I had, like I would assume most people did, heard only the joke - likely written for Kerry - defining Trump was happy to fine that this was otherwise a great interview where he spoke brilliantly on both the accomplishments of the Obama years and the need for truth and the rule of law.

Seeing all of that made me understand the ridiculous attacks by Trump and Pompeo against him. The reason is that he is so articulate and so obviously a good person with an honest accounting that defines the Obama foreign policy as respected - for good reasons - while Trump has only a few countries - mostly with dictators running them - happy with them.

I get the type of show this was, but I think Kerry is at his best speaking about serious issues with the complexity that they are due. I've read about 3.4ths of his book and it only reinforced my great respect for him as a leader, a statesman and as a person. He is an AMerican treasure.

not just from GOPers, but Dems, liberals, and progressives.

Didn't state that clearly above, that seemed to be a low point as if he was going after teenagers as a whole. There are many on social media (resisters) that didn't find it amusing and think he should apologize.

I would have rather him say the cold hard truth about Trump. He is a vile, racist, sexist, xenophobic piece of trash period.


If he is going to be on the respect level of Obama, Biden, the Clintons, and even Gore, he has to be more careful about choice of words in the future, especially if you are trying to sell books.

skin. It most definately does not attack either teen girls or seven year olds. I also think that - many young teen are very sensitive. I know I was and my three brilliant, capable daughters were. I know I parsed any comment people made to me - worrying that it was meant in the worst way. I would obsess over comments .. casually made long after the person who said them likely remembered them. As to my daughters, let's just say that my husband and I walked on egg shells for nearly a decade trying to avoid saying anything that they could take negatively --and still had times when we later learned that they were upset about something said.

That said, there is no way to have watched Kerry with his daughters, step sons and their grandkids and not seen that he loves them and is a very kind, loving parent and grandparent. There is no need to explain or apologize for a comment that at best is - in Obama's words - inartful.

You also miss that on some issues, Kerry was far better than his peers. One example was seen in his interview with Ari Melber. Melber played CSPAN footage of a 1991 Kerry speaking about the problems with the way a nearly all male Senate treated Anita Hill. Melber than played a small segment of Biden chairing the committee and asked for a comment. Kerry skillfully avoided responding saying he would need the full contest -- though he likely remembered that Biden did a terrible job. https://www.msnbc.com/the-beat-with-ari-melber/watch/john-kerry-trump-effected-hostile-takeover-of-republican-party-1324586051546?v=raila& (Another example would be that Kerry spoke strongly against DOMA and was the only Senator up for election who voted against it.)

He IS on the respect level of Gore and Biden -- and that is obvious in the comments and reactions that people have to him. There are several things that he will always have as things he accomplished that were important to the world. In spite of Trump, the Paris Accord still is a turning point where the world started to make progress on climate change. In addition, he very likely (with Obama) avoided a war with Iran, which is bigger than Iraq. Add that he led on ending the Vietnam War and, in its wake, helping the US be more cautious in entering wars. It likely meant a HUGE amount to Kerry when Pope Francis referred to him as the "ambassador of peace and spoke of praying for him as he traveled as Secretary. Additionally, in his last months as secretary, he was given high honors from France, Germany and the UK for work he had done.

He will not have the level of respect that Obama gets because Obama is a very respected President. He probably, on balance gets more respect than Clinton (but less attention), who while he was President, also has part of his reputation that will always be colored by negative things. As to Hillary, there was MORE negativity to many of her comments on her book tour than there has been on Kerry's. I don't recall you picking the worst comments she made and being a concern troll. (In fact, this is the ONLY think anyone not on the right has had a problem with.) If you really wanted, I could list far worse things said by EVERY one of the people mentioned.

As to his book, it is an incredible view of the last 50 or so years from someone lucky to have had a front row seat through many important. He is an American hero - in Vietnam, as a protestor and as probably the best Secretary of State in at least 50 years.

I haven't seen the Melber interview (he used to work for Kerry), but I will check it out. Ok, is/was the whole thing blown out of proportion? He shouldn't apologize?

I also have not seen the anti-HRC comments (and there are many from the Bernie folks), and to be fair, Biden still gets flack for Anita Hill from liberal women nearly 30 years later.

It was nice that he got props for his work as a war hero, Senator, and SOS. History will seem to be kind (though still curious about what happened with the Syria red-line thing via Obama admin).

You are right, no one will come close to Obama. That being said, when McCain passed, there was talk (Matthew Iglesias had a twitter feed about it) that no other war heroes (Kerry, Cleland, former POTUS Carter, etc) would/or will get the same amount of coverage and/or tributes from both sides of the aisle, despite having accomplished more as public servants and private citizens.

Best wishes in reading.

