Will John Kerry ever find himself in trouble for his foreign meddling?
I doubt it, actually.
Here’s Michael Rubin at the Washington Examiner on the subject:
Kerry is personally invested in the Iran nuclear deal (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA), from which President Trump walked away. The wisdom of Trump’s action is open to debate, but what is not is this: Trump won the 2016 election. He made clear during his campaign that he opposed the JCPOA, just like Obama made clear during his campaign that he supported outreach to Iran. There was no deception on either man’s part. And Trump’s decision to walk away from the JCPOA is not illegal. Julie Frifield, assistant secretary of state for legislative affairs under Kerry, acknowledged the JCPOA was unsigned and “neither a treaty nor an executive agreement.” In other words, it had the same status as the Bush-era agreements with the Czech Republic and Poland for anti-missile defenses which Obama voided when he came to office.
There has been a temptation among polemicists on both the Right and Left to criminalize the policy debate, and this is unfortunate. But that does not mean anyone should get a free pass for what appears to be criminal activity. If Kerry wants to criticize Trump for walking away from the JCPOA, he is free to do so. And if he wants to plot and plan with Zarif, he can register as a foreign agent on behalf of Iran. But he should not remain above the law. To allow him to do so sets a horrible precedent for any future administration, for American democracy, and for coherence of U.S. policy. It is time both Kerry and the Justice Department understood that.
Michael Rubin was born in 1971. So perhaps he can be forgiven for not mentioning that this action of Kerry’s doesn’t set any precedent. Kerry set the precedent already, back in 1970 and 1971.
One of the many things that fuels Kerry’s arrogance is the idea that he can do this sort of thing and (at least in his own mind) be regarded as a hero.
I must say that John Kerry is one of the people in the Democratic Party I detested back when I was a Democrat. I have never seen a single reason to change that opinion of Kerry in all the years he’s been in public life.
ADDENDUM: Kerry seems to think the whole thing is good for some yuks, plus a book plug.
Mr. President, you should be more worried about Paul Manafort meeting with Robert Mueller than me meeting with Iran's FM. But if you want to learn something about the nuclear agreement that made the world safer, buy my new book, Every Day Is Extra: https://t.co/DKjc33Kvvu https://t.co/cesltkt0zW
— John Kerry (@JohnKerry) September 14, 2018
I doubt it, actually.
Democratic pols have to do something fairly crude for federal prosecutors to take an interest in them, like having a chest freezer full of greenbacks in their basement.
Cowardice under fire. Wants to be in the limelight. Willing to accept recognition for something others do. Willing to work behind the back of his compatriots (country) to achieve his own ends. Liar. Hypocrite. Incompetent. Sanctimonious.
John Kerry is a real life Major Frank Burns without Burns’ rare saving graces.
The M.C. Hammer of Diplomacy.
He ought to be, but being a Dem means “not gonna happen”. Unless The Donald decides “it’s time”.
Yep, Lurch is safe. Now it Condi had done something like this while BO was Prez, the sky would have fallen in on her.
From my observations of him, which date to his “Genghis Khan” period, Kerry has always been a traitorous coward. I say coward because he never risks anything of personal value with these demonstrations. And, frankly, he doesn’t seem very bright. His time at State is in the history books as one of the least effective ever.
Apparently though, he’s pimping a new book?
” I say coward because he never risks anything of personal value . . . .” Yep!
“And, frankly, he doesn’t seem very bright.” Yep!
.
But he deludes himself into thinking he is some kind of leader. Ergo, Frank Burns.
I have loathed John Kerry since his “Summer Soldier” days. His anti-war activities and cozying up to the North Vietnamese in Paris represented treasonous actions against his fellow Americans. That he would be rewarded by election and appointment to high office is an affront to all American citizens who have served this nation. I have hated few men in my 85 years, but he tops the list of those few.
I, too, have detested the P.O.S. for nearly 50-yrs. I was on the Dem Left when he began and quickly learned his (cough) wounds had been fantasy scratches that kept him off duty a day or two. As an anti-war activist, few of us took him for anything but a liar and black hole of NEED.
Later, in the Senate, he never ever restrained his Pinnochio impulse to rhapsodise about his 3 or 4 months in Vietnam. Oh, and who wasn’t nauseated by his memories “burned into my memory” of a night on his swift boat in “Cambodia”?
Never happened.
A True Slime.
Hunter S. Thompson, the gonzo journalist who had a hot run from the sixties into the seventies, was friends with Kerry. From Thompson’s last column in Rolling Stone magazine:
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Back in June [2004], when John Kerry was beginning to feel like a winner, I had a quick little rendezvous with him on a rain-soaked runway in Aspen, Colorado, where he was scheduled to meet with a harem of wealthy campaign contributors. As we rode to the event, I told him that Bush’s vicious goons in the White House are perfectly capable of assassinating Nader and blaming it on him. His staff laughed, but the Secret Service men didn’t. Kerry quickly suggested that I might make a good running mate, and we reminisced about trying to end the Vietnam War in 1972.
That was the year I first met him, at a riot on that elegant little street in front of the White House. He was yelling into a bullhorn and I was trying to throw a dead, bleeding rat over a black-spike fence and onto the president’s lawn.
We were angry and righteous in those days, and there were millions of us. We kicked two chief executives out of the White House because they were stupid warmongers. We conquered Lyndon Johnson and we stomped on Richard Nixon — which wise people said was impossible, but so what? It was fun. We were warriors then, and our tribe was strong like a river.
