Murtha of All Contradictions
Is it too much to ask him to get his story straight?
By Mickey Kaus
Updated Tuesday, Dec. 6, 2005, at 4:54 AM ET
Murtha vs. Murtha: Rep. Murtha on the prospects of an Iraqi civil war:
[T]here's a civil war going. We're caught in between a civil war right now. Our troops are the targets of the civil war. They're the only people that could have unified the various factions in Iraq. And they're unified against us. --ABC's This Week, 12/4/05
[W]hy should I believe what the CIA says about what's happening in Iraq, that there's going to be a civil war? First of all, al Qaeda was wrong. It was wrong on the nuclear stuff. It was wrong on everything they have said over there. So why should I believe that there's going to be a civil war? -- same show, a few moments later.
Rep. Murtha on whether the Iraqis will throw us out:
[T]he military won a military victory. They got rid of Saddam Hussein. ...[snip] ... Now, it's got to be a political win. They have to win this politically. The Iraqis themselves. We'll stay there forever. The Iraqis are never going to say turn it over. We can't allow them to say when it's gonna turn it over.--This Week, 12/4/05
You're gonna see the Iraqis clamoring. Listen, anybody we support in Iraq loses the election. And so they're gonna be clamoring for us to get out. -- same show, a few moments later.
Sorry, this man seems confused. In his current state I wouldn't follow him either into battle or out of it. ...[Emphases added] P.S.: Reinforcing the suggestion that he's been pulling a Nader, Murtha also had nice things to say about President Bush. ("I like this guy. ...Well, he's coming around, because he's talking about redeployment. He's talking about pulling our troops out. And I can see by what he's saying that we're going to be out of there by the end of the year or very close to it.") I must have missed the subsequent wall-to-wall fish-out-of-water MSM coverage--you know, "Longtime Iraq War Critic Praises Bush Plans," that sort of thing. .
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