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August 17, 2006
Today's Coffee Snorter
For several days, the half vast editorial staff have been amusing our reverse side away extremely at this unfolding train wreck:
I heard back from General Hagee’s office yesterday regarding my inquiry about when Gen. Hagee briefed John Murtha about Haditha. The bottom line: Gen. Hagee’s office has directly contradicted an assertion by the L.A. Times that Gen. Hagee briefed John Murtha on Haditha before Murtha accused Marines of killing civilians in cold blood. Gen. Hagee’s office confirmed to me that the General’s first briefing to Murtha took place a week after Murtha had already made his public accusations.
As alert readers will no doubt recall, back in June our staff of itinerant Eskimo typists were simply wallowing in obscene bouts of schadenfreude over this juicy item from that fascist rag, the WashTimes:
A criminal defense attorney for a Marine under investigation in the Haditha killings says he will call a senior Democratic congressman as a trial witness, if his client is charged, to find out who told the lawmaker that U.S. troops are guilty of cold-blooded murder. Attorney Neal A. Puckett told The Washington Times that Gen. Michael Hagee, the Marine commandant, briefed Rep. John P. Murtha, Pennsylvania Democrat, on the Nov. 19 killings of 24 Iraqis in the town north of Baghdad. Mr. Murtha later told reporters that the Marines were guilty of killing the civilians in "cold blood." Mr. Murtha said he based his statement on Marine commanders, whom he did not identify.Mr. Puckett said such public comments from a congressman via senior Marines amount to "unlawful command influence." He said potential Marine jurors could be biased by the knowledge that their commandant, the Corps' top officer, thinks the Haditha Marines are guilty.
"Congressman Murtha will be one of the first witnesses I call to the witness stand," Mr. Puckett said yesterday.
We have tried to talk to the staff about their reading habits. We even tried tempting them with our coveted TimesSelect login, but some people just refuse to broaden their horizons.
At any rate, back in June we pondered snidely that our gallant war hero Rep. Murtha must be squirming a bit. It seems a bit hard to believe that the Commandant of the Marine Corps would prejudice an ongoing investigation by making intemperate remarks of that sort on the House floor. Nor was he likely to condemn his own Marines without trial. One rarely rises to that level in the military without both a thorough knowledge of the UCMJ and a healthy respect for the dangers of shooting oneself in the foot. On reflection, we expected this rather obvious fact might tend to emerge under rigorous cross-examination, since Rep. Murtha was not the only member of the House present that day.
Several months ago, a reader asked why Murtha angers conservatives. It was a good question - such a good question that we thought it merited its own post. We tried to point out many of the factual inaccuracies in some of his most oft-quoted soundbytes. And then there is the fact that he can't quite seem to make up his mind what he means when he says something - he's a constantly moving target.
But our biggest beef with the Representative from Pennsylvania is that he doesn't seem to think about the damage he might do before he opens his mouth. He was a Marine. This is an ongoing investigation and he knows eight fellow Marines stand accused of the most serious crimes.
He knows full well that, in America at least, even accused criminals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Therefore, he had no business disclosing what he says were the results of a closed briefing to the press. If what he says is true (and we do not happen to believe it is) then he has provided the defense with an "out". They can now claim improper command influence was being excercised at the highest possible levels, making it impossible for their clients to get a fair trial. Even a complete moron should have foreseen that the press would run with these inflammatory remarks, and as a Marine officer he should have known enough about the UCMJ to know that wouldn't fly.
If he truly believes they are guilty, (and we can believe what he says) he not only queered the trial but made the Marine Corps look even worse than they already did. How was justice served by his rash actions?
And if he simply spoke hastily and with no forethought, or worse, if he exaggerated the briefing he received, then he has caused unneeded pain for the families of the accused Marines, who are, at least, innocent of any wrongdoing. Did he never think of them?
And don't you find it interesting that out of all the Representatives who were briefed that day in closed session, only Representative Murtha felt it necessary to run immediately to the press with inflammatory and prejudicial commentary?
Because we do. People wonder why the White House and the Pentagon don't want to trust Congress. Perhaps they need look no farther than this incident.
At any rate, if this comes down to a showdown we don't think we'd want to be Rep. Murtha.
Update: Dang. The least y'all could do is tell us when we have mistakes in our posts. We have a really sore throat and a horrible headache. Not that this is any excuse for putting up crappy posts full of mistakes. But if you notice them, please let us know. Because those durned Eskimos never seem to clue us in and frankly, we can't see worth a darn with these stupid OTC reading glasses. We really, really need to see an eye doctor.
Posted by Cassandra at August 17, 2006 06:22 AM
Comments
Excellent synopsis...
Posted by: JannyMae at August 17, 2006 01:19 PM
Hey, it's fake but true!
Posted by: Mark at August 17, 2006 02:09 PM
Mark, that's "Fake but accurate!" Heh.
Posted by: Don Brouhaha at August 17, 2006 02:42 PM
Will be interesting to see this progress ... if the Marines are actually called and the judge allows the defense to call Murtha ... he's got two choices, tell the truth that he was playing politics with the incident or he lies under oath.
Posted by: Frodo at August 17, 2006 04:15 PM
Don, no wonder the MSM and Pols hate the blogs when they get caught playing fast and loose with quotes.
Posted by: Mark at August 18, 2006 08:41 PM