Robert Reich Believes It Is SoS John Kerry Sounding The War Drums of Syria.

[karynnj]

56. One example that I can easily name is that Kerry wrote the bill that provided f

help for New Orleans and other areas after Katerina. He introduced the bill, he then added Landrieu as a sponsor and then Snowe who was the chair of Small Business agreed to sponsor the bill as well - as she was chair it became Snowe/Kerry. While it was on the floor of the Senate and the vote was going on - a large group of Republicans refused to vote for it if his name was on. Kerry then took his name off his own bill and it won over 80 votes. A large group of us in the JK group were watching on CSPAN and were surprised to see the name of the bill change from Snowe/Kerry to Snowe/Vitter - as they were voting.

In addition, Kerry and Kennedy wrote a health care bill that was the precursor for SCHIP. Kennedy then worked with Hatch and some substantial changes were made including letting each state design their plan. Kerry (and Dodd) were still included as cosponsors. The reason I know this is that Kennedy in several speeches in 2004 spoke of it. Hillary Clinton, who had less involvement, claimed far more credit for it in 2008 than Kerry did in 2004

Kerry wrote the provisions that allow for following the money internationally that has provided tools to catch international criminals, including non state terrorists. He wrote the legislation in the wake of his BCCI investigation and was blocked by the banks and the Senators they controlled until after 911.

Kerry sponsored the Affordable Housing Fund through 3 congresses getting progressively more sponsors until in 2008 he had 23 sponsors including Dodd and Reed. Dodd and Reed agreed to include the bill into the Banking Committee's bill. The NYT in writing about it had quotes from Dodd, Reed and Sessions from the banking committee and they praised Reid and McConnell for helping get the overall bill passed.

Another example is that it was Kerry and his SFRC staffer who suggested and wrote the provisions that formed the basis of the Aids in Africa effort in Pepfar. Kerry convinced Frist to join him as a go sponsor and Frist pushed Bush to back it. Ironically, because he was President at the time, Bush has gotten the most credit - and Pepfar which is a SFRC bill is listed as Lugar/Biden (the then chair and ranking member).

You could also note that Kerry who initiated the investigation of the Contras and who had the witness whose testimony which was earlier trashed by the WH was proven accurate after a plane with guns crashed in Central America was then not included in the joint committee that did the grandstanding hearing.

In 2007, Olympia Snowe and John Kerry negotiated and agreement that raised the fuel efficiency standards for cars for the first time in over a decade. Neither got much credit for it - it was a Maine paper where I first saw the story behind this.

On a personal level, the Boston Globe was furious with him when the Las Vegas papers reported that Kerry had saved NV Senator Hecht who was chocking. They were angry that his office had not called them to inform them that he did this. Looking for a link on this to get the Senator's name - the first google result was this - http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1893&dat=19880713&id=msFQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=PccMAAAAIBAJ&pg=1200,1475098 Note that Kerry's response was - "I think Dr Heimlich deserves the credit.

These are all from memory - I assume a much larger list could be compiled.