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Home Front: Politix
Whodathunkit?: WaPo slams Murtha and Pelosi
2006-11-14
LOYALTY IS an admirable quality, but sometimes it can be taken too far. Except by us Media Pukes who can hide all sorts of stuff about our Dhimmicrat allies before the election but then use it to skewer them right afterwards That is the case with the decision by the incoming House speaker, Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), to offer a public endorsement of the bid of Pennsylvania Rep. John P. Mad Dog Murtha (D) to become majority leader. Ms. Pelosi's preference for Mr. Murtha was no secret; he managed her campaign for minority leader against Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.), now Mr. Murtha's rival for the majority leader post. What was surprising was that Ms. Pelosi would weigh in publicly on Mr. Murtha's behalf, albeit -- as she pointedly noted at the beginning of her letter -- in response to his request.
Mr. Murtha's candidacy is troubling for several reasons, beginning with his position on the war in Iraq. A former Marine, Mr. Murtha deserves credit for sounding an alarm about the deteriorating situation a year ago. But his descriptions of the stakes there have been consistently unrealistic, and his solutions irresponsible. Just last week he denied that the United States was fighting terrorism in Iraq, though al-Qaeda is known to play a major part in the insurgency. He said the United States should abandon even the effort to train the Iraqi army and should "redeploy as soon as practicable," an extreme step that most congressional Democrats oppose. He claimed that "stability in the Middle East, stability in Iraq," would come from such an abrupt withdrawal; in fact, virtually all Iraqi and Middle Eastern leaders have said that it would lead to a greatly escalated conflict that could spread through the region.

Mr. Murtha would also be the wrong choice as majority leader after an election in which a large number of voters expressed unhappiness with Washington business as usual. Mr. Murtha has been a force against stronger ethics and lobbying rules. He was one of just four Democrats whose votes helped kill a strong Democratic package of lobbying reforms this spring.

As a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, he has been an avid participant in the orgy of earmarking, including numerous projects sought by a lobbying firm that employed his brother. During the Abscam congressional bribery investigation in 1980, Mr. Murtha was videotaped discussing a bribe with an undercover FBI agent. ("You know, we do business for a while, maybe I'll be interested, maybe I won't, you know," Mr. Murtha said.) He wasn't indicted, but it's fair to say the episode raised questions about his integrity.


Posted by:DanNY

#14  In 2008 all these issues will disappear. Suddenly Murtha will be just what the House needed. It's OK to tell the truth, but not if it would influence an election.
Posted by: Jackal   2006-11-14 21:57  

#13  The election's over. That's why it's OK for the WaPo to write this.
Posted by: Danking70   2006-11-14 19:12  

#12  Pelosi couldn't restrain herself for even one week before tipping her true hand. No poker player she. That's OK. It just means a standoff with nothing being accomplished for two years. This is a great outcome for taxpayers. After two years of commie leadership, voters will be ready to support Pubs again. Hopefully, a real Pub candidate will emerge. Not the two faced ass from Arizona.
Posted by: SpecOp35   2006-11-14 18:21  

#11  Steny's a local boy, his district borders DC. His constituents receive their WaPo on the front porch every morning, assuming they still subscribe to any paper.
Posted by: Seafarious   2006-11-14 15:29  

#10  wapo was always for Steny Hoyer, a good DLCer. No change. My expectation is Hoyer will win.

After than Harman should go after Hastings.
Posted by: liberalhawk   2006-11-14 14:36  

#9  MSM - they eat their young....
Posted by: Glavique Snomolet4823   2006-11-14 14:14  

#8  Assuming, as anticipated, that Murtha loses, his post election press conference ought to be a doozy.
Posted by: mhw   2006-11-14 10:19  

#7  combine this with the elevation of Alcee Hastings - an impeached judge, removed for accepting bribes, to the intel committee head, and you have an excellent 30 second ad
Posted by: Frank G   2006-11-14 09:01  

#6  OK where was all this when Irey was pointing it out? Nice of the WaPo to wait till AFTER the election to finally print all this.

Partisan assholes.

I hope Murtha gets in there - he'll be a shining example of what the PRESS wants in office, and of how the Dems work.

