Category: John Kerry

  • Iran talks fail once again

    Iran talks fail once again

    So, you may not have noticed, but there was supposed to be a deadline for an agreement on Iran’s nuclear ambitions yesterday, instead, after a few days of scurrying around trying to put together an agreement of sorts, the negotiating parties decided instead to extend the deadline for seven months. Needless to say, John Kerry, the least Secretary of State man in the world was front and center of the failure, according to the Associated Press;

    Past talks have often ended on an acrimonious note, with each side blaming the other for lack of a deal. But, mindful of hard discussions ahead, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry focused on praise, in an apparent attempt to maintain a relatively cordial atmosphere at the negotiating table.

    Kerry, who arrived Thursday and met repeatedly with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohamad Javad Zarif, said Zarif “worked diligently and approached these negotiations in good faith.”

    “We have made real and substantial progress and we have seen new ideas surface,” Kerry told reporters. “Today we are closer to a deal that will make the whole world, especially our allies in Israel and the Gulf, safer.”

    Hammond and other foreign ministers of the six powers also sought to put a good face on what was achieved. Hammond spoke of “significant progress,” while German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said only differences about “technical details” remained.

    Of course a delay only gets Iran closer to the development of nuclear weapons, the delay only benefits Iran and drawing a smiley face on it all doesn’t make the world any less dangerous.

  • Kerry’s credibility problems

    Kerry’s credibility problems

    kerrypinkbike01

    As they say, the bloom is off the rose at the Washington Post when they let Marc Thiessen, former Bush speechwriter beat up John Kerry like this;

    When John Kerry ran for president in 2004, he dismissed the allies fighting alongside the United States in Iraq as a “trumped-up, so-called coalition of the bribed, the coerced, the bought and the extorted.”

    Now, as secretary of state, Kerry is going hat-in-hand to many of the same nations he insulted, asking them to join a U.S.-led coalition in Iraq.

    […]

    Kerry mocked the contributions of smaller nations, declaring “When they talk about a coalition, that’s the phoniest thing I ever heard. You’ve got 500 troops here, 500 troops there.” Never mind he’s now working for a president who just used a prime-time address to announce that he is deploying — wait for it — 475 troops to Iraq (but insists they will not have a “combat role”).

    Yeah, his State Department spokesperson won’t name the countries that make up his 40-country coalition and he’s only named two in public, so I’m sure this will be epic. From CNN;

    Just hours after an ISIL spokesman called on the group’s foreign fighters to carry out attacks on coalition countries led by the United States in the battle against the terrorist group, a senior Obama administration official warned the international community is not prepared to respond to such threats.

    “We’re not structured that way effectively right now” to respond to that kind of call, the official said.

    But, I’m sure John Kerry can pull them together, especially since his 2004 presidential campaign revolved around the fact that they were useless. As time goes by, we get to see how big that bullet was that we dodged ten years ago.

    Thanks to Chief Tango for the link.

  • NATO Nations vow to join in fight against ISIS

    NATO Nations vow to join in fight against ISIS

    last convoy out of Iraq

    From the Christian Science Monitor comes the news that 26 nations pledged to join the fight against ISIS during a summit in Paris, if that’s not ironic;

    “It shows a political will to tackle [the extremists] collectively,” says Yves Boyer, associate director of the French think tank Foundation for Strategic Research, which he says is crucial for legitimacy. “There is some feeling that the US should not be the full leader of what is going on, because of the failures of the US in this part of the world since 2001.”

    Yeah, now I’m inspired – the French have taken to criticizing our military adventures.

    The New York Times reports that some Arab Nations have signed on, too, but don’t ask Kerry which ones;

    Secretary of State John Kerry, speaking from Paris, declined to say which states had offered to contribute air power, an announcement that White House officials said could await his return to testify in Congress early this week. State Department officials, who asked not to be identified under the agency’s protocol for briefing reporters, said Arab nations could participate in an air campaign against ISIS in other ways without dropping bombs, such as by flying arms to Iraqi or Kurdish forces, conducting reconnaissance flights or providing logistical support and refueling.

