Dropping Like Flies Edition

This week's Republican to decide he's had enough is Rep. Jim Walsh, who represents a pretty blue district in NY-25 (the Syracuse area), where there is a great progressive candidate named Dan Maffei already in the wings (he lost by a mere two points last time). That flipped seat will improve the government in major ways, and while the change in the President is obviously of paramount importance, what's happening in the Congress will have positive ramifications well into the future. Getting Donna Edwards and Mark Pera into the House over some bad Bush Dog Democrats would also help. You can donate to them here. I'm in for twenty bucks.

Ignorance Is Bliss

As I expected, the traditional media has simply ignored GOP Rep. Jim Walsh, who has changed his view on Iraq and backed withdrawal. Contrast it with Brian Baird, everybody's new favorite Democrat who has become a media staple because he now supports a continued military presence in the country.

Other things the media has conveniently forgotten: claims that the surge would bring stability to Iraq, the fact that the benchmarks were written by the Iraqi government and the Congress, not the White House, the knowledge that the surge was always going to end next spring because there aren't any troops available to continue it, and the continual proof that an Iraqi oil law is always two days away from being a "done deal."

BAGHDAD, Sept. 12 — A carefully constructed compromise on a draft law governing Iraq’s rich oil fields, agreed to in February after months of arduous talks among Iraqi political groups, appears to have collapsed. The apparent breakdown comes just as Congress and the White House are struggling to find evidence that there is progress toward reconciliation and a functioning government here.

Senior Iraqi negotiators met in Baghdad on Wednesday in an attempt to salvage the original compromise, two participants said. But the meeting came against the backdrop of a public series of increasingly strident disagreements over the draft law that had broken out in recent days between Hussain al-Shahristani, the Iraqi oil minister, and officials of the provincial government in the Kurdish north, where some of the nation’s largest fields are located.

The White House relies on people's short-term memories. Those running the traditional media are among the most reliable.

Compare And Contrast

When Bush Dog Democrat Brian Baird changed his vote and decided to come out in favor of the surge and against drawing it down, he was rewarded with a never-before place of prominence on all the cable news shows. He was literally on a merry go-round of media appearances, and became the symbol of the "Democrats in disarray" narrative that the traditional media collectively decided to push.

Republican Representative Jim Walsh today came out against the surge.

Just received an email from our Washington reporter, Erin Kelly, who just got off the phone with Rep. Jim Walsh. She's writing a story for tomorrow's paper that reports the moderate Republican is switching gears and is now calling for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

Not only that but Walsh, who visited Iraq during the weekend, says he will no longer support funding the war.

Let's sit back and see how much scrutiny that gets in the media. Somehow I doubt that they'll give Rep. Walsh an hourlong "Briefing for America" to explain his position. In fact, he'll be lucky if his name appears on the crawl.