"said he was not aware of the ethical issues around the lawmaker. but said they will have little impact on Republicans Democrats"

Thats exactly how the Republicans went about losing their majority and their conservative mojo - and the American Public's support.

Add in some earmarks and pork, and a tin ear regarding Immigration/Amnesty and the War on Terror, and BINGO, you'll have all the stuff that cause the voters to show the Repubs the door. Major exception is they don't have Dubya's unpopularity to fight against like the Repubs did, but they will instead have Hillary a a burden on the national ticket in 08.

So GO Murtha GO! Murtha for Majority Leader!

Show America how little the Dems care about prok, earmarks and corruption, show them how they voted for Cut-N-Run Jack, and the San Francisco Values.

The funny thing remaining is how the WaPo all of a sudden got religion about Murtha's idiotic "Okinawa" stance and his corrput background and pork budgeting -- when they had been fawning all over him the past couple years. Fekking hypocrites.
Posted by: OldSpook   2006-11-14 08:59  

#5  The Culture of Greater Corruption[tm]

Done by professionals on a closed circuit. Do not attempt this at home.
Posted by: Procopius2K   2006-11-14 08:40  

#4  From the Washington Times. Link

Most notably, Mr. Murtha was an "unindicted co-conspirator" in the Abscam scandal of the 1980s when FBI agents posed as emissaries of an Arab sheik and lured several congressmen into a Capitol Hill town house to hand out $50,000 bribes. Mr. Murtha was among those offered money, but he declined.
"I'm not interested. I'm sorry," he said, adding: "You know, we do business for a while, maybe I'll be interested, maybe I won't."
The following year, the ethics panel in the then-Democrat-controlled House declined -- on a "near party-line vote," according to press accounts at the time -- to file ethics charges against the Pennsylvania Democrat.
More recently, according to press reports and a dossier compiled by CREW, Mr. Murtha abused his position as ranking member of the defense appropriations subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee to benefit clients of his brother, Robert "Kit" Murtha, who is a registered lobbyist. The $417 billion defense appropriations bill that went through the subcommittee in 2004 benefited at least 10 companies represented by Robert Murtha's firm, which lobbied the congressman directly, according to the group.
"Future House Speaker Pelosi's endorsement of Rep. Murtha, one of the most unethical members of Congress, shows that she may have prioritized ethics reform merely to win votes with no real commitment to changing the culture of corruption," Ms. Sloan said.
Pelosi spokeswoman Jennifer Crider dismissed the concerns and said Mr. Murtha "has addressed these issues."
"Leader Pelosi will show that Democrats will change the way business is done in Washington," Ms. Crider said.
But many Democrats adamantly oppose Mr. Murtha and say Mrs. Pelosi blundered badly by throwing her public support behind a tainted figure just one week after winning so many campaigns that promised to clean up corruption in Washington.
"This is cloakroom conversation," one Democrat said. "This sends a very bad message as the first thing she's gotten involved in. The whole Abscam thing is a problem, and so is the whole wheeler-dealer thing."
Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, the Maryland Democrat who now holds the whip position, has said he has the votes needed to win the majority-leader post in this week's elections among Democrats. Hoyer allies say he has the support of 13 of the 19 top Democrats in the House and public statements of support from at least 28 of the 40 new members.
Posted by: SwissTex   2006-11-14 07:59  

#3   said he was not aware of the ethical issues around the lawmaker. but said they will have little impact on Democrats

And there on a nutshell is the Denocratic party.
Posted by: Redneck Jim   2006-11-14 06:18  

#2  Rep. Michael E. Capuano (D-Mass.), a Murtha supporter, said he was not aware of the ethical issues around the lawmaker. but said they will have little impact on Democrats as they gather Thursday to choose the next majority leader.

"The bottom line is, Nancy has decided what team she wants," Capuano said. "What members have to ask themselves is whether they want a unified leadership team or a fractured leadership team. That will make a difference in the next two years."

From a related article at WaPo, here
Posted by: Bobby   2006-11-14 05:55  

#1  Saved America = Amerika, USSA =USR/SSR, from WW1 + WW2 > will save us from WW3/4.
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2006-11-14 04:40  

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