Blame It On the Balloon Guy

©2004 Patrick Rooney

“J****! We need more balloons. I want all balloons to go, g********... What the f*** are you guys doing up there? We want more balloons coming down, more balloons. More balloons. More balloons…”

                                                            --Producer for DNC Convention, on live TV

Leave it to the Balloon Guy to give up the game.

They had tried all week to present themselves as the party of reason. They were going to be kinder, gentler character assassins. They were going to take the high road, but the cracks in the façade began to show.

They calmed down Algore--almost. And Bill Clinton said President Bush was a pretty good guy before accusing him of trying to throw children in the street, letting hoodlums run wild, and allowing terrorists to violate our borders, just so he could give the newly-rich Bubba a tax cut.

They limited Al Sharpton to seven minutes, he took twenty, which they really didn’t mind because he’s just so cute! So they turned their heads and allowed the Riot King to pretend he was Frederick Douglas.

Then there was John Kerry. Did I forget to tell you he served in Vietnam ? Kerry said he was taking the high road too but couldn’t resist the digs: “Proclaiming ‘Mission Accomplished’ certainly doesn’t make it so,” he said to roars from the home crowd.

I couldn’t help wondering if Kerry realized his words sounded as if they applied more to his war in Vietnam : Four months served, then sent home after sustaining questionable injuries and requesting medals he won’t let us forget about. Kerry still refuses to clear up the lingering questions by not releasing his full military medical records, just as Bill Clinton refused to release his doctor’s records at the height of questions about his—ahem… personal practices.

It’s clear both Bill Clinton and John F. Kerry are competing to be thought of as the second John F. Kennedy. But hasn’t anyone told them that the gig requires some actual character? Kennedy commanded a PT boat, and served heroically while injured, so Kerry sought out a Swiftboat to command, armed himself with a camera to re-enact his own heroics, played the “three Purple Hearts you’re out” game, and jumpstarted his liberal Massachusetts political career by cavorting with Jane Fonda and lying about U.S. military “atrocities”.

I wonder if Kerry exclaimed “Mission Accomplished” after abandoning his boatmates in Vietnam , or did he wait until after Saigon fell to the Communists?

Then Kerry sought and attained political office, and continued his destruction. His new and most impressive badge of honor became his voting record, the most liberal in the Senate.

This year’s election is as critical as they say. What Kerry and the other liberal Democrats are so afraid of, is the fruition of George W. Bush’s foreign policy. Because in four more years, the results of the war on terror will essentially be in, and we will know who was right and who was wrong.

I can see the path the President is laying out, and it is sound. Beyond the other reasons for war, he’s creating a beachhead in the Middle East , a base of operations for future actions. He has the Mullahs of Iran quaking. Iran is vulnerable, because many of Iran ’s people are pro-America. A dominant—not wimpy— U.S. in the Middle East is an achievable and desirable goal.

President Bush was extremely critical of Iran ’s phony elections, while Kerry released no statement, which was quite telling. Kerry has openly declared that he wants to work with the Iranian government, which is known to be harboring top al Qaeda operatives.

But it’s not just Iran . Kerry told the Council on Foreign Relations that “the Bush administration has pursued the most arrogant, inept, reckless and ideological foreign policy in modern history”, and that Kerry planned to spend his first hundred days as president by going to the U.N. and other “traditional allies” to make his case for an internationalist U.S. foreign policy.

And so a week of cracking facades and unseemly lies came to an end—but the confetti and the balloons refused to fall on the great Democratic coronation, so the show producer—the Balloon Guy—went ballistic. What a joy! Finally someone in that great hall had the guts to just be themselves!

Patrick Rooney is the Director of Development at BOND, the Brotherhood Organization of A New Destiny, a nonprofit organization dedicated to “Rebuilding the Family By Rebuilding the Man.”

For more information, please visit www.bondinfo.org, call 1-800-411-BOND (2663), or write to patrick@bondinfo.org.