Kerry: 'This Tunnel Will Be a Bargain'

If you're wondering why John Kerry has a long face today, look no further.

It’s reassuring to know that Congress’ so-called Super Committee will have at least one solon on it who has a track record of being able to ferret out waste, fraud and abuse wherever it rears its bloated head.

How odd that John Kerry should be appointed to his august new position the very same week the Big Dig bargain tunnel of which he spoke so proudly has now sprung another “sinkhole.” We are informed that the sinkhole “poses no risk” to motorists, even though the Dig has already spent $3.5 million addressing the problem, with another $11.5 million budgeted to correct this latest fiasco.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: “Consultants evaluating the problem are at a loss to explain why the area has settled so much.”

But don’t forget, this tunnel will be a bargain. Of course, the occasional setback could still occur. In which case you might want to paraphrase another of Liveshot’s famous questions: “Can I get me a submarine here?”

Ouch. Of course, you shouldn't expect Kerry or any other Massachusetts luminaries to admit they were wrong. Besides, suckers, it was your money they wasted on this fiasco. And if you dare voice dissent, you're just a bunch of inbred teabagging terrorists.

Without getting bogged down in the details, which in the spirit of transparency finally have been revealed four years after they were first noticed, the geniuses who built the bargain Big Dig tried to freeze some of the land under the tunnel. Imagine their shock when they discovered that what is frozen also can thaw.

Among other things, the melting water ruined a huge drainage pipe, a high-voltage electrical duct and even buckled pavement in the (above-ground) Postal Service parking lot.

At least that’s what you’ve read in the papers, anyway. But at that same ribbon-cutting where Liveshot told us the tunnel would be a bargain, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank told us that much of the Big Dig’s bad press “has been manufactured by the media.”

You know, like the made-up headlines about the Jamaica Plain woman being crushed by a 3-ton slab of concrete falling from the tunnel ceiling.

That’s why Kerry lectured the media this week about how they should stop covering the Tea Party.

Yes, perhaps the media should ignore the Tea Party for awhile and instead focus on these corrupt Democrats.

Kerry: Media Should Ignore the Tea Party or Something

The dolt doesn't even realize that the only coverage the media gives the Tea Party is negative.

SEN. JOHN KERRY: "And I have to tell you, I say this to you politely. The media in America has a bigger responsibility than it's exercising today. The media has got to to begin to not give equal time or equal balance to an absolutely absurd notion just because somebody asserts it or simply because somebody says something which everybody knows is not factual.

"It doesn't deserve the same credit as a legitimate idea about what you do. And the problem is everything is put into this tit-for-tat equal battle and America is losing any sense of what's real, of who's accountable, of who is not accountable, of who's real, who isn't, who's serious, who isn't?"

Video at the link.

Meanwhile, Kerry, who served in Vietnam for 14 weeks, is planning to run again in 2014 so we'll still have him to kick around for at least another nine years.

Kerry: Why Aren't There More 'Investments' in Debt Deal?

Leave it to a guy who skips out on his luxury yacht taxes to call for more so-called "investment" in the debt deal just worked out. But hey, at least he served in Vietnam for 14 weeks.

So what did Kerry want in the compromise? He wanted a “balanced approach” that included more “investments.” By now we all know investment is code for higher taxes. Not to worry, he only wants to tax rich people making more than $250,000 per year. Caution to readers: never trust a Massachusetts Democrat who has a 6 percent rating with the National Taxpayers Union.

If we don’t invest, Kerry said our nation would be “eating America’s seed corn.” Forget the corn, let’s talk about eating peas. He was the senator who tried to avoid paying taxes on his luxury yacht by hiding it in Rhode Island. I don’t subscribe to the theory that “Newport” was painted on the stern of his boat accidentally. Obviously leading by example escapes him.

What did Kerry propose doing with higher taxes? Pay off the debt? Reduce the deficit? No, he wanted to spend on infrastructure. Obviously, he missed the whole point of the debt ceiling debate. According to Kerry, for every billion expended in tax dollars on infrastructure, we create 18,000 new jobs. Really? He needs better ship-to-shore communication. Our nation just spent $787 billion on the president’s stimulus plan to stop unemployment from reaching 8 percent. It didn’t work. Using the senator’s formula, we should have created 14 million jobs costing $56,000 per job. Instead, Obama’s not-so-shovel-ready projects ended up costing us $278,000 per job. Can we have our money back? No, because we charged it to China Express.

Surprise! Obama All-time Leading Recipient of News Corp. Donations

Obviously, he's in the back pocket of the evil Rupert Murdoch.

Political donations by News Corp., its employees and their families were evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, with President Obama the all-time leading recipient, according to a report from the Sunlight Foundation.

The transparency watchdog noted Tuesday that Democrats received 51 percent of contributions while Republicans received 49 percent, despite the firm's highly publicized links to the GOP, such as a $1 million donation to the Republican Governors Association in August.

