Mr. Reid was involved in a real estate transaction several years ago and made some money in the deal. Here's the story from Mr. Solomon that infers that Sen. Reid had some questionable dealings and made a profit of $1.1 million even though he no longer owned the land.
Sounds pretty shady...not unlike the story earlier this year where a news story -- also written by Mr. Solomon -- accused the senator of getting free tickets to a prize fight in Las Vegas in an attempt to sway his vote on a bill coming before the Senate. Except it turned out that they weren't tickets; they were free passes to which he was entitled and the Senator ended up voting against the bill.
Paul Kiel at TPMmuckraker has a concise dissection of Mr. Solomon's story and pretty well deflates the hype.
So what's the story here? Well, it's not clear that Reid broke any ethical rules -- let alone any laws. Solomon cites one expert as saying that Reid should have disclosed the transfer to the LLC [limited liability company], because "[w]hether you make a profit or a loss you've got to put that transaction down so the public, voters, can see exactly what kind of money is moving to or from a member of Congress." The thing is, of course, that no money moved in the LLC transaction. Reid still owned the same amount of land - it was just under the cover of the LLC.I remember a similar kerfuffle back in the early days of the Clinton administration when Hillary Clinton made a tidy sum on a stock deal; the righties were all over it for possible insider trading. Turns out she just invested wisely. But I guess the Republicans have a problem with people getting rich -- if they're not one of them.
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On two earlier occasions, Solomon has over-inflated his stories on Reid. TPM readers might remember his expose on Reid's involvement with Jack Abramoff (which, after exhaustively detailing an Abramoff’s associate’s contacts with Reid’s office, failed to mention that Reid didn't vote the way Abramoff wanted him to) and his stories on Reid's acceptance of passes to a boxing match from the Nevada Gaming Commission (which managed to expunge a host of mitigating details too plentiful to name here).
There's an old saying in journalism that three examples make a trend. I think we have a trend here. Solomon’s apparent weakness for detail is one issue. But most curious is the fact that we live in the muckiest times in recent memory, and yet Solomon, at the helm of the most powerful news agency in the country, persists in roaming the wide ocean of Congressional corruption in a Captain Ahab-like hunt for Reid's ethical missteps.
