Kerry: the face of a supine America

John Kerry tries to explain why he left Americans in Iran prisons

BY ANDREW MALCOLM

I ride a bike. (Pool)

 Ondanger of being a U.S. citizen during this Obama administration is that so often its most important priorities do not include the basic governmental function of protecting individual Americans. The Benghazi terrorist deadliness, among others, comes to mind in which no rescue efforts were ready or mounted. And four U.S. citizens died violently.

More recently came the strangely one-sided deal Obama made with Iran over its longtime desire to develop nuclear weapons. Iran got pretty much everything it wanted, including self-inspections, an end to international economic sanctions and a 10-year time frame.

The deal was negotiated largely by Secretary of State John Kerry as part of the ketchup king's quest for a Nobel Peace Prize. He didn't include Iran's ICBMs. Nor did he include release of at least four American citizens under Iranian detention, including an imprisoned journalist.

This week in a Boston news conference Kerry accidentally revealed how much more important to him and Obama was the nuclear deal than the lives of their four countrymen.

A reporter asked Kerry:

"I'd like to get your reaction to the fact that Washington Post correspondent Jason Rezaian was reportedly convicted in Iran and your description of what the United States is doing to help free him, and whether you regret not making a more concerted push to get him and others freed as part of the nuclear deal."

One of the most striking characteristics of the Obama administration's long years is a chronic propensity to measure its effectiveness by words spoken, not by actual results. Thus, if you talk about how much you've talked, that proves effort. Never mind anything real to show for it.

Here's how Kerry replied:

"Well, with respect to Jason Rezaian, not a meeting went by, literally not a meeting, where we did not raise the issue of our citizens who are being held in Iran."

So, with these prolonged meetings going on for some two years, that makes for many instances of issue-raising, literally. Since bringing up the subject of imprisoned Americans produced no results over many months, Kerry's response was to do more of the same. No increased pressure while the U.S. had leverage. Just more talking.

"Clearly," Kerry continued, "we are tracking extremely closely the news coming out of Iran regarding the trial and the fact of a conviction. We still don't know and we haven't seen any official confirmation on that verdict whatsoever, and we are continuing a dialogue with the Iranians regarding our citizens, and we will until they come home."

Iran government photo said to show underground missile facility.

Which all sounds suspiciously helpless, less like super-power negotiating and more like pathetic presidential pleading. Additionally, it's not really a "dialogue."

"So I'm not going to, you know, go backwards," Kerry added, "except to say that the families themselves of these hostages knew exactly what our strategy was." What does that have to do with anything?

"And why it was important not to hold a nuclear agreement hostage to hostages."

Wait! What? Let that last sentence sink in: "It was important not to hold a nuclear agreement hostage to hostages."

That's what bargaining is. Or should be. You have something somebody wants. They have something you want. Make a trade, based on Obama's own words that every option including force remains on the table. Instead, merely repeated requests.

Kerry: "And in our judgment, it was the right thing to do because it could have complicated both significantly and perhaps have resulted in nothing happening on either." Failure is always a possibility in negotiations. That's the motivation for both sides. But it doesn't work when one side fears failure far more than the other side.

More words from Kerry: "So I think we did -- it was the right strategy to pursue. We are continuing, as I say, that dialogue and we call on the government of Iran -- whether they've had a conviction, with sentence or no sentence, whatever the status is -- we call on the government of Iran to release these individuals, to drop all the charges and to see them reunited with their families here in the United States.

"And I can assure you when they do return and people gain full knowledge on the efforts that have been made, nobody will see anything except an extraordinary, continued -- (inaudible) -- focused, intensive effort to secure their release."

Meanwhile for four imprisoned Americans, merely more Kerry words must suffice.