News Corp. is the parent company of The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and Fox News, among others. The firm is currently under scrutiny in both the U.S. and U.K. over allegations its subsidiary News of the World hacked into voice mail accounts and bribed public officials.

"Obama being listed as the company’s top recipient might surprise some people because of its highly publicized involvement with his political rivals, like Sarah Palin who was the vice presidential candidate in 2008 and reportedly still under contract with Murdoch-owned Fox News as a paid commentator," wrote Sunlight's Ryan Sibley.

More here.

Hypocrisy, you say? Feh. Obama likes to talk one game and play another. Heck, it hardly caused a ripple last year when he railed against BP and then was revealed to be their largest recipient.

Inconvenient truths.

So clearly News Corp., its subsidiaries and employees are fair and balanced when it comes to political donations. I wonder whether we could say the same about other large news organizations?

Update: More details on past recipients.

While Obama is by far the all-time leading recipient, he's followed in order by Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Barbara Boxer, Gray Davis and Howard Berman. See if you can detect a common thread between them (hint: they're all Democrats).

Chuckie Schumer's also in the top ten. Considering Schumer was also the biggest recipient of Bernie Madoff money when he ran the DSCC, this daily double should qualify him for some kind of award.

The top recipient from News America Holdings was also a Democrat, Massachusetts Congressman Edward Markey.

For 2009-2010 from News America Holdings, the top recipients with $10,000 each were Democrats Nancy Pelosi, Berman and Schumer.

Meanwhile, the fabulously wealthy Kerry, who served in Vietnam, is the top political stakeholder in News Corp, with an estimated $600,002 to $1,250,000.

Granted, that's his wife's money.

Update: In a stunning development, a George Soros flying monkey from Media Matters put a unique spin on these revelations.

If it seems like Obama got a lot of money from News Corp. employees, that’s because he got a lot of money from a lot of people in 2008.

Soros is really getting his money's worth, huh?

Lurch: "I Would Have Made a Good President - Maybe Even a Great One."

A man sure can dream.

Former presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) thinks he could have done a good job leading the country.

"I would have been a good president," he said Wednesday on Fox Business Network's "Imus in the Morning." "Maybe even a great one."

Kerry stopped short of agreeing with host Don Imus's assertion that a President Kerry would have been "better than the guy we have now."

Makes you wonder what Kerry's definition of "great" is.

Cross-posted.

Kerry: The Government Invented the Internet So We Can't Ever Cut Spending

Using the logic (so to speak) employed here by John Kerry, if it weren't for the U.S. government, there never would have been an Internet. But because they helped start up the technology four decades ago, if we dare to even think about cutting our budget to avoid the impending economic catastrophe, life as we know it will cease. He's speaking to the stupid people here in case you can't figure it out. In other words, Democrat voters. Someone wake me up if this tool ever make anything other than the most simplistic of arguments.

Senate John Kerry (D-Mass.) warned Tuesday that spending cuts could wipe out future government achievements, like the invention of the Internet, which Kerry credited to Washington.

“A lot of people don’t think about that. But the fact is the government invented the Internet,” Kerry said in a 30-minute floor speech.

Kerry said the Internet was first conceived by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) as a communications system in case of nuclear war.

“The private sector saw the opportunities and took those opportunities and translated them into what we have today, which has revolutionized the way people communicate and do business,” Kerry said.

He unwittingly refutes his own case by pointing out how the private sector made it what it is today. Companies willing to take risks are the ones at the forefront. Meanwhile, we're wasting billions into bogus research chasing some magic global warming unicorn around.

The credit government deserves for developing the Internet has long been a subject of partisan wrangling.

Former Vice President Al Gore weathered unrelenting criticism during the 2000 campaign for claiming he “took the initiative in creating the Internet.”

Kerry was the 2004 Democratic nominee for president.

Thankfully today both of them are irrelevant. Granted, one became rich off the stupidity of people while the other married a rich widow.

'Some People Who Throw That Line Out Have No Idea What They're Talking About'

Trigger-happy warmonger John Kerry really ought to step back and think twice before he speaks. Then he wouldn't come off looking like such a cowboy.

U.S. Senator John Kerry has proposed that America not only set up a no-fly zone over Libya but bomb its airports and runways to temporarily disable Moammar Gaddafi's air power.

The high-profile Democrat Senator added that the U.S. and its allies should be committed to disarming Gaddafi if he threatened mass killings with fighters and helicopters.

His comments are in direct opposition to statements from White House chief of staff Bill Daley and Secretary of Defence Robert Gates, who are both cautioning against fighting talk and committing U.S. military involvement in the area.

Mr Gates said a no-fly zone would effectively be an act of war, as Libyan air defences would have to be taken out to protect U.S. pilots.

And Mr Daley said people who talked of a no-fly zone had 'no idea what they're talking about'.

