Cowards

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Ohio Congresswoman and former maha next-door-neighbor Jean Schmidt called John Murtha a coward on the floor of Congress today.

I just saw it on television. I don’t have the exact quote, but it was something to the effect of “Cowards cut and run; Marines never do.”

I am reasonably certain the congresswoman is not a Marine, btw.

Congressman Murtha is on television denouncing the house resolution today calling for an immediate pullout from Iraq. He feels it makes a mockery of his proposal from yesterday. By Liz Sidoti of the Associated Press:

House Republicans, sensing an opportunity for political advantage, maneuvered for a quick vote and swift rejection Friday of a Democratic lawmaker’s call for an immediate troop withdrawal from Iraq.

“We want to make sure that we support our troops that are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan,” said Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. “We will not retreat.” …

… The GOP leadership decided to act little more than 24 hours after Rep. Jack Murtha, a hawkish Democrat with close ties to the military, said the time had come to pull out the troops. By forcing the issue to a vote, Republicans placed many Democrats in a politically unappealing position – whether to side with Murtha and expose themselves to attacks from the White House and congressional Republicans, or whether to oppose him and risk angering the voters that polls show want an end to the conflict.

Murtha says that the Republican resolution is not what he proposed, and he is upset that, after he spent months thinking and working out the details of his proposal, The GOP would, in effect, put up a straw proposal in its place just so they could knock it down.

Andrea Mitchell commented that Murtha has always been very close to the Pentagon brass. She suspects that Murtha’s plan may be favored by military personnel in the Pentagon who can’t talk to Rumsfeld.

Update: A Republican congressman announced an ethics probe of John Murtha. They’re pulling out all the stops.

John Aravosis suggests House Dems offer another quickie resolution —

The Dems should try to offer a resolution, and have the Repubs block it, proclaiming the sense of the Congress that President Bush is doing a great job – a heck of a job, one might say – executing the war in Iraq. If the Republicans kill the resolution, they look like they’re afraid to endorse Bush, and if they vote for the resolution, they’ll look like idiots calling this a great job when the majority of the public doesn’t agree.

Update on Jean Schmidt’s weasel insult of John Murtha: Apparently after she made her “coward” statement, the House Republican leadership cut off the mikes and had her read a request to take her remarks out of the record.

BTW, I’ve seen the video of Mean Jean five times on television today. I think it’s on the public record, if not the Congressional Record.

Update update: House Dems are fighting mad. I think they’re going to fire up (finally) and start taking the fight to the Repugs. And I sincerely believe the GOP is way overplaying their hand. I predict a public backlash against the GOP.

12 thoughts on “Cowards”

  1. Schmidt is crafty — the “cut and run” statement is supposedly a quote from someone else. So she didn’t call Murtha a coward, she just told everyone that someone else did. And then she cut and run, requesting that her statement be stricken from the record.

  3. I hope you’re right about the public backlash. I read the public as being ready for a serious discussion about getting out of Iraq, and having the Rethuglicans calling a decorated veteran Marines a coward, and pulling procedural stunts in Congress is just a slap in the face to anyone who thinks Iraq is serious business, and it’s time for some new approaches.

  4. Jeebus Siddhartha Xrist! Don’t you regret not having accidentally backed over her with your car when you had the chance? I know, I know. She also said something about attending a funeral at Arlington Nat Cem yesterday, I bet that’s either BS or it’s the first one she’s been to (I can picture her staff late last night frantically calling the Pentagon to find out if any funerals were being scheduled for that day after Murtha made his speech).

    I also think she should be tested for rabies.

  5. *HTML allowed?*

    I just posted this:

    Lieutenant General William E. Odom (U.S. Army (Ret.); Senior Fellow with Hudson Institute and a professor at Yale University; Director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988) writes an article: “Everything that opponents of a pullout say would happen if the U.S. left Iraq is happening already” “If I were a journalist, I would list all the arguments that you hear against pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq” [He lists 9 arguments and shows how they become arguments for pulling out!] Also see his “Want stability in the Middle East? Get out of Iraq!“

  7. The vote was a sham. The Dems should have abstained from voting; that would have sent the correct message. Instead a 400+ vote against just shows how basically cowardly they are …

  8. Murtha is my hero. In 21 years in the Navy, I was not wounded (no Purple Heart) and no ribbons for valor. But I did manage to accumulate 35 months of time in combat zones.

    And I am represented in Congress by a Republican weasel.

  9. Howard Fineman said last night on Countdown that the Murtha smear was ordered by Karl Rove. I didn’t see it, but the folks at kos said Fineman looked very angry.

    You know, if the press stops enabling these thugs, we just might get an actual debate. I’d like to start with a question…

    What exactly is our objective in Iraq? No, not what is our slogan of the day; no, not who is the boogeyman; really, what will victory look like? Anyone?

    (silence from the administration)

  10. “I didn’t see it, but the folks at kos said Fineman looked very angry.”

    I saw it. My impression was that he was struggling to conceal emotion and not quite succeeding.

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