Posted on 11/01/2006 9:36:58 AM PST by WmShirerAdmirer
48 minutes ago WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic Sen. John Kerry apologized on Wednesday for a "botched joke" that had drawn fire from President George W. Bush and dominated debate in the last days of a bitter fight for control of Congress.
Kerry said his remarks about Iraq troops to a college crowd in California were aimed at Bush, not the military, and canceled campaign appearances on behalf of Democratic candidates to avoid becoming a bigger distraction.
Polls ahead of Tuesday's congressional elections show Democrats are poised to win power in the House of Representatives for the first time since 1994 and could threaten Republican control of the Senate.
Kerry told the students that if they studied hard they could do well, but if they didn't "you get stuck in Iraq." His office said he neglected to add the punch line: "Just ask President Bush."
"I said it was a botched joke. Of course, I'm sorry about a botched joke," Kerry, who had refused to apologize on Tuesday, said on the "Imus in the Morning" radio show on MSNBC.
Bush and his Republicans, eager to switch the campaign debate from the war in Iraq and questions about Bush's leadership, seized on the remarks as an illustration of why Democrats should not be trusted with national security.
"He is a liberal, a leftist, and this is the typical attitude they have toward our military," House Republican Leader John Boehner said on Fox News. "It goes to show you what liberal Democrats would do if they were to take control of the House and Senate."
Democrats must pick up 15 House seats and six Senate seats to gain control of both chambers.
A series of Reuters/Zogby polls released on Wednesday showed Democrats leading in 12 of 15 key House districts polled. Democrats are favored in several other races not polled. Another three dozen House races are considered competitive.
'INSULTING, SHAMEFUL'
Voter disillusionment with the Iraq war, Bush's leadership and the Republican-led Congress have fueled the Democratic surge this year. Republicans rushed to change the topic and draw attention to the comments by Kerry.
"The senator's suggestion that the men and women of our military are somehow uneducated is insulting and it is shameful," Bush told a campaign rally in Georgia on Tuesday.
Kerry, a decorated Vietnam veteran who lost the 2004 presidential race to Bush after his military record was questioned, reacted angrily to the Republican attacks and initially refused to apologize.
White House spokesman Tony Snow said Kerry's failure to do so on Tuesday was the reason it blew up into a broader debate.
"We're not the one who whipped this up into a big issue. Senator Kerry did so yesterday. He's the guy who put the gasoline on the fire," Snow said on CBS.
For voters, the Kerry flap had the familiar ring of the 2004 presidential campaign. The Massachusetts Democrat is not running for any office this year but is a possible 2008 presidential contender.
"I'm not offended, but this is why John Kerry lost the election," said Jana Cook, a 43-year-old advertising executive and mother of two in Olathe, Kansas. "He was perceived as an elitist and those are the kind of statements an elitist makes."
Democrats were eager to move on with the campaign. Democratic Rep. Harold Ford (news, bio, voting record) Jr., embroiled in a tight Tennessee Senate race with Republican Bob Corker, criticized Kerry but said there were bigger issues.
"Whatever the intent, Senator Kerry was wrong to say what he said. He needs to apologize to our troops," Ford said in a statement. "However, Senator Kerry's words don't alter the fact that the stay-the-course strategy pursued by President Bush and supported by Bob Corker isn't working."
(Additional reporting by Thomas Ferraro in Washington and Carey Gillam in Kansas)
I realize it's not polite to revel at someone else's tribulations,but i must admit i'm enjoying every minute of this.Kerry has stated this was simply a gaff,but i believe this is how he truly feels about the military.A gaff or a Fruedian slip?
Office phones and FAX numbers for Sen. Kerry:
Washington D.C.
Phone--(202) 224-2742
FAX--(202) 224-8525
Boston
Phone--(617) 565-8519
FAX--(617) 248-3870
Springfield
Phone--(413) 785-4610
FAX--(413) 736-1049
Fall River
Phone--(508)677-0522
FAX--(508)677-0275
Two whole news cycles and he still infers that our troops are stupid. Had he included the comment about "Just ask President Bush", it still would mean that the poor and stupid go to the military.
