Jack Murtha: Veteran Ex-Marine Hero or Lying Cowardly Crybaby REMF?

I ran across a reference to an interesting post by Techniguy, in which he describes the results of his own investigation into Jack Murtha's background. Here are the highlights:

I found a man with a couple of years of active duty, and the rest of his 37-year career spent in the Marine Corps Reserve.

I found a man who served in the Marines during Korean War, yes, but somehow never actually made it to Korea.

I found a man with one year in Vietnam, not 'up front' but in the rear area, as a staff intelligence offer.

I found a man who's no more been in combat, or is a war hero, than I am.

Even John Kerry has more combat experience than Jack Murtha.

I know flight attendants who have spent more time in Danang than him.

Techniguy then posts a letter from Congressman Don Bailey to Murtha, whose disgust with Murtha is loud and clear. Congressman Bailey, apparently duped by Murtha into helping to clear House Ethics Committee charges over Murtha's involvement in the ABSCAM scandle (in which Murtha was not charged but was named as an unindicted co-conspirator), details admissions by Murtha to him that his Purple Heart was thoroughly undeserved, among other things:

I'm writing on matters of joint concern. A number of weeks ago I was talking with someone who is a mutual acquaintance and your name came up. It was an unusually frank discussion and I considered it private. I did relate some opinions about you and shared some recollections about experiences with you in Congress. I was, to be honest, critical about how you misled me about ABSCAM where you convinced me you had voluntarily told federal agents about the offer of money to you and I learned later, after I had successfully defeated the ethics charges against you, that you had merely manipulated the system to cooperate with federal agents to avoid prosecution.

I also shared my recollection of when you admitted, back in our corner, that you didn't earn your purple hearts (you indicated you had small scratch on your cheek that wasn't even directly related to an APC that ran over a small anti personnel mine that was behind you). The other purple heart you even declined to explain.

At the time you were feeling particularly vulnerable, because it wasn't too long after you had called me crying and sobbing, thanking me for "saving your life" before the ethics committee. There was no doubt in my mind that you were expressing to me that you did not believe you did anything sufficient to earn the purple heart, and that you didn't want to be active in my efforts to laud Vietnam Veterans that served with us.

Jack Murtha is beneath contempt. He has shown himself to be the archetypal self-centered, self-serving, lying, dishonest, stupid politician. This former REMF should have been booted out of Congress twenty years ago, and now does everything he can to further his own ambitions, and in the process aiding and abetting America's enemies. Shame on him.

Murtha is opposed for re-election by Republican Diana Irey, who says that she has received donations to her campaign from people in 48 states - an amazing fact, considering this is a small congressional district in Pennsylvania. Let's hope that she is successful in relegating Murtha to the same ashheap as Tom Daschle.

Update: Techniguy has this open letter to Murtha from Kurt G. - Gunnery Sergeant, USMC, Retired. It is a thorough and much deserved lambasting by somebody who remembers what it means to be a Marine.

HotAir Cleans House, Throws Yours Truly Out With The Bathwater

Apparently I am just too clever for my own good. As a result, I find myself banned from posting comments on Hot Air (something that I kinda enjoyed doing, and it added a trickle of traffic to Wambulance too). The sad part is, its all just a misunderstanding. That is, I would prefer to believe that it is a misunderstanding rather than a case of HotAir's AllahPundit being too dense to comprehend nuanced irony when he sees it. Here are the facts...

On June 20, 2006 HotAir's AllahPundit posted this item regarding the tragedy of the 2 US soldiers who had been kidnapped and whose brutally murdered and horribly mutilated bodies were later found. Understandably, the overall reaction in the comment section to this atrocity was heated, to put it mildly. Some commenters expressed their frustration by calling for massive retaliation in the form of carpet bombing the areas of insurgent activity. AllahPundit challenged these assertions, which the commenters then vigorously defended. After following the thread for awhile, I crafted and submitted my own comment:

In the struggle to acquire the hearts and minds of the Iraqis, the only option for success after carpet bombing is to use a sponge and a mop.

inmanjh on June 20, 2006 at 5:04 PM

Is this statement that hard to understand? All I meant was that carpet bombing would kill innocents and eliminate any possibility of support from the Iraqi population. My wife understood what I meant immediately (one of the reasons I married her), as did anyone else with whom I discussed this matter. Hey, I'm obtuse but I'm not that obtuse!

