Health care reform once again dominated the Senate debate.  In health committee hearings, Senator Bernie Sanders focused on a dirty decade of massive industry fraud. He also spoke out for the need to provide better prescription drug coverage under Medicare. On the Senate floor, the week began with Republicans blocking a vote on a Sanders amendment to curb rampant speculation in the crude oil markets. By week’s end, Senate Majority Leader Reid reportedly said the issue could resurface. At the Supreme Court, justices wound down the term with rulings in some of the most important cases. It was a week when newspaper front-page stories veered from coverage of street protests in Iran to the passing of American pop icons. It was the first week of summer, and the Vermont Lake Monsters drew crowds to a home stand capped by Sanders taking the mound on Friday to throw out the ceremonial first pitch.

Health Care Issues At a Senate hearing, Sanders recited example after example of fraud perpetrated by private insurance companies, drug companies, and for-profit hospitals. Any serious health care reform, he said, must deal with the way corporations have bilked consumers and taxpayers out of billions of dollars. Meanwhile, Sanders said the high cost of prescription drugs and the huge gap in Medicare coverage for medicine for seniors also should be addressed in health care reform. He wants to close the gap popularly known as the doughnut hole. “Seniors simply cannot afford to pay the 100 percent of prescription drug costs that occur when they spend over $2,700 a year on prescription drugs,” he said. “In my view, Medicare must negotiate lower drug prices with the pharmaceutical industry and use those savings to fill the doughnut hole.” Interviewed on ABC News, Sanders said, “Iin Vermont and all of the country, people understand that we have a dysfunctional health care system. What the president is talking about is giving people a choice of whether they want to stay with their own private health insurance or if they want to go into a Medicare-like program which would be available to all people regardless of age.  Do I think all people should have that choice?  I sure do.” To read the list on health care industry fraud cases, click here. To watch Sanders discuss health care reform with ABC News, click here.

Health Care Politics Senators negotiating a bipartisan health care overhaul left Thursday for the July Fourth recess without a deal.  Sanders told Congressional Quarterly that completing a comprehensive health care bill is more important than winning bipartisan approval. “What’s more important is delivering a product rather than sitting around holding hands.” Worried that health care reform is falling apart, more than 130 Vermont lawmakers urged President Obama and members of Congress to pass meaningful changes. If the federal government is unwilling to support a public health insurance option, Vermont House Speaker Shap Smith hoped a proposal by Sanders allowing states to enter into a single-payer health care model goes forward. "There is a lot of support among the American public for this," Sanders said, "but there are also a lot of lobbyists who are fighting this."

Oil Prices Senate Republicans on Monday blocked consideration of an amendment by Sanders to require federal regulators to use emergency powers to curb oil price speculation. “What are they afraid of?  Who are they trying to protect?” Sanders asked in a Senate floor speech. Sanders cited mounting evidence that a year-long run-up in oil prices has little to do with the fundamentals of supply and demand and everything to do with excessive speculation by some of the same Wall Street firms that received the largest taxpayer bailout in the history of the world. “They're back,” he warned. “Not having caused enough damage driving our country and much of the world into a deep recession, now they're back into their speculation games jacking up oil prices.” Sanders is the chief sponsor of a bill to make federal regulators use emergency powers to prevent price manipulation. To read more, click here.