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Newly elect Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi put on her best game face as she described the unity of the Democrat caucus in coming to the decision to elect Rep. Steny Hoyer as House Majority Leader over her choice of Rep. John Murtha (who watched on in stone face).

Speaker elect Pelosi did manage to pull off a religious reference as she said “as they say in church, let there be peace on earth and let that begin with us.” I expect to see more of these references to religious groups as we near 2006. I wonder how that will fly with her base?

Representative Hoyer touted Pelosi’s values in his acceptance speech and siad one of their first tasks will involve changing the direction in Iraq.

John Murtha, for his part said he didn’t have the votes; hmmm, that sounds a bit different than what we heard yesterday. On the downside, Murtha slipped and said “led that flight” when he spoke about redeployment in Iraq. Fight and flight are often times confusing for liberal Democrats.

The buzz of course is that Nancy Pelosi made a huge error in trying to make a stand on Murtha. In that respect she failed her first test of her new power as the Democrat congress chose someone with a little less baggage on the ethics front.

The AP jumped on this bandwagon with their latest article, Democrats defy Pelosi, elect Hoyer House leader. It is a sentiment that is getting a lot of attention.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A week after winning back control of the U.S. Congress, Democrats in the House defied incoming speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday and bypassed a vocal Iraq war critic to elevate her moderate deputy to majority leader.

It marked an embarrassing first defeat for Pelosi, a California liberal who had endorsed Rep. John Murtha (news, bio, voting record) of Pennsylvania, a key player in the anti-war effort that helped Democrats sweep to power in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

The secret vote behind closed doors was 149-86.

Democrats embraced Hoyer, a Maryland moderate who has been Pelosi’s deputy while she served the past three years as minority leader. The two have had a somewhat strained relationship.

Pelosi, as expected, was officially nominated to be the first woman speaker of the House. A vote by the full House will be held when the 110th Congress convenes in January.

Shortly before the election several Democrats said Murtha had denounced a package of lobby and ethics reforms designed to clean up how the scandal-rocked Congress does business, another key issue in the 2006 elections. He said he was not referring to the Pelosi-backed package.

Pelosi endorsed Murtha on Sunday, ending her neutrality in the contest and getting behind the man who managed her successful 2001 campaign for House minority whip. She defeated Hoyer.

The Washington Post has the Transcript.

Others: Hot Air, Michelle Malkin, WizBang, Stop The ACLU, The Anchoress

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