Reply #1: Boston Globe article - fairer but doesn't allow comments at this point

[karynnj]

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2011/11/17/book-about-insider-trading-raises-questions-about-kerry/Za2jnLUa3lo6u14wuBf9WL/story.html

If they did, I would post that it was not "secret" that a healthcare bill was in the works - in either year. All that information was public. I would also point out that, in the same interval, insurance stocks soared.

Insider trading requires that you can prove that something was know by the individual AND NOT KNOWN by the rest of the world. On the 2003 or 2009 HCR bills, it was common knowledge. As to medical devices, the law added a tax not there before. So, you can argue that the HCR hurt these companies compared to the bill not passing

It is true that the size of the tax was reduced from the original amount in the Baucus markup and then again in the reconciliation package - and Kerry, representing Massachusetts well, fought for that reduction - publicly in the Finance committee. (Note Brown had an amendment to end it altogether which failed when they were doing amendments to the reconciliation bill - he argued that would help MA (and other state's) companies. )