Kerry's November Gift to Republicans? (Dem Congressman Says Kerry Is Blowing 2006 for Dems.)

ABC News ^ | 10/31/06 | JAKE TAPPER, MIKE CALLAHAN and AVERY MILLER

[MikeA]

WASHINGTON, D.C., Oct. 31, 2006 — For weeks, Republicans on the campaign trail have been looking for something — anything — to talk about other than the record of the Republican Congress and the way the Bush administration has conducted the war in Iraq.

Monday, they got their wish. While stumping for local Democrats in California, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., addressed students at Pasadena City College and made a comment about education and the war in Iraq that lent itself to much controversy.

"You know education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. And if you don't, you get stuck in Iraq," he said.

It was a rhetorical gift for the embattled Republican Party which is eager to run against Kerry again. The White House unusually notified the media ahead of time that the president would address the issue in remarks at today's campaign rally in Georgia.

Election Fodder

The Kerry kerfuffle is a prototype of controversies of the new media age. "Thanks to the Internet, all life is on the record now," observed journalism professor Jeff Jarvis of CUNY. "Everything a politician says and does is public and the world can see in a second … that's life now."

After Kerry's remarks were mentioned on the Web sites of local newspapers, including the Whittier Daily News, the video popped up on YouTube and conservative blogs like Newsbusters.org, and then talk radio seized on them.

Though, as opposed to 2004, it didn't take Kerry weeks to respond to attacks against him. Shortly before noon, Tuesday, Kerry, a Vietnam veteran, responded, insisting in a statement that he had not belittled the intelligence of soldiers serving in Iraq, but rather, that of "the president who got us stuck there."

But it may have been too late, the train had left the station.

"I believe Sen. Kerry owes an apology to many thousands of Americans serving in Iraq, who answered their country's call," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., campaigning in Indiana.

Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh said, "It tells us what John Kerry himself and the Democratic Party think about the troops and the U.S. military."

By the time Kerry got to a microphone in Seattle this afternoon to explain what he called a botched joke about the president, hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Americans, had already heard about this new issue and Republican candidates were talking about it.

"It disgusts me that a bunch of these Republican hacks who have never worn the uniform of our country are willing to lie about those who did," Kerry added.

What's unclear is if Kerry's comments will help rally Republican voters or help their party portray Democrats as against the troops to score victories next Tuesday. A Democratic congressman told ABC News, Tuesday, "I guess Kerry wasn't content blowing 2004, now he wants to blow 2006, too."

[Nickname]

I'm curious....

I know there's been a drive at some colleges to ban military recuiters.

Has Pasadena City College been a big player in this?

I just wonder if this pathetic excuse for a senator was engaging in the lowest form of pandering.

[MikeA]

anything — to talk about other than the record of the Republican Congress and the way the Bush administration has conducted the war in Iraq.

In regard to the incredibly biased remarks above, I love that Kerry's remarks can't be disgusting in their own right. No, instead they're only notable according to these writers because the Republicans want to cover up their record according to ABC News, sounding ever so much like a Democratic Congressional leader.

But the record of 12 years of Republican control of Congress is welfare reform, tax cuts, a strong economy, a surplus during the 90s, a stronger military, greatly enhanced homeland security, a whole host of reforms to government and on and on. Indeed, 90% of what Clinton claimed the credit for in the 90s was actually done by a Republican Congress.

This Congress' record just in the last 2 years isn't insignificant either, though the obstructionist creep Harry Reid used parliamentary manuvears to bottle most of it up once it got to the Senate. Just look at what this Congress tried to get done that the Democrats blocked:

And the incredibly biased comment about how President Bush has waged the war needs little comment. How about how ABC and other news outlets have COVERED the war with their nothing but negative coverage of Iraq?

[RoseofTexas]

All sKErry had to say is that he misspoke and that his joke didn't come out the way it was intended to. Make a simple apology and move on...BUTTTTTTTTTTTT NOOOOOOOOO the freakin doofus had to insert foot in mouth! I BET YOU, I bet a million bucks, if I had it, that the RATS are crying in their RATHOLES wishing this moron would have kept his trap shut! I can just hear the gnashing of teeth on the RATS phones and cells.......GOOD!

[trustandobey]

Or I'm stuck on stupid.