After posting this comment, I went on about my business and didn't give it another thought. The next day I was perusing HotAir and noticed that, instead of a text box for me to enter my comments, it merely stated "You are not allowed to leave comments." Hmm?

I sent an email to AllahPundit inquiring whether my posting privileges had been revoked, and he responded:

"Yes, Jay, it's been revoked. We appreciate your participation but
we're trying to change the tone in the comments section. No hard
feelings."

No hard feelings? Thats easy for him to say. WTF is this all about? I mull it over while I continue to browse HotAir until I find this comment from AllahPundit in this item (emphasis added):

See-Dubya — Yeah, in quantity. But if you want to kill thousands of Kurds, you could also carpet-bomb them the old-fashioned way. Are the chem shells that much more lethal?
You know, like some of our (ex-)commenters want to do to the Iraqis.

Allahpundit on June 21, 2006 at 6:07 PM

Ok, now that rings a bell. I go back to the post in which I left my "sponge and mop" comment and read further down into the comments section. Patterico weighs in (emphasis added):

I haven’t read all the comments here, but I have read enough to get the idea that some commenters would like the United States to carpet-bomb civilians, or randomly kill civilians.
You should be deeply ashamed of yourselves. We’re there to help the Iraqis — now you want us to randomly slaughter them like the terrorists do to us?
I shouldn’t have to say this, but that is despicable and outrageous.
I think it comes from you seeing all Iraqis as less than human.
Have any of you met Omar and Mohammed, the folks who run Iraq the Model?
Well, I have. They are inspirational people, fighting for freedom in a land that has known far too little of it, for far too long.
The actions you advocate could kill them. Indeed, you suggest *targeting* people exactly like them.
If you had met them, you wouldn’t be saying this.
I hope that the commenters making suggestions like this get banned.
Patterico on June 21, 2006 at 1:07 AM

This is immediately followed by AllahPundit:

A bunch of folks who have commented in this thread will no longer be joining us in the Hot Air comments section. It’s been a long time coming, frankly; Bryan and I have talked with Michelle about the tone of the comments at some length in recent days and none of us are happy with it.
I’m not going to lecture anyone. You’re all entitled to your opinions, but you’re not entitled to use our space as a platform. There are a million other conservative forums out there.
Registration at Free Republic is indeed free, and they seem to have a higher tolerance for this sort of thing.
Thanks all for your contributions, and best of luck in your new digs. To the rest of you guys: I mean what I say about changing the tone here. If you can’t muster anything except “it’s the goddamned media’s fault” or “we need to let our troops off the leash” or “Michelle looks HAWT,” you have two choices: (a) refrain from commenting until you have something substantive to say or (b) sign up for one of those Freeper accounts I mentioned.
Okay?
Allahpundit on June 21, 2006 at 1:08 AM

Now, I can assure you, gentle reader, that your humble correspondent has never wasted his time posting anything as inane as “it’s the goddamned media’s fault” or “we need to let our troops off the leash” or “Michelle looks HAWT.” I pride myself on my measured, carefully crafted posts. So what gives here? Why have I been lumped in with the type-before-you-think-and-then-don't-even-think-that-much-anyway crowd?

I traced it back to my "sponge and mop" post. The only conclusion I can reach is that AllahPundit cleaned house with a very broad brush and swept away more than perhaps he should. Or maybe I'm just deluding myself regarding the quality and content of my own writing. That is a distinct possibility.

At any rate, I will continue to believe that I was unjustly revoked from posting on HotAir until somebody convinces me otherwise. Any takers?

If you should happen to read this post (and I readily concede that not many will) and you feel that I have a legitimate beef, drop AllahPundit a line and give him what-for in my behalf. He isn't answering my mail any more.

P.S. - Like my graphic, above? Nothing inspires like righteous anger, ya know.

