Kerry warns U.S.: ‘The world will not wait for us’
By Alison Harding
Fresh off the plane from a whirlwind four days of meetings in Europe, Secretary of State John Kerry stopped by a progressive policy forum in Washington on Thursday to chide U.S. leaders for allowing the government to shut down.
“I wanted just to come here this afternoon…to reflect on the damage that events like the one we’ve just been through can do to the esteem in which the U.S. is held in the world, a key component of our national power,” Kerry said at a Center for American Progress forum.
Kerry, who attended a series of international summits in Asia during the government shutdown, warned that the United States must “be far more conscious about how our leadership looks through other people's eyes.”
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“I have seen how our allies and our partners and those who wish to challenge us or do us harm – they are all sizing us up. Every day they are taking our measure,” Kerry said. “What we do in Washington matters deeply to them. And that’s why a self-inflicted wound like the shutdown that we just endured can never happen again.”
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Kerry is an Israeli shill. You can't trust half the stuff coming out of his mouth.
An Israeli shill? Are you joking? This is the most anti-Israel American administration since the founding of the modern state of Israel and Kerry is Obama's bought dog.
Kerry, Obama, Hillary et al are key personnel in the most pro-Islam, anti-Israel government we have ever elected to power. Aside of course from being self-loathing American apologists who would enjoy nothing more than continue to tear down America.
Seems to me that you're the piece of crap. And yr an idiot at that. Israel has been killing americans since its inception and all you guys do is keep giving it aid and blind unconditional support. Jews control your country. Benjamin Franklin warned the american people of that and it happened. Yet people are too ignorant to see it. Zionists are manipulative, they hide behind the horrific actions they make.
It looks to me most of the world wont be our friend unless we give them a check, So I can see how the shutdown would be upsetting Kerry
Quite true Paul, quite true indeed. We subsidize the third world countries with money borrowed from China. Does that make sense to you? This is how the right-wing politicians in Washington do business!!!
Most of the world will be friends with us if we are friendly and fair with them. I am an American and have lived in about 15 different developing nations for over 30 years.
Very well said Paul. As regards to those countries who the esteemed Mr. Kerry said "won't wait for us" I have a message – I don't give a damn if you wait for us or not – in fact why don't you just all go wait for a street car instead.
It looks that USA foreign policy is not active. All the Red lines have been erased and all the criminal regimes are happy and hopeful for creating more tensions like Syria, Iran....!
Apartheid Israel has been spreading terrorism since before 1948. Does that bother you at all?
Quite frankly ShiverMe Timbers – you anti-semite piece of crap – no, it doesn't bother me at all. And Israel practices apartheidt? Are you kidding me? A large bloc of the Israeli Knesset is held by Muslims. Just how many Jews hold seats in Syria, Morrocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Iraqi, Iran, Jordanian, Saudi Arabian, Yemen, Arghanistan, Pakistan, Libyan, Lebanon, Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, Kuwait, or Dubai parliaments? That is even those of the above-listed world sore-holes that actually have anything that closely resembles a freely elected legislature.
Kerry is right partially. However it's not just the Shutdown mess. Really just look at all the scandals and moments of misrule and insanity for just this year, 2013, alone. Anything from IRS Scandal down to all the spying stuff and even the Snowden witch-hunt itself that ultimately drove him into the hands of Putin (though this may be a hidden blessing as now Putin must confront his own errors if he wants to look like a good guy.) Either way though not only do our allies and enemies alike not trust us or respect us, but increasingly our own people don't trust the government, and with very good and valid reasons too.
Really the party leadership of both parties in Congress has to step down in my opinion and more importantly we gotta reform or completely scrap some of these bad policies and "laws" like NDAA, the vast spying network, NDRP, war making, maxing out our spending limit 3 times a year, dealing with shady countries that we don't call enemy but their actions prove they are no allies, and so forth. As for Obama, he got re-elected we're gonna have to bear with him, but we have term limits and also good old fashioned federalist checks and balances. If Obama keeps going the next three years like he has this one then there will be much bad things, but I think Obama would be willing to compromise if the People turned out the Congress. I don't know though it could be futile, the Dem and GOP leaders are a weird crew. They can't agree to keep the government open, but yet they almost unanimously agree to spy on Americans, allies, the free press, and make and fund wars all over Earth.
When it comes down to it though we gotta reform some of those bad laws and practices not even for the World, but for our own People. Our allies, even Britain, proved in the Syria debates tthat they aren't going to have our elite's backs if they go too far. The only ones supporting USA's elites are the American People, so treat your own people better. Ya its terrible practice to spy on our allies, but Americans will defend our government on that because we know the other countries spy on us too and they lie if they say they don't because whole businesses are made out of it because it entertains Americans lol. Just check out BBC, the Guardian, or Mr. Murdoch's News of the World scandal for proof.
When the going gets tough only Americans got America's back, so government and elites, treat your own citizens better. After you do that then you can show the allies that they will be treated better too and we can refreshen our connections with them. As for our enemies they'll always hate us, so that's why we need allies and more importantly the trust of our own People above all else. Americans will let their government get away with a lot because we know the World is all messed up, but the government shouldn't abuse that as they have been doing for over a decade now. They gotta let up a bit, at least on our own People. A good place to start is the spying scandal. It even be in the government's interest to be more forgiving of Snowden because he at least launched the conversation of it when no one else would. This gives the government a golden opportunity to reform these practices and crackdown on its abuses to restore confidence both to our allies and Americans.
When a party is controlled by greedy, self serving, racists and bigots... who hates a Blac President more than they care about their country and citizenry.... the world should tell America to P$ss up the flagpole and die
Don't you mean when country is run by greedy, self serving, racists, bigot President that has no leadership....
Nicely stated fellow Peasant!
The joke is up worldwide about "American exceptionalism." Only Americans don't get it. .....L.A.Schools slystem buys I-Pods without keyboards to teach the children how to use computers in their educational experience. So the kids hunt and peck, like the hard scrabble chickens go for. And on and on. There's a million examples of Americans being exceptional stupid.
Why should the world "wait for us"? Can't these other countries like Germany, Britain and France lead themselves any longer? They did a good job throughout the last few centuries without us as well as Russia and China. If the Germans had any sense at all, they'd ditch Angie Merkel and the so-called "Christian" Democrats. pull out of the EU and go back to using the strong Deutschmark and make that the new standard world currency, replacing the U.S. dollar. Unfortunately, this is only too unlikely to happen!!!
"They did a good job throughout the past few centuries without us......" What hell was our Revolutionary war about, Our intervention in France to help end WWI, Our defeat of the Axis nations in WWII, The Marshall plan that rebuilt post war Europe Our economic and military pressure that hastened the fall of the Soviet Union. What on earth are you talking about when you imply they got along fine without us?
You forgot one thing, Portland. Had we not intervened in WW1, Germany would have won and in that case, WW2 most probably would not have broken out, no holocaust and no Pearl Harbor since J apan would not have dared to launch such an attack without a strong German ally in the West. Germany would never have been taken over by the Nazis since the Kaiser would have remained in power and their economy would never have deteriorated to such a degree!