The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) reported recently that it had “just obtained a never-before-seen ‘unclassified’ October 2018 memo entitled, “Notes From ‘Iran and the US: An Off-the-Record Conversation with Foreign Minister Mohamad Javad Zarif.’” This was during the Trump administration, but Obama’s former Secretary of State was busy conducting foreign policy. “The newly obtained memo,” the ACLJ noted, “regarding the secret meeting between Zarif and these former U.S. officials, included discussions of nuclear weapons, potential prisoner swaps, Afghanistan withdrawal and negotiations with the Taliban, Houthi rebels, Syria, Suleimani’s popularity in Iran, and the ‘region in turmoil.’” Imagine if Mike Pompeo were conducting secret meetings with foreign officials now: the uproar would be intense, and Pompeo would likely be prosecuted. But nothing will happen to Kerry. He is a member of the privileged elite.
The memo is new confirmation of what has long been known, and provides additional detail about what exactly Kerry did. The Boston Globe revealed back in May 2018 that Kerry was working hard to sabotage Trump’s foreign policy regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran. Kerry reportedly “sat down at the United Nations with Foreign Minister Javad Zarif to discuss ways of preserving the pact limiting Iran’s nuclear weapons program.”
This was not, apparently, a one-off meeting between Kerry and the foreign minister of the regime that ordered its citizens to chant “Death to America” in mosques every Friday: “It was the second time in about two months that the two had met to strategize over salvaging a deal they spent years negotiating during the Obama administration, according to a person briefed on the meetings.”
Further, the Globe reported that Kerry had not limited his shadow diplomacy to Zarif: “[Kerry] also met last month with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, and he’s been on the phone with top European Union official Federica Mogherini … Kerry has also met with French President Emmanuel Macron in both Paris and New York, conversing over the details of sanctions and regional nuclear threats in both French and English.”
All this was actually illegal. John Kerry violated a federal law, the Logan Act, which forbids unauthorized people from engaging in negotiations with foreign governments that are involved in disputes with the United States. The Logan Act’s intention is to prevent those unauthorized negotiations from undermining the position of the U.S. government. That was exactly what Kerry was doing, and he should have been arrested and prosecuted. But his deep state peers thought he was right, were hoping for his success, and couldn’t have cared less about the Logan Act.
Popular culture is obsessed these days with “white privilege” and “white supremacy.” But despite the Buffalo shooting, that threat is wildly overstated for narrow political purposes. In reality, the most heinous example of privilege in today’s society is one that no one talks about or even acknowledges exists: Leftist privilege.
If you’re a Leftist and want to start a not-for-profit organization, no problem. Only conservative organizations got buried in mountains of red tape and hobbled by unexplained delays by the IRS.
If you’re a Leftist and start a news website, you’ll have loads of readers referred to your site from Facebook, Twitter and the rest. Only conservative sites are being systematically blocked.
If you’re a Leftist president, you can oversee a corrupt and lawless administration for eight years and then brag about how your presidency was “scandal-free.” You won’t hear a murmur of dissent from an establishment media that worked hard throughout those years to make sure that as few people as possible knew about your scandals.
And if you’re John Kerry, you can traverse the globe doing everything you can to undermine the foreign policy of the United States government, secure in the confidence that you will not face any consequences at all. You’re John Kerry. You’re a made man in the Leftist political elite. You could shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue, and awaken the next morning to adoring headlines in the New York Times and the Washington Post.
Nor is this because John Kerry is someone singular. This goes for every one of the Leftist elites as well. And as long as they enjoy this privileged status, America will not truly be a place that offers equal justice for all.
Robert Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He is author of 23 books including many bestsellers, such as The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), The Truth About Muhammad and The History of Jihad. His latest book is The Critical Qur’an. Follow him on Twitter here. Like him on Facebook here.
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