"Hadji Girl"

And now, a brief musical interlude...

The Emperor's New Immigration Plan

Thomas Sowell tells it like he sees it. "Bordering on Fraud" dissects the stool sample that the US Senate is trying to pass off as an immigration bill. He flays the various buzzphrases such as, "jobs Americans won't do," the impossibility of "finding and deporting 12 million people," and the chaos that would follow "suddenly taking 12 million people out of the workforce." He exposes the black-and-white arguments of the very people who clamor about how immigration is a gray issue. Finally, he exposes the absurdity of unarmed troops on the border, "sanctuary" cities that prohibit their police from taking any action regarding known illegal aliens, and the notion that, since there are so many illegal alien lawbreakers, the only solution is to make them all legal:

"There is probably no category of law-breakers -- from counterfeiters to burglars or from jay-walkers to murderers -- who can all be found and arrested. But no one suggests that we must therefore make what they have done legal.
Such an argument would suggest that there is nothing in between 100 percent effective law enforcement and zero percent effective law enforcement."

Read it here.


Mona Charen takes on the one underlying flaw in American law that dooms any attempt at creating a guest worker program to ultimate failure: Anchor babies:

"Most Americans take it for granted that the 14th Amendment requires birthright citizenship, but a number of scholars deem this to be a misinterpretation. The clause reads "All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof" are citizens. If the drafters intended to say only that all persons born on U.S. territory would be considered citizens, why did they add the phrase "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof"? Are those words superfluous? If not, what do they mean?"

What, indeed.

BTW, I read Mona Charen's book, "Do-Gooders: How Liberals Harm Those They Claim to Help -- and the Rest of Us" a couple of years or so ago, and instantly became an avid fan of her writing. Warning: it will piss you off.

Madeleine "Not At" Albright Can't Shut Her Pie-Hole

She was the first woman Secretary of State, about whose stewardship of American foreign policy her former mentor Dean Peter Krogh of Georgetown's School of Foreign Service said one cannot "recall a time when our foreign policy was in less competent hands." She believes that, without her ground-breaking appointment as the nation's highest-ranking diplomat, Condoleezza Rice would never have had a similar opportunity. She collects brooches, yet every word out of her mouth is calculated to pin it all on George W. Bush. She is as partisan as it gets, and as dumb as a bag of hammers.

Madeleine "not-at" Albright once served as congressional liason for Carter's SecDef, Zbigniew "Can I Buy A Vowel" Brzezinski, but only because her dad got her the job. She had lots to say about foreign policy even then, but nobody was interested in listening (having heard the quality of her ideas already). If you want some yucks and to know more about her "illustrious" career, read this article by Julia Gorin. It was written in 9/2003, but some things, like Madeleine's intellect, don't change much.

Now Madeleine is concerned about GWB's faith, saying in a story on CNN.com, "President Bush's certitude about what he believes in, and the division between good and evil, is, I think, different." She goes on to lament that, "Some of his language is really quite over the top. When he says 'God is on our side', it's very different from (former U.S. President Abraham) Lincoln saying 'We have to be on God's side.'"

Now, I'm no Bible-thumper by any stretch of the imagination, but I've never personally been uncomfortable with the president's faith. In these modern times when so few passionately believe in anything bigger than themselves, I think that Bush's faith is a good thing in a president. America has an obligation to maintain the moral high ground, and I have no problem with Bush planting the American flag on the summit.

What really strikes me, regarding Albright's blatherings, is how she fails to contrast or even acknowledge the equally fierce but morally vacuous beliefs held by our radical Ilamic jihadist enemies. The Left usually stumble over themselves apologizing to evil in the world for America's audacity to defend what is right (depending, of course, on what your definition of "is" is).

Julia Gorin sums it up: "... when you employ a merit-based system, you get Condoleezza Rice. And when you employ affirmative action, you get Madeleine Albright."

