Mainstream Media Sings John Murtha's Praises, but His Legacy Tainted by Abscam and Slanderous Iraq War Criticism

While the liberal mainstream media sings John Murtha's praises, his legacy is nonetheless tainted ad infinitum by his Abscam involvement and his slanderous Iraq war criticism. Dying yesterday at Virginia Hospital Center from complications arising from gallbladder surgery, John Murtha was the exorbitantly long-serving congressman from Pennsylvania's 12th district, having been in Congress for a whopping, almost 40 years. To hear the liberal media tell it, Murtha was a stout defender of the military and noble, yet that conveniently glosses over many episodes in his too-long career that can only bring to mind the word "unethical" at best, or "misconduct" at worst. If there's anything he ought to be held up for, it's that he was a bona fide poster boy for term limits if there ever was one.

The ever-cheerleading AP had an article/fawning eulogy where they praised Murtha as a voice for veterans while the Politico web-rag even referred to him as a "congressional giant." Of course, those both pale in comparison to his home-state paper, the Tribune-Democrat, which editorialized/eulogized him as a "great" American." Oh, really?? While I don't want anyone to take this as "schadenfreude" over his death, I nonetheless want to focus on the liberal spin of making Murtha out to be greater than what he was versus the reality of what he truly was. And reality is harshly different from the liberal exaggeration of this term limit poster boy congressman.

The biggest problem with the liberal spin is their constantly misleading reference to Murtha as a defender of the military because that would mean he did things to help them. To be sure, when the liberals spin it this way, they're of course referring to his overly long tenure as the ranking Democrat on the subcommittee that oversaw Pentagon spending. Naturally, this allowed him to be an advocate for the military on issues like pay and health care, and that's not where the criticism should be leveled.

However, any successful advocacy over any number of years on behalf of the military was completely frittered away when Murtha savagely started to character assassinate US Marines still on the battlefield in Iraq for having allegedly committed war crimes against the Iraqi people. If you launch such a ruinous charge against US Marines who are fighting for your life and liberty in a foreign country-thereby putting them in increased danger-you lose any prior status as a so-called "defender" of the military. To continue calling Murtha an "advocate" of the military, even posthumously, is hypocrisy at best and all-out fraud at worst. The incident in question was the so-called Haditha incident in 2005, yet before an official military investigation was even completed-meaning no one knew any facts-Murtha went on to the media and accused the US Marines in that incident, saying, "...they [Marines] killed innocent civilians in cold blood." Needless to say, this also inflamed the population of Iraqis already suspicious of the US presence!

Additionally, on the domestic front, Murtha was involved in the Abscam scandal of the 80s, something that tainted him up to the present day. Abscam was an investigation run by the FBI to see if congressmen would take bribes from fake middlemen for Saudi nationals hoping to bribe their way through the immigration process into the US. While not convicted (Murtha testifying against two fellow congressmen likely had a lot to do with that, not total innocence), Murtha was an unindicted co-conspirator in the scandal and was caught on a very notorious, undercover tape saying to the fake agents that he may be interested in taking a bribe in the future! Now, if you're ethical as a congressman, when you get offered a bribe, you declare a resounding "No!" on the spot and report the people to police. End of story. No talk about being open to taking bribes in the future.

Still think Murtha was a "great" American like the liberal media spins him? If the aforementioned didn't change your mind, then I can't help you, but consider these last, two offenses that spring out in my mind as being unpardonable, though less so than the previous ones.

His involvement with earmarks and pork was beyond the pale. He was named as one of the 20 most corrupt members of Congress by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington; derided by Esquire Magazine as one of the ten worst members of Congress due to his opposition to ethics reform (Gee, I wonder why?); and branded by the WSJ as one of Congress' most unapologetic earmarkers. As a congressman, he was addicted to pork and existed only to bring more pork into his 12th district in PA, thus helping to run up the national deficit.

His last, biggest scandal, if you will, occurred just as Obama was campaigning for president (that turned out great for the States, yes?). Murtha actually called all his constituents-that's right, the very gullible people of the 12th district who kept voting this walking scandal back into office-racists and rednecks who were not comfortable with voting for someone because they're black.

Read most any article about Murtha, and, I guarantee you, you will not find all these scandalous details despite the fact that they're all true. The principled point of this article is that crooked politicians ought to be held accountable and not given a pass by a cheerleading, liberal media just because they died. Otherwise, the same, crooked politicians will continue to be voted in.

To send Marc questions, praise or criticism, you can email him at marc_schenker@telus.net

More Reading: Palin to Obama: We Americans Are Not Going To Sit Down And Shut Up; Rachel Maddow calls Tea Party Convention Attendees Racists with White Hoods; Beck says Palin is Suspicious of Everything and Has Her Shields Up

Sources:

Peter Jackson, Rep. John Murtha, voice for veterans, dies at 77, AP

Martin Kady II, Reps. mourn "congressional giant," Politico

Randy Griffith, "He was a giant," The Tribune-Democrat

Haditha Incident, Wikipedia

Abscam, Wikipedia

John Murtha - Earmarks and campaign contributions, Wikipedia

John Murtha calls Western PA "Redneck," ThePittsburghChannel.com