Yes, indeed I am.

OK, so yesterday morning, I had to get up with the baby, so I was conscious while Meet the Press was on, and didn’t have the motivation to change the channel.  And Murtha was talking, and Joey Douchebag, whatever his name is, the host, was trying to troll Murtha.  He played a Cheney clip talking about Murtha’s withdrawal strategy validating al-Quaeda’s Strategy.  He (Douchebag) was all, “So does Cheney suck fo comparing you to the Taliban, or what?” And Murtha was all “Naw, dog, it’s all good, Cheney’s aight, we’re tight like that.  And Douchebag was all, “But dawg, you’re a MARINE, you can kill him with your thumb!” And Murtha was all “Nah, man, chill.” And Douchebag was all, “But he thinks you da ENEMY, man!” And Murtha was all “Naw, it ain’t like dat.  I was chillin at his crib the other night, smacked his old lady on the ass, we were discussing a little green, ya dig?”

MR. RUSSERT: Vice President Cheney weighed in on your thinking. He said, quote, “I think, in fact, if we were to do what Speaker Pelosi and Congressman Murtha are suggesting, all we’ll do is validate the al-Qaeda strategy. The al-Qaeda strategy is to break the will of the American people—in fact, knowing they can’t win in a stand-up fight, try to persuade us to throw in the towel and come home, and then they” can “win because we quit.” How does it feel to be linked with al-Qaeda by the vice president?

REP. MURTHA: Yeah. Well, it’s, it’s unfortunate that the vice president does not have the—he doesn’t listen to what I’m saying. We can’t send troops into combat without equipment. We can’t send troops into combat without training. We can’t extend them past the one-year boots-on-the-ground policy that they have. And, and we can’t continue to have them over there in Iraq more than—more than a year. That’s what he’s, he’s not saying. That—he’s not—and he’s not saying our strategic reserve and the future threats to this country significantly increased in the last year because we have no ground strategic reserve. That’s what he’s not saying. So he attacks my, my differences, but he doesn’t attack the policy. He doesn’t talk about the policy and the results of what I’m saying.

MR. RUSSERT: But you’re a Marine. You like being linked with al-Qaeda?

REP. MURTHA: Well, they’ll take care of al-Qaeda. Let me—let me tell you this, Tim. Al-Qaeda will be taken care of by the Iraqis. They know who—there’re only 2,000 al-Qaeda. They’re Iraqis fighting Iraqis. It’s a civil war between the Shias and the, the Sunni. And they won’t negotiate. The Shias won’t negotiate with the Sunni. What, what I—what I found out when I was out there last time just a month ago, the Sunnis are not going to help in this whole process as long as the Shias control it and won’t negotiate with the Sunnis. Now, this may seem like an incidental point, but this is probably the most important point. They won’t change their constitution to give the Sunnis some influence in this whole thing. They’ve got to work it out themselves. We cannot do it for them.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the vice president’s questioning your patriotism?

REP. MURTHA: No, I don’t think so. No, I, I, I met with the vice president the other day. We talked about the money. We talked about some of the things that, that I felt were important. And I said to him, “We can’t send these troops in without equipment, without training. It can’t be done. If you do that, it’s a disservice to our troops and to the families, the small percentage of families that are fighting this war.”

MR. RUSSERT: Did he apologize to you?

REP. MURTHA: Oh, no. No, no. That, that, you know, this is one of those things where, where he said that overseas. He didn’t blame me for, at least, getting the British out. You know, I thought he might blame me for getting the British out. But he didn’t do that.

Anyhoo, short story long:  Douchebag was looking for headlines and didn’t get any.  And while Murtha’s foreign policy would doom us, at least he’s not the shrill little bitch I thought he was.