This is all very symbolic: Orlando Sentinel reporter Scott Powers was assigned to cover a fundraiser for Senator Bill Nelson (D, FL) that was being thrown by local real estate bigwig Alan Ginsburg. The fundraiser featured Vice President Joe Biden (D), whose staff promptly tossed Powers into a closet and refused to let him out except for the actual speeches [themselves]. This… is problematical, particularly since Biden’s been beating the transparency drum lately; well, more accurately the words on the paper in front of him are telling Biden to beat the transparency drum, and that’s just what Joe Biden is going to do, yes indeed. Fortunately for Biden, Nelson, & Ginsburg, neither Powers nor the Orlando Sentinel seem inclined to see whether all of this qualifies as ‘kidnapping’ under Florida law.
I know that people will find this story funny on first read, and superficially it is. But there’s a problem here, and it exists on a somewhat deeper level than the assault on the dignity of a member of the Fourth Estate. You see, who told Biden’s staff that they had the right to sequester a reporter in another man’s home? It certainly wasn’t Alan Ginsburg who signed off on it: as the article linked to above reports, Ginsburg fell all over himself to apologize to Powers once the former heard what had happened to the latter. As well he should have: Alan Ginsburg’s intent with this fundraiser was to maintain good relations with a sitting US Senator and generally build links, not get swept up into a dispute that threatens to sour his existing relationship with a local paper, at absolute best. Ginsburg is thanking God right now that the Orlando Sentinel isn’t threatening a lawsuit; and I’m not a lawyer, but it looks like there would have been at least a civil case there. In other words, Ginsburg mostly dodged the bullet that Biden fired. Continue reading Orlando Sentinel reporter Scott Powers stuffed in closet at Bill Nelson shindig.