The gaffe heard 'round the twitter: challenged by history, Bachmann flubs geography as well

Life on the road is tough for Michele Bachmann. She seems to forget those social studies fundamentals she fought so hard to restore with the repeal of the Profiles of Learning.

In a speech today,  she located Concord, where the shots heard 'round the world were fired, in New Hampshire, where she happens to be right now. Politico has the scoop in Bachmann fails political geography 101:

"You're the state where the shot was heard around the world at Lexington and Concord," she said Saturday morning at an event organized by the Republican Liberty Caucus of New Hampshire. "And you put a marker in the ground and paid with the blood of your ancestors."

Good, patriotic stuff … only the “Shot Heard ‘Round the World” was fired about 70 miles to the south in Concord, Massachusetts.

Perhaps the gentlewoman from Minnesota's Sixth has simply located "secret" gunshots the founders and the media--including that rascal Ben Franklin--concealed from the rest of us, like the "secret" funding in a recent bill she lamented. The Star Tribune today editorialized that Michele Bachmann's 'bombshell' is a dud: There was nothing secret about health care funding.

And given her level of understanding of early American history, it's no wonder she is the Queen of a Tea Party that defends tax breaks for corporations and the stripping of power from local officials, when the original Boston Tea Party protested tax breaks for corporations and taxation without representation.

Photos: Michele Bachmann (above); Statute of the Minuteman, Concord, MA (below).

Comments

[Phoenix Woman]

And bear in mind, she's one of the smarter Republicans out there. She comes off like Stephen Hawking compared to Scott Walker (aka Governor Dropout) or Sarah Palin.

[Atlanta Roofing]

I can only hope the crowd erupted in laughter at this gaffe of Bachmann's. It's really the only appropriate response. And I hope she can laugh at herself. I don’t know if Obama does, but the two do seem to be different levels of fuck-ups. Also, I saw Bachmann in the Tea Party response to the SOTU. If I hadn't ever heard of her before, that would have been enough to run me off.