Ole White Flag

Sometimes I could just whack myself.

I enjoy mocking the foolish, visiting liberal blogs and making snide remarks that really are below me, and from time to time I'll engage in a debate I don't believe in just for the fun of it all. Yes, I'm a deeply troubled man.

So, it confounds me then why, in this post, I pulled my punches with Congressman Murtha. I guess it was the whole combat veteran thing. I honored his service, despised what he was now doing, and suspected that there might have been some dark motivation. At the time I wondered to myself, "is this guy trying to make himself untouchable in the press, because he knows something corrupt is going to surface?" I so wanted to suggest this, but instead just questioned his timing:

"So he's a good guy and a patriot, by virtually everyone's account. Which makes this all the more puzzling. Why, dare tell me, would a decorated veteran declare his support for a six month pull out? I could understand a lot of things, but this? It doesn't make sense."

After that I flinched. Pussy.

Today, I came across to items that make me wonder if I was - just possibly - on to something. First there was Bob Novak on the past.

"I had forgotten that federal prosecutors designated him an unindicted co-conspirator in the Abscam investigation 26 years ago."

Wow, that is pretty damning stuff! I wonder why the press hasn't reminded us about ABSCAM? I mean, it is more recent than his war duty, and they can't stop talking about that.

Then there was this, today

Last June, the Los Angeles Times reported how the ranking member on the defense appropriations subcommittee has a brother, Robert Murtha, whose lobbying firm represents 10 companies that received more than $20 million from last year's defense spending bill. "Clients of the lobbying firm KSA Consulting -- whose top officials also include former congressional aide Carmen V. Scialabba, who worked for Rep. Murtha as a congressional aide for 27 years -- received a total of $20.8 million from the bill," the L.A. Times reported.

In early 2004, according to Roll Call, Mr. Murtha "reportedly leaned on U.S. Navy officials to sign a contract to transfer the Hunters Point Shipyard to the city of San Francisco." Laurence Pelosi, nephew of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, at the time was an executive of the company which owned the rights to the land. The same article also reported how Mr. Murtha has been behind millions of dollars worth of earmarks in defense appropriations bills that went to companies owned by the children of fellow Pennsylvania Democrat, Rep. Paul Kanjorski. Meanwhile, the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan campaign-finance watchdog group, lists Mr. Murtha as the top recipient of defense industry dollars in the current 2006 election cycle.

So what are we left to think? This certainly sounds as bad as the Denny Hastert deal that was recently disclosed, and some ways worse. After all, White Flag's actions seem to have directly benefited his political allies.

I suppose we'll see where this all comes out, but I still do wonder; why did Ole White Flag decide out of the blue to become the poster boy for the anti-war movement?