Tag: patrick murray

Jim Moran ranks military service below PTA membership.

Here’s a really good rule of thumb: when you’ve done something not only dumb, but actually vile – in this case, if you’ve declared that wearing your country’s uniform for twenty-four years is not ‘public service*’ – don’t compound the error later by trying to explain it away.  Jim Moran (D, VA-08) apparently does not understand this rule of thumb, which is why he is now trying to try to walk back from the aforementioned vile thing that he said about Patrick Murray:

But Moran says he was specifically citing local service aimed at Virginian communities, which Murray lacks, he says.

“Whether it be a civic association or a (parent-teacher association) or a non-profit charitable group, nothing,” Moran says.

You know, nobody’s ever been able to tell me what Moran brings to the table for VA-08 besides pork and Jew-bashing. Neither is likely to be an indulgence permitted to Democratic legislators in the 112th Congress, so why should Moran be re-elected, again?

Via @jimgeraghty.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: Donate to Patrick Murray here. Continue reading Jim Moran ranks military service below PTA membership.

Meet Patrick Murray (R CAND, VA-08)

Col. Murray is running against the infamous Jim Moran in VA-08, and he took a moment to speak with us today. He’s won his primary, so he’s the official Republican candidate in this district. He also didn’t try to get in my face once during the interview when I asked him a question… something that Moran hadn’t mastered as of this April.

Patrick’s site is here.

Crossposted to RedState.

*How* old is Jim Moran (D, VA-08), again?

[UPDATE]: Welcome, Instapundit readers.

…65, is it? Well, that’s a little early. Still, being in a condition where you have to have your aides physically intervene every time you get asked a perfectly reasonable question about government waste is a little, ah, problematical:

Hot Air has more; Jason Mattera, of course, is the new editor over at Human Events (and welcome, by the way). He also seems to have a bit of a talent at finding Congressmen who don’t want to talk about the health care bill…

Moe Lane

PS: Both Matthew Berry and Patrick Murray are eager to help Jim Moran reach some sort of closure with both his anger issues, and his self-evident sense of resentment towards those fools that will not recognize Jim Moran’s genius. I imagine that both would be equally eager to hear from you.

Crossposted to RedState.

‘Most Ethical Congress in History.’ Man, that *never* gets old.

I’m going to miss laughing at that notion, starting January 2011.

Forget ‘outraged’: if anyone is surprised, then they haven’t been paying attention.

Lobbyists and corporate officials talked bluntly in e-mail exchanges about connections between making generous campaign donations and securing federal funds through members of an important House Appropriations subcommittee, according to not-yet-public documents reviewed by ethics investigators.

In summer 2007, for example, senior executives at [Innovative Concepts] tried to figure out which of them would buy a ticket to a wine-tasting fundraiser for Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), a member of the Appropriations subcommittee on defense. At the time, the company sought help from Moran’s office in securing contracts through special earmarks added to the defense bill.

[snip]

The fundraiser was hosted by the PMA Group, a powerful lobbying firm whose unusual success in obtaining “earmarked” contracts from members of the military subcommittee was a key focus of a recent House ethics investigation.

Moran raked in $91,900 in campaign checks to his personal campaign and leadership PAC that day. He secured an $800,000 earmark for Innovative Concepts in the 2008 defense appropriations bill.

Or they don’t really want to. Which I can sort of understand; after all, the revelation that one has not only been lied too, but that one has enthusiastically participated in being lied to in order to get… nothing at all? Yes, that would strike someone squarely in the self-worth. I’d feel sorry for that, except that I have to live in the same corrupt political atmosphere.

At any rate, feel free to read the whole article, particularly the bits where the Democratic-run legislature let off the all-but-one Democratic appropriators, despite the fairly clear understanding that money was expected, and that money would be taken. Also, note that Jim Moran has at least two people on the GOP ready to replace him: Matthew Berry, who just picked up the uber-critical Volokh Conspiracy endorsement (via Instapundit); and Patrick Murray, who I just missed interviewing at CPAC. I would say that they’d both be superior to having Moran in that seat, and it’d be true: it’d also be implicitly insulting to either to suggest that they wouldn’t automatically clear that particular bar anyway.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.