Here’s a fun one from my colleague Emily Kaiser, who’s reporting from Capitol Hill today (she’s monitoring the hearing on TV. Turns out we have someone else there. That’s what you get when you write about DC from New York), specifically from the Financial Services Committee in the House of Representatives:
Committee Chairman and Massachusetts Democratic Congressman Barney Frank was convening a hearing on how the government is using the $700 billion rescue fund, featuring some serious economic star power in the form of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp Chairman Sheila Bair.
Long story short, when the financial future of the nation is at stake, you gotta let the hearing get started — especially when Rep Frank wields the gavel:
The hearing will come to order. … We’ll need the photographers to stop obstructing… I’m a great believer in the freedom of information, but I think America is fully informed as to what these two gentlemen [Bernanke and Paulson -- ed.] look like, so I don’t feel like I’m interfering with First Amendment rights if I ask you to let us get on with the hearing.
Fair point, but politics aside, some of those photographers get paid by the picture…
