After looking into the records of both Steny Hoyer and Jack Murtha, I believe that neither of them should be the Majority Leader of the 110th Congress.
I will first go into why Steny Hoyer should not be Majority Leader, (because he would most certainly be worse than Murtha).
What I know about Hoyer is from this profile in the Washington Monthly (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/...) and from this blog entry by David Sirota in December 2006 (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...).
They paint a disturbing pattern. Hoyer seems to have a certain degree of respect for the House as an institution, but beyond that he has not been a progressive member of the House of Representatives. From his early days as a power broker in Maryland, to his current days of frequently undercutting Nancy Pelosi (who I believe has been a loyal footsoldier to the progressive movement on all issues except Israel) Steny Hoyer is obsessed with maintaining and cautiously increasing his own power. Although Dick Gephardt passed the torch to Pelosi as Democratic Leader, his torch as being the senior Democratic go-to guy for business lobbyist passed to Hoyer. In preparation for the Democratic majority, Hoyer began to implement a Democratic K-Street project- something that would be massive obstacle to the goals of the progressive movement. Steny Hoyer wants to institutionalize the Democrats relationship with big business at a level that is greater than what it was pre-1994.
This is dangerous, for obvious reasons. Firstly, it is dangerous for America because it continues the pay-to-play democracy of the Republican years in Congress. Secondly, it is dangerous for the Democratic party, because Hoyer and his ilk at the Democratic Leadership Council have brought this party 5 out of 6 Congressional defeats.
Hoyer's negative performance as a member of the Democratic leadership outshadows his faults as a member of the House, but there are still glaring concerns.
My main issue is with Hoyer's recent performance is with his vote for the Bankruptcy Bill. Go to Elizabeth Warren for the details, but that piece of legislation was one of the most loathesome pieces of domestic policy that I have seen come out of Congress since the Reagan spending cuts in the early 1980s. The fact that Hoyer would vote for a bill that is so counter to working families and the ideals of the Democratic party is reason alone for him not to be Majority Leader.
(I also want to touch on the overall strategic idiocy that occurred with Hoyer's actions on the Bankruptcy bill. If this had been simply a partisan vote [every Republican voted for it], we could have hammered the Republicans for voting for such a draconian and evil bill- but because Hoyer not only did not whip against it but voted for it, a bill that could have had extraordinary resonance with the voting public was taken out of the public square.)
After the Bankruptcy bill was passed and Pelosi called those who voted for it on their idiocy Hoyer defended them, and not only that, leaked the argument to members of the press, giving credence to the "Democrats are divided" stories. Sirota has much more on how he has undercut Pelosi, like on the Murtha resolution.
This is not to say that Hoyer is not progressive on social issues (he is), or that he is a disloyal Democrat on the whole. But he is not loyal nor is he strategically smart enough to be the leader of the Democratic caucus.
So with all of this (and I hope you read those links, they're excellent) that is why Steny Hoyer should not be the Majority Leader of the United States House of Representatives.
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So with that diatribe, this is why Jack Murtha should not be Majority Leader.
Jack Murtha is undoubtedly an American hero who has been a valiant public servant, and I, along with millions of Americans cheered when the Murtha resolution was introduced. Jack Murtha truly cares about the America's military families and veterans.
That said, Jack Murtha also voted for the Bankruptcy Bill. And he trades votes for Republicans for votes for military pork spending for his district. (See this article http://www.nytimes.com/...).
The article describes how on close votes, Jack Murtha is the second most disloyal Democrat in the House, and how he has set up his own alternative whipping operation to get pork for members of his inner circle. Murtha also has an anemic 66% score from ProgressivePunch, (http://www.progressivepunch.org/...) and an also anemic 56% lifetime rating from Americans for Democratic Action. Despite Murtha's courage on Iraq, Murtha is at his core an old-school appropriator- and with his actions in the last six years, it appears that he will place pork spending for his district above the goals of the Democratic caucus and this country.
Murtha is also a concern strategically. Exit polls show that corruption was the No.1 issue for voters this past Tuesday. And according to CREW (http://www.beyonddelay.org/...), he doesn't have a clean slate at all- his relationship with his brother's lobbying firm is very, concerning, and CREW places him among Dennis Hastert, Don Sherwood, Chris Cannon, and J.D. Hayworth in it's Dishonorable Mentions category. Murtha also was involved in ABSCAM, shown on tape denying a bribe with about as much conviction as Rush Limbaugh issues an apology. (He said he wouldn't take a bribe- at that point.) Today Chris Bowers called for defeating William Jefferson for the sake of the integrity of the House Democratic Caucus- we should make it so our No.2 isn't corrupt as well.
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John Lewis is one of my heroes. Lewis started out as a civil rights activist as one of the leaders of SNCC in the 60s, was defeated in a primary by Wyche Fowler in 1978, elected to the Atlanta City Council in 1979, and then elected to Congress in 1986 (defeating Julian Bond in the primary, interestingly.) John Lewis is a dedicated liberal Democrat and is with progressive movement on nearly every issue. He was one of the founding members, along with Bernie Sanders and Maxine Waters, of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and has been a voice for oppressed people, working families and every progressive issue through his political career.
There is also a case for Lewis strategically. The first is that the Majority Leader in the 110th Congress I believe will be the public spokesperson of House Democrats, mainly due to the fact that Nancy Pelosi is not the best public speaker we have. John Lewis is exceedingly eloquent, (in addition to being a talented writer- Walking With the Wind is an incredible book), and is also somebody who Time referred to as a "living saint". Having somebody of that caliber as our public spokesperson would make many of our points seem irrefutable. John Lewis is also already a talented politician- the reason why I am suggesting him is because, as Senior Chief Deputy Whip (No.6) he is the highest ranking member of the Progressive Caucus in Congress.
I also believe that the Democratic Party owes America's black community a lot. African-Americans have consistently been the Democratic Party's most loyal constituency, and Clinton fucked us over with things like welfare reform, allowing affirmative action to keep being reduced, no initiatives on urban renewal or environmental racism, and the crime bill. Having a black person as the No.2 would send a message of renewed commitment to issues important to people of color.
There's also quotes like these:
"The remnants of the same injustice we marched on Washington to protest 43 years ago was still visible in the drama of neglect and abandonment that we watched unfold before our very eyes only one year ago. ... Where is the leadership today in the White House or the Congress that realizes the purpose of government is not just to serve the rich and the self-sufficient, but also to defend the poor, the sick, the elderly, the starving, the homeless and the suffering?"
-- Aug. 29, 2006, the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina
"How many more of our young men and young women must pay the ultimate price for this ill-conceived, mismanaged war? We cannot kill all of the terrorists. We cannot shoot them all; we cannot bomb them all. We need to stop this madness."
-- Oct. 25, 2006, after receiving news that 93 American soldiers had died in October trying to keep the peace in Iraq
"We cannot separate the debate today from our history and the past we have traveled. When we marched from Selma to Montgomery in 1965, it was dangerous. It was a matter of life and death. I was beaten. I had a concussion at the bridge. I almost died. I gave blood, but some of my colleagues gave their very lives. We must pass this act. ... It is the right thing to do, not just for us, but for generations yet unborn. When historians pick up their pens and write about this period, let it be said that those of us in the Congress in 2006, we did the right thing.
-- July 13, 2006, urging Congress to re-authorize the Voting Rights Act
John Lewis, by the way, has a 93% rating from Progressive Punch- and there's something wrong with ADA's server, so I can't tell you what his lifetime rating from them is.
And that's why John Lewis should be Majority Leader.
Cross-posted at MyDD