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Politics : I Will Continue to Continue, to Pretend.... -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (23955)	11/13/2006 1:53:45 PM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Murtha: a man with past Ed Lasky The American Thinker 11 13 06 Pelosi supports Murtha as Maj. Leader because of his national security/war on terror credentials. Has she forgotten he was willing to be bribed by Arabs? From The Hill. <<< Speaker-in-waiting Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) threw her support behind Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) for majority leader Sunday, giving a significant boost to Murtha in his race against Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). >>>“Your strong voice for national security, the war on terror and Iraq provides genuine leadership for our party, and I count on you to continue to lead on these vital issues,” Pelosi wrote Murtha Sunday in a letter obtained by The Hill. “For this and for all you have done for Democrats in the past and especially this last year, I am pleased to support your candidacy for majority leader for the 110th Congress.”<<< As the House Democrats’ unchallenged leader, Pelosi has considerable sway over her colleagues. She and Murtha have long been close allies, but until now, she had not interfered in the majority leader race. >>> Has Ms. Pelosi forgotten that this paragon on national security issues and purported fighter in the war on terror was an unindicted co-conspirator in the ABSCAM investigation of the late 1970s and 1980. Recall that he appeared very interested in the idea of being bribed by what he believed to be Arab oil potentates (in reality, FBI undercover investigators) but wanted to protect himself from being arrested in the future. He waived off the initial offer of a bribe but seemingly only because he wanted to ensure the bona fides of the people who were offering him the bribe. He said he might be interested in taking the money at a later date after they do more business together. The New Republic wrote, <<< More troubling is Murtha’s role in Congress’s last massive corruption scandal: the 1980 Abscam case. Murtha was videotaped meeting with an FBI agent masquerading undercover as an Arab sheik. When the “sheik” offered Murtha $50,000 in exchange for help gaining U.S. residency, Murtha demurred, saying he wasn’t interested “at this time”-but suggested he might rethink it after getting to know the sheik better. Murtha later admitted he’d hoped the sheik might “invest” money in his district, which might be legal but certainly doesn’t sound pristine. The Justice Department named Murtha an unindicted co-conspirator, and, when the House Ethics Committee ultimately voted not to bring charges against him, the Committee’s special counsel resigned in protest. It doesn’t help matters that Murtha was one of exactly four Democrats to vote against their own caucus’ motion last month promoting a tougher ethics reform bill than a sham Republican version. Abscam may be ancient history, and no sinister confluence between Murtha’s work and his brother’s lobbying has been established. Still, Murtha may not be an ideal leader symbolically, at least-for a party determined to reform a “culture of corruption" >>> So the man who Nancy Pelosi lionizes as a national security expert and a defender of America from terrorists appeared to be ready and willing to accept bribes from Arab businessmen and oil potentates. Murtha failed to report this meeting and sequence of events to the FBI. Since Arabs are the main source of terror in the world today and he was willing to sell out to them, anyone have a problem with that? Apparently, Nancy Pelosi appears not to. americanthinker.com hillnews.com foxnews.com spectator.org tnr.com

To: Sully- who wrote (23955)	11/13/2006 2:12:58 PM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

GO JACK, GO! Byron York The Corner Some Republicans are quietly rooting for John Murtha, Nancy Pelosi's choice in the race for House Majority Leader, over rival Steny Hoyer. The reason? They regard Murtha as a target-rich environment, and a brief passage in today's Washington Post hints at why: <<< Hoyer also has the strong support of many of the party's conservative "Blue Dog" Democrats, who worry about Murtha's involvement in the Abscam bribery sting in 1980 and what they see as his freewheeling style on the House Appropriations Committee, where he has openly advocated for the interests of his district and his political supporters. >>> corner.nationalreview.com washingtonpost.com

To: Sully- who wrote (23955)	11/15/2006 6:08:33 PM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