As to the Kerry comment, it is something that carries very little weight. He is someone with a long history of supporting women when most men didn't - from hiring women, getting a grant to open one of the first rape victims' centers as the assistant DA to being one of the Senators who spoke out in Anita Hill's defense to doing a lot of work on the Small Business committee on programs that helped women's businesses and voting against DOMA.

Note that you dismiss all criticism of any HRC comments when she had her book tour by blaming them on "Bernie fans", but do not consider that many on the left also are not Kerry fans. Anyone out on such a tour where the goal is to interest people enough that they buy their books will say something that others will try to make into controversies. This comment is something that - in repetition, works against Trump more than Kerry - as people can and will see that Trump is as uncontrolled as a small boy and unusually thin skinned. The comment is absolutely not against either young boys or teenage girls, but a very negaive assessment of Trump.

As to the Syrian red line, much will be written about Syria in the future by historians. It is a tragedy. The red line was Obama's - not Kerry's - and the decision on what military or diplomatic response to be made was also Obama's. Just as any diplomatic successes of the administartion are Obama's - so are the failures. What is clear is Obama - in Kerry - had a very able diplomat who especially with the Iran deal and the Paris Climate Accord found success where few thought it could be done.

On Syria, it may be the American tendancy to think we can make everything better. The downside of that conviction is that there is an implicit corollary that we are responsible when any bad things happen. Trump twice bombed Syria in response to chemical weapons use causing very little damage or impact on the overall situation and was cheered by a media trained to speak about Obama and the red line. Yet, which do you think had more impact - actually removing 1300 tons of chemical weapons or the attacks where we warned Russia ahead of time (as we had to) which likely meant Syria was passed the same warning?

What is clear is Kerry's work with Lavrov that resulted in removing those chemical weapons, his unlikely success at getting a UN resolution - backed by Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia, that might at some point still form the basis of apath to reconciliation, and his many very short but hard won ceasefires were among the few small threads of light in a near totally black situation. The perception that Obama ignored his red line made any diplomatic successes after the chemical weapon deal harder.

Looking back, my own perception is that that deal got Obama out of a situation (having to order even the small attack spoken of) that he did not want to be in. After that point, for all practical purposes, there was absolutely no threat that ANY action by Assad would trigger a military response. IMO, the real "red line" deficiency is that after the chemical weapons were out, we did not do the same on use of cluster bombs, barrel bombs etc on civilians. However, that "deficiency" was not unintentional. Any attack led us further into that incredibly complex situation where there were no good guys we could support. Obama spoke in one interiew of needing to have a clear picture of what happens next. The hard thing for him, Susan Rice, Kerry etc is that Syria is an open wound that they would have loved to have healed. It was possible that there was nothing they could have done.

The Iglesias comment spoke to the uniqueness of McCain and was said at the time that he was being buried. It ignores that while McCain was respected and loved by many Democrats, he was trashed - even as he was bravely facing death - by many in his own party. There was also the contrast between Trump and McCain. His actual legacy will be much more complex than the eulogies. Their was genuine integrity, honor and courage when he was a POW. His actual accomplishments as a Senator are nowhere near as clear as those of Ted Kennedy. It was his oversized personality, loved by the media, that colored much of the glowing praise. I suspect that when Jimmy Carter dies, his inate goodness will get the praise he is due. I also think that, where he willl never be seen as one of the greatest Presidents, his reputation will continue to improve. I think it will be a tossup whether Clinton or Carter will be better regarded 50 years from now when more dispassionate historians look at their presidencies. In some ways,when he dies I suspect the coverage and the praise will mirror the response to McCain.

Obviously, Presidents, no matter how good they are, are in a different category than people who do not become President. However, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Al Gore or John McCain will not necessarily be seen to have a better or larger legacy than Kerry. No major accomplishment is done alone, but it was already said in 2016 that neither the Iran deal, which avoided a war, or the Paris Accord would have happened without his skill, perserverance and commitment. Of these people, only Al Gore has a similar claim to fame. McCain's greatest legacy was all the work he did on making peace with Vietnam, but even here his partner who actually led the effort was John Kerry.

You are right, many on the left are not Hillary, Kerry, Obama and Dem fans period. As for Syria, removing the chemical weapons had more of an impact, though it has become a civil war. Everyone did everything they could (you could say that about the Russian interference warnings).

As for everything else, I don't disagree with what you have written here.

Since he was on a comedy show, he probably figured he had to come up with a joke - and it was probably given to him. I'm guessing they review what they're going to be speaking about ahead of time to make the interview go more smoothly - and on time.

And with the serial offenders we hear each and every day, especially right now, anyone who goes after John Kerry for a lame joke just hasn't been paying attention!

And thanks for the book recommendation! He really is a national treasure, with the wisdom he's gained from his years of all kinds of experience, we really need to hear from him more often.