Kerry defends Obama's national security policies

[karynnj]

This is a longish article that contains quotes from Kerry's press availability with print journalists. It is very difficult to post just 4 paragraphs to reflect the entire article.

[div class = "excerpt"]
On Iran:

“We took the initiative and led the effort in order to try and figure out if, before we go to war, there might actually be a peaceful solution,” he said.

<snip>

“I learned this pretty hard in Vietnam that before you send young people to war you ought to find out if there is another alternative,” Kerry said. “I think that is an obligation we have as leaders — to exhaust all the remedies available to you before you ask people to give up their lives. And that is what we are doing. “We may not succeed. But if we don’t succeed we will have exhausted the remedies available,’’ he said. “We can look people in the eye and say, ‘Look, we tried everything available to us to find a peaceful solution. It didn’t work. Sorry, [military force] is our only alternative.’ ”

On Israel:

“I laugh at people who say it is not going anywhere,” he said. “They don’t know because we’re not talking about where it’s at. They have no clue where our negotiations are, whether they can go anywhere. The fact is it was our leadership that helped to pull that discussion back together.”

In General:

“We are leading across the globe,” he repeated several times during the round table in his ornate seventh-floor suite in the State Department, with his 9-month-old yellow Labrador retriever, Ben, at his side. “I think there has never been a time in our history where the United States is playing as significant a role in as many places simultaneously as we are today.”

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/02/27/kerry-fires-back-critics-peace-negotiations/j0UXroACT6M8wwlsEH6KMO/story.html

This incidentally is the interview that the "acting like a poor nation" quote is from. To all the people who posted (not even reading the lousy Washington Times article) assuming that he was speaking of the military should not he wasn't. He is speaking of the STATE DEPARTMENT'S budget. (Somehow I think this will get fewer comments - although hopefully none of the idiotic BFEE comments.)

[pipoman]

1. Paint it how you will

He is 1%er who likes the TPP and NSA surveillance. ..more of the same.

[karynnj]

3. You need to look at his positions as Senator - Kerry was one of the strongest against FISA in 2006

He was absolutely against the bill to make it legal retrospectively. He was one of the small number of Senators who joined Dodd in trying to filibuster it - but they were far short of the needed 41 Senators.

As to TPP, Kerry worked to get an amendment into CAFTA that the AFL/CIO praised because it would protect workers. It passed the Finance committee but was rejected in the final bill. He also spoke of how NAFTA as implemented had hurt not just the US workers, but the Mexican workers.

As Secretary of State, he will NOT work or speak against Obama policies in public, but his long time opinions on both these issues are what he worked for in the Senate. I for one am happy that he will be one voice heard in the inner circles. THAT in fact is the trade off - he can now speak more directly inside the WH, but he has to be more constrained speaking his own position.

[ProSense]

2. Thanks for posting.

There are still members of Congress trying to sabotage the diplomatic negotiations with Iran.

[karynnj]

4. True - and AIPAC is still working on that

Although, at least from one expert, they are actually rather stunned by their defeat on this issue. They failed first before the interim agreement was signed and in their attempt to so immediately afterward.

They also were surprised at the strength of the competing J Street lobbying. (I think their defeat was less J Street - which I support - but the strong team of Obama himself, and Biden and Kerry - both former SFCR chairs who obviously worked hard to pull back Democrats.)