Our troops are smart and fight hard for the liberty that we hold so dear.
It's frustrating to hear that rumpswab (after swilling his lattes) to still have a job that does not involve actually producing something after having lied without apology about Vietnam and about his peers and for having negotiated with the enemy to ensure that millions would become property of the VC. In Paris.
Few cite the VC general who later recanted as he said that this hadn't been what he'd been promised. What he'd been promised was what we have in the US.
God bless our troops and may each one write a letter to all of Kerry's financial and political sponsors. Even TeRAYzah.
"Kerry told the students that if they studied hard they could do well, but if they didn't "you get stuck in Iraq." His office said he neglected to add the punch line: "Just ask President Bush."
And that would change the meaning how? Besides he's such a liar. On Imus he said something about forgetting a word, just one word, but again, not only did the word not fit into the sentence it did not change the meaning at all. I wonder if Imus posts transcripts.
John Kerry on Trent Lott, 11 Dec 2002 (CNN)
I would make it my tagline, but it's too long.
i'd say it's more of a freudian slip rather than a botched joke.
His answer to our dependence on ME oil is to GROW it.
Imus' weak attempt to save Kerry & the Dems. Free airtime, too bad no one listens.
Kerry's Schedule Starts To Lighten Up (Updated)
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Rep Ford , a democrat, running in Tenn is calling for a Kerry apology...
Wait a minute!
Yesterday he pledged to never aplogize and wanted to fight with 'real men', right?
Now he's apologizing?
So is this Cut and Run apologizing or just another version of his infamous flip flop style?
Calling him a treasonous coward only insults treasonous cowards throughout history.
This is Al-Rueters twisting Kerry's words on Imus' show into an 'apology'. What BS.
As for the Troops pictorial response....I'm blowing it up into a campaign poster and adding it to my front yard.
Earlier Wednesday, Sen. John Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat and 2004 presidential contender, became the first member of the Senate to suggest Lott was now unfit to lead the upper chamber. "It saddens me greatly to suggest this, but in the interests of the Senate, his party, and the nation, I believe Trent Lott should step aside as majority leader," Kerry said. "I simply do not believe the country can today afford to have someone who has made these statements again and again be the leader of the United States Senate."
Is this where your double-standard kicks in, Mr. Kerry?
He stop apologizing before he apologized and then stop apologizing.
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Posted by Hugh Hewitt | 11:17 PM
He slandered the military, of course, and the white hot anger is the result. (See this e-mail from a Navy officer. I have received scores of similar e-mails and calls)
But Kerry also reminded and clarified.
Kerry reminded people that the war against the war has been underway since mid-2003, and that the Democrats have never taken the many opportunities to try and rally around the effort to reconstruct a free Iraq but at every turn have demanded an exit on some sort of rushed and arbitrary timetable. They disparaged the effort to push elections forward, then the effort to form a government, and now that government's effort to rule and unite. The enemy has been watching, and has calculated that they only way they can win is by waiting out America ---just as the North Vietnamese did.
Today Kerry also reminded all Americans of the deep, anti-military bias that has infected the left since Vietnam, and through the left, the MSM. In a flash all the anti-military rhetoric that began in the late '60s and built through 9/11 was back on the front shelf. (Donna Shalala's on Vietnam veterans: “not our best and brightest." Clinton Assistant Secretary of the Army Sara Lister: ""The Marines are extremists. Wherever you have extremists, you've got some risks of total disconnection with society. And that's a little dangerous." Michael Moore's portrait of the recruits in his bit of agitprop.)
The coverage of the Kerry slander is also reminding Americans of the MSM's deep-seated left-leaning bias, a reminder that will grow more pronounced as viewers recall the pursuit of Trent Lott and more recently George Allen over gaffes. Kerry's slander is much, much worse than a gaffe, but the MSM was already in "he was misunderstood" mode tonight, as my interview with ABC News' Mark Halperin today made clear:
HH: Mark Halperin, how did ABC handle the John Kerry story today? How ought it handle it tomorrow in the morning show, and in the evening news?
