The battle over prescription drug legislation to help seniors pay the soaring costs of their needed medicines took a cynical turn June 19 when the House Ways and Means Committee approved, along party lines, a drug industry- and Bush administration-backed bill that falls far short of providing adequate assistance.

The bill gives "new meaning to 'election year cynicism.' Intended, according to Republicans' own internal documents, to confuse voters, the bill claims to respond to the needs of older Americans for affordable prescription drugs, but would benefit the pharmaceutical companies more than the seniors they say they would help," AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said.

A comparison by the Congressional Research Service shows the Republican bill's benefits are about 40 percent less than benefits in legislation proposed by Democrats. House and Senate Democratic plans for Medicare prescription drug benefits call for Medicare to pick up a large portion of beneficiaries' prescription costs, set a cap on out-of-pocket expenses and carry a $25-a-month premium. The bill backed by the drug industry and Bush calls for higher premiums, would force seniors to pay a huge portion of their prescription drug bills out of their own pockets and would require them to enter into HMO-type plans to get coverage.

"These proposals, shamefully, are exactly what had been hoped for by the giant pharmaceutical companies -- which are already funneling millions of dollars into ad campaigns that thank Republicans for supporting a drug benefit that pushes seniors to the private markets and further away from affordable medicine," Sweeney said.

The same day the pharmaceutical industry- and Bush administration-backed prescription drug bill won committee approval, many of those drug companies took part in a Republican fundraiser where some donors paid $250,000 each to hear President Bush.

According to CNN.com and The Washington Post, GlaxoSmithKline PLC and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America -- a drug company-funded trade group -- kicked in a quarter of a million dollars each. Pfizer Inc. dropped $100,000 into the GOP campaign coffers and Eli Lilly and Co., Bayer AG and Merck & Co. gave $50,000 each to hear Bush's partisan speech.