Grandma Pelosi with a 4-10:
The WaPo reports:
"House Democrats elected Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (Md.) the new majority leader yesterday over strong opposition from Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), exposing a deep political divide even before the party takes control."
Well, it looks like the Dems have finally resolved the whole Murtha/Hoyer controversy, anyway, thank God. Can we move on now? Please, no more stupid crap like that again. I mean, just a week after winning a huge election to retake the Congress for the first time in 12 years -- 12 years!-- here comes Grandma Pelosi runnin' down the freeway with a 4-10 loaded with lead, trying to strong arm her caucus into voting for her man to be majority leader. Not exactly a good start for the first woman in history to become Speaker of the House. Of course, it's unfair, but when women play hardball politics like this they come off looking like out of control bitches. (I can't wait until Hillary gets on the war-path. Just imagine the field day the media will have with her!) The Dems came off looking real bad during this recent episode; let's hope this sort of thing isn't going to be a regular feature of Nana Pelosi's iron rule.
[And can I just say that if this stupid little intramural dust up hadn't been going on, more attention might have been focused on the GOP making that dumb redneck Trent Lott minority whip in the Senate, again. The South has risen again and no one noticed.]
What was this media frenzy all about anyway? Do most Americans really care about who the majority leader is in the House; obviously not because, no one had even heard of Tom DeLay until he was indicted. The whole thing about Murtha's supposed ethics problems was way over blown by the media, to put it mildly. We kept being treated to a replay of the infamous Abscam tapes over and over again, as if there was some story there. The thrust of the reporting seemed to be that he was some how ethically challenged because he refused to take a bribe -- 25 years ago. There clearly was no there, there, but the media just kept running with it. And as far as his comments about earmarks are concerned; I think that he's probably in the majority of those in Congress who want no fiddling going on with their cherished pork.
And the notion that majority leader John Murtha would have wound up undermining the new Democratic push to clean up politics as usual Washington is ridiculous. I don't get the impression that Murtha in even in his wildest dreams could even come close to the kind of corruption that characterized the past twelve years of the GOP's congressional klepocracy. He's just doing what they all do by steering big defense contracts to his district, he's certainly no Richard Pombo.
I understand the urge to reward Murtha for coming out early for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, but I don't think that's enough to entitle him to be majority leader. Tom DeLay may have operated pretty much under the radar his whole tenure, while he sold the government to the highest bidder, but the media wouldn't have left Murtha alone. No matter what the Dems tried to get accomplished Murtha would be the in the center of some storm or other.
It's better for the majority that Hoyer is the leader, because he's media Sominex. If I see him on a Sunday talk show I'll be leaping up to change the channel before he puts me back to sleep (it's hard enough for me to get up that early on Sundays.) He's a good guy though; I think he'll do a good job. And I think he should get some credit for the speech he gave back in 2005 on the House floor during the Terry Schiavo debacle. He was only one of a few sane voices in that sorry affair. (Too bad some 47 of his fellow Democrats didn't listen to him and voted for that shameful legislation.)
And besides, I think it's a good thing that there'll be some healthy oversight within the majority looking over Nana Pelosi's shoulder. 149 Democrats in the House apparently think so, too, and you can see why. Within minutes of seizing so much power she's just tossed a bit of it away by losing this fight that she should have never picked in the first place. Imagine what Karl Rove is gong to do to her.
"House Democrats elected Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (Md.) the new majority leader yesterday over strong opposition from Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), exposing a deep political divide even before the party takes control."
Well, it looks like the Dems have finally resolved the whole Murtha/Hoyer controversy, anyway, thank God. Can we move on now? Please, no more stupid crap like that again. I mean, just a week after winning a huge election to retake the Congress for the first time in 12 years -- 12 years!-- here comes Grandma Pelosi runnin' down the freeway with a 4-10 loaded with lead, trying to strong arm her caucus into voting for her man to be majority leader. Not exactly a good start for the first woman in history to become Speaker of the House. Of course, it's unfair, but when women play hardball politics like this they come off looking like out of control bitches. (I can't wait until Hillary gets on the war-path. Just imagine the field day the media will have with her!) The Dems came off looking real bad during this recent episode; let's hope this sort of thing isn't going to be a regular feature of Nana Pelosi's iron rule.
[And can I just say that if this stupid little intramural dust up hadn't been going on, more attention might have been focused on the GOP making that dumb redneck Trent Lott minority whip in the Senate, again. The South has risen again and no one noticed.]
What was this media frenzy all about anyway? Do most Americans really care about who the majority leader is in the House; obviously not because, no one had even heard of Tom DeLay until he was indicted. The whole thing about Murtha's supposed ethics problems was way over blown by the media, to put it mildly. We kept being treated to a replay of the infamous Abscam tapes over and over again, as if there was some story there. The thrust of the reporting seemed to be that he was some how ethically challenged because he refused to take a bribe -- 25 years ago. There clearly was no there, there, but the media just kept running with it. And as far as his comments about earmarks are concerned; I think that he's probably in the majority of those in Congress who want no fiddling going on with their cherished pork.
And the notion that majority leader John Murtha would have wound up undermining the new Democratic push to clean up politics as usual Washington is ridiculous. I don't get the impression that Murtha in even in his wildest dreams could even come close to the kind of corruption that characterized the past twelve years of the GOP's congressional klepocracy. He's just doing what they all do by steering big defense contracts to his district, he's certainly no Richard Pombo.
I understand the urge to reward Murtha for coming out early for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, but I don't think that's enough to entitle him to be majority leader. Tom DeLay may have operated pretty much under the radar his whole tenure, while he sold the government to the highest bidder, but the media wouldn't have left Murtha alone. No matter what the Dems tried to get accomplished Murtha would be the in the center of some storm or other.
It's better for the majority that Hoyer is the leader, because he's media Sominex. If I see him on a Sunday talk show I'll be leaping up to change the channel before he puts me back to sleep (it's hard enough for me to get up that early on Sundays.) He's a good guy though; I think he'll do a good job. And I think he should get some credit for the speech he gave back in 2005 on the House floor during the Terry Schiavo debacle. He was only one of a few sane voices in that sorry affair. (Too bad some 47 of his fellow Democrats didn't listen to him and voted for that shameful legislation.)
And besides, I think it's a good thing that there'll be some healthy oversight within the majority looking over Nana Pelosi's shoulder. 149 Democrats in the House apparently think so, too, and you can see why. Within minutes of seizing so much power she's just tossed a bit of it away by losing this fight that she should have never picked in the first place. Imagine what Karl Rove is gong to do to her.
posted by William Duane at 1:48 PM
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