The Real Iraq

Amir Taheri has penned an assessment of the current state of affairs in Iraq, in which he presents a series of benchmarks for the success of the democratization effort there. He contrasts today's Iraq with the nation as it was under Saddam, against the historical backdrop of the early 20th century when Iraq first appeared on a map, and the coup d'etat in 1958 that ended the constitutional monarchy which had prospered. Taheri readily concedes that the Iraq story is too big for any one news organization to cover in full, and it is only natural that the more sensational events (bombs, murders, and bombs) tend to garner more attention than employment statistics, GDP, and record school attendance. He stresses, however, that the one-sided picture painted by the MSM and the lack of objectivity on the part of anti-Bush and anti-America factions across the globe ignore the plain fact that, although not guaranteed of success, the Iraqi people are rebounding from their decades of oppression, as are the democratic traditions of Iraq's early history. Further, the negative press coverage has become the insurgent's last hope of breaking America's will to win, since all of the insurgency's other attempts to derail democracy and freedom in Iraq have so far come to naught. He sums it up well:

Is Iraq a quagmire, a disaster, a failure? Certainly not; none of the above. Of all the adjectives used by skeptics and critics to describe todays Iraq, the only one that has a ring of truth is messy. Yes, the situation in Iraq today is messy. Births always are. Since when is that a reason to declare a baby unworthy of life?

Read it all here, it is time well spent.

On a separate note, there is a huge furor over reports, apparently attributed to Amir Taheri, that the Iranian government has decided to force all Jews and Christians to wear yellow and blue badges or ribbons, respectively. While it is confirmed that the Iranian parliament has passed a new law imposing an Islamic dress code on all of it's citizens, no news organizations have been able to independantly confirm the yellow/blue badges for Jews/Christians.

Update:
Amir Taheri responds to the furor by indicating that his article was "opinion" and its not his fault if others treated it as news. Get the lowdown at HotAir.

Ahmadinejad to send a Letter to the Pope

Mahmoud Ahmadenijad is writing a letter to Pope Benedict the 16th. Expect it to contain some friendly advice regarding the Pope's poor choice of religion. This is a common theme in his letters.
From HotAir:

He also invited Bush to become a Muslim. And you would be wise to interpret the word “invite” to have a whiff of the mob inviting you to dinner at the end of a pier.

This guy (I get tired of typing his name) is definitely using a page from Mohammed's (phui) bloody-border playbook. And here is why.

Know thy enemy.

In Their Own Words: Al Qaeda Is Losing In Iraq

Captain Ed at CQ has posted this story: Captured AQ Documents: "Every Year Is Worse Than The Previous Year". Very interesting read:

CENTCOM announced today that they had captured
al-Qaeda correspondence in Iraq that discusses the state of the insurgency, especially around Baghdad but also around the entire country. Far from optimistic, the documents captured in an April 16th raid reveal frustration and desperation, as the terrorists acknowledge the superior position of American and free Iraqi forces and their ability to quickly adapt to new tactics.

It goes on to describe how AQ realizes that they are becoming marginalized, the populace (including the all-important imams) are turning against them, and what little they have in the way of leadership is incompetent and ineffective. It does note, however, that the media is still being fooled by their actions, but its just a matter of time before even those useful idiots realize that AQ is on it's last legs in Iraq. Of course, this story will receive nada coverage from the MSM, who would have to admit their own (un?)witting complicity with AQ's aims.

Check it out.

Comedy Central Caves on Muhammed Depiction in South Park

How do you like my take on it?



I thought so...


Update: Welcome to Michelle Malkin readers! My hit counter needed this! :-)
Please take a moment to browse the WAmbulance. The boring political stuff is at the top, the funny stuff toward the bottom. Comments are welcome.

Abdul Rahman: Sentenced to Die By Islamic Court in Afghanistan

Scroll for update.

Abdul Rahman, an Afghan citizen who converted from Islam to Christianity 16 years ago while living in Germany, has been sentenced to death by a court in Afghanistan. His crime is apostasy, or renouncing Islam. After a one-day trial at which Rahman refused the opportunity to revert to Islam (as is required by Sharia) and thus spare his own life, Rahman was convicted and sentenced to death. Sharia law is quite specific and inflexible with regards to his punishment, and only mounting international pressure on Afghan president Hamid Karzai can save Rahman's life.

