Campaigning in California, Sen. J. F. Kerry said the following before an audience of largely young college students:
"You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."
In a nano-second, the whole world of media and blogosphere exploded like an unexpected IED.
The debris has not settled and cleared yet, since the ensuing crossfires from all sides continue to be exchanged. Sharp explosive retorts delivered in assumed righteous indignation and equally assumed justified anger fill the air.
So, let’s all move way from the scene of carnage and take a long and detached view.
Even if we assume that John Kerry hates or despises the military to the core of his soul, he is not going to articulate that publicly whether with subtle or not so subtle intent, or even comic inference. That would be as close to a political hara-kiri as one can get especially in these waning days of the frenetic campaigns. He is not the polished politician that everybody labels him to be if he does not know this.
So, let us take it for what it obviously is. He simply misspoke, using a badly constructed and limply delivered sentence. And culling from his subsequent pronouncements, an equally bad analogy of comparing not studying hard to the situation of a president who is waging a failed and protracted war in Iraq.
So, why is this happening to him?
He is supposed to be the clever and polished debater/speaker as proclaimed and shown during his last run for presidency.
Maybe, he was just plain tired and not thinking too sharply?
We, I’m sure, would have expected that kind of extemporaneous speech gaffe to come from a less gifted politician. Like a George W. Bush? Who, by the way, in his response, referred to the troops as “plenty smart”.
Since many of the people who read and analyzed the above Kerry statement believe that he was referring to the military as “stuck in Iraq”, including parents of soldiers, veterans, and many of their neighbors, he should just apologize to those inadvertently slighted. And get this entire thing behind and move on.
That shouldn’t be hard to do, even for a highly educated, intelligent, and experienced senator. Unless, there really is something more that Kerry is not publicly stating.
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ReplyDeleteI'm one of those "uneducated" morons who joined the US military evidently because I was incapable of little else, just the same, I don't think Kerry was referring to us. This is more in line with something Democrat Charlie "Race card" Rangel, also a war veteran, would say.
ReplyDeleteObviously Kerry, whom I despise for many reasons, did not mean to insult the military intellect. I read the entire transcript and he was delivering what was supposed to be a punch-line driven diatribe against the president. I don't know why Kerry feels like he has to personally demean anyone, but it seems to be his style. He truly WAS talking about Bush, not us. He's guilty of being "cute" and misunderstood.
I voted against him two years ago because he's a flip-flopping progressive who stabbed his own comrades in the back when he came back from his 4 "hellish" months as a swiftboater in VN. I don't care how many purple hearts or decorations he has, he abrogated all of that when he figuratively "spat" on all Vietnam vets upon his return, accusing his ex-comrades of warcrimes, all in the interest of furthering his career in politics.
Thank God this guy was defeated for the presidency. He confuses glibbness with intellect. By the way, the president, whom he disparages for being short on intellect, actually outstripped him in college. Militarily, GWB flew single-seat F104s mostly at night while Kerry captained swiftboats. Guess which task requires the higher intellect? It ain't telling your coxswain which way to steer.
Advice to Senator Kerry: Start acting like a statesman instead of the host of a late night show.
NeonPrimeTime:
ReplyDeleteAgain, I pose: Is one's politics weaker because one has to apologize for misstatements made, whether intended or not?
Phil:
In any case, Kerry should never have brought the military issue in the context of his speech where he is extolling the virtues of education to impressionable young men.
The virtues of education pale in comparison to what those young soliders are exhibiting over there.
My daily reading today had this:
Greater love than this no man hath, that one lays down one's life for his friends. (Or his country.)