More on John Murtha and the sleaze factor Betsy's Page John Fund takes a lengthy look at all the accusations against John Murtha and bribery charges from ABSCAM plus more recent charges. Murtha dismisses it all as "swift-boating" but won't answer the substance of the charges. From Fund's report, it's pretty clear that Tip O'Neill deliberately got the House Ethics Committee to drop the investigation into John Murtha, perhaps out of fear that Murtha was going to testify for the FBI and his testimony might reach into O'Neill's office. If you read the transcript from his taped discussions with the FBI agents pretending to be Arab sheiks, it's clear that Murtha was trying to find the best angle for the sheiks to invest in his district for the sole purpose of disguising any aid that Murtha might give them. If you’re not disposed to take John Fund as a credible source for criticizing Murtha, how about Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post? She is not any more thrilled with the idea of seeing this guy as Majority Leader. <<< The videotape is grainy, dark and devastating. The congressman and the FBI undercover agents -- the congressman thinks they represent an Arab sheik willing to pay $50,000 to get immigration papers -- are talking business in the living room of a secretly wired Washington townhouse. Two other congressmen in on the deal "do expect to be taken care of," the lawmaker says. But for the time being -- and he says repeatedly that he might change his mind and take money down the road -- he'd rather trade his help for investment in his district, maybe a hefty deposit in the bank of a political supporter who's done him favors. "I'm not interested -- at this point," he says of the dangled bribe. "You know, we do business for a while, maybe I'll be interested, maybe I won't, you know." Indeed, he acknowledges, even though he needs to be careful -- "I expect to be in the [expletive] leadership of the House," he notes -- the money's awfully tempting. "It's hard for me to say, just the hell with it." This is John Murtha, incoming House speaker Nancy Pelosi's choice to be her majority leader, snared but not charged in the Abscam probe in 1980. "The Democrats intend to lead the most honest, most open and most ethical Congress in history," Pelosi pledged on election night. Five days later she wrote Murtha a letter endorsing his bid to become her No. 2. Not the most promising start. >>> Ruth Marcus doesn’t buy Murtha’s defense that his enemies are just “swift-boating” him. If he can’t convince the editorial writers at the Washington Post, he is going to be vulnerable to these sorts of charges throughout his tenure as Majority Leader if he should win. And don’t forget that this is one guy who was all against any plans to limit earmarks. Is he really the guy that the Democrats want as their poster child for their efforts to supposedly remake the House? It will be interesting to see if Pelosi is going to go to the mattresses to get her guy elected Majority Leader. She has made her support so public that it will be taken as a defeat for her if Steny Hoyer defeats Murtha. But a Murtha victory will immediately taint the new Democratic majority with a very strong whiff of corruption plus being tied to a guy who is a past master of pork and earmarks. Is that their new image for disposing of the "culture of corruption?" Not to mention that Pelosi's guy is the one who had the laughable suggestion that we immediately redeploy our troops out of Iraq and station them in Okinawa. What does it say about Nancy Pelosi that she has set up a battle within her own caucus over who should be leader over this guy? betsyspage.blogspot.com opinionjournal.com washingtonpost.com

To: Sully- who wrote (23955)	11/15/2006 9:39:59 PM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Oh, and one more question. Why has the mainstream media, including big local papers in the area, like the Johnstown Tribune-Democrat and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, put forth barely a word about all this? What Did Mr. Murtha Mean? By Ralph Kinney Bennett TCSDaily I think I can say, and say with pride, that we have some legislatures that bring higher prices than any in the world. -- Mark Twain, 1875 When morality comes up against profit, it is seldom that profit loses. -- Shirley Chisholm Cong. "Jack" Murtha is a sort of local legend here in Western Pennsylvania. He delivers the goods, as they say. The pork. He has steered plenty of money into his district. He's from just over the mountain from me, in Johnstown. Local boy makes good and all that. We forgive him for "going native" a bit after all these years in Washington's corridors of power. He's smoothed off a lot of his Allegheny mountain "frontier-coal-steel" coarseness. Carefully cut business suits. That white hair. A very studied establishment look. Great stuff. And now he's in line to be Majority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives. A lot of people around here are rubbing their hands because they figure that then old Jack will really be able to ladle out the pork. I'm impressed with how far Jack's come. But I just have a question. What did Mr. Murtha mean that day, January 7, 1980, when he met with those guys in that Washington, D.C. townhouse - the guys with the cash sitting right there in a drawer - what did Mr. Murtha mean when he said: ...I want to do business with you. I mean I want to get the goddamn jobs in the area, you know, a few bank deposits in my area. Nothing I'd like better. Later on, after we've dealt a while we might change our mind - we might want to do more business. What was that all about? What did Mr. Murtha mean when, apparently knowing he was talking to men bent on bribing members of Congress, he told them "we might want to do more business?" You can see the whole FBI tape of the thing here. spectator.org I know, I know. I've heard his explanation before he clammed up to the press for good - that he was just looking for jobs for his downtrodden district. But that just doesn't stretch far enough to cover everything said in that townhouse that day. Yes, he has "long experience" in Congress. And, yes, a great military record, blah, blah, blah. All well and good. Look, maybe that whole Abscam thing was, as the Washington Post has since called it, "an ethical scrape" for Mr. Murtha, a real learning experience from which the good congressman emerged a thoroughly chastened individual. All Mr. Murtha needs to do now is explain what he meant by being willing to "do more business" with strangers that he met in a strange place; strangers with cash on hand. Oh, and one more question. Why has the mainstream media, including big local papers in the area, like the Johnstown Tribune-Democrat and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, put forth barely a word about all this? tcsdaily.com