Pelosi's Missteps

The new Speaker seems intent on making really boneheaded missteps during the early days of her reign, and I use the word "reign" intentionally. To some, it appears that Ms. Pelosi considers herself royalty.

First we had her decision to back John Murtha for Majority Leader, a battle she should have stayed out of. Steny Hoyer won easily which took some of the wind from Pelosi's sails during the early days of organizing the house. Murtha is now content to be Pelosi's enforcer (more on that later).

Then came "Tunagate" and the exclusion of American Samoa from minimum wage legislation. Why? Because the big tuna packers use something like 40% of the labor force on the island at a very cheap rate, and those packers just happen to be based in Pelosi's California district. It's pretty hard to get away from the appearance of corruption.

Now we have "Pelosi One", the ham-handed attempt to get a luxurious Air Force jetliner for her personal transportation to and from California. She has stated that the small bizjet used by Denny Hastert is not sufficient because it can't make the trip non-stop. For "security" reasons, she needs a bigger plane. We even have her designated goon, John Murtha, making veiled threats against future Pentagon funding should they fail to accommodate Ms. Pelosi's desires.

Murtha said he will hold hearings that examine the use of military planes by members of Congress and Bush administration officials for the past two fiscal years. Asked whether the hearings are payback for the decision on Pelosi's request, he smiled and said, ``Would I do something like that?''

Well let's think about that for a minute. What's the security risk of making a mid-continent fuel stop? Official Air Force jets hauling VIP passengers are not going to stop at Billy Bob's Fly-in and Democrat Target Range in Bupkiss, MO. They're going to land and refuel at Air Force bases where there will be plenty of security to keep Ms. Pelosi's artificially-lifted heinie out of trouble. She doesn't want the inconvenience of spending 30 minutes at a fuel stop, not to mention the fact that she can't pile donors and other political operatives in the smaller plane.

Ms. Pelosi now has three significant blunders in her short tenure as Speaker, and all of them appear to be born of arrogance brought on by her new lofty status. These things have a way of distracting her side from whatever their agenda is supposed to be, and makes her look like a petty dilettante in the eyes of observers. She's not doing the Dems any favors, and it looks more and more like she's really not cut out for the job.