The joke's on Kerry.

Byline: The Register-Guard

As a man schooled in the art of nuance, Sen. John Kerry should understand the subtlety required of criticisms of the war in Iraq. Americans increasingly doubt that the war has been prosecuted capably, or that it was justified to begin with. These doubts give Democrats a strong advantage going into next week's mid-term elections - provided they don't stoke Republicans' charges that criticizing the fight is the same as criticizing the fighters.

So Kerry, a week before the election, gets up on a stage in California and says to a student audience, "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."

The Republicans could not have scripted a better soundbite. Kerry's remark suggests that the people fighting in Iraq are losers, not smart or hardworking enough to claim a safe berth on a college campus. Those 36 words are dripping with the condescension that the GOP claims colors Democrats' attitudes toward people in the armed forces - never mind that Kerry, unlike many of his GOP critics, is a decorated veteran.

Kerry insists that he was trying to make a joke at President Bush's expense, and botched the attempt. If that's the case, Jay Leno needn't fear any competition from Kerry. The Massachusetts senator would be well-advised to avoid poking fun at the intelligence of the man who defeated him in the 2004 presidential race - nanoseconds after the gaffe, commentators recalled that Bush had better grades at Yale than Kerry. Then there's the fact that Kerry voted to support the war, and shares partial responsibility for the nation's being stuck there.

The airwaves are full of demands that Kerry apologize, and many of them are coming from Democrats. After furiously defending himself against "right-wing nut jobs" on Tuesday, Kerry offered a half-hearted apology on Wednesday. Kerry should apologize, but the controversy won't go away - the GOP will make sure of that.

The furor saves Republicans, though perhaps only temporarily, from being called to account for launching a war under false pretenses, and conducting it in a way that squanders the nation's blood, treasure and moral standing. The Republicans are fortunate to have such tone-deaf opponents.