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Reacting to President Barack Obama’s recent nomination of John Kerry as the next US secretary of state, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius praised his future counterpart’s “personal commitment to Franco-American friendship”. The comment was a reference to a poorly-kept “secret” that dogged the former Democratic presidential candidate during his bid to unseat then-incumbent George W. Bush in 2004: Kerry has a French connection. … But the politician’s “Frenchness” has not always been an advantage. While running for president in 2004, Kerry was ridiculed by Republicans for his closeness to the country seen as having spurned the US by refusing to...

On the last day the public could comment on the Nantucket Sound wind farm project, the tally of responses yesterday was 3,500 and counting. But one voice remained silent: U.S. Sen. John Kerry's position is still unclear. In the years since the Cape Wind Associates proposal was first floated, U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy has stated clearly his opposition. Gov. Mitt Romney and U.S. Rep. William Delahunt, the Cape's congressman, have too. But Kerry - Nantucket homeowner and the ranking Democrat on the Senate Subcommittee on Oceans, Fisheries, and Coast Guard - still has not taken a position about putting the...

PARIS - Sen. John Kerry's French connection was treated as a liability during his bid for the U.S. presidency. On Friday, he used his popularity here to try to help rebuild strained ties between Paris and Washington, and expressed confidence that would happen.       The Massachusetts Democrat was in Paris at the close of a tour of Europe and the Middle East that included trips to Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Israel and the West Bank.       In a more than 45-minute meeting with President Jacques Chirac, the former presidential candidate discussed frayed relations between France and the United States.       ``I'm...

NOW that John Kerry has lost the election, his French politician cousin can come out of hiding. Kerry's cousin Brice Lalonde, mayor of a French town who once ran for president of France, was shunned by Kerry's family during the election, reports the National Review online. "When Lalonde traveled to support his cousin at the Democratic National Convention in August, many of his relatives were horrified," NR reports. "One part of the family refused to speak French with me and wanted me to hide," Lalonde is quoted as saying. "I really sensed the anti-French feeling during the convention.

ORLANDO, Fla. - Declaring "the world is watching," Democrat John Kerry urged voters Monday to make a strong turnout on Election Day and "change the direction of this country" by rejecting President Bush and sending him to the White House instead. "This is the choice. This is the moment of accountability for America," Kerry said on the tarmac of Orlando International Airport. "It's the moment where the world is watching what you're going to do. All of the hopes and dreams of our country are on the line today." During a hopscotch tour of battleground states, Kerry said he felt...

PARIS (Reuters) - Nearly nine out of ten French people would back John Kerry if they could vote in the U.S. election, according to an opinion poll on Friday which showed deep distrust of President Bush (news - web sites) since the Iraq war. The poll, published after Kerry and Bush battled over Iraq in a television debate, came as no surprise in the country which led opposition to the U.S.-led war and whose people were dubbed "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" by American Republicans. But it underlined concern abroad over U.S. policies and highlighted the gulf that has opened with France...

Kerry claimed that during the Cuban Missile Crisis, de Gaulle said he didn't need to see photos of Soviet missiles in Cuba because the word of the US President (Kennedy) was "good enough" for him. I realize his point was that goodwill between nations is a valuable thing, but does anybody know if this is actually true? I have studied the missile crisis ad nauseum in HS and college and don't recall this ever being written about. I tried a google search and found nothing to substantiate this claim. Is this another Kerry lie or can somebody point me to...

GREENSBORO, N.C. (Reuters) - Democratic White House challenger John Kerry sharply rebuked President Bush on Tuesday for choosing to go to war in Iraq and sticking Americans with the $200 billion bill. With a tighter stump speech and a sharper message built around a riff on Bush's middle initial, Kerry declared: "W stands for wrong -- wrong direction, wrong choices -- and it's time to put it right." He said he would start to do that by internationalizing the security and reconstruction effort in Iraq and showing "the kind of statesmanship and leadership that builds a true coalition to share...

NEWARK, Ohio (Reuters) - Democrat John Kerry on Friday dismissed the Republican convention as "bitter and insulting" and promised to be a U.S. president who would tell Americans the truth. "Every time they open their mouths they can't tell the truth," Kerry said at a rally. "It's time for us to have a president of the United States who can look you in the eye and when he does, you know you're being told the truth." The newly combative senator from Massachusetts said he would not allow President Bush (news - web sites) or others to question his fitness for...

ST.-BRIAC-SUR-MER, France — Imagine the scene here a year from now if this genteel village enters U.S. history. On Aug. 15, 2005, President John F. Kerry returns with great fanfare to St.-Briac-sur-Mer, where his parents met and where he spent childhood vacations in a Breton coastal landscape immortalized by Renoir. Escorted by his cousin, Mayor Brice Lalonde — a former candidate for the French presidency — Kerry leads the celebration of the 61st anniversary of the Allied liberation of the village from the Nazis. Speaking fluent French, Kerry greets crowds filling narrow lanes and a town plaza festooned with flags...