That river is still running. All we have to do is get out and vote, while it’s still legal, and we will wash those crooked warmongers out of the White House.
http://www.insomniacathon.org/rrIHTWIHTS01.html
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It’s exaggerated of course — everything HST wrote was exaggerated — but the moral certainty and rage is endemic to the psychology of American progressives.
Thompson committed suicide a month after George W. Bush began his second term. Thompson had serious health problems and was hardly a stable person. but many people noticed the timing, including Jann Wenner, Thompson’s editor at Rolling Stone:
One month after Bush’s inauguration for a second term – Hunter would be dead.
Sorry. Beg to differ.
Kerry should be congratulated, not damned.
He is merely doing what a good ally, a reliable ally, a dependable ally, should be doing.
The Obama administration, having decided to ally itself with the Islamic Republic(!!) of Iran, has shown itself, to its credit, to be such an ally.
Moreover, to continue such an alliance—even when not in power—shows extraordinary backbone, laudable character and a practically unbelievable moral imperative rarely if ever shown by politicians, not to mention administrations.
And no, it’s not easy to ally oneself with a Sunni-hating, Anti-Semitic, international-terror-supporting entity, whose goal (and it’s always good to have goals, especially if a bit on the ambitious side—aim high!) is regional domination, destruction of the Big and Little Satans, sophisticated, global agit-prop whose intent is the confusion and weakening of its enemies, and general Islamicization of the planet.
No, not easy at all. (But someone’s, apparently, got to do it.)
One should also mention the Obama administration’s extraordinary financial generosity and diplomatic support for its ambitious, forward-looking ally; since such support, which has enabled and will continue to enable the Islamic Republic to purchase all kinds of weaponry and weapon systems from Putin’s Russia, is essential in supporting the latter’s economy and military R&D.
A two-fer, one might say! (But, don’t forget, for the cause of peace. For the sake of peace.)
To be sure, since Trump is the one we must all absolutely believe is colluding with Putin, such financial support for Putin must be laid squarely at Trump’s doorstep. By definition. QED.
And remember: All of the above can by no means be considered a scandal simply because the Obama administration, in addition to being the most transparent administration evah, did not (and does not and will never) “do” scandals. Evah. (By extension, neither did/does/will the Democratic Party.)
So lay off John F. Kerry. He’s only doing what has to be done.
Yea, when the Federal Reserve gets killed by Trum, just after Hillary Rodham Wicked Witch of the West engaging in child trafficking and sexual assault rings, gets charged and put in jail, BEFORE she dies that is.
Barry M.(3:31am):
Vastly, VASTLY identify with your cuddly, sensitive post re-the imminent teller of ‘troot & integrity, John Boy Kerry!!
Has the Subsidized By Hugely Wealthy Idiotic Spouses reminded us in the past hour that he served in Vietnam for 4-months, 49-yrs ago, was wounded multiple times & spent no time in the hospital… All HEROICALLY..??!!
Loathed him when I was an anti-war lefty Dem…. Loathe him equally
now as a 37-year Neoconservative. ‘Nuff said.
The only purely political thing I’ve ever done is to pay my own way to fly to D.C. to march in the “Vietnam Veterans Against Kerry” demonstration. He was a liar and a coward then and he’s only gotten worse as he got older.
I differ; the egregiousness, the sheerchutzpahegoisticmegalomaniafatheadedpreeningpoppycockery and treasonous nature of Kerry’s stance make him finally a clear example for those who believe we need to reassert the rule of law in our nation. That includes Trump and Sessions, prominently. If not now……
It also reminds me that Theresa, who has had her health issues in the last several years, has not only my sympathy but especially my best wishes for her full, complete and longlasting recovery from those issues.
Barry Meislin on September 16, 2018 at 3:31 am at 3:31 am said:
Sorry. Beg to differ.
Kerry should be congratulated, not damned.
He is merely doing what a good ally, a reliable ally, a dependable ally, should be doing.
* * *
Brilliant.
The Onion has missed out on a great piece.
Unless…you already work for them….
Alas, given the absurd state of so much of today’s “journalism”, it would appear that “We are all ‘The Onion’ now…”.
(Or any of its various spin-offs, e.g., “The Leek”….or the “Rap-Scallion”….)
In the early 1970s, John Kerry —private citizen— somehow horned into the Paris peace talks, which were a canard from top to bottom, and buddied up there with Mme. Nguyen Thi Binh, who was representing the “National Liberation Front”, which was then being touted as an independent-minded consortium of southern VN opposition forces coming from a broad range of ideological backgrounds; and no sirree Bob!, by no means a cats paw or fake news creature of the North Vietnamese communist apparat.
In about 1992 or so, I was living Ho Chi Minh City (ex-Saigon) working under an American research grant on the recovery (or not) of the Dong Nai-Saigon Delta, which is where the worst of the Agent Orange defoliation took place.
The hard-core Hanoi apparatchiki, who never much loved the deep south (“Nam Bo”) —which they considered too soft, martially; and too pro-western to be politically reliable— apparently decided it was time to finally rein in the myth of the NLF (known perjoratively by their anti communist opponents as the “Viet Cong”); and literally overnight, all the NLF flags, badges, paraphernalia, and portraits of Mme. Binh and her ilk disappeared from the souvenir shops and markets of downtown Saigon. It was a breathtakingly Orwellian moment —one of many during and after the Second Indochina War— which received zero mention, much less any serious investigative coverage in the foreign media. Of course, no such discourse was even conceivable within the VN domestic media. It still isn’t there. And maybe not here either.