Kerry's Jibe at GIs Draws Rebuke by Bush and McCain

Seven days before an election in which he is not on the ballot, Senator Kerry of Massachusetts made an unexpected return to the center of the national political stage as President Bush and other Republicans accused him of questioning the intelligence of American troops fighting in Iraq.

"The senator's suggestion that the men and women of our military are somehow uneducated is insulting and it is shameful," Mr. Bush said at a campaign rally in Georgia yesterday. "The members of the United States military are plenty smart and they are plenty brave and the senator from Massachusetts owes them an apology."

Mr. Bush was criticizing comments Mr. Kerry made Monday at a political rally with college students in Pasadena, Calif.

"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. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq," Mr. Kerry said.

The attack on his remarks drew a combative response from the Massachusetts senator, who was in Washington State yesterday to support Democratic congressional candidates.

"My statement yesterday — and the White House knows this full well — was a botched joke about the president and the president's people, not about the troops," Mr. Kerry said. "If anyone thinks that a veteran would somehow criticize more than 140,000 troops serving in Iraq and not the president and his people who put them there, they're crazy."

Mr. Kerry refused to apologize and instead unleashed a fusillade of attacks on Mr. Bush and his aides.

"It disgusts me that a bunch of these Republican hacks who've never worn the uniform of our country are willing to lie about those who did," the senator said. He said his critics were simply trying to avoid a debate about the Iraq war. "The Republicans are afraid to stand up and debate a real veteran on this topic. …They want to debate straw men because they're afraid to debate real men."

Potential contenders for the GOP nomination in 2008 eagerly jumped into the fray over Mr. Kerry's remarks.

"The statement in itself is incredibly offensive to those brave young Americans who have volunteered, whether they have high school diplomas or graduate degrees," Senator McCain of Arizona said in an interview with CNN Headline News.

"Senator Kerry owes an apology to the thousands of men and women serving in Iraq," another 2008 prospect, Governor Romney of Massachusetts, said. "No matter where you went to school, or how many degrees you have, most people understand the strength of our nation comes from every corner of America."

The angry counterattack from Mr. Kerry, who was the Democratic nominee in 2004 and is considering another presidential run in 2008, seemed likely to endear him to the liberal bloggers who could be influential in selecting the next Democratic nominee.

"Kerry responded perfectly," a leading Democratic blogger, Markos Moulitsas, wrote yesterday.

The Massachusetts senator made clear that his immediate and indignant response to the Republican criticism was a product of his experience in 2004, when he allowed attacks on his Vietnam War record to go largely unrebutted.

"I'm not going to give them one ounce of daylight to spread one of their lies and to play this game ever, ever again," the senator said. "That is a lesson I learned deep and hard."

While the episode could boost Mr. Kerry's effort to be viewed as one of the leading voices of his party, political analysts said the confrontation also could be a boon to the GOP in the upcoming congressional election.

Republican leaders seized the opportunity to motivate their base by beating up rhetorically on Mr. Kerry, a figure who is deeply unpopular in conservative circles. The rock-ribbed Republican crowd Mr. Bush addressed yesterday in Georgia began booing loudly as soon as the president mentioned the senator's name.

According to the Associated Press, Mr. Kerry's statement to the California college audience came amid a series of oneliners aimed at Mr. Bush. Mr. Kerry insisted yesterday that he was intending to highlight Mr. Bush's lack of preparation for the conflict in Iraq and did not intend to cast aspersions on the troops.

A former Democratic senator from Georgia, Max Cleland, gave full backing to Mr. Kerry and described his aggressive rebuttal as a watershed moment for the Democratic Party.

"I think people will remember John Kerry's press conference today as the moment we Democrats stopped once and forever accepting the disgraceful smears of Republicans. John Kerry showed our party how to fight back with the truth," Mr. Cleland said in a statement distributed by Mr. Kerry's aides.

In a written statement, the Massachusetts senator launched ad hominem attacks on some of his critics. He called a conservative talk show host, Rush Limbaugh, "doughy." Mr. Kerry also skewered Mr. Bush's spokesman, Tony Snow, calling him "a stuffed suit White House mouthpiece."