GRAND CANYON, Ariz. - Responding to President Bush's question with several of his own, Sen. John Kerry said Monday he would have voted to authorize the war in Iraq knowing what he does now, but added that he would have used the power more effectively than the current commander in chief. The Democratic presidential nominee said he hoped to begin reducing the number of U.S. forces in Iraq within six months of taking office if he is elected. "It is an appropriate goal to have," he said, but added that achieving it would depend on broader international assistance, better stability...

For Kerry, Taking Care Not to Get Lost in TranslationBy JODI WILGORENPublished: June 7, 2004 OLEDO, Ohio — Senator John Kerry may speak French fluently, but he does not speak it publicly, at least not anymore. In a high school commencement address here on Sunday, on the 60th anniversary of the invasion of Normandy, Mr. Kerry skipped yet another opportunity to use the language he learned in high school.In his best American accent, Senator Kerry referred to the "glorious boys of Pointe du Hoc," emphasizing each consonant: POYNT-doo-HOCK. The text of his remarks even left the "e" off the first...

RELATIONSHIP John Kerry's French Connection By Dale HurdCBN News Sr. Reporter June 1, 2004 When Kerry got into the race in 2003, the automatic assumption in the pundit class and among anyone who hadn't studied his background thoroughly, was that the man is Irish. CBN.com – SAINT-BRIAC-SUR-MER, France -- This is Kerry Country. No, it is not Massachusetts. And it is not Ireland. It is Brittany, on the coast of France, where John Forbes Kerry's French roots go through this pretty seaside village called Saint Briac-by-the-Sea. It was here in 1908 that the wealthy Forbes family came over from England...

Anyone catch the 700 club with Pat Robertson? He just did a piece on Kerry that was beautiful. "Some of you may think Monsieur John Kerry (yes he used Monsier) is Irish, but that is false and the Senator has at times even said he was Irish. In 1984 he said he was part English and Irish, and in 1986 he said "some of us who are lucky enough to be Irish" in a speech, but the fact is Kerry is part French/English-Austrain Jew, who speaks French fluently. We went over to France to interview some of the people Jacques...

We’ve had some fun with John Kerry’s French connections. The video “Only Thinner” is wildly funny and makes an important point: John Kerry has a surprisingly French view of the world, complete with quasi-socialist economic policies and a consensus driven approach to the war on terror that boarders on appeasement. But there’s a serious and troubling side to this controversy; one Big Media doesn’t want us to know about. To begin with, conservatives have tried in vain to pinpoint which foreign leaders support Kerry. He claims to have met with them “face-to-face,” they have sworn their allegiance to him, but...

Europe Offers Help Privately, Kerry Says Senator says nations alluded to sending more troops to Iraq 'given the right statesmanship.' By Matea Gold, Times Staff Writer WASHINGTON ? Sen. John F. Kerry said Friday that despite public declarations from France and other European countries that they would not send troops to Iraq, there were indications some of the nations would be willing to change course with the right diplomatic effort. "There are senators and ? diplomats who have had conversations with other folks that I think indicate that ? given the right equation, given the right statesmanship and leadership ?...

Not wanting to hurt his election chances, relatives in Brittany downplay affiliations St. Briac sur Mer, France – John Kerry's relatives in France bristle at jabs from across the Atlantic that the presidential contender has a French connection. They say Kerry has no link to France other than the home his grandparents bought here. "John Kerry is incredibly American," says Brice Lalonde, Kerry's cousin and mayor of this seaside Brittany village. "He has absolutely nothing French about him." For another cousin, Christopher Curtis: "This is an American story. John is an all-American guy with the benefit of having spent some...

SAINT-BRIAC-SUR-MER, France -- John Kerry's relatives in France bristle at jabs from across the Atlantic that the presidential contender has a French connection. They say Kerry has no link to France other than the home his grandparents bought here. ''John Kerry is incredibly American,'' says Brice Lalonde, Kerry's cousin and mayor of this seaside Brittany village. ''He has absolutely nothing French about him.'' For another cousin, Christopher Curtis: ''John is an all-American guy with the benefit of having spent some time overseas.'' With the race for the White House turning nasty -- and France-U.S. ties not quite mended from the...

<p>SAINT-BRIAC-SUR-MER, France -- John Kerry's relatives in France bristle at jabs from across the Atlantic that the presidential contender has a French connection.</p> <p>They say Kerry has no link to France other than the home his grandparents bought here.</p> <p>"John Kerry is incredibly American," says Brice Lalonde, Kerry's cousin and mayor of this seaside Brittany village. "He has absolutely nothing French about him."</p>

John Kerry's French cousin insists there's nothing gallingly Gallic about the Massachusetts Democrat. "John Kerry is incredibly American," claimed cousin Brice Lalonde, mayor of Saint-Briac-Sur-Mer and environment minister under Socialist former president Francois Mitterrand. "He has absolutely nothing French about him." The Associated Press reported today: "With the race for the White House turning nasty - and France-U.S. ties not quite mended from the Iraq war - Kerry's Gallic clan, when questioned, talks up his American-ness. Some are keeping a low profile, saying too much talk about France could be political arsenic." Lalonde admitted, "I'm afraid to hurt him," but...