U.S. Rep. John Murtha, the Pennsylvania Democrat and decorated war hero whom U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt called a "coward" on the floor of the U.S. House last year, campaigned in Cincinnati Saturday to help make sure Schmidt's career in Congress is a brief one.
More than 200 supporters of Democratic congressional candidate Victoria Wulsin - union members, military veterans and campaign volunteers - packed the basement of the IBEW Union Hall in East Walnut Hills to hear Murtha, a 32-year veteran of Congress and critic of the Bush administration's Iraq policy, call for a "return to civility" in a Democrat-controlled Congress.
Murtha, a Marine Corps veteran of Vietnam, dismissed Schmidt's remark on the House floor last year that "cowards cut and run, Marines never do."
"She didn't know me from Adam," Murtha told the crowd. "It was embarrassing that she would say those things about me."
But Murtha, who has called for U.S. troops to withdraw to the "periphery" in Iraq and allow Iraqis to settle their own differences, said he is accustomed to having his patriotism questioned by Republicans.
The Bush administration, Murtha said, "refuses to recognize reality."
"These guys are sitting on their fat backsides and sending our young people into harm's way with 70-pound packs on their back and they're saying Iraq is an open-ended process, with no end in sight," Murtha said. "Our young men and women in the military deserve better.''
Saturday morning, Schmidt held her own rally at her Kenwood campaign headquarters with her predecessor, Rob Portman, now the White House budget director.
Several Schmidt supporters - military veterans who served in Vietnam and Iraq - held a small rally of their own across the street from the IBEW Hall, where Wulsin and Murtha were rallying the Democratic troops.
Steve Griffith of Sycamore Township, who was in the first wave of Marines to enter Iraq in April 2003, said the group gathered to show their "disappointment" with Murtha's criticism of the Iraq war.
"What Jean Schmidt said might not have been the nice way to say it, but it needed to be said," Griffith said.
Usually when candidates make speeches before friendly audiences, they end up talking about themselves.
But Saturday, at a Republican rally in Butler County, Betty Montgomery, the Republican candidate for Ohio attorney general, spent much of her time talking about Mike DeWine.
DeWine is in a difficult re-election battle with U.S. Rep. Sherrod Brown, the Lorain Democrat, and there is fear in the Republican party that many of the party's most conservative voters will skip the senate race because they are unhappy with DeWine.
Some of their displeasure comes from the fact that DeWine joined with 13 other Democratic and Republican senators this year to work out a deal that would allow Democrats to filibuster judicial nominations under special circumstances.
DeWine was at the rally and spoke after Montgomery touted his candidacy in her speech.
In effect, Montgomery told Republicans to get over it.
"If you don't vote for Mike DeWine, you are really voting for Sherrod Brown, one of the most liberal congressmen in Washington," Montgomery said.
The Butler County rally was the kickoff for a day-long get-out-the-vote effort, with about 100 volunteers fanning out after the rally to key Republican precincts to knock on doors and distribute campaign literature and yard signs.
"Republicans were somewhat down, but we see the energy coming back," said Scott Owens, executive director of the Butler County Republican Party. "This election is going to be won by the side which is better at getting its voters out."
E-mail hwilkinson@enquirer.com
