Murtha's Top Aide Buys Gun With Campaign Loot

Some posts just kind of write themselves:

Rep. John Murtha’s (D-Pa.) top aide spent more than $2,000 of campaign money to buy a rifle and other items for himself at a National Rifle Association (NRA) charity auction, raising questions about whether the transaction violated House ethics rules and campaign finance law.

John Hugya, Murtha’s chief of staff, reimbursed the campaign Friday for the expenses after The Hill inquired about the use of campaign money for personal items.

The Murtha for Congress campaign paid for Hugya, a decorated retired colonel in the Marine Corps, to buy a rifle, knife, NRA blanket and other items at a Friends of the NRA auction in September 2006. Hugya disclosed the $2,151 purchase as a gift from the Murtha campaign in a financial disclosure report that recently became available online through Legistorm, a company that advocates for greater transparency for congressional documents and post many of them online.

No word on what Speaker Pelosi has to say about this issue.

Now Murtha--a former Marine himself--is definitely not your typical liberal when it comes to gun rights. He has repeatedly voted down intrusive gun legislation.

Yet, this can't sit well with a party that has exulted the man to stratospheric heights and who has, by selling out the Marines, established himself as a player in the House. This won't help his status among the more liberal faction of that august body.

I wonder if we'll hear Speaker Pelosi use Murtha as an example of the loopholes we have at gun shows next time the gun wars heat up.

Finally, the falsely accused Haditha Marines are still awaiting that apology Rep. Murtha. I'm sure they really enjoyed being accused of war crimes by you when they hadn't actually been responsible for any.