STUCK IN IRAQ

One last comment on the John Kerry hullaballoo.

For all the idiots, hypocrites and MEDIA who are using Kerry's badly delivered joke about Bush not doing his homework about Iraq and thus getting STUCK IN IRAQ to assert that Kerry REALLY was saying to the students he was addressing that "if you don't do your homework, YOU will get stuck in Iraq" --

Who's going to point out that WE DON'T HAVE A MILITARY DRAFT? This is an all-volunteer service.

Flashback: Vietnam conflict. Every young man in the U.S. was subject to being drafted. In the earlier years, college students got an automatic deferment. If you were 18 or older, didn't go to college, or flunked out (or even if you left on your own volition), you were I-A and subject to involuntary induction into the military, which carried a great likelihood that you would end up in Vietnam. Kerry knows this. He was one of the few who were privileged and could have avoided service (as George W. Bush did) by entering the National Guard, by continuing in school (as Dick Cheney did), or by getting married (as Dick Cheney also did). But no! John Kerry volunteered for military service AND elected to serve in foreign climes (as did Al Gore, but as Dubya specifically DID NOT DO), a virtual guarantee that he would end up serving in Vietnam. John Kerry served honorably and with distinction in a very hot zone. When he returned stateside, he heroically and bravely spoke truth to power, advocating for his fellow veterans.

Of all people, John Kerry knows there's no draft now. His explanation that he was dissing Bush, not the troops, has the clear ring of truth simply because there's no reason for young people today to get "stuck in Iraq" simply because they don't "do well" in school. They have any number of options, according to Republicans who tout the great economy we're supposed to be experiencing. Well, at least he knows they could work for no benefits and low wages at Wal-Mart or flip hamburgers at a fast-food joint.

I sympathize with Kerry's position that he doesn't have anything to apologize for, and his resolution that he won't be "Swift-boated" again. But yet, a savvy politician should know that it would have been very easy to have simply said, "That wasn't at all what I meant, I'm lousy with jokes, but I realize in retrospect that I blew the joke about Bush, that my words actually hurt the people I care about most -- our troops and their families -- and I am deeply sorry for that. Now, in the light of my apology, I ask president Bush to join me and apologize for leading our troops into harm's way for nothing that will substantively help or protect the U.S., and for failing to protect them by providing them with the proper equipment, the proper levels of troops, and a properly thought-through plan not only for the invasion but for an extended occupation."

From my perspective, I was really glad to hear Kerry be tough for once. But reluctantly I bow to the political realities.

Tags: John Kerry