But Mr Kerry said he believed a no-fly zone was not considered military intervention, and said there were other options to destroying Libya's air defence system.

Speaking on CBS's Face The Nation today, he said: 'That's actually not the only option. One could crater the airports and the runways and leave them incapable of using them for a period of time.'

Mr Kerry is among a growing number of lawmakers continuing a drumbeat for military action in in the strife-torn African nation. As the debate rages in America of what to do to stop the killing in Libya, the country itself is descending into a bloody civil war.

Mr Daley attacked growing calls for a no-fly zone, saying: 'Lots of people throw around phrases of 'no-fly zone' and they talk about it as though it's just a game, a video game or something.

'Some people who throw that line out have no idea what they're talking about.'

Kerry hasn't had any idea what he's talking about for around four decades now. Which is why nobody listens to him.

Warm-onger John Kerry Calls Junk Science Nonbelievers 'Neanderthals'

So a constituent of John Kerry demands an apology from the tax-dodging oaf and what does he do? Doubles down on stupid and call everyone who doesn't buy his junk science theories neanderthals.

U.S. Sen. John Kerry encountered a loud and often angry crowd during a town hall meeting at the Northampton Center for the Arts on Saturday, as area residents grilled him about his support for the war in Afghanistan, federal spending and the federal government’s response to the recession.

Anti-war protesters interrupted the Democrat on numerous occasions, yelling and calling on him to explain his support for funding the war in Afghanistan.

And in what might have might been the most bizarre exchange of the two-hour gathering, Kerry apologized to one woman who claimed he had called her a Neanderthal for not believing in global warming.

Kerry said he was referring generally to those who do not believe in the science of global warming and not the one woman in particular.

Thanks for clearing that up. So nice that we have such esteemed people in our senate.

"The biggest fight we have on the environment right now in Washington is not going forward, it is preventing these Neanderthals, troglodytes, whatever you call them, from going backward - preventing them from attacking the EPA, preventing the EPA from doing anything about clean air for the next few years," Kerry said.

"I think we have to build up the same kind of grassroots energy and movement that we had in 1970 when we passed the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, the Safe Water Drinking Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act," he continued. "... There is a price to pay for not moving forward to protect the planet."

We? Uh, Lurch, you were busy trashing your own government back in 1970, so how is it we?

More on John Thurston Kerry III from Doug Powers.

Shocker: John Kerry Still Hasn't Paid His Luxury Yacht Tax

I guess taxes are for the little people.

It’s been more than three months since we first told you about Capt. John Kerry’s high-seas tax dodge on his new $7 million yacht, Isabel, and the town of Nantucket still doesn’t have a check from the senior senator!

You may recall that Kerry lowered the flag and surrendered in July, agreeing to pony up more than $400,000 to cover state taxes on the toney tub. Mr. Teresa Heinz broke out the checkbook four days after the Track set off a furious tempest with our report that he had purchased the 76-foot floating palace and ported her in Rhode Island, thus depriving the commonwealth of its pound of flesh.

A spokesman for the state Department of Revenue confirmed that “a sales tax return was filed” by Kerry last summer to cover state taxes that would have been owed, had he kept the Isabel in his home state’s waters. But according to the Nantucket tax collector, he never paid any excise taxes to the town on the Isabel.

Now, in case you forgot, Kerry’s yacht is a New Zealand-built Friendship sloop with an Edwardian-style, glossy varnished teak interior, two VIP main cabins and a pilothouse fitted with a wet bar and cold wine storage. We point this out because the excise tax on boats is $10 per thousand of valuation. However, the state caps the assessment on yachts over 60 feet that are less than four years old at $50,000. Which, if you ask us, seems rather foolish . . .

So, the $7 million Isabel, for excise tax purposes, is worth just $50G, meaning, should Kerry decide to pony up, he’d owe just $500 to the island’s tax coffers. Chump change for Jawn and Ta-ray-za!

Anyway, Kerry’s flack Jodi Seth told us the senator hasn’t paid because he hasn’t received a bill. Which is very different from what Kerry said last summer. Back then the story was that the senator would pay all the taxes as if the boat were berthed in Massachusetts.

You're My Ego Wall: John Kerry Voted Most Vain Senator

Not only is he the most smug, arrogant, condescending prick in Washington, he's also won the vanity prize.

Sen. John Kerry is so vain, he probably thinks this story is about him . . . and he’d be right!

Slate.com has named the skipper of the Isabel the most vain man in that vanity pit known as the U.S. Senate based on a “scientific analysis” of all 100 senators’ “Ego Walls.”

In a posting headed “If the Walls Could Talk,” Slate writers Darren Garnick (who also writes “The Working Stiff” column for the Herald) and Ilya Mirman explored the photo displays on the waiting-room walls of each senator’s office and developed a “Senate Vanity Index.” The formula, developed by Mirman, an engineer and scientist, measures the level of egotism displayed in each senator’s lobby based on how many pictures the solon has of himself (or herself) glad-handing celebrities, world leaders and the like.

