[

In 1962, Kerry entered Yale University, majoring in political science. He graduated with a B.A. in 1966. Kerry played on the soccer, hockey, lacrosse, and fencing teams;
in addition, he took flying lessons. To earn extra money during the
summers, he loaded trucks in a grocery warehouse and sold encyclopedias
door to door.

In his sophomore year, Kerry became president of the Yale Political Union. His involvement with the Political Union gave him an opportunity to be involved with important issues of the day, such as the civil rights movement and Kennedy's New Frontier program. He was also inducted into the secretive Skull and Bones Society. President George W. Bush was inducted two years later.

Under the guidance of the speaking coach and history professor
Rollin Osterweis, Kerry won many debates against other college students
from across the nation. In March 1965, as the Vietnam War escalated, he won the Ten Eyck prize as the best orator in the junior class for a speech that was critical of U.S. foreign policy. In the speech he said, "It is the specter of Western imperialism that causes more fear among Africans and Asians than communism, and thus it is self-defeating." [5]

Over four years, Kerry maintained a 76 grade average and received an 81 average in his senior year.[6]
Kerry, even then a capable speaker, was chosen to give the class
oration at graduation. His speech was a broad criticism of American
foreign policy, including the Vietnam War, in which he would soon
participate.

In 1962, Kerry was a volunteer for Edward Kennedy's first Senatorial campaign. That summer, he dated Janet Jennings Auchincloss, Jacqueline Kennedy's half-sister. Auchincloss invited Kerry to visit her family's estate, Hammersmith Farm in Rhode Island. It was there that Kerry met President Kennedy for the first time.

According to Kerry, when he told the president he was about to enter Yale University, Kennedy grimaced because he had gone to rival Harvard University.
Kerry later recalled, "He smiled at me, laughed and said, 'Oh, don't
worry about it. You know I'm a Yale man too now.'" According to Kerry,
"The President uttered that famous comment about how he had the best of
two worlds now: a Harvard education and Yale degree," in reference to
the honorary degree
he had received from Yale a few months earlier. Later that day, a White
House photographer snapped a photo of Kerry sailing with Kennedy and
his family in Narragansett Bay.

Contributions

During his Senate career, Kerry has sponsored or cosponsored dozens of bills. Some of his notable bills have addressed small business concerns, education, terrorism, veterans' and POW-MIA issues, marine resource protection and other topics. Of those bills with his sponsorship, as of December 2004, 11 have been signed into law.

Kerry was the chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee from 1987 to 1989. He was reelected to the Senate in 1990, 1996 (after winning re-election against the then-Governor of Massachusetts, Republican William Weld), and 2002. His current term will end on January 3, 2009.

As of 2006, Kerry serves on four Senate committees and twelve subcommittees:

* Committee on Finance
o Subcommittee on Health Care
o Subcommittee on Social Security and Family Policy
o Subcommittee on Long-term Growth and Debt Reduction (Ranking member)
* Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship (Ranking member - Chairman from 2001 to 2003)
* Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation
o Subcommittee on Fisheries and the Coast Guard
o Subcommittee on Trade, Tourism and Economic Development
o Subcommittee on Technology, Innovation and Competitiveness (Ranking member)
o Subcommittee on Global Climate Change and Impacts
o Subcommittee on National Ocean Policy Study
* Committee on Foreign Relations
o Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs(Ranking member)
o Subcommittee on International Ecomonic Policy, Export and Trade Promotion
o Subcommittee on International Operations and Terrorism
o Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps & Narcotics Affair



Kerry's prominence also made him a frequent leader and spokesman at antiwar events around the country in 1971. One of particular note was Operation POW, organized by the VVAW in Massachusetts. The protest got its name from the group's concern that Americans were prisoners of the Vietnam War, as well as to honor American POWs held captive by North Vietnam.

The event sought to tie antiwar activism to patriotic themes. Over the Memorial Day weekend, veterans and other participants marched from Concord to a rally on Boston Common. The plan was to invoke the spirit of the American Revolution and Paul Revere by spending successive nights at the sites of the Battle of Lexington and Concord and the Battle of Bunker Hill, culminating in a Memorial Day rally with a public reading of the Declaration of Independence.

