Politics of Mass Distraction: Kerry's Blunder & Commentary on Modern Stupidity

The only issue proved in this latest war of talking points over Sen. John Kerry's (D-MA) latest foot-in-the-mouth is that he talks too much for a Presidential candidate. Those engaged in the Quest for the White House must accept the rigid controls imposed by that Golden Rule of politics: you must always say the right thing at the right or wrong time. There is no flexibility on that rule. Certainly, this only proves why Kerry was never the best top spot candidate in the first place. He's a very smart cat, but he doesn't know when to cut the verbal faucet off. A lot of us have that problem. It's just that the stakes are higher when an elected official does it.

But, still, the latest distraction flap over the comments below also prove that Republican operatives are well aware of the public's lack of intellectual capacity and ability to understand pure wit when they hear it. We live in an age where the art of conversation and the written word is lost; where kids would rather X-Box all day than read a chapter (much less a paragraph); and where the President boasts about his "ec-e-lectic" reading list. We agree with Philly Inquirer reporter Daniel Rubin in his latest Blinq entry:

There's an enormous amount of hot air blowing around the blogosphere on the matter.

Oh yeah, before we forget, here's the Kerry comment:

“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.”

Agreed: it's a "botched" joke. But, to this blog - at first glance - it's not a joke about the troops. However, now may be a fine time to re-engage a social debate that's been raging long before Iraq and World War III, where recent studies raise concerns about the military lowering educational requirements for recruits and how (statistically) that determines who ends up on a front line.

Let's get real for a moment: if he wasn't a one-time nominee for President and Jon Stewart on the Daily Show instead, everybody would get it. Politicians can't be tongue-in-cheek because they have to be serious all the time; then, when they get serious, they need to be relaxed - which is it, people? Kerry wanted a Comedy Central moment since that's where a great bite of the American population is getting its political news.

Someone on a disingenuous blog posing as a conservative, but really moonlighting as a GOP party hack, will argue that this blog is implying that the families of U.S. troops are then "stupid" for not getting the joke. We retort: leave the families out of this and quit using their emotions to front your causes. But, the joke is really on the American public if GOP strategists successfully spin this into something that it's not. We look "dumb" for not getting it and "dumber" for letting it dominate our voting habits next Tuesday. Don't know if Kerry is reading this, but here's our recommendation: take this moment as an opportunity to punk the Bush Administration in a way you failed or refused to do in 2004. Kerry could use this as that grand opportunity to sound off on the fact that he served (with distinction) in Vietnam while the current President scurried away from it by hiding behind a cozy Air National Guard stint in sunny Texas.