“When do a few photos or plaques transmogrify into a self-aggrandizing shrine?” ask the writers. “Where is the line between modest pride and out-of-control egomania?”

Well, wherever it is, apparently Kerry crossed it! His ego wall — featuring pics of the senior senator with, among others, President Obama, the Dalai Lama, Bono, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Norman Schwarzkopf, Kofi Annan, Mikhail Gorbachev, John Glenn, Nicolas Sarkozy, Tip O’Neill, Colin Powell, Ted Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and more — is “the most enormous in Washington,” says the site.

“Kerry’s office is one of the last ones we found,” Mirman told the Track. “When we walked in, we kind of looked at each other and said, ‘Jackpot!’ As Garnick said, it looked like he pre-built his presidential library. He had more than 100 photos of himself with various celebrities.”

Garnick later visited Kerry’s office in Boston and surprise, surprise, found another 31 pics of Mr. Teresa Heinz gracing the waiting-room walls.

Mirman said he wasn’t exactly surprised to find the most egotistical guy in the Senate is from Massachusetts but he was surprised that Kerry didn’t appear to get it.

“These guys work so hard to craft their images and Kerry always gets this rap as an elitist, but you know, you can control what’s in your own lobby!”

We're surprised he didn't name his luxury yacht after himself.

'We're in a Period of Know-Nothingism in the Country'

Ah, taste the bitter fruit of impending defeat, courtesy of the man living off his second wife's first husband's trust fund. And what better time to bust out this photo than Halloween. It might be six years old, but it never gets old. A great way to rally the troops five days out of the impending tsunami--by insulting your own constituents.

Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry unleashed a broadside Thursday against Republican "obstructionism," saying the GOP and its talk-show allies have created a "period of know-nothingism" in the country.

With his party braced for defeats in the midterm elections, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee told the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce that a Republican machine -- fueled by talk show hosts such as Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck -- has undermined progress and misled the public into believing Democrats created the country's current economic problems.

Kerry singled out attacks on an energy deal he was negotiating with Republicans, which fell apart amid criticism of an emissions-trading program. Some 20 Senate candidates are now opposing the proposed deal in their campaigns.

"It's absurd. We've lost our minds," said a clearly exasperated Kerry. "We're in a period of know-nothingism in the country, where truth and science and facts don't weigh in. It's all short-order, lowest common denominator, cheap-seat politics."

To underscore his claim, he said statistics show Republicans had blocked Senate business with filibuster tactics more during the past 18 months than the period between the end of World War I and the Apollo moon landing in 1969.

"The obstructionism is stunning," Kerry said, noting the country still lacks an assistant treasury secretary. "I think America really needs to know more of this kind of tactic and how it's shortchanging us."

Limbaugh and Beck did not immediately respond to e-mails sent to the public addresses on their websites. The Republican National Committee also did not immediately respond to an e-mail or phone message left at its national media office.

I trust Limbaugh and Beck will respond in kind to their massive national audiences.

Party Chairwoman Jennifer Nassour added in a statement: "Instead of listening to the concerns of voters upset about the reckless spending that has pushed our national debt to an all-time high; the failed stimulus that has not created jobs and the unpopular government takeover of our health care system that hurts our seniors, Senator Kerry chooses to insult the intelligence of Americans who believe that our country is headed down the wrong path."

During his 45-minute speech, Kerry urged business leaders to support thoughtful candidates. And he urged voters to reject the ones who ignore facts.

Methinks Lerch ought to take a nice long cruise on his $7 million yacht (check that--his wife's $7 million yacht) post-election. Let's just hope he's paid his state taxes on it by now.

Considering Barney Frank is now possibly facing an enormous loss Tuesday, energizing the voters Massachusetts in such a fashion is more than welcome. Thanks, Lerch.

H/T Spitfire Murphy.

Bill Clinton: Kerry Didn't Mean to Call You Ignorant Dolts, You Idiots

After the bumbling John Kerry called voters ignorant and uninformed the other day, Bill Clinton rode to his rescue and called people uninformed. This really seems to be a unique strategy the Democrats have.

“I wish (voters) had the kind of access to information that I do,” he said. “You can’t put 20 stories about this (election) on the front page every day, right? We have to do a better job publicizing ourselves.”

Clinton said Kerry and other Democrats shouldn’t blame the voters for the heat they’re putting on the party over the country’s economic ills.

“We took eight years to get in this hole. The voters gave us those eight years,” he said. “I’m just asking them to give us half the time to get out of the hole as it took to dig it in the first place.”

Translation: You idiots voted for Bush and caused this mess.

