By Ralph De La Cruz
Florida Center for Investigative Reporting
The Miami Herald on Tuesday published transcripts of Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott’s depositions from a couple of civil lawsuits in the 1990s.
At the same time, the campaign of Scott’s opponent, Alex Sink, also began showing a number of clips of his depositions on YouTube. This is apparently the new way of controlling the message. And the Sink campaign is doing quite a job of it. But just because an opponent’s campaign is pushing an issue doesn’t mean it’s not valid:
Scott is the founder of the company that would become Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corporation, the largest hospital chain in the world. And apparently Columbia/HCA didn’t always handle itself commendably with Scott at the helm.
There was a $1.7 billion fine for Medicare and Medicaid fraud. A charge of insider trading by the state of Florida. And lawsuits. With depositions.
The kind of things that capture words that are hard to deny.
In the depositions, Scott puts on a Clintonesque performance full of hair-splitting and non-denial denials.
An example is this 1997 exchange between Scott and lawyer Jack Ayers that ends up sounding like Abbot and Costello doing “Who’s on first?” Ayers questioned Scott about the contents of a letter he signed.
Rick Scott
Ayers: What is it?
Scott: It’s a letter.
Ayers: What does it say?
Scott: It says these words.
Ayers: And what does that mean to you? If you were to characterize that?
Scott: I would characterize it as a letter with these words.
But to me the most damning line in the transcripts was this assertion from Scott: “I sign letters all the time that I have not read.”
What a lovely attribute for a governor.
Anyone else flashback to Gov. William J. Lepetomane of Blazing Saddles fame?
Work, work, work, work.