John Kerry, who came a few thousand Ohio voters short of being Commander in Chief of our Armed Forces:
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.
Unbelievable. And rather ironic given that the line sounds dumb in more ways than one.
And, of course, in the age of YouTube politics, this is everywhere already including, appropriately enough, YouTube:
Update: Lots of reaction out there in the blogosphere, too:
- Michael Demmons: “I happen to know several military people whose smarts would put people like John Kerry to shame.”
- AllahPundit: “[I]t’s awfully goofy. And, of course, completely politically tone-deaf, which makes it vintage JFK. “
- BCB: “There is this vast amount of contempt for the military within the Democratic party.”
- Richard @ Hyscience: “It’s another reason to vote R on election day.”
- Ed Morrissey: “Wow. Just wow.”
- Greg Tinti: “[M]uch like Mel Gibson’s comments about ‘the Jooos,’ you don’t say something like this unless you think it’s actually true. He’ll try to weasel his way out of it, of course, but it’s too late.”
- Dan Riehl: “The bastard should be tried for treason and shot!”
I think we can stop a little short of that . . . .
Update: Foreign Policy‘s James Forsyth:
Personally, I buy Kerry's explanation that he was trying to insult Bush's intellect – not that of the troops. Any politician knows that bashing the men and women who serve is the dumbest thing a politician can do and Kerry himself is a veteran. Kerry also seems slightly obsessed with the question of whether he or Bush is smarter. Indeed, one can't help but wonder if he didn't release his Navy records during the campaign because they revealed that he actually got slightly worse grades at Yale than Bush did.
Nevertheless, the Republicans are going to run with this: note McCain's demand for an apology. Today there must be even fewer Democrats keen on Kerry '08.
It’s almost axiomatic that people who spend a lot of time trying to convince you of how clever they are aren’t very clever.
