Berkley raps choice of Cheney, Porter’s speech

Lee Scrivner

Wednesday, Aug. 2, 2000 | 10:45 a.m.

Calling the GOP's vice-presidential nomination of Dick Cheney a "nonstarter," Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., Tuesday suggested a Democratic vice-presidential candidate that she said "would be trailblazing."

"I want to put a name in the mix that I haven't heard very much: Madeleine Albright," Berkley said on the Sun's news discussion show, "POV Vegas," which airs on Las Vegas ONE, Cox channels 1 and 39.

"She is a woman ... and she is as tough on national defense as any human being in this country."

Despite the congresswoman's enthusiasm for the secretary of state, her suggestion was deflated as unrealistic by her own office.

"I do not think that was an official endorsement or official prognostication," Berkley's press secretary, Michael O'Donovan, said. I think she was just speaking off the top of her head."

Berkley also called the Republican National Convention speech of her congressional opponent, state Sen. Jon Porter, a "nonstarter," saying that Porter's "rhetoric" will have to translate into action.

"If you talk the talk, you have to walk the walk," she said.

Both candidates raised the issue of prescription medicine for seniors.

Claiming to be an early advocate of a prescription medication benefit in Medicare, Berkley cited four surveys she conducted at the behest senior citizens who could not afford the medication that their doctors prescribed for them.

One report, released in April 1999, showed prices for the most common drugs prescribed to Southern Nevada seniors.

"We found un-insured seniors in Southern Nevada pay 126 percent more than the favored customers of pharmaceutical companies--HMO's the federal government, insurance companies," Berkley said. "So the people who cannot afford to pay ... are paying the highest prices."

Berkley has co-sponsored the Prescription Drug Fairness For Seniors Act, which makes prescription drugs available to Medicare beneficiaries at reduced prices.

"Most of the laundry list of issues that (Porter) is talking about are of course issues that I embrace,"she said. "But the proof is in the pudding...Let's pass a meaningful prescription medication benefit in Medicare."