The fact that California Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi will soon be Speaker Of The House should be a good thing for California. After all she does represent California and one would assume that she would attempt to assist the state that put her into office.

Unhappily, that does not appear to be the case. She appears to be a two agenda person and those agendas seem to be to help old cronies obtain high and powerful positions within the Congress and to arrange the surrender of the United States in the war in Iraq and the war against terrorism.

The first major position she takes is to support Congressman John Murtha in his bid to become House Majority Leader. Congressman John Murtha has a proven track record of skirting the edge of ethics violations and is about as far left on the Iraq war as one can get, however, he is an old friend of Congresswoman Pelosi. When Congressman Murtha lost his bid for the Speakers job Congresswoman gives him the job of Chairman of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. This man who is vehemetly against the Iraq war , has called for the immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq and has in effect called people in our military murderers, will now be the most powerful person on the committee that decides how much money the military can spend while protecting our country.

Her next step was to bypass the logical choice for chair of the House Select Intelligence Committee, ranking member California Congresswoman Jane Harman of Southern California. Considered an expert on intelligence issues, Harman is respected on both sides of the aisle. But anti-war Democrats think she gets along too well with Republicans, and reportedly Pelosi doesn't like her. As speaker, Pelosi can name the chair without party approval. Instead of deciding to appoint Congresswoman Harmon, she appears to have decided on far left Congressman Alcee Hastings of Florida, a former federal judge who was impeached by Congress and and convicted by the Senate, one of only seven in our history, for taking a $150,000 bribe and committing perjury. As far as I can tell, his only qualifications for the job are that he is also vehemetly against the war in Iraq, he is an old crony of Pelosi and Congresswoman Pelosi owes him favors. It has been said that Pelosi doesn't want Harmon because she is a moderate liberal and may not be willing to help Pelosi in her agenda to 'crush' President Bush.

The worst thing is that these decisions are coming from a person who stated that her first priority is to clean up House ethics. Attempting to place old cronies, with ethics problems of their, in high and powerful positions in the House does not seem to me to be a way to 'clean up' House ethics.

If Nancy Pelosi harms this country it will be California's fault for listening to the far left and electing a self centered and power hungry person to represent us.

David G. Hallstrom, Sr.
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