Boston Globe article on START that is focused on JK

[karynnj]

WASHINGTON — Senator John F. Kerry, laboring to achieve a foreign policy victory that would be a highlight of his career, gained crucial support yesterday for a nuclear arms control treaty with Russia from his Republican counterpart, Senator Scott Brown.

Brown’s backing gave Kerry additional momentum heading into a possible vote today. As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Kerry is President Obama’s man in charge of trying to lock down the two-thirds support of the Senate — 67 votes if every member shows up — required to ratify the New START pact.
<snip>
For Kerry, passage of the treaty has been one of the greatest challenges of his 25-year Senate career. After weeks of hearings he conducted this spring in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he spent the summer and fall working with the White House behind the scenes to gather support. For much of the past week, he has been on the Senate floor battling for ratification and beating back treaty-killing amendments while several Republican senators sought to slow the proceedings by mixing discussions of technical equations concerning warheads with personal anecdotes.

<snip>
“If Kerry is successful, it means he comes out of the shadow of Ted Kennedy,’’ said Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers University who studies Congress, referring to Senator Edward M. Kennedy, the late Massachusetts Democrat. “This is a career turning point, and if he succeeds, he lays claim to being a legislator of the first order.’’

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2010/12/21/brown_joins_kerry_to_back_start_pact/?rss_id=Boston.com+--+Top+political+stories

Now, one would think becoming the Presidential nominee and coming 59,000 votes from being President, would have meant he came out from Teddy's shadow - after all if Ohio had an adequate number of voting machines, he would have become President in 2005.

It does look like this will pass

[Luftmensch067]

1. Fascinating to watch JK on the floor

Watching him persuade other senators, you can SEE how much work it is. It looks like he has to stroke the egos of a lot of Republicans and there's a lot of hands on shoulders and arms camaraderie. The Senate has that clubby atmosphere and practiced courtliness and I can't help wondering how many family anecdotes and the equivalent of golf stories have to be exchanged to offset the tension caused by partisan squabbling. JK certainly seems to be a master at smiling, back-patting and keeping his temper. And, if we're lucky, it seems like it might work!

[karynnj]

2. On Friday, he was actually trying to act almost like a therapist

to Graham, after Graham's arguing he couldn't vote for it because he didn't like other things done recently. http://www.c-spanvideo.org/videoLibrary/clip.php?appid=599292483

When Corker brought up the same issue - Kerry was incredible in reaching out to get to their consciences - http://www.c-spanvideo.org/videoLibrary/clip.php?appid=599292512 (here is the rough Cspan transcript.)