    I guess the whole point of this little diplomatic exercise is to let other countries participate, but not really do anything to kill thugs in large numbers. I guess the “do anything” mentality is seeping into the diplomatic corps and the defense organizations.

    We’ve been selling fighters and armored vehicles to these Arab nations for decades, why can’t they use them? Ever? We’ve had huge exercises with their troops – I assume they train their officers and soldiers to fight in wars – so why aren’t they making that sort of commitment. When Kuwait was devastated by Saddam Hussein, we protected the Arab Nations from succumbing to the same fate and then rescued Kuwait from being the “19th Province” of Iraq. So what do we get in return? Air taxis.

    I’m sure they’ll all get pretty medals and pats on the back from John Kerry, while once again, the US shoulders the majority of the fight and suffers more criticism from the Euro-wienies when it all fails because no one is willing to make a commitment to the war that they’ll need to destroy ISIS.

  • White House: We’re “at war” with ISIS

    White House: We’re “at war” with ISIS

    Halp us Jon Cary

    The other night, John Kerry made some kind of discombobulated statement to explain how we’re not really at war with ISIS/ISIL/Islamic State forces. So the White House quickly corrected him yesterday, according to Fox News;

    The comments are a sharp turnaround from how Kerry described the military operation on Thursday. In interviews with CNN and CBS News, Kerry described it as a “very significant” and “major counterterrorism operation.” He told CBS News that “war is the wrong terminology.”

    His spokeswoman, Marie Harf, also said she would not “refer to our efforts” as part of the “war on terrorism.”

    Therein lies the problem; If you can’t even admit that its a war, how can you fight it the way it needs to be fought? Do they plan to tickle the jihadists until they cry “Uncle!” The only way to win is to kill them all, every last one of them until the countryside is one huge gooey paste, but if the people who are responsible for fighting the war can’t even say the word “war” and use it correctly in a sentence, it’s already lost. No one in the White House thought to correct Kerry until the morning shows pointed out the silliness of his statement.

    Then they send out Kerry to coordinate a “broad coalition” of allies, but who is going to take him seriously? Turkey has already caved on their commitment to provide us with airbases from which we could hit whatever we’re going to be shooting at Syria, you know Turkey, the sole Islamic member of the 10-nation coalition that was supposed to provide direct military support.

    There are other Islamic countries in the coalition, though;

    Thursday’s meeting in Jiddah ended with Saudi Arabia, other Gulf states, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon pledging to stand against terrorism. They promised steps including stopping fighters and funding, repudiating the Islamic State group’s ideology, providing humanitarian aid and “as appropriate, joining in the many aspects of a coordinated military campaign.”

    They also agreed to boost support for the new Iraqi government as it tries to unite its citizens in the fight against the militants. Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said coalition members agreed to share responsibilities for fighting the Islamic State group, as well as to “be serious and continuous in our action to eliminate and wipe out all these terrorist organizations.”

    That sounds helpful, but not in any meaningful way, but I’m sure they all feel better about themselves. At least they’re going to “be serious” more than John Kerry appears to “be serious”. I appreciate their seriousness. Back to Fox News;

    White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest and Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby used almost identical language when pressed by reporters Friday whether or not the expanded military operation against the terrorist group is in fact a war.

    “In the same way that the United States is at war with Al Qaeda and its affiliates … the United States is at war with ISIL,” Earnest said.

    OK, that’s a little bit better, but someone needs to grab the State Department by the throat (I’ll volunteer) and shake them until they understand that war is part of their political business, too. They should read von Clauswitz, and then reread it occasionally.

  • So Just Why Is John Kerry Secretary of State?

    So Just Why Is John Kerry Secretary of State?

