Ranger from the North

Michelle Malkin has the C-SPAN video clips of Sgt. Mark Seavey (here) and General Wagner (here) confronting the clueless combination of Rep. Jim Moran and Rep. John Murtha at a town hall forum earlier this month. Greyhawk at the Mudville Gazette provided a transcript of Sgt. Seavey's comments:

"Yes sir my name is Mark Seavey and I just want to thank you for coming up here. Until about a month ago I was Sgt Mark Seavey infantry squad leader, I returned from Afghanistan. My question to you, (applause)

"Like yourself I dropped out of college two years ago to volunteer to go to Afghanistan, and I went and I came back. If I didn't have a herniated disk now I would volunteer to go to Iraq in a second with my troops, three of which have already volunteered to go to Iraq. I keep hearing you say how you talk to the troops and the troops are demoralized, and I really resent that characterization. (applause) The morale of the troops that I talk to is phenomenal, which is why my troops are volunteering to go back, despite the hardships they had to endure in Afghanistan.

"And Congressman Moran, 200 of your constituents just returned from Afghanistan. We never got a letter from you; we never got a visit from you. You didn't come to our homecoming. The only thing we got from any of our elected officials was one letter from the governor of this state thanking us for our service in Iraq, when we were in Afghanistan. That's reprehensible. I don't know who you two are talking to but the morale of the troops is very high."

Moran - who is one of the few congressmen supporting Charlie Rangel's call to restore the draft - responded quickly: "That wasn't in the form of a question, it was in the form of a statement. But, uhh... let's go over here." And he took the next question.

Greyhawk adds,

That was not in the form of a response to Sgt Seavey in any way shape or form.

Apparently, Congressman Moran thought that he was hosting Jeopardy. Quickly moving on whenever they are called on their ridiculous statements seems to be one of the Democrats' most used tactics. I was a bit disappointed that they didn't combine it with another one; neither Moran or Murtha warned Sgt. Seavey about questioning their patriotism.