[Soul Seeker]

By the time Kerry got to a microphone in Seattle this afternoon

A Mic he knocked off the stand btw...LOL

You can tell the Libs are steamed at Kerry. They didn't try to distort Rush's comments or take shots at him. They reserved their bite for Kerry.

[ez]

"Our troops did not enlist because they did not study hard in school or do their homework," Bush said in his prepared remarks for a former GOP congressman, Mac Collins, who is trying to oust Democratic Rep. Jim Marshall. "The men and women who serve in our all-volunteer armed forces are plenty smart and are serving because they are patriots."

[MikeA]

Has Pasadena City College been a big player in this?

I doubt it. PCC is just a community college, and quite a good one, that's not particularly known for political activism.

[bray]

Bush became a fighter pilot after he got his BA from Yale. This joke was NOT directed at President Bush!

BTW Kerry had to go in the service since his grades didn't allow him another deferment!

Pray for W and Our Troops

[SolomoninSouthDakota]

The pathetic thing is that Skerry was not at all there to address issues of education, or at least that was not his primary objective. No, the first thing out of his mouth, according to he current version was a sniveling, classless joke with the POTUS as the butt.

It is scary to think that there are many liberal professors in front of students day after day doing the same thing---and that passes for education today. As Mortimer Adler said a few years back, even today, we are in a Dark Age of education darker than the original "Dark Age".

[Petronski]

Kerry's tortured explanation? I was making fun of Bush's lack of education. Hmmmm, Bush has a Harvard MBA, while you Senator Kerry have a bachelor's degree.

Both men went to Yale, where the President got better grades. Kerry was a D student.

[knightshadow]

Bush, not being gifted with verbal eloquence, is assumed, and protrayed, to be stupid by the democrats on that basis alone. Whether they know better or not, they deliberately propagate the notion as part of their continuous strategy to make hatred of him the central vehicle for their return to power. VEry Marxist, by the way, but what's new?

[MikeA]

But, I'm curious, does anyone care enough about John Kerry these days for this to make more than a passing dent of impact on this election?

I think Kerry as even the defeated Pres. candidate for the Dems. in 2004 is still seen as being a leading Democrat by virtue of that. The biggest impact of this is it will help get out whatever reluctant bit of the GOP base there still is that was thinking of sitting out the election. I don't think it will turn many if any from voting Democrat to Republican. No, the bigger value is in keeping the GOP base fired up. In a close election like this, even a passing dent can have a big impact and make a difference. We'll have to see.

[Republicus2001]

The question now on the table is - will Kerry have the courage to take a principled resignation before the election on Tuesday? Or will he stay on as a sparring punching bag to doom his party before Big Tuesday '08?

Don't forget BOXER/Hilary in 08!

[APRPEH]

What's unclear is if Kerry's comments will help rally Republican voters or help their party portray Democrats as against the troops to score victories next Tuesday. A Democratic congressman told ABC News, Tuesday, "I guess Kerry wasn't content blowing 2004, now he wants to blow 2006, too."

[Retain Mike]

John Kerry’s statement that only losers join the military aligns precisely with his uncorroborated testimony before Congress about how I, and others of TF116, committed unspeakable atrocities against the South Vietnamese. In my little corner of the war our boats and ships were ordered not to return fire from the village of Nam Can as they transited to and from Seafloat. We were expected to gut it out through the kill zone, because the village was designated by us as a sanctuary from the war for civilians.



Now he regards my son who joined the Marine Corps infantry out of high school as intellectually failed, and never considers the possibility that he may have deferred college to serve his nation. My son had the aptitude scores and security clearance to serve a tour with Marine Presidential Security Forces, before joining Third Battalion Fourth Marines security.



Life has come full circle.

[knightshadow]

Hope you're right, my friend!

-knightshadow.

[FReepapalooza]

I'll second that.

[Republicus2001]

The question now on the table is - will Kerry have the courage to take a principled resignation before the election on Tuesday? Or will he stay on as a sparring punching bag to doom his party before Big Tuesday '08?

Don't forget BOXER/Hilary in 08!

[seasoned traditionalist]

 

“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.”

"John F'n Kerry" October 31, 2006.

(John F'n Kerry--1971)

 

A Snake sheds its skin on a regular basis.  However, when the Snake's skin re-grows, its still a "Snake."

 

 

[MikeA]

Yes, Bush went to Yale for his undergraduate studies, Harvard for his post-grad.