Clinton dazzled a capacity crowd at the Park Plaza’s Pairings restaurant yesterday at a fund-raising rally for businessman and philanthropist Grossman, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, who faces a fierce fight against GOP rival Karyn Polito.

The crowd featured such local party luminaries as outgoing U.S. Rep. William Delahunt (D-Mass.), Mayor Thomas M. Menino.

Grossman’s backers plunked down $100 for crudites, cocktails and a chance to shake Clinton’s hand across a red velvet rope in the cramped eatery.

Clinton told the crowd, “We need serious people who talk about serious things in a way ordinary people can understand. The only thing that matters is what are we going to do and who’s best to do it.”

See, all you ordinary people are just too stupid to understand the larger issues so we need sleazy Democrats to talk to us like children so we see how stupid we've been.

Thanks for the advice, Slick.

'People Are Influenced By a Simple Slogan Rather Than the Facts'

John Kerry explains how stupid people came to vote for Barack Obama.

“We have an electorate that doesn’t always pay that much attention to what’s going on so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what’s happening,” Kerry told reporters after touring the Boston Medical Center yesterday.

Hope! Change! Yes We Can! Those kind of slogans, Live Shot?

Oh no, he actually means those stupid, uninformed knuckle-draggers prepared to bury the left in five weeks.

“I think a lot of the anger today - while it’s appropriate because Washington is broken - is not directed at the right people,” said Kerry. “Barney is prepared, as others are, to explain what we’re doing. I think when people hear the facts and they see what we’re doing, it frankly makes sense.”

So if you're not stupid and uninformed, you're angry. That dovetails nicely with the latest anti-Tea Party message: They're all crazy. Of course this pampered elitist snob is looking down his nose at anyone from the deck of his luxury yacht.

John Feehery, a Washington D.C.-based Republican consultant, said Kerry’s comments mark yet another embarrassing stumble for the gaffe-prone senior senator. In 2006, the former presidential candidate had to apologize for a statement he made at a California college that U.S. students who did not study hard and stay in school would end up “stuck in Iraq.”

“I think that arrogance sums up why John Kerry didn’t get elected president,” Feehery said. “He’s out of touch.”

Nice to see one of those rabble-rousing bloggers being quoted in a story.

Conservative political blogger William Jacobson, who writes Legal Insurrection, immediately pounced on Kerry’s comments, saying that attitude is why voters are looking to shake up Capitol Hill by electing upstart candidates such as U.S. Sen. Scott Brown.

“It just continues the Democrats’ theme that the reason people are upset is because they don’t understand. They’re not smart enough. That sort of rhetoric just gets people even more upset,” said Jacobson.

Wonderful: Kerry Announces Ongoing 'Negotiations' With Taliban

I wonder if he made this announcement from his luxurious $7 million yacht?

Sen. John Kerry, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Friday that there is a "very active" effort under way to reach a negotiated political settlement with the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Kerry (D-Mass.) acknowledged that "efforts" have begun after visiting Afghanistan and Pakistan this week, meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and other officials.

"I can report without being specific that there are efforts under way. They are serious and I completely agree with that fundamental premise — and so does General [David] Petraeus and so does President Obama — there is no military solution," he told NPR. "And there are very active efforts now to seek an appropriate kind of political settlement."

U.S. officials have acknowledged that some sort of political settlement must be reached with the Taliban -- a loosely affiliated group of Islamic insurgents that control large swaths of territory in Afghanistan -- in order to bring an end to the almost nine-year-long U.S. war there.

The beginning of settlement negotiations represents a significant development in terms of Western involvement there.

The announcement also comes at a time when a growing number of U.S. politicians and the public are becoming war weary and want a quick end to it.

Kerry was asked if negotiations are underway between either between the Afghan government or NATO and a specific portion of the Taliban.

Allied forces in Afghanistan have fought Taliban insurgents since 2001, when the war began. The group, which once governed the mountainous Central Asian nation, was booted from power, but has since regained control of several key areas of the country.

Kerry said that any "appropriate" settlement would have to include "a renunciation of al-Qaeda," a "reduction of violence," a "recognition of the constitutional rights of both Pakistan and Afghanistan and greater efforts to reduce sanctuaries for insurgency."

God luck with that, Lerch.

Doesn't look like the Taliban is taking these outreach efforts too seriously.

Sweet Irony: Kerry Hailed Legislation Ending 'Blatant Tax Evasion'

Ah, such laws are merely for the little people, not the wealthy, hypocritical elitists like John Kerry.

Now that Sen. John Kerry has cut a check for something in the neighborhood of $500,000 to cover use and excise taxes on his new $7 million high-seas plaything, Isabel, he gets to sail off into the sunset in peace. But not before we bring you one final postscript.

As you know, the senior senator purchased his New Zealand-built, 76-foot floating palace back in March and ported her in Rhode Island, a state which repealed its boat sales and use tax back in 1993. By doing so, the senator could dodge some $437,500 in state sales taxes and an annual excise tax bill of $70,000.

