Short lived majority?
What would you say if a man with $50,000 in a suitcase asked you to break the law?”I am not interested,” was a good start. Unfortunately, Rep. Jack Murtha, D-Pa., kept talking. “I am sorry,” he said, “At this point, you know, we do business for a while, maybe I’ll be interested.”
Murtha’s comments on FBI videotape in the late 1970’s bribery sting known as “Abscam” wouldn’t be news except for the fact that he’s now vying to be Democratic majority leader in the House of
Last weekend, soon-to-be Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., released a letter to Democratic congressmen supporting Murtha’s bid for the post. He’s not the first Democratic congressman with a questionable past to get key support from Pelosi.The powerful congresswoman from San Francisco has also made clear she’ll pass over the House Intelligence Committee’s senior Democrat in favor of raising Florida Rep. Alcee Hastings to the chairmanship of the key committee.Hastings is a former federal judge who was impeached by the Democratically controlled House in 1989 and convicted by the Democratically controlled Senate for “conspiring to extort a $150,000 bribe in a case before him, repeatedly lying about it under oath and manufacturing evidence at trial.”
The decision to back Murtha and Hastings for leadership positions reflects exactly the kind of casual disregard for ethics that led voters to boot Republicans from office just eight days ago.
If the Democrats continue in this manner, I don’t think 2008 will be a good year for them.
