“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.”

He later tried to act as if he had “misspoken” and that he was really speaking about President Bush. Really? The President Bush who attended Yale and earned a Bachelor’s Degree, and then Harvard Business School where he earned an MBA. I’m sure that he was able to do that, even though he really isn’t that smart, and he didn’t “study hard, do his homework, or make an effort to be smart.” President Bush has also been highly successful in business. He invested about $800,000 in the Texas Rangers in 1989, and then sold his share of the team in 1998 for $15 Million. Besides that, he has successfully run for several elected offices, and won. Oh, and one more thing…he won the presidency twice. Regardless of what the liberals have propagated for the last 8 years, this man is not stupid. He is not articulate! But, being articulate is not the sole identifier of one who is intelligent. If you take the body of work that George Bush has put together in the last 30 years, you have to be ignorant to think that he is stupid! You can see much more about the life of George Bush at Wikipedia, though you will have to weed through the liberal commentary and just pick out the facts. It is interesting that even in that article, every good thing accomplished by George Bush is painted in a bad light!

It is clear that John Kerry was not really talking about George Bush, so the only other conclusion is that he was talking about those who are serving in the military. I know this is dredging up old news, but it sets the stage for what came out in the last day or so. And that is, Stephen King’s comments. Speaking before a group of high school students at the Library of Congress, King had this to say:

I don’t want to sound like an ad, a public service ad on TV, but the fact is if you can read, you can walk into a job later on. If you don’t, then you’ve got, the Army, Iraq, I don’t know, something like that. It’s, it’s not as bright. So, that’s my little commercial for that.

So, Kerry claimed that his comments were just a mistake. A blown joke. But, at the time, many of us thought that he was just reflecting the true liberal mindset. This quote from King makes it pretty clear that this really is the mindset of liberals…or at least this liberal.

Why are these quotes so troubling? Because they are derogatory to those who choose to sign up for our military forces. They have come to the conclusion that they don’t agree with the war, therefore everyone who is smart must agree with them. Therefore, if a person volunteers to sign up for a war they don’t agree with, they must be stupid, and unable to get a job anywhere else. There have been numerous claims to that effect made over the last five or six years. How often have you heard that our young people just couldn’t afford to get an education unless they joined the military, and let the government pay for it. Or that people sign up for the military because there aren’t any other jobs, after all, every factory has been shut down nation wide!  They don’t even consider the possibility that these young people are smart people, who believe in the military.  Liberals think that our military is supposed to be able to have a free will–that is they can fight when they want to, and not fight when they don’t want to.  But that is not the nature of a military force.  They fight when the Commander-in-Chief decides it is appropriate.  They believe in freedom, and so they fight when they are commanded to do so.  However, it is interesting that when Clinton was in office, the military was at an all time low.  Under Bush, the military has been the strongest it has been for a long time.  What we need to remember when considering those facts is that we have a volunteer force!  The military is not as large as it is right now only because the Bush administration has compelled it to be so, but because men and women have signed up, voluntarily, to protect this country, and its interests throughout the world.

Liberals should be furious with these high profile men speaking in such a depreciatory way toward our military.  How dare they say that our men and women in uniform are only in uniform because they are too stupid to do anything else.  We have the most intelligent, educated armed forces on the face of the earth.  If you don’t think this war should be fought, then say so–it is your right.  But, don’t insult the men and women of the armed forces.  I wonder if the same soldiers will still be stupid when they are under the command of a democratic president?

I, for one, will not insult those who choose to protect our country.  They give us the freedom that we have, and I appreciate the sacrifice that they have made to provide these freedoms.  In fact, they are the very ones who provide the freedom for these liberals to make their uniformed, ridiculous statements about the military!

A real plan for the “energy crisis”. President Bush pushed for drilling for oil in Anwar. That is the most logical plan for success when it comes to our energy problems. We can provide enough oil for our nation for a long time (how long is still under debate, but most acknowledge there is a lot of oil there). One reporter said that this would be a “long term” solution, but she was dead wrong about this. If we announced today that we were moving equipment into Anwar, the price of gas would start coming down almost immediately. Even if the Arab nations thought we were bluffing, when we started moving equipment into Anwar, they would fall all over themselves to lower the price of oil. Unfortunately, the democrats are going to continue to fight tooth and nail over this solution. Nancy Pelosi wants to open up our reserves…like that will really work. The best outcome that I have read lowers the price at the pump somewhere between $.05 and $.20 per gallon, and that only in the short term until our reserves begin to deplete!

Make the tax cuts permanent. We all know that President Bush has been pushing for this since he got the tax cuts through in the first place. But, he really emphasized in this press conference the connection between the threat of increased taxes and the current economic “slow down”. Anyone who can’t put two and two together and understand that the threat of increased taxes causes people to stop spending their money is an idiot! If you think that a bill is going to come due next week, and the only way you can pay it is to save the money you have today, what will you do? Those that are truly conscious of their obligations will do what they have to do to pay their bills. The democrats are telling us that they are going to raise taxes! They are going to get rid of the Bush tax cuts, which means that middle class Americans (not just the wealthy, as they try to make us believe) are going to owe more money. I read a few days ago that anyone making over $50,000 will suddenly owe $4000 to $5000 more per year in taxes. That is significant! We need the confidence that we aren’t going to have a new tax load before we will be willing to spend our money.

Put the economic blame where it belongs. Now, I have not agreed with a lot that President Bush has done fiscally, but to try and pin the economic “slow down” on him and his administration is ludicrous! He spoke this morning about how the democrats in congress have intentionally stalled legislation dealing with our trade with Columbia. We have an unfair setup with Columbia right now. They send their exports to us duty free, and our exports to them are taxed. If small businesses could send their products out tax free, they could make more money, and thus may just save their own businesses. I’m not an economist, and I don’t even play one on TV, but it makes sense to me that if we can export more products, it would be good for our economy. After all, the more I may sell as a business man, the more money I can make. It seems that principle would spread out over the whole economy. Furthermore, it is the democrats who continue to call for more and more spending. I found it ironic that the same democrats who try to make it sound like the Bush administration is spending too much on the Iraq war are the same democrats calling for the War Spending Bill to be increased with their pet projects! As I surf the web and read the liberal blogs, I keep seeing these annoying little widgets that tell us how much is being spent on the Iraq War. However, what is not told is how much of that number is the pork put in by the democrats! The president has set a cap on the spending bill, and it is the democrat led congress who are trying to add to it, and expand the spending. Please don’t act high and mighty about wanting to stop the spending if you are going to keep adding to the bill.

Nicely call Jimmy Carter an idiot. When asked if Jimmy Carter’s nice little visit with Hamas was beneficial, or whether it could cause problems, President Bush responded very diplomatically. He explained why he could not, and would not meet with the terrorist group. They are the group responsible for much of the unrest in the Middle East. They are a group that is against peace, and will continue to be so. Jimmy Carter’s visit to the region completely undermined the work that every president has done in the region since his time. The truth of the matter is, Jimmy Carter was an extreme failure in foreign policy when he was in the White House, and he continues to show his inadequacies in that department now. He didn’t have enough sense to listen to those who are far wiser than he in such matters. Don’t get me wrong, I think Jimmy Carter is probably a good guy, with good intentions. He has done some good work in this country, especially with Habitat for Humanity. But, he really needs to stay here, and work on those projects, instead of trying to deal with things he obviously knows nothing about. He has become an embarrassment to even the democratic party, and that is saying something!

I am sure there were a lot of other things that were worth discussing in the press conference this morning, but these stood out in my mind as I watched. If you saw it (or heard it) and want to add to my list, feel free to do so in the comments below!