Of course, Kerry insisted all along that he would be paying whatever dough he owed, but we notice he didn’t fork it over until four embarrassing days after the Track first broke the story!

Which is rather ironic, considering that back in March, when Kerry was taking delivery of his new yacht, he was applauding passage of legislation designed to end “blatant tax evasion.”

The new law, Kerry said, would put an end to a system that allowed “powerful people to hide assets abroad and evade our tax laws.”

“It repulsed me,” he continued, rather dramatically, “that while the average American plays by the rules and pays taxes, some of the biggest corporations avoid paying their fair share.”

One minor quibble with the item is I doubt it was Kerry who cut the check paying off the tab. We suspect it came from his wife's trust fund.

'He’s Apologizing for Getting Caught'

The fallout continues for the laughingstock John Kerry and his woes over the good ship SS 1040. Or maybe to use his own words we should call it the Botched Joke. Ironically by running to his favorite newspaper to try and control the damage he's just kept the story alive.

A seasick Sen. John Kerry - eager to sail past the storm over taxes on his yacht - actually kept the story afloat by attempting damage control through a mea culpa interview with a favored newspaper, spin doctors and analysts said.

“He said himself he’s handled this badly and that he’s stretching out the pain. I guess that’s just continuing,” said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.

“The worst part for Kerry,” said Suffolk University political professor John C. Berg, “is that people continue to discuss the $7 million yacht. If I were him I wouldn’t want my $7 million yacht in the paper all the time.”

Kerry told the Boston Globe he always intended to pay the state and local taxes - more than a week after the Herald first put the question to him about the New Zealand-built craft that the Massachusetts senator keeps in Rhode Island, where boat taxes are not collected.

“I said to people, on day one, ‘We will pay all taxes, all taxes,’ there’s no issue here,’ ” Kerry told the Globe.

Robert Bliss, spokesman for the Massachusetts Department of Revenue, told the Herald yesterday that “a tax return has been filed” for Kerry’s yacht. He said the law forbids him from saying if the bill was paid by check, bank transfer or gold doubloons.

Hub public relations guru George Regan said Kerry made the fatal error of waiting too long to address the issue. The Globe interview appeared after a week of Herald reports, and after Kerry fled a gaggle of reporters seeking comment.

“PR wise, this was not one of his finest hours,” Regan said.

‘’But,” he added, “he had to put it to rest he just should have done it earlier in the week.”

This is not Kerry’s first awkward moment. In fact, the wind-surfing, joke-dropping Democrat trips up on a regular basis.

In 2006, Kerry scrambled to recover from a self-admitted “botched joke” after he told California college students to “study hard and do your homework . . . if you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

Former President Bush demanded that Kerry apologize for the “insulting” and “shameful” remark.

A few years earlier Kerry quipped that the Iraqi army was so weak “even the Italians could kick their butts.” That blunder didn’t sit well with Italian-Americans - especially Republicans.

Once again, the rival party is accusing Kerry of being out of touch and late to recover.

“It’s too little, too late,” said Tarah Breed, communications director for the Massachusetts GOP, of the payment for his yacht Isabel. “He’s apologizing for getting caught.”

Listening to local talk radio while on vacation in New England the Kerry story has dominated discussion and he's been mercilessly ridiculed. Of course people did the same to Ted Kennedy for years and still kept re-electing him.

Funny how Kerry weakly claims he was going to pay taxes from day one, yet if you look at the timeline, that just doesn't add up.

Instapundit links. Thanks!

Senator Liveshot: I Always Intended to Pay the Taxes I was Avoiding Paying

So nice to see the Boston Globe getting around to reporting on this story after a week of avoiding it. Just imagine the saturation coverage Scott Brown would receive from them if he skipped paying half a million dollars in taxes.

Senator John F. Kerry yesterday acknowledged for the first time that he mishandled the political fallout from questions about taxes on his new $7 million yacht berthed in Rhode Island, but insisted that he always intended to make the $500,000 payment once he had registered the boat in Massachusetts.

“Our fault,’’ the Massachusetts Democrat said in an interview. “I don’t think I dealt with it fast enough, effectively enough. There’s nobody to blame but myself for that.’’

This is a watershed event in America: A Democrat taking responsibility for his actions. Of course this never would be happening if the Boston Herald didn't expose this fraud.

Last Friday, Kerry issued a less-than-definitive statement about the matter, saying, “If I owe taxes, I will pay promptly.’’ That was followed over the next few days by a series of similar comments, fueling a stream of media reports about whether the senator was trying to dodge Massachusetts taxes.

Then, on Tuesday, Kerry said he would deliver a check for roughly $500,000 — “whether owed or not’’ — to the Massachusetts Department of Revenue to quell the controversy.

Kerry, during a 45-minute session with Globe reporters, repeatedly insisted that he never had any intention of permanently docking the yacht in Rhode Island to avoid paying taxes in Massachusetts.

