{"id":5457,"date":"2004-03-08T15:22:49","date_gmt":"2004-03-08T22:22:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2004\/03\/08\/covert-support.html"},"modified":"2004-03-08T15:22:49","modified_gmt":"2004-03-08T22:22:49","slug":"covert_support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/03\/08\/covert_support.html","title":{"rendered":"Covert support"},"content":{"rendered":"

If, as Kerry claims, various “foreign leaders” are supporting him in his candidacy from behind the scenes, is that a good thing, or a bad thing?<\/a><\/p>\n

Without naming anybody, Kerry said he had received words of encouragement from leaders abroad who were eager to see him defeat Bush on Nov. 2.
\n“I’ve met foreign leaders who can’t go out and say this publicly, but boy they look at you and say, ‘You’ve got to win this, you’ve got to beat this guy, we need a new policy,’ things like that,” he said.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the GOP can spread the rumor that the foreign leaders include Moammar Gaddafi, Fidel Castro, and Kim Jung Il. <\/p>\n

It’s a bizarre claim to come out with, at any rate. Since they <\/i>won’t go public with it (according to Kerry), and he <\/i>won’t betray their confidence (he says), Kerry is reduced to simply saying, “I’ve got a secret — trust me, it would be really to everyone’s benefit if I won.” He could be making it up completely. He could be hinting at support from Zambia and Sri Lanka and Luxembourg.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, it’s a meaningless assertion, only as good as your belief in Kerry. And even if he actually has France, Germany, Mexico, Russia, and whatever other country you want to name in his pocket … so what? Ought we be influenced in who we vote for based on who Jacques Chirac wants to see in the White House? Really?<\/p>\n

Even if you grant that France and the US have some common interests, and even if you believe that the US policy has been at odds with France of late — is Jacques Chirac really hoping for a president that will serve the American <\/i>people? Or one that will pursue policies that France <\/i>sees as being to its benefit? Are those necessarily one and the same thing?<\/p>\n

And why would Kerry think that’s a great claim to tout to potential voters?<\/p>\n

And, as far as that goes, why the heck is Kerry hobnobbing with foreign leaders and accepting their well-wishes of victory? Is that really constructive toward future US foreign policy, regardless of who wins?<\/p>\n

There’s a reason why contributions from foreign governments aren’t allowed in the presidential race. It strikes me that foreign endorsements — especially covert ones — aren’t much better, and that proclaiming them as a great reason to vote for oneself isn’t all that clever an idea.<\/p>\n

(via RantingProfs<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If, as Kerry claims, various “foreign leaders” are supporting him in his candidacy from behind the scenes, is that a good thing, or a bad thing? Without naming anybody, Kerry…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geopolitical-brouhaha"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":5422,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/03\/15\/all_your_leader.html","url_meta":{"origin":5457,"position":0},"title":"All your leaders are belong to us","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 15-Mar-04 6:44am","format":false,"excerpt":"The \"unnamed foreign leaders support me\" claim is coming back to haunt Kerry a bit, as folks continue to question who, exactly, we're talking about here. Kerry declined to name...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5407,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/03\/16\/all_your_leader.html","url_meta":{"origin":5457,"position":1},"title":"All your leaders are belong to us, Part II","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 16-Mar-04 11:00pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A blogger over here announces, with a flourish (and a half-dozen trackback pings to the two posts I wrote on it), that John Kerry did not, in fact, say, \"I've...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5466,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/03\/07\/kerrying_the_me.html","url_meta":{"origin":5457,"position":2},"title":"Kerrying the message on defense policy","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 7-Mar-04 8:17pm","format":false,"excerpt":"An interesting analysis of an interesting John Kerry speech on defense and foreign policy. Worth reading. There are aspects of it that certainly sound pretty good. And aspects that sound...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6584,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/08\/16\/battle_royale.html","url_meta":{"origin":5457,"position":3},"title":"Battle Royale","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 16-Aug-04 3:14pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A group of British genealogists claim that the US presidential candidate with the best ties to royalty wins the election. On that basis, they're calling it for John Kerry. After...","rel":"","context":"In "Elections 2004"","block_context":{"text":"Elections 2004","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/elections-2004"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7193,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/10\/11\/distorted_words.html","url_meta":{"origin":5457,"position":4},"title":"Distorted words","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 11-Oct-04 1:40pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Nice article here about how the GOP campaign has seized on certain words and phrases by Kerry, out of context, to distort his message (or to reinforce their own) in...","rel":"","context":"In "Elections 2004"","block_context":{"text":"Elections 2004","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/elections-2004"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6195,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/04\/29\/scenarios.html","url_meta":{"origin":5457,"position":5},"title":"Scenarios","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 29-Apr-04 7:19am","format":false,"excerpt":"Scott quotes a Robert Reich column on the coming American Apocalypse if the Bushies get reelected. Freed from the bonds of having to win the next election, they all go...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5457\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}