But a presidential pardon alone won't do it; Abdul Rahman will die if he is released from prison but forced to remain in the country, because his crime was the topic of most Imam's sermons at Friday prayers, with calls for him to be torn apart into little pieces until nothing remains of him, for example. Rahman must be granted political asylum in another country (such as the USA) in order to survive, assuming he can even make it out of Afghanistan alive in the first place.

The most sickening aspect of this whole mess is the fact that Rahman's own parents exposed him as an apostate to the authorities because of a custody battle over his two daughters. Of course, no court in Afghanistan will grant Rahman custody of the children because he is a Christian, so that battle is lost. I would suggest to him that, if he gets out alive, to change his name to Smith, Jones, or even Schwartz.

Afghanistan's much-heralded constitution, which acknowledges human rights and freedom of speech, conscience, and religion, also contains a so-called "repugnancy clause," which states that no law may conflict with Islamic law (Iraq's constitution has this clause as well). Since no system of laws can conceivably be more repressive to human rights than Islamic Sharia, the conflict of interests is all too obvious. Did the USA and other countries expend so much blood, sweat, tears, and money to prop up an Afghanistan that turns out to behave just like the Taliban it replaced? Apparently so.

Sharia law was devised in medieval times by a violent, perverted pedophile who is revered today as a prophet. It has no relevance to the modern age or any society with the most basic set of values. Sharia Law is the antithesis of civilization. And until Sharia law is eliminated, Islam's borders will remain bloody. Wafa Sultan was right.

Update: After immense international pressure, Afghan prosecutors announced that there was insufficient evidence that Rahman was mentally fit to stand trial, and he was released. He was immediately whisked away to a secret, secure location by [shudder] his family. These are the same people who turned him in, remember? Several countries offered Rahman political asylum, with Italy being the first (it should have been the USA at the head of the line, but whatever). As of this writing he has indeed landed safely in Italy.

Meanwhile, the mobs in Afghanistan who didn't get their hands on Rahman are still there, and probably even more pissed off. Look for an assassination attempt on President Karzai very soon.

Wafa Sultan: The Bravest Woman On Earth

Speaking out against Islam can be risky at best, or even fatal. Consider the case of Theo Van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker who outraged Muslims with his film "Submission" and was subsequently murdered by a Muslim jihadist. With this in mind, consider the mind-boggling courage of Syrian-born psychologist Wafa Sultan. She didn't just take Islam to task for it's medieval mind-set, she did so in Arabic on Al-Jazeera, before an Arabic audience.

Wafa Sultan: The clash we are witnessing around the world is not a clash of religions, or a clash of civilizations. It is a clash between two opposites, between two eras. It is a clash between a mentality that belongs to the Middle Ages and another mentality that belongs to the 21st century. It is a clash between civilization and backwardness, between the civilized and the primitive, between barbarity and rationality. It is a clash between freedom and oppression, between democracy and dictatorship. It is a clash between human rights, on the one hand, and the violation of these rights, on other hand. It is a clash between those who treat women like beasts, and those who treat them like human beings. What we see today is not a clash of civilizations. Civilizations do not clash, but compete.

Host: I understand from your words that what is happening today is a clash between the culture of the West, and the backwardness and ignorance of the Muslims?

Wafa Sultan: Yes, that is what I mean.

The other participant in the segment was an Islamic scholar who, shocked by her bold statements, asked if she was a heretic. Her response was, "You can say whatever you like."

Wafa Sultan's message is nothing less than one of the most relevant and important of our time. I hope that she lives long enough to spread it far and wide.

Read excerpts of the english translation of her interview here. And keep her in your prayers.

Shut Up And Act

Alec Baldwin opens his mouth and drivel pours out. His latest tirade on the Huffington Post is so inane that it is actually funny. Funnier still is the fact that it represents what passes for the far-left's actual thought processes:

So, I suppose the question is...what kind of civil trial will we see, or not see, between Cheney and Whittington? Whittington is certainly no stranger to a court room and to civil litigation. Will Cheney pay him off, preemptively? Will they go to court? I would imagine if a guy with a few beers in him shoots you in the face on a hunting trip, how could you turn down that opportunity?


