a "Kerry person" is at the State Dept.?

[ginnyinWI]

This is from the New York Sun, which might be a rw paper? Anyway, they seem to be critical of a certain Nicholas Burns, who they say had been in line to serve in a Kerry administration.

John Kerry's State Department
New York Sun Staff Editorial
November 21, 2005
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/23314

A story circulating in Washington, perhaps apocryphal, has it that late one evening during last year's annual Munich Conference on Security Policy, after the day's discussions were finished and a few drinks had been downed, Richard Holbrooke began a sentence by saying, "When John Kerry is president and I'm secretary of state and Nicholas Burns here is undersecretary of state for political affairs ..." Mr. Kerry went on to lose the election, and Mr. Holbrooke, who was America's ambassador to the United Nations under President Clinton and Mr. Kerry's foreign policy adviser, is but a private citizen, albeit a distinguished one. Mr. Burns, however, emerged from his position as America's ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to become just what that story had Mr. Holbrooke predicting, undersecretary of state for political affairs, with the surprise ending being that it's in a Bush administration.

Mr. Holbrooke, relaying a message via his office, denies the yarn about the remark in Munich and says it "wouldn't be appropriate" for him to have made such a declaration. But he is, his office says, "delighted" that the undersecretary is Mr. Burns, who "epitomizes the best in the foreign service." In January, Mr. Holbrooke had written a glowing report in the Washington Post predicting that Mr. Burns would be in the new State Department team, which he described as "among the very best professionals of the current generation." He said their foreign policy would be "more centrist, oriented toward problem-solving, essentially non-ideological, and focused on traditional diplomacy." Mr. Holbrooke got almost all the appointments he predicted (and praised) correct - including Assistant Secretary Daniel Fried, Assistant Secretary C. David Welch, and Assistant Secretary Christopher R. Hill.

Such effusive praise of the Bush administration's team for State from the man who would have most likely led the State Department in a Kerry administration (sorry, Senator Biden) tells a lot about the state of things in Foggy Bottom. President Bush won the 2004 election, a contest fought largely on foreign policy issues. Mr. Bush presented the platform for continuing America's war on terror by tackling tyrannical regimes and democratizing the Middle East. Mr. Kerry ran on a platform of working "more with our European allies," which the American people knew meant ignoring the British, Italians, and others who joined the war in Iraq, and instead making nice with the French and Germans. But the staffing hasn't worked out the way the voters might have expected.

Instead, with a few exceptions, most notably John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations and Condoleezza Rice as secretary, we've gotten a State Department of Kerry-ites. Mr. Burns, moreover, is unusually influential as the third-ranking officer in the department because Ms. Rice has been relentlessly globetrotting and her immediate deputy, Robert Zoellick, has been preoccupied with Sudan and China. And if there's a tradition of bipartisan consensus in the foreign service and in American foreign policy overall, no one seems to have told Mr. Burns about it. The State Department is back to advancing its own agenda rather than the president's - or, worse, counseling the president and influencing him in ways that pull him away from the policies he ran on.

rest of the article at: http://www.nysun.com/article/23314

[ProSense]

1. I read this earlier

My take is that someone is trying to let Bush off the hook, by saying we'd have gotten no different from a Kerry WH (a subtle Kerry bash). Call me cynical, but what's the point? This is like that NY Post front page: Kerry Picks Gephardt.

[_dynamicdems]

2. An article based on a rumored conversation....

and not a very substantial rumor at that. Seems to me that this is nothing more than trying to give credence to gossip. Hardly newsworthy. But they are desperate.

Shrub is currently in Mongolia. (Big doings in Mongolia, I guess.) I say we leave him there.

[LittleClarkie]

12. I keep hearing Devo's "Mongoloid" in my head

every time I hear that Bush is in Mongolia.

"He was a Mongoloid, Mongoloid... one chromosome too many..."

[rox63]

3. The NY Sun

is associated with the Moonie (Washington) Times.

[europegirl4jfk]

4. I don't understand why this must be something negative for Kerry

I just googled Burns and found other sources about him being someone Kerry wanted in his administration. The NY Sun describes Burns' influence as negative which is understandable if it's a right-wing paper (I don't know if it is but it sounds that way). But let's have a closer look. The stuff they are talking about are the things in the second Bush administration's foreign policies that really surprised me when they started with it early this year: reconciliation with Germany and France, letting the EU-3 do the talk with Iran, accepting bilateral talks with North-Korea. There certainly is more but these are the things which strikes me the most. It's a positive development from a democratic point of view, isn't it?

Maybe my imagination is running wild and I have by no means the experience with these things that most of you people have, but just think about it: Let's assume Kerry got his people in the State Department and they are trying to do damage control to Bush's foreign policies. Didn't Kerry travel to Europe and the Middle-East in January? Maybe he just prepared these governments for what was coming and asked for their cooperation. Couldn't it be that he doesn't care if these policies are attributed to Condi or even Bush, as long as they work and don't damage the standings of the USA in the world further? Couldn't it be that his country is more important to Kerry than getting the credits for any eventual success? Just my thoughts.