MH: We led with it, as did the other networks. It’s an interesting story. Sometimes in politics, interesting trumps everything else. But it’s also a complicated story, because you’ve got to decide what standards do you use to decide what matters about John Kerry says, something we don’t normally care about much in the evening news these days, and also about whether or not what he said is being mischaracterized, how it’s being used by you and other conservatives. So we did lead with it. I suspect it’ll play very big on the news tomorrow. I’m not sure about after that, how much shelf life it will have, or should have.
HH: Do you believe he was making a joke?
MH: I do believe he was making a joke.
HH: And now, I have had…and have you talked to any military active duty about that conclusion?
MH: Not active duty, but retired. But I don’t know that…but that was almost a fluke. I don’t know that someone in the military would have more insight into what John Kerry’s brand of humor is like than someone not in the military.
HH: Does it matter at all how they, to your reporting, how the military is reacting to this statement by Kerry, and his explanation?
MH: Sure.
HH: And given that I’ve done an hour of radio tonight, I probably had fifteen calls from veterans and active duty, including one non-com just got back from a second tour there, a medic, a combat medic, seething with outrage. They’re not buying the apology. They believe it was premeditated. Should their point of view find a prominent place in your news coverage?
MH: The point of view should find a prominent…or a place in all news coverage. But again, as important and valuable as the troops are, as much as all Americans, and we respect them, that’s not always…they’re not necessarily the best arbiters of Senator Kerry’s sense of humor.
HH: And so, how are you going to figure that out? Because obviously, it’s convenient for him, Mark Halperin, to say he was making a joke. I find it astonishing. I can’t imagine anyone making that joke, or trying to make that joke to college students facing a choice of careers, talking about stuck in Iraq where there are hundreds of thousands of their fellow aged Americans are, or have passed through. I just can’t imagine it as a joke. But you think it was.
MH: Well, Hugh, you’ve got greater faith in John Kerry’s sense of humor than I do, I guess.
HH: I don’t understand.
MH: Well, I mean, you can’t believe he’d be making a joke about President Bush’s intelligence? He’s done it in the past.
HH: But he always has been willing to use President Bush’s name. And if he wanted to make that joke, if you don’t study and do your homework, you’ll end up as President of the United States, and you’ll get us stuck in a war? As opposed to indulging a stereotype that he once testified to about…in 1971, the Genghis Khan testimony, that he might really have severe and significant contempt for America’s fighting men…
The MSM is going to try and cover for Kerry and his party, and will refuse to press other Democrats for responses to the obvious questions: What do you think about Kerry's remarks? Do you believe he was making a joke about President Bush? Should Senator Kerry apologize? (There are others, but I'd settle for those three.)
Having reminded the public of all this, Kerry's slander will also clarify things for many, many Americans.
The Democrats remain the party of Michael Moore, Ned Lamont, Kosputin, John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, Dan Rather and Howard Dean.
Any vote for any Democrat is a vote for every one of those folks, and many more besides.
Kerry sent up a flare over the whole Democratic Party. Other Dems and the MSM are trying mightily to put it out. I don't think they will succeed. The silence about Kerry from Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and every high profile Democrat is the loudest noise in American politics tonight.
What cowards not to state the obvious, rebuke Kerry and join the American Legion and countless others in demanding an apology. And what a disaster for the United States if this party achieves a majority in either the House or the Senate.
Any vote for any Democrat is a vote against victory and a vote for vulnerability. It is also a vote against the military.
' His office said he neglected to add the punch line: "Just ask President Bush."
Hmmm....that's not the excuse his office released yesterday.
They said he forgot to add two words to his comedy club audition tape.
A joke is -two guys walk into a bar...
Trashing the Commander in Chief during a war, is not a joke.
Obviously, Kerry is.
The bum should resign.
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