    Did not anyone in the Obama administration give any consideration to how the rest of the world might perceive John Kerry as the anointed representative of our nation’s views before they sent him out there to screw up all the rest of those things Hillary didn’t? Did they not suppose that intelligence agencies around the world charged with the responsibility of rooting into the most intimate details of the lives, careers and loyalties of American leaders and diplomats with whom their leaders may have to interact, could have missed the salient and salacious details of John Kerry’s bizarre background?

    Anyone want to wager that the North Vietnamese don’t have amplified tapes of every single word of their unauthorized negotiations with young Jean Fraud in the Paris Peace Accords when he was eagerly flushing his country down Parisian toilettes to further his own political ambitions? And of course, having America’s best interests at heart, those wiley Asian communists would never, ever trade that possibly advantageous information with any other government inimical to American diplomatic interests, now would they? Oh, of course not.

    And surely, none of the countries our clueless Obama has dispatched his ethically emasculated emissary out to treat with has ever compiled a dossier on this self-promoting turncoat, have they? Surely they took no note of the his political opportunism when he leveraged four months of highly dubious combat experience in Vietnam to first denounce his fellow American warriors as war criminals, then years later, used that very same experience to report for duty as the presidential nominee of the political party that seems to have a strange affinity for Jane Fonda type traitors. Nah, those foreigners wouldn’t pick up on that crass hypocrisy now would they?

    Likewise, they surely paid no attention to the fact once exposed by his fellow sailors as a phony, glory-seeking opportunist, the presidential candidate blustered mightily that he would open his military records to the world while threatening legal action against those who were flaying his phony combat records into shreds. But then, post-election, he shrank quietly into the political swamp of lost campaigners and his blusters became but faint bubbles in the leftist media.

    Truth is John Kerry has never to this day opened his records nor has he sued anyone. He likely had the best defamatory damages case of any plaintiff in the history of jurisprudence, the loss of the most powerful office in the world. Except for the troublesome reality that truth is a rock solid defense against such a defamatory tort action and John knew those Swift Boat guys had truth on their side. Also, it has been speculated that he did not want the public to see that he may have been issued a less than honorable discharge for his traitorous activities in treating with the North Vietnamese in Paris when he was a junior reserve naval officer, a discharge later commuted to honorable by Jimmy Carter as part of his broad amnesty for Vietnam draft-dodgers. No, those foreign intelligence agencies surely wouldn’t have included that information in their assessments of this man’s possible weak points and vulnerabilities at any negotiations table would they?

    And lastly, we can rest assured that those nations around the globe wondering and assessing just what weaknesses may be exploitable in negotiating with the once-mighty United States, would never, ever give any thought to the personal vanity of a man who in his seventh decade would completely restructure his physiognomy by expensive, artificial means like some aging Hollywood diva praying to stay lively and lovely in the limelight. And then of course lie about the obvious fact that such surgery occurred. But then there is one advantage to America: Sitting across a negotiating table from John Kerry, how are you going to read that face unless you’re a plastic surgeon? But seriously, they couldn’t possibly attribute such a significant personal decision to an excessive vanity and immaturity that could offer them any advantage in sophisticated foreign intelligence operations now could they?

    Think about all the above and the consider that the Obama administration and the Democrat party actually feel comfortable that this very flawed, dishonest and contemptible man is the best they can put forward to represent and negotiate our nation’s best interests around this globe. If you’ve never thought about this before, trust me, the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians, the North Koreans, Al Qaeda and every other entity out there with interests opposite our own certainly have been devoting huge intelligence resources to determine how best to manipulate this bumbling gift America has presented them. The Democrat party may not care what kind of incompetent charlatans they put forward to represent our nation in this troubled world, but our enemies most assuredly do. With an indolent, inept and clueless community organizer in the White House and a frozen-faced, phony war hero/gigolo and tax cheat out there as his sock puppet, why do you think the once respected America is being mocked and disrespected around the world?

