Mullings: An American Cyber-column By Rich Galen

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I Got Nothin'

Rich Galen

Wednesday November 23, 2005

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From Great Barrington, Massachusetts

This is one of those days when I've got absolutely nothing to tell you.

That's not entirely true. Yesterday morning, I called Bernard McGuirk who is Don Imus' producer, when someone on "Imus in the Morning" show on MSNBC was talking about the dust-up on the House Floor last Friday.

To review the moment, the House GOP leadership had introduced a resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq, to (as regular readers know I love quoting myself) "make the Democrats put their voting cards where their mouths were."

During the debate (which was a debate in the same way that the meeting of the Sharks and the Jets in "West Side Story" was a fight), the newest member of the House, Rep. Jean Schmidt of Ohio quoted a constituent who "asked me to send Congressman Murtha a message: that cowards cut and run, Marines never do" which was an abysmally stupid thing to say for a person who barely knows where the bathrooms are in the Capitol and did not know the history of Mr. Murtha's 37-year active duty and reserve career with the Marine Corps.

Nevertheless, according to the NY Times' Eric Schmitt (whom, we suspect, did not change the spelling of his name simply to distinguish his family name from that of the Gentlelady from Ohio), "Representative Harold Ford, Democrat of Tennessee, charged across the chamber's center aisle to the Republican side screaming that Ms. Schmidt's attack had been unwarranted."

Here's the sum and substance of my conversation with Bernie McGuirk:

Suppose, just for the purposes of this discussion, that the person making the remark had not been a White Republican Woman and the person who "charged across the center aisle" had not been a Black Democratic Man.
Suppose, just for the purposes of this discussion that a White Republican man had "charged across the center aisle" and gotten into the face of a Black Democratic woman.
How quickly do you think the story would have moved from Murtha and Iraq to a racial attack by a White Republican man on an African-American female Democratic Member of Congress?

The answer is: Instantaneously.

Jesse Jackson would have flown into Washington as fast as his private jet could carry him to remind us that � ah, you know the act.

The Cable Cabal would have replayed the moment every ten minutes from last Friday until this very day.

The New York Times would have cluck-clucked editorially about how we thought we'd gotten well beyond the day when a White man thought he could shout at a Black woman with alacrity.

The Washington Post might have assigned Bob Woodward - as punishment - to report on the whole thing.

Unfortunately, by the time I got through all that, the segment had ended.

New Topic.

I am in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts for the annual gathering of the Galen Clan for Thanksgiving.

Two years ago, I was in Baghdad for Thanksgiving about which, you may not be surprised, I wrote about.

That was the Thanksgiving when President Bush showed up at the 1st Infantry Division mess hall.

I had been invited to attend what was supposed to be Thanksgiving Dinner and speeches by the Commanding General and Ambassador Bremer but I declined because I had been there earlier in the day.

I had waned to write a column about Thanksgiving in Iraq and I knew if I had waited until that night I would be up until 3 AM; so I went, with General Mark Kimmitt, in the afternoon and got everything I needed.

Imagine my surprise and delight when I learned I had turned down a chance to watch one of the most dramatic moments in Presidential history.

As I said: I got nothin'.

On the Secret Decoder Ring page today: A link to the "Good Morning Mesopotamia" Travelogue about Thanksgiving Day in Iraq; a most provocative Mullfoto; and - yet another reference to Iraq - a pair of photos showing how much I changed from my earliest days in Iraq to about three-quarters of my tour.

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