John Kerry Makes a Fool of Himself

Imagine: A middle-aged fat guy with busted out teeth, a balding head and beer-tinged breath puts on pink tights and silly looking slippers and prances around on stage in an attempt to attract hot, young, artsy babes by showing that he’s a muscular, but sensitive, ballet dancer who identifies with and cares deeply about them.

Would the babes pant, rip off their clothes and rejoice: “Bravo! He is one of us! Let us smother him with our love?”

Or would they shake their heads in disgust and groan that the guy was a pathetic loser who embarrassed the entire planet by pretending to be something he wasn’t and never could be?

You don’t even have think about it. It’s obvious.

And it’s obvious that no self-respecting beer-drinking fat guy would ever try something so stupid. Nor would a svelte ballerina ever clad herself in a baggy house coat, put her hair up in curlers and smear her face with cold cream in an attempt to show blue-collar guys that she was just like their women. Not unless she was demented.

Or unless she was running for president of the United States.

It’s the presidential campaign season again, and us regular Americans are being treated to the spectacle of rich and well-bred men pretending to be bros, sisters, steel workers, farmers, beer-drinking hillbillies, regular folk, and now, in the case of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, a leather-clad Harley Davidson motorcycle rider.

Kerry took presidential candidate absurdity to a new low the other night when he felt compelled to make an appearance on the Jay Leno show by driving on stage on Harley. With his remarkably bad hair in place, Kerry powered the bike on stage to the cheers of the goofs in the audience.

And undoubtedly to the delight of his highly-paid campaign handlers who probably figured the stunt showed their man to be a zany regular guy, a biker dude, and a beer-swilling man of the people.

The act might have made Kerry’s handlers dizzy with visions of the Oval Office, but it made me cringe. It was one of the more pathetic acts in a long time.

Do Kerry and his expensive advisers really believe that driving a motorcycle in a crowded building for TV cameras will cause millions of Americans to exclaim: “My God! John Kerry speaks to me. He is me and I am him! My lifelong dream has been to drive a motorcycle in a building! I will vote for him this instant.”

The truth is, they do believe that will happen.

And that’s probably one reason that more people don’t vote than do. Americans are sometimes stupid, but they aren’t always dumb. They know that rich guys or gals who’ve spent years in the Senate and whose daddies or wives were rich enough to buy them the seats aren’t one of them, and never will be.

They know that the John Kerrys, Howard Deans, Nancy Pelosis and George W. Bushes don’t sweat the bills, don’t have several credit cards maxed out, and don’t worry where the money will come from for the next repair bill on the 12-year-old car.

They know those people aren’t slaves to computers and abusive bosses in office cubicles. They know that the hair-sprayed Republicans and indignant Democrats aren’t despairing over the inability to make it on two salaries. They know those people aren’t worried about being downsized, having their job shipped to China or having a heart attack just after they’ve lost their health insurance. And they know that the pols and their advisers aren’t worried about whether they can afford to go anywhere on their measly two weeks vacation.

But the politicians continue to insult our intelligence by thinking we will actually believe that they’re a member of our group, profession or neighborhood because they dress like us for an hour or so, roll up their shirt sleeves to show their rubbery arms, munch on a couple of sausages or burritos, and ride onto a TV stage on a $16,000 motorcycle that most of us can’t afford.

And they insult us by having us believe that they would actually want to be in our positions of chronic debt, job uncertainty and the means to afford only low-end beer.

As my buddy Phil said, “I’m in debt up to my ass. I can’t bust loose of this dumb job. I haven’t lived my dream. The car is busted. The kids won’t stop screaming. The wife is a nag. This ain’t the way it was supposed to turn out. Anybody who wants to be like me would be a fool.”

Either that or a presidential candidate.