    So just why the Hell is John Kerry our Secretary of State?

  • Constitutional crisis in Iraq

    Constitutional crisis in Iraq

    kerrypinkbike01

    I guess our legacy in Iraq will be to bring them a Constitutional crisis. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has become a liability to the government with his Shia-centric government, disenfranchising the Sunnis, so the legislature and the Iraqi president have decided they should dump him, just two months after his recent election. From Associated Press;

    On Sunday night, in a nationally televised speech, al-Maliki declared he will file a legal complaint against the new president, Fouad Massoum, for committing “a clear constitutional violation.”

    Al-Maliki, whose Shiite-dominated bloc won the most seats in April elections, accused Massoum of neglecting to name a prime minister from the country’s largest parliamentary faction by Sunday’s deadline. He said the president has violated the constitution “for the sake of political goals.”

    Al-Maliki, speaking on Iraqi TV for the first time since U.S. forces launched airstrikes and humanitarian airdrops in Iraq last week, said the security situation will only worsen as a result of Massoum’s actions.

    Of course, if Maliki was thinking of anything except himself, he would have stepped down weeks ago for the good of Iraq. Maybe they can send John Kerry in to straighten this all out – you know like he’s done everywhere he’s stuck his snooty nose.

  • Kerry in Kabul to kick loose election stalemate

    kerrypinkbike01

    Stars & Stripes reports that John Kerry, our Secretary of State was in Kabul yesterday to try and help the stalemated presidential candidates decide who should be president of Afghanistan.

    Kerry brokered an agreement between the two camps in July after allegations of corruption by Abdullah, who in a June runoff finished second to Ghani by roughly a million votes. Part of the agreement was the review of every vote cast in the runoff, a process that continued this week despite a shaky start and confusion over the criteria for invalidating ballots.

    The agreement also called for the formation of a so-called national unity government involving the losing candidate. Under the deal, the candidate who loses the runoff would be allowed to pick an individual to serve in a “chief executive” position.

    Yet another win for John Kerry – he struck a deal between the two parties and now he has to strike another deal with them. I’m sure the picture posted above will influence them to take Kerry’s advice. In fact, the only reason I wrote this post was so I could post the picture of Kerry on a pink girl’s bicycle.

  • Where’s Wal…er…Kerry?

    Where’s Wal…er…Kerry?

    Kerry blue bunny suit

    Kimberly Atkins, in the Boston Herald, remarks on the disappearance of John Kerry;

    After what was arguably his worst week since becoming the nation’s top diplomat, Secretary of State John Kerry has been conspicuously absent.

    The conflict in Gaza rages on, fresh off the violent collapse of a short-term cease-fire. I expected Kerry to be everywhere: making on-camera appearances, hitting the Sunday talk show circuit to detail U.S. efforts to try to bring at least a temporary stop to the violence in the region.

    But Kerry — rarely camera-shy — couldn’t be found. The job was left to President Obama himself and other White House officials.

    In fact, Hamas and Israel have agreed to two ceasefires this weekend without Kerry, including one today;

    Israel and Hamas said they have agreed a new 72-hour truce starting on Tuesday, after increasingly vocal world demands for a ceasefire in the bloody Gaza conflict.

    The breakthrough came during talks in Cairo on Monday, only days after a similar three-day truce collapsed in a deadly wave of violence within hours of starting on Friday.

    And John Kerry is no where to be seen. He should have been on the Sunday shows explaining why he’s incapable of negotiating between the two governments. You know, besides the fact that he’s only good at dictating to people what they should do – like he did when he tried to cram his deal with Hamas down Israel’s throat. But those meanies in Israel made fun of him and told him to go home.

    I suspect that he’s in some luxurious hotel room somewhere pouting about how his job is hard and no one does what he tells them to do. John Kerry is an incompetent pampered boob. And somehow he thinks what I just said makes me a racist.