Background: several weeks ago the LA Times reported that the Obama administration had steered nearly half a billion dollars’ worth of a no-bid contract on a secondary smallpox vaccine – one not actually tested on human beings – to Siga Technology, a company controlled by longtime Democratic party contributor Ronald Perelman. Needless to say, the drug’s much more expensive than the primary drug, the government interfered with the bidding process, and people pretended afterward that no correspondence between the company and the government took place.

Well, it seems that questions are being asked by an exceptionally unlikely source:

Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat, has asked The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to review the Obama administration’s award of a $443 million sole-source contract to a company owned by a major Democratic donor.

[snip]

Citing “serious questions” about the contract, the Los Angeles Times reported that McCaskill has asked the inspector general of HHS to investigate. McCaskill is the chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Contracting and Oversight.

…except that it’s not really a surprise. As Hot Air cynically (and accurately) points out (via Instapundit), McCaskill’s in the unenviable position of having to run as a Democrat in Missouri in 2012 with Obama at the top of the ticket; which is a longer-winded way of saying “DOOM.” If McCaskill wants to simply be reduced to being the Ranking Member of the Senate Subcommittee on Contracting and Oversight starting in 2013, she’s going to have to come up with some way of distancing herself from the Obamatross President. Exposing yet another corruption scandal in this administration might work.

Might. Obamacare is a mighty albatross, all on its own.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: Siga is currently being pegged as a potential candidate for a buyout, given the combination of the government contract and a low stock price. Not that I’d be the sort to suggest that such a thing might be a consideration for any sort of delay.