Asked why he had not paid taxes earlier, he said he has not taken final ownership of the yacht because there were several changes still being made by a designer, whose team is based in Rhode Island. Thus, he said, he was not in a position to pay taxes in Massachusetts.

He said, however, that he could now take possession within days — possibly soon enough to go sailing this weekend. He insisted he always intended on paying taxes after taking possession, notwithstanding the conditionality of his earlier statements.

“If you guys think that John Kerry doesn’t have enough sense of either propriety or common sense, that I’m going to be sailing my boat around Massachusetts where I’m highly recognizable but it’s going to somehow stay in Rhode Island and I’m going to avoid a tax . . . I’d be crazy to think that I’m going to be doing that, and that was never our long-term intention here.’’

He characterized his initial response as definitive. “I said to people, on day one, ‘We will pay all taxes, all taxes, there’s no issue here,’ ’’ he said. But he acknowledged he did not get that message across.

Sure. That's why he was on seen on camera fleeing reporters earlier this week.

Kerry sounded drained at times from dealing with the controversy, explaining how he tried to keep up with the details as he was going “100,000 miles an hour’’ on Senate business. He spoke in his ornate Senate office, which is filled with photos of boating races and a model of the swift boat that he commanded in Vietnam.

He served in Vietnam? Wow, I never heard that one before.

Over recent days, as questions mounted, Kerry’s frustration showed; at one point he slammed a car door in front of a pack of reporters as he asked, “Can I get out of here, please?’’

Yesterday, even as he faulted himself for his handling of the controversy, he was defensive over the brouhaha.

He insisted that, while he was caught off guard on how the controversy appeared, he did nothing legally wrong in not initially paying the tax.

“Legally, I’m not compelled,’’ he said. “But politically, and in terms of the perception, that is something that came at us unexpectedly, before I had gotten to the point of doing what we needed to do. That’s the way it is, that’s the way life is sometimes. . . . I should have paid more attention and done it faster or whatever. I just didn’t think we had to.’’

Those taxes are for the little people, not the pampered, spoiled elitists like Liveshot.

'Campaigning with Kerry Would be Like Campaigning with Thurston Howell III on Gilligan’s Island'

Why the Long Face?

One question not being asked following John Kerry's yacht debacle is why is he not being hit with tax evasion charges? If you or I stiffed our home state to the tune of about a half million dollars we'd be facing felony charges at the least. Whatever the case, here's hoping Liveshot's Democrat brethren feel the pinch.

Buoyant Massachusetts Republicans say U.S. Sen. John Kerry’s boat tax bumbling could turn the state’s already storm-tossed Democratic congressional campaigns into a fleet of S.S. Minnows: at risk of being lost.

“Campaigning with Kerry would be like campaigning with Thurston Howell III on Gilligan’s Island,” said Jennifer Nassour, chairwoman of the state’s Republican Party. “Could he be more out of touch?”

GOP consultant Ron Kaufman expects Democrats to flee from what he called “the sinking ship.”

“The thing that kills you the most in politics is two things - arrogance and hypocrisy. (Kerry) represents both of those,” said Kaufman. Kerry’s choice to dock his $7 million yacht in tax-free Rhode Island plays into voter anger about out-of-touch Washington insiders - the same anger that pushed U.S. Sen. Scott Brown to victory, he said.

If the Republicans are right, that could make the state’s senior senator an electoral albatross. A spokesman for U.S. Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-Lowell) declined to say if she would welcome Kerry at the oars in her own re-election bid. But former state Democratic Chairman Phil Johnston called the boat scandal a passing squall.

“I think John Kerry remains very popular,” said Johnston, a consultant for congressional candidate and Norfolk District Attorney William Keating. “Bill Keating would be happy to have (Kerry) campaign for him.”

Tory Mazzola of the National Republican Congressional Committee, countered that the squall hit at the worst possible time for Dems fishing for Brown voters.

“It is certainly a drag on Democrats going into a tough election season where they already have to defend a record of raising taxes and spending recklessly,” said Mazzola. “When it comes time to pay their bill to Uncle Sam they conveniently forget.”

Howie Carr can't help but gloat.

Sen. John “Liveshot” Kerry was so angry last night he threw somebody else’s tax bill over the White House wall.

The real JFK had PT 109, and now all John Forbes Kerry is left with is PT 1099.

Even Christy Mihos and Jack E. Robinson held out longer against the DOR than Liveshot did, and that reminds the senior senator of what he likes least about the 21st century: The Globe can’t protect him anymore.

Why, did you see those riff-raff reporters Monday in Weymouth, chasing him into the SUV, asking him those impertinent questions about his tax evasion?