Anyway, here is what I found about Burns:

Biography:
http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/ERC/biographies/burns.html

from John Fund:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/journaleditorialreport/012105/transcript_leadstory.html
"Now, in addition, if you look at the actual reality in the State Department, the State Department is going to be staffed by a lot more people who used to work for Brent Scowcroft, who was George Bush's National Security Advisor, than it is neo-cons. Nicholas Burns is going to be the director of political affairs. He is someone that John Kerry and Richard Holbrook had picked to serve in their administration. So this is going to be a much broader approach, and I think a much more multi-lateral approach than people suspect. But, it's going to have a clear message."

from Robert Novak:
http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/2005_01.html
"The new State Department team is more worrisome (to conservatives). Nick Burns, a foreign service officer named to the department's third-ranking post as undersecretary for political affairs, is close to the John Kerry foreign policy team and probably would have had the same position if Bush had lost. There is no Bolton-type conservative stalwart."

from MyDD:
http://www.mydd.com/story/2004/10/1/13948/8489
George "He forgot about Poland" Bush wanted to know what the "Global Test" was all about last night.
Bush should listen to Ambassador R. Nicholas Burns, the United States Permanent Representative to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization speaking on May 20, 2004. Appointed by President Bush, he was sworn into office by Secretary of State Colin Powell on August 8, 2001, here's the answer:
The defining feature of this globalized world is that these transnational threats flow under, over and right through our national boundaries. No oceans, mountains or fences are impervious to them. No country, including the United States of America, can sit back in isolation from them.
This is the "great, global test" of our time--how do we cope with this new set of challenges? The only way I know to spread the bright side of globalization and to fight the darker side is to join forces on a global basis in concerted international action. No one country, however powerful, can combat these incredible problems on its own. We need strong and purposeful global cooperation to defeat complex, global ills.

[karynnj]

5. I think you have it right.

when you say,

"Couldn't it be that he doesn't care if these policies are attributed to Condi or even Bush, as long as they work and don't damage the standings of the USA in the world further? Couldn't it be that his country is more important to Kerry than getting the credits for any eventual success? "

I don't think he has any power to "get" someone into the state department, but below a certain level they are mostly career people - I don't know if that's the case here. This is his job as a Senator on the Senate Foreign Relations committee.

I think on Iraq he would love Bush taking his plan, having it work (as well as anything can). That his plan was the first detailed plan and may start a discussion leading to a change, means he may have helped move people to change course and likely saved lives. It's just too bad he's not President - instead of the comedian who can't find the door.

[TayTay]

6. I agree, and this is a heartening development.

It means that there are some sane people in the government and that State has totally been absorbed into the neo-cons agenda. State is supposed to be a continuing agency that functions with career people who know their jobs and do it regardless of who the President is. The tragedy of the Bush Admin is that they wought to get rid of everyone who was not on board with their PNAC plans.

It is an immense relief to see Burns at State and that he has a powerful role in the current government. We can't afford anymore idiots who make things worse for the US.

I agree with you europegirl4jfk, this is country above politics.

[ProSense]

7. OK

After reading your post and the above two posts, I now understand. You have a point, this is above politics.

Thanks.

[ginnyinWI]

13. yes, that's what I was thinking

This is not something the * administration would want to be widely known (notice how this RW paper took it), but it may be that they actually want to mend some fences now without seeming to be flip-flopping and caving to the left. By coincidence, I saw Richard Holbrooke and Nick Burns on Cspan yesterday talking about Bosnia, and all I can say is whoever Holbrooke speaks that highly of is okay with me too!

I do think this is a good thing for American and the world. I would think Kerry feels the same way--he wants what's good for people. The Republican party is devoid of diplomatic ability it seems, and they need to go to the Democrats for skilled people! :)

[ProSense]

14. On second thought

"He's just not what the American people voted for, and when Mr. Bush returns from his gallivanting overseas the best thing he can do to redeem his commitment to voters is to do something about it."



The NY Suns' intention was not to show Kerry in a good light nor was it to embarrass Bush. The sole purpose of this article was to say the Bush Administration isn't all bad, and it isn't, but what they are suggesting is that Bush can redeem himself (based on what he promised voters he'd do?) Who wants anything to do with what Bush promised? What he promised was utter BS.

[ginnyinWI]

15. the way I read that statement

is that Bush is betraying his base by putting Burns in, and he should get rid of him. (can't have no lefties in the State Dept.!)

[sandnsea]

8. Too stupid

"Mr. Kerry ran on a platform of working "more with our European allies," which the American people knew meant ignoring the British, Italians, and others who joined the war in Iraq, and instead making nice with the French and Germans. But the staffing hasn't worked out the way the voters might have expected."

That blows any credibility that this article might have with me. These people just pull shit out of their ass and write it down. And get paid for it. What a country.

[TayTay]

9. This was a RW article that seeks to disparage Burns

by linking him to Kerry. Extract the good info from the RW crap and it's not a bad story. Set your inner bullshit detector to full and then wade in.

A miracle occurred at State, some sane people got in. The rest is RW snark at finding, horrors, sane people at State. (Even worse, sane people who might have worked at State in a Kerry Admin.)

[sandnsea]

10. No sir, it's a Skull & Bones conspiracy

What's the matter with you. Run out of sugar for your kool-aid???

Honestly, between Murtha, Korb, Dean, and now Blumenauer, I am in just a shit pile of a mood. I don't know how JK does it because I'd have blown my top a long, long time ago.

[TayTay]

11. Oh Sandy, I'm right there with you on that one.

I would have run out of niceness long, long ago. (Maybe at the Boston Globe and some of their articles about Kerry, but I digress.)

This is why I like my Junior Senator so much: he's a class act. He just keeps going no matter who is giving him grief. He will, I swear, outwork, outthink and outlast the bastards. I would have just lost it and started screaming. Kerry is made of different stuff.