The first statement below presents the real “joke” that was written in Senator John Kerry’s speech notes, a joke that supposedly criticizes President Bush’s policy in Iraq.  The second is just a botched version of the first.

 What Kerry was supposed to say:

 1.  "Do you know where you end up if you don't study, if you're intellectually lazy?  You  end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq.  Just ask President Bush."

What Kind of Mind

The discussion about John Kerry’s comments has been focusing on the wrong issue: of course, his statement insulted the troops, and of course, he will continue to deny it, but the real question is, what kind of mind reads the first statement and then, upon trying to ad lib it, turns it into the second?

The real “joke” makes no sense as criticism of Bush, even if you believe he mistakenly entered us into the war.  The senator’s audience is students of Pasadena City College, and he is addressing them: “Do you know where you end up if you don’t study, if you’re intellectually lazy?”  Well, they can end up any number of places, including very wealthy or just spiritually happy from jobs that do not require intellectual vigor.  And then again, the student who is intellectually lazy in one subject that does not interest that student might be intellectually vigorous in another subject that does interest him/her. 

Because he is addressing a college audience, it would seem that he was comparing today’s college student with President Bush as a student.  Again, this would make no sense, because Bush completed a BS degree in history at Yale and an MBA at Harvard; he was not one of those Vietnam era drop-outs who “got stuck in” Vietnam, and he did serve in the Texas Air National Guard, from which he was honorably discharged.  But the claim that “if you don’t study, if you’re intellectually lazy” clearly refers to college students, not presidents.

Then the leap to “getting us stuck in Iraq” is absurd.  We have nothing to fear from an intellectually lazy college student, but, of course, Kerry means to skip us ahead several decades to when this intellectually lazy college student as president gets us stuck in Iraq.  So does he mean that Bush was a lazy college student or is he lazy now because he got us stuck in Iraq?  But remember he is addressing college students and his statement is “jokingly” prodding them to study and not be intellectually lazy.  If he is referring to Bush as an intellectually lazy college student, what can be said of Kerry, whose grade point average at Yale was one point lower than Bush’s?

Bush – Intellectually Lazy yet Brilliant at Deceiving Democrats

Another problem with the “joke” is that the usual complaint is that Bush deliberately led us astray; he deliberately lied, covered-up, conspired to deceive the Democrats into voting to go into Iraq.  That has been the message for the past two years.  That kind of behavior requires skill, not accomplished by someone not doing his homework or who is intellectually lazy.  That kind of activity requires a lot of thought to put such deception into practice.  On the one hand, the Democrats want to paint Bush as intellectually inferior, a dullard, while on the other hand they claim he misled them, deceived them.  If they are so easily misled by a dolt, what must their level of intelligence be?  Criminals, from rapists to serial killers to tax evaders, are anything but intellectually lazy; they do their homework diligently right up to time they get caught.  

So the statement even if delivered correctly is patently absurd, and yet he claims it was a joke.  But how can it be a “joke” if he believes the statement?  He surely believes that Bush is a dumb, lazy jerk who got us stuck in Iraq, unlike the brilliant, silver-tongued junior senator from Massachusetts whose intellectual power would not have gotten us stuck in Iraq. 

What Kerry Really Believes

So to answer the question, what kind of mind turns the first statement into the second?  A lazy, intellectually slow mind, which disdains the military.  That Kerry obviously did not even realize he had insulted the men and women of today’s military indicates that he still thinks an all volunteer military must be “dominated by the underprivileged” as he wrote in 1972.  This flub is a continuation of Kerry’s denigration of the military that began with his disingenuous “Genghis Khan” speech in 1971 up to last year when he said our military was terrorizing women and children in the night in Iraq.

His remark must have made sense to him or else he would have corrected himself immediately and then read the actual “joke.”  But not only did he not correct himself immediately, he waited two days before offering his non-apology.  His immediate response was to lash out as if he had, in fact, read the real “joke,” saying that the White House knew exactly what he meant.  It did— only Kerry seemed to be a daze about the meaning of his statement.  One can only assume it took a number of explanations to get the senator to realize what he actually said. 

The Non-Apology

No doubt that if members of his own party had not begun to call for his apology, Kerry would have continued his “I apologize to no one for criticizing the Bush administration. . . .” 

But when the word “apologize” finally appeared, it appeared in rhetoric that implies that Kerry had said nothing for which he needed to apologize.  And the fact that the following statement has been accepted by the media and other pundits demonstrates the lack of intellectual scrutiny that politicians actually receive.  Kerry’s apology appeared only on his web site; he did not even have the courage of conviction to utter these words aloud: 

I sincerely regret that my words were misinterpreted to wrongly imply anything negative about those in uniform and I personally apologize to any service member, family member or American who was offended.

Supporters of Kerry will read only the following: “I personally apologize to any service member, family member or American . . . ." But this is couched in rhetoric that absolves the senator of any blame.

According to this “apology,” Kerry does not regret belittling the service members, family members, or Americans, he sincerely regrets that his words were misinterpreted to wrongly imply something negative.  But those words we heard were not misinterpreted.  He did not imply, he clearly stated that “if you don't [study hard], you get stuck in Iraq."  And by saying he apologizes to those who were offended, he relieves himself of blame, because anyone at anytime can claim to be offended by any discourse, regardless of its intent or actual content.