What would Cheney do about the whole secrecy thing then? I mean, this is the guy that sicced Enron on Gray Davis and the state of California to embarrass Davis, trigger the recall and then watched Arnold Schwarzenegger become governor of California. (To this day, perhaps, still the low point in American political life.) Then Cheney covered it up.

The only instance of which I am aware of Alec Baldwin saying anything remotely intelligent is when it was scripted by Tom Clancy.

I found this little gem linked on Drudge Report. I read. I laughed. Then I decided to read the comments too, and it just got funnier. At first, it was all agreement by leftoids with their typical Halliburton crap, but then it became apparent when the Drudge readers like myself began to show up. Baldwin's pathetic accusations were thoroughly eviscerated, debunked, and refuted. I hope he doesn't read the comments himself, I doubt that his fragile self-image could survive the pummeling. He should just shut up and act.

Thomas Sowell: Point of No Return

Thomas Sowell's column over at Townhall.com brings much-needed perspective:

Looking back at the history of tragic times often reveals that many -- or most -- of the people of those times were often preoccupied with things that look trivial, or even pathetic, in view of the catastrophe looming over them. Will later generations looking back at our times see a similar blindness, and even frivolousness, in the face of mortal dangers?

Terrorists and terrorist governments are giving us almost daily evidence of their fanatical hatred and violent sadism, as the clock ticks away toward their gaining possession of nuclear weapons. They not only hold a harmless young woman hostage in Iraq, they parade her in tears on television, just as they have paraded not only the terrorizing, but even the beheading, of others on television.

Moreover, there is a large and gleeful audience in the Arab world for these gross brutalities, just as there was glee and cheering among the Palestinians when the televised destruction of the World Trade center was broadcast in the Middle East.

Yet what are we preoccupied with or outraged about? Whether the
American government should intercept the phone calls of these cutthroats to people in the United States.

Read it all here...

Cartoons, But Not the Funnies

Over at RealClearPolitics, Tony Blankley writes:

There has been intense debate in the blogs and elsewhere on whether newspapers and television networks should republish or not. The quite plausible, expressed argument against re-publishing is that: 1) just because one has the right to speak doesn't mean one must, 2) restraint is often exercised, particularly when being respectful of other religions or cultures, 3) tensions are particularly high amongst Muslims now, 4) only a madman or, if there is a difference, those who want to instigate the "clash of civilizations" would pour gasoline on that already raging fire.

That argument would be not only plausible, but persuasive, if the cause of the violent Muslim reaction to the cartoons was merely a transitory phenomenon -- a brief, spontaneous, bizarre overreaction.

...the reaction to the Danish cartoons is merely the latest predictable, intolerant response of radical Islam to any opposition to their view of man and God...

Those who argue for republication of the Danish cartoons are not "instigating" a clash of civilization. Nor are they pouring gasoline on a fire. Rather, they are defending against the already declared and engaged radical Islamist clash against the Christian, Secular, Jewish, Hindu, Chinese world by expressing solidarity with the firemen.


Here is a cartoon that pretty well sums up the western media's cowardly coverage, courtesy of Cox & Forkum:

"Religion of Peace" or Riots

George Neumayr at NRO acknowleges the elephant in the room:

Only radical Muslims would consider rioting a rational rebuttal to descriptions of Islam as violent. What other religious group riots or issues death threats after it is criticized? It is precisely because Christianity is so tame that Western liberals often feel safe to lampoon its history as violent. They wouldn't dare level similarly harsh criticism of Islam.

One of the unstated reasons for hesitating before calling radical Islam violent — the reason the fog of political correctness thickens around it — is that it does contain elements of violence. Western society falls silent lest its criticism of Islam result in an explosion of anger validating the criticism.

This amounts to nothing less than surrendering liberty to a violent minority group, and the beginnings of the tacit imposition of oppressive sharia upon a free society. Why is this tolerated?