John Kerry: A Racy Joke?

I will not whip the John Kerry story to death, but there are several more things to say about Mr. Kerry's allegedly "botched joke." The first thing to say is that, if you get a chance to watch the video of Mr. Kerry's stand-up routine, you will see that he does not, at any time, LOOK (or sound) like he is telling any sort of joke. There is no facial cue, no lilt in the voice. He does not offer a softening of the eyes, or even a twinkle in one eye. There is no wink; no feigned laugh, no silly smirk. There is no affect whatsoever that he is trying to be funny. He does not prompt his audience after a long set-up to the punchline. Nay. He gives us nothing other than a very dour face; he looks like he is waiting for the audience to immolate themselves, to burn themselves to death. He does not look like he is expecting a laugh: His face, without doubt, looks like he is saying that none of this is a laughing matter.

That is point 1.

Point 2 is that even if we rewrite Mr. Kerry's joke, adding the "us" that he says he carelessly omitted, it isn't one whit funny. "You know, if you don't do well in school, well, you get us stuck in Iraq." AHHAHHHAHAHAHA! What a howler!

Point 3 is that, irrespective of Mr. Kerry's apology -- in which he apologizes, not for the joke but its misinterpretation (it's the listeners' fault) -- the joke, no matter how accurately or inaccurately delivered, cannot, in any way, be interpreted as NOT a slam of the military. For if Mr. Kerry is telling the truth, that he was merely damning the dumbness of the Bush Administration, he is nonetheless damning the Commander-in-Chief and his underlings. In other words, he is slamming the military. Moreover, he is also slamming the generals and colonels who submit to the alleged idiots in the White House; and he is also suggesting that many of the generals and other military officials who believe the invasion of Iraq was indeed a good thing are also "dumb". In other words, it is a joke belittling the military. Lastly, the joke suggests that all those soldiers who are UNDER the great dolts comprising the leadership of the war are themselves duped into submission, serving under leaders who are foolish, deceitful, empty -- men and women who did not do their homework. In other words, the joke damned every level of the military, no matter how you look at it.

The fourth point is one I brought up here yesterday. I am going to be so bold to suggest that I am one of the first bloggers (if not the first and only) to make the observation, and the observation is this: John Kerry might have been playing the race and class card. For we all know that certain Democrats, like Charlie Rangel and John Conyers, have complained that too many minorities -- inner-city minorities -- and the least privileged members of society, are most vulnerable to military recruitment. We also know that Messrs. Rangel and Conyers supported the reinstitution of the military draft during the 2004 election cycle: they played on the fears of their base under the guise that they were trying to build balance or parity in the recruitment of soldiers.

It appears to me that any sane observer could conclude that Mr. Kerry was playing this very cynical, racially-charged card. Context is everything, no? So it stands to reason that we might want to understand who it was Mr. Kerry may have been aiming his comments at; it is reasonable to ask to whom was Mr. Kerry speaking. You see, his joke was to a college crowd at Pasadena City College. As I stated yesterday, that inner-city college has a student body of over 25,000; 70.3 percent of that student body is made up of minorities. The school's largest minority group is Hispanic; the second is Asian; with the black student population making up just about 6.5%. Was John Kerry playing to this crowd? Was he saying -- since these listeners were minorities -- that they were most vulnerable to recruitment, to death on the war front? Was he playing to two stereotypes; one being that minorities make great cannon fodder for Republican wars; and two, that minorities are only able to save themselves if they rise above their apparent dumbness by doing well in school (I do not think there is ANY apparent dumbness, by the way)? Was Mr. Kerry propping himself up as a defender of minorities from alleged Republican indifference to their plight?

I think a good case could be made that he was so propping himself. This is not to suggest that Mr. Kerry is at all a racist himself. It is merely to posit some reason why Mr. Kerry said what he said. Here is a good question: Would Mr. Kerry have told this joke to an Ivy League college crowd? Had he ever told that joke to a group of affluent white folks? If he has told this joke before, or if he would have told this joke to a bunch of rich kids at Harvard, then my observations here are irrelevant and misplaced.

One final little note: Amy Kane of Atlantic Avenue passed this very informative link along to me. It is a very detailed study of the actual, rather than perceived, demographics regarding military recruitment.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

Technorati tags: John Kerry, Botched Joke, Race