are calling for two inquiries after the New York Times reported earlier this week that drug companies were jacking up their prices, negating savings they promised for healthcare reform:

Responding to news reports of unusually high wholesale price increases in brand-name prescription drugs, four House leaders and one senator asked for government reviews of the pricing practices.

Although drug makers challenge the theory, some experts say the run-up in wholesale prices may be partly related to the industry’s concerns about future cost containment under any health care legislation.

“Recent studies have indicated that the industry may be artificially raising prices for certain pharmaceutical products in expectation of new reforms,” the House Democrats wrote in a letter to the Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan investigative arm of Congress. “Any price gouging is unacceptable, but anticipatory price gouging is especially offensive,” the letter added, asking the G.A.O. to conduct an expedited review of the price increases.

[...] Separately, Senator Bill Nelson of Florida, a Democrat who has led efforts in the Senate to seek more concessions from drug makers, wrote to the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services asking for “an immediate and thorough investigation into drug industry pricing and recent increases, and the extent to which these increases may affect the Medicare and Medicaid programs.”

Robert Reich's blog :

When I worked in Washington, the biggest lobby - after Big Oil, and the big military contractors - was the big pharmaceutical companies - Big Pharma. Early in the Bush administration Big Pharma pushed the new Medicare drug benefit through Congress, releasing a $600 billion dollar gusher in their direction. The bill included a guarantee that Medicare wouldn't use its huge bargaining leverage to negotiate lower prices with the drug companies - an extra bonus. If this isn't corporate welfare, I don't know what is.

Nancy Pelosi has announced that one of the Dems first priorities ("first hundred hours") would be to end this ban and have Medicare use its bargaining clout to get lower drug prices for seniors. But Big Pharma is already on the attack. Read on...

Joshua Muravchik jots down a few thoughts...Big Pharma would make a boatload of cash developing a new drug to break the denial people like Muravchik are afflicted with. Haven't they done enough damage already?