Don’t those ruffians know who John Kerry almost was? Why, if Diebold hadn’t stolen all those votes in Ohio in 2004, it’d be Liveshot’s picture hanging in the lobby of the Yale Club on 44th Street in New York City, right alongside Clinton’s and Bush’s.

Would that it were, would that it were...

Why the long face, Sen. Kerry?

You know very well what Mama T served him for dinner last night - hot tongue and cold shoulder - especially when he started asking her questions like “Lovey, have you seen the checkbook?”

He’ll be down at the bank first thing this morning: “Can I get me a cashier’s check for a half-million dollars here?”

Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “Taxes are what we pay for civilized society.”

Or as John Kerry would put it, “Taxes are what everybody but me pays for civilized society.”

Benjamin Franklin said, “In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes.”

That, and rich liberal Democrats trying to cheat on their taxes.

Kerry's Second Wife's First Husband's Trust Fund to Pay Taxes on Luxury Yacht

He was against paying taxes before he was for them.

Sen. John Kerry has told the Massachusetts Department of Revenue he will pay taxes to Massachusetts on his new $7 million yacht even though the vessel is based in tax-free Rhode Island.

In a statement Tuesday to The Associated Press, the Democrat said, "The payment is being made promptly."

The 2004 Democratic presidential nominee has been dogged by charges of tax evasion since last week, when the Boston Herald first reported about his decision to dock the 76-foot sloop Isabel in Newport, R.I. Doing so spared Kerry a $437,500 one-times sales tax charge in Massachusetts, as well as about $70,000 in annual excise taxes.

In his statement, Kerry says, "Whether owed or not, we intend to pay the equivalent taxes as if the boat's home-port were currently in Massachusetts."

Please. If he didn't legitimately owe the tax he'd still have his wife cut a check? Who's he kidding?

Shipwreck: Kerry's Luxury Yacht Built in New Zealand

Not only did Massachusetts Senator John Kerry dodge helping feed the children by skipping out on his state taxes, but now we discover the Good Ship Lurch wasn't even built in the United States. He obviously doesn't care about helping struggling American families while throwing his sugar mama's money around.

New England boat builders say shame on Sen. John Kerry for buying a $7 million New Zealand-built luxury yacht while local ship makers struggle to find work.

“Darn, that would have been a wonderful job for a Maine builder,” said Jane Wellehan, president of the trade group Maine Built Boats. “If someone comes to build a $7 million boat that would employ half the population of some towns for a year or two. Boat building is such a critical component of our coastal economy.”

Gregory Egan, who owns the Crosby Yacht Yard in Osterville, said Bay State boat builders must feel cut adrift by Kerry as well.

“I’m confident that anything constructed in New Zealand could be constructed here in the state,” he said. “From a political perspective, it seems to me he could have thought twice about that one.”

News that Kerry was docking the 76-foot custom-built sloop in Newport, R.I., was first reported in the Herald Friday. Sources told the Herald the yacht cost $7 million, meaning Kerry would owe the state more than $500,000 in excise and sales taxes.

The Isabel has two VIP main cabins, a glossy teak interior and a wet bar and wine storage in the pilothouse. It is billed as a “departure from the norm in the opulent world of yachting” and designed to be piloted without a crew.

With the nation enduring a nasty economy, painful joblessness and extreme belt-tightening, word of the luxury yacht’s foreign construction - as Americans yearn for work - could create a political tempest for Kerry.

“The message is, ‘The American boat builders aren’t good enough, and the Massachusetts people aren’t good enough to maintain it.’ It’s just a bad message all around,” said Connecticut boater Steve Potter, who docks in Charlestown.

The commenters at the link are having a field day.

Howie Carr weighs in.

This is the most amusing story of the summer, by far. Great work, Inside Track. You can tell how devastating it is by the way the Globe is giving it a good leaving-alone, with wire copy. Yes, the Globe, the same dying broadsheet that railed for days about how two small-fry pols named Christy Mihos and Jack E. Robinson were trying to avoid paying their, uh, fair share of taxes on boats that were basically dinghies, at least compared to the Botched Joke.

Of course the difference was Mihos and Robinson were Republicans. Liveshot is one of the Beautiful People. Nothing to see here folks, move along. Filthy-rich Democrats refusing to pay their taxes isn’t news. Just ask Charlie Rangel, or Tim Geithner, or Tom Daschle.

Do as I say, not as I do. Taxes for thee but not for me. Just like when the Kennedys were allowed to file Rose’s will for probate in low-tax Florida, even though she hadn’t left Massachusetts for the last 12 years of her life.

John Kerry was for higher taxes before he was against them.

If he doesn’t like the name Botched Joke, perhaps Liveshot could take a hint from an old Beach Boys song and call it the Sloop Tax Free. Or go further back in musical history and lift the title of an old Louie Prima tune - the S.S. Just a Gigolo. Or the S.S. Manny Ortiz, or the S.S. Flip Flop.

Or maybe the S.S. Do You Know Who I Am?