Majority Leader Murtha?!

This is the third of three interesting political tidbits i heard this weekend.
PoliticalWire pointed to a CNN Story covering Murtha's interest in the Majority Leader's seat if the Dems win big in November:

Rep. John Murtha, an outspoken opponent of the war in Iraq, announced Friday that he would run for majority leader if the Democrats take over the House in the fall elections.

"If we prevail as I hope and know we will, and return to the majority this next Congress, I have decided to run for the open seat of the majority leader," Murtha said in a letter to his Democratic colleagues.

i think this is really good news for a few reasons:

1. murtha is a close ally of pelosi's. pelosi is reliably progressive and would be speaker.
   
2. murtha is highly credible on military issues and would be a good spokesperson for the party on foreign affairs and armed services issues.
   

there are some problems, namely that murtha is a very conservative dem who may still have hawkish instincts despite his noteable opposition to operation iraqi freedom. murtha is also socially rather conservative.
i am interested to know what unites him with pelosi. they are close allies, i am somewhat curious how that came to be.