WELL, MADAM PRESIDENT, I WANT TO SAY FIRST OF ALL, I WISH THE SENATOR FROM TENNESSEE WOULD HAVE FINISHED THE SENTENCE HE ORIGINALLY BEGAN WHICH IS TO SAY THIS IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT THINGS WE COULD TAKE UP.
08:57:30 BUT I UNDERSTAND WHY HE CHECKED HIMSELF AND HELD BACK FROM THAT.
08:57:34 BUT LET ME JUST SAY -- LET ME JUST SAY, I'D SAY THIS TO MY COLLEAGUES, I PROBABLY DON'T HAVE THE POWER OR THE ABILITY TO REACH OVER SOME OF THESE FEELINGS.
08:57:50 I WOULD HOPE -- AND THIS IS A PRAYER AS WELL AS A PLEA, ON A PERSONAL LEVEL -- THAT SOMETIMES THINGS HAPPEN THAT OUR OUT OF SOME PEOPLE'S CONTROL HERE.
08:58:05 I BELIEVE THAT WE CAN GET THROUGH THESE VOTES TOMORROW AND STILL HAVE TIME TO DO SOMETHING THAT I KNOW THESE COLLEAGUES OF CONVERSATIONS WITH THEM.
08:58:14 MINE -- I'VE HAD PRIVATE I KNOW WHAT THEY THINK ABOUT THIS TREATY BEHIND ALL OF THIS THAT'S GOING ON.
08:58:23 I KNOW THEY UNDERSTAND THE IMPORTANCE OF OUR POSITION IN THE WORLD, OF OUR CAPACITY TO NOT MAKE FOREIGN POLICY AND NATIONAL SECURITY SUBJECT TO ALL THESE OTHER FORCES HERE.
08:58:38 IT'S A REACH.
08:58:39 IT'S GOING TO REQUIRE -- I UNDERSTAND.
08:58:42 LOOK, I'M JUST ASKING, ONE PERSON, ONE SENATOR, CHAIRMAN OF THE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE, WE'VE PUT A LOT OF ENERGY INTO THIS EFFORT OVER THE LAST YEAR AND A HALF, THIS MATTERS, I THINK, TO OUR COUNTRY.
08:58:54 I'M NOT SAYING THAT AS A DEMOCRAT.
08:58:57 I DON'T THINK YOU'D SAY IT AS A REPUBLICAN.
08:58:58 I THINK THIS MATTERS TO OUR COUNTRY.
08:59:01 I THINK RUSSIA IS WATCHING WHAT WE'RE GOING TO DO HERE.
08:59:04 I THINK THE WORLD IS WATCHING WHAT WE'RE GOING TO DO HERE.
08:59:09 THIS IS ABOUT NUCLEAR WEAPONS.
08:59:11 IT'S ABOUT STABILITY.
08:59:13 WE HAVE ENORMOUS CHALLENGES WITH IRAN AND NORTH KOREA.
08:59:18 BELIEVE ME, FROM ALL THE CONVERSATIONS I HAVE AS CHAIRMAN OF THIS COMMITTEE WITH A LOT OF DIFFERENT LITERS, LEADERS, THEY LOOK TO US FOR WHAT WE DO AND WHETHER WE MAKE GOOD ON THE THINGS WE SAY THAT MATTER TO US.
08:59:28 AND I BELIEVE THAT THIS IS ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT THEY'LL SAY, WOW, THESE GUYS CAN'T EVEN GET THEIR COLLECTIVE ACT TOGETHER TO DO SOMETHING AS IMPORTANT AS A BILATERAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE TWO COUNTRIES THAT HAVE 90% OF THE WORLD'S NUCLEAR WEAPONS.
08:59:45 SO MY PRAYER IS THAT WE CAN DO THAT IN THESE NEXT FEW DAYS, AND I HOPE WE CAN MAKE THAT HAPPEN.

[Mass]

3. OK, so they took Matt Viser's web article and added some vague generalities after it written by

Arsenault.

I like that they needed a Rutgers professor to say it was the turning point of his career. I would have guessed there were many professors in Boston, or is it they could not find somebody ready to say something as stupid as that?

Well, I think this tells us a lot about the Globe. I guess their title once the treaty is signed will be: Brown essential to passing Start.

[karynnj]

4. It is frustrating

I hope it is that all the MA professors are too smart to say that. It is completely stupid - the guy was hardly in a shadow when he was the Presidential nominee. In terms, of legislative work - the entire Senate as it now is was in Kennedy's shadow by the definition they use. Not to mention, what - other than posing for Cosmo has Brown done that gets him out of the shadow of almost anyone in the Senate?

[Mass]

6. USA Today quotes Corker and lists Brown as the pivotal vote, but apparently avoids Lugar and Kerry

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2010/12/obama-aides-confident-about-start-treaty/1 (well, they list Lugar, but avoid saying he had a leading role).

Did they miss the Kerry/Lugar press conference?

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/12/21/kerry_and_lugar_try_not_to_gloat_as_new_start_gets_67_votes


Kerry and Lugar try not to gloat as New START gets 67 votes

[wisteria]

5. You would think. n/t

[karynnj]

7. Laura Rozen Politico article says Kerry has been on the Senate floor for about 70 hours on START

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) patiently presided Wednesday as his Senate colleagues made their final remarks before voting 71 to 26 to ratify the new START treaty.

As of Wednesday afternoon, Kerry had been on the Senate floor for about 70 hours since START debate began last Wednesday, aides calculated.

In shepherding the U.S.-Russian arms control pact through the Senate, the chairman of the Senate foreign relations panel held over twenty meetings and had over thirty phone calls with figures integral to the process, including Vice President Joe Biden, key Republican Senate negotiators Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), John McCain (R-Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), and Bob Corker (R-Tenn), in the past week.

Until recent days, however, the only Republican Senator who had openly declared that he would support the U.S.-Russian arms control pact was Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the ranking Republican on the foreign relations panel and a long-time leader on U.S.-Russian arms control who in 2004 took then Sen. Barack Obama on his first Codel trip to see Russian nuclear sites.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/laurarozen/1210/The_Chairmen_John_Kerrys_and_Richard_Lugars_START_victory_.html?showall

[wisteria]

8. This was a good article. n/t