Obama should nominate John Kerry to serve as Secretary of State. After all, he has more foreign policy experience than Hillary; he is fluent in at least one foreign language (French); she is not; and he would surely be more loyal…
This would be an ideal way for Obama to repay Kerry for inviting him to speak at the 2004 Democratic National Convention – the seminal occasion that launched his meteoric rise to the presidency just four years later.
Not to mention that Kerry endorsed his candidacy when most in the Democratic establishment were still riding Hillary’s bandwagon on her purportedly inevitable path to the presidency….
(“Hillary As Secretary of State? Don’t Do It Barack,” The iPINIONS Journal, November 15, 2008)
I hope this quote explains why it should have been a moment of mutual triumph at the White House this afternoon when President Obama announced Senator Kerry as his nominee to replace Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State.
Yet the occasion seemed more funereal than triumphal. And this pall had nothing to do with their having just come from a funeral service for Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii; or with their knowledge that the concussion Hillary sustained is actually worse than has been reported. Instead it had everything to do with their acute awareness that the entire world knew Kerry was standing there only because a few rabidly partisan Republicans threatened to vote against Susan Rice, Obama’s first choice.
Instead it had everything to do with the fact that they knew the entire world knows that Kerry was standing there only because a few rabidly partisan Republicans threatened to vote against Obama’s first choice, U.S. Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice.
Hence my mixed reaction: because even though Kerry was my first choice, I regret the way Obama caved in to Republicans by throwing Rice under the bus. For after telegraphing his intent to nominate her, he should have dared those Republicans to vote against her.
In my November 19 commentary, Benghazi-gate? No. McCain fried Rice, I delineated the many reasons why Republicans would not have been able to sustain their opposition to Rice under the public glare of a congressional hearing. But Obama denied her that chance. Instead, he allowed her to wither on the political vine until she was forced to withdraw her name from consideration to preserve what was left of her professional dignity.
The disillusioning and disaffecting truth, of course, is that Obama prevailed upon her to withdraw in a misguided attempt to preserve all of his re-election capital. Never mind the public humiliation he had already caused her by having her crawl up to Capitol Hill to appease her Republican critics by kissing their … brass rings – only to have them diss her as a lousy kisser.
This is why Obama looked like a whipped phony heaping praise on Kerry as the “perfect choice” for the job; and Kerry looked like a poor sap standing there like the kid who is always the last to be picked for high-school sports teams.
Congratulations, John.
Related commentaries:
Benghazi-gate? No. McCain fried Rice
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