The second night of the march, May 29, was the occasion for Kerry's only arrest, when the participants tried to camp on the village green in Lexington. At 2:30 a.m. on May 30, local and state police awoke and arrested 441 demonstrators, including Kerry, for trespassing. All were given the Miranda Warning and were hauled away on school buses to spend the night at the Lexington Public Works Garage. Kerry and the other protestors later paid a $5 fine and were released. At the time, Kerry's wife kept $100 under her pillow in case she needed to bail her husband out of jail if he was arrested at a protest. The mass arrests caused a community backlash and ended up giving positive coverage to the VVAW. [citation needed]

Despite his role in Operation POW and other VVAW events, Kerry eventually quit the organization over leadership differences. Kerry has been criticized regarding VVAW - see John Kerry VVAW controversy for more details."

Achievements

"

Military honors

During the night of December 2, 1968 and early morning of December 3, Kerry was in charge of a small boat operating near a peninsula north of Cam Ranh Bay together with a Swift boat (PCF-60). Kerry's boat surprised a group of men unloading sampans
at a river crossing, who began running and failed to obey an order to
stop. As the men fled, Kerry and his crew of two sailors opened fire on
the sampans and destroyed them, then rapidly left. During this
encounter, Kerry suffered a shrapnel wound in the left arm above the elbow. It was for this injury, that Kerry received his first Purple Heart.

Kerry received his second Purple Heart for a wound received in action on the Bo De River on February 20, 1969.
The plan had been for the Swift boats to be accompanied by support
helicopters. On the way up the Bo De, however, the helicopters were
attacked. They returned to their base to refuel and were unable to
return to the mission for several hours.

As the Swift boats reached the Cua Lon River, Kerry's boat was hit
by a rocket-propelled grenade round, and a piece of shrapnel hit
Kerry's left leg, wounding him. Thereafter, they had no more trouble,
and reached the Gulf of Thailand
safely. Kerry still has shrapnel in his left thigh because the doctors
tending to him decided to remove the damaged tissue and close the wound
with sutures
rather than make a wide opening to remove the shrapnel. Kerry received
his second Purple Heart for this injury, but he did not lose any time
off from duty.

Eight days later, on February 28, came the events for which Kerry was awarded his Silver Star.
On this occasion, Kerry was in tactical command of his Swift boat and
two others. Their mission included bringing a demolition team and
dozens of South Vietnamese soldiers to destroy enemy sampans,
structures and bunkers. Along the Bay Hap river, they ran into an
ambush. Kerry directed the boats "to turn to the beach and charge the
Viet Cong positions" and he "expertly directed" his boat's fire and
coordinated the deployment of the South Vietnamese troops, according to
Admiral Zumwalt's original medal citation. [12]

After the South Vietnamese troops and a team of three U.S. Army
advisors that were with them had disembarked at the ambush site,
Kerry's boat and another headed up river to look for the fleeing enemy.
The two boats came under fire from a Viet Cong rocket-propelled grenade,
shattering the crew cabin windows of PCF-94. Kerry ordered the boats to
turn and charge the second ambush site. As they reached the shore, a
Viet Cong soldier jumped out of the brush, carrying an RPG
launcher. With the enemy soldier only a short distance away from the
boat and crew, forward gunner Tommy Belodeau shot him in the leg with
the boat's 7.62x51 caliber M-60 machine gun.
Belodeau's machine gun jammed after he fired, and while fellow crewmate
Michael Medeiros attempted to fire, he was unable to do so. Kerry
leaped ashore followed by Medeiros. As they pursued the fleeing Viet
Cong soldier, Kerry shot and killed him with rifle fire.

Kerry's commanding officer, Lieutenant
George Elliott, joked that he didn't know whether to court-martial him
for beaching the boat without orders or give him a medal for saving the
crew. Elliott recommended Kerry for the Silver Star, and Zumwalt flew
into An Thoi to personally award medals to Kerry and the rest of the
sailors involved in the mission. The Navy's account of Kerry's actions
is presented in the original medal citation
signed by Zumwalt. In addition, the after-action reports for this
mission are available, along with the original press release written on
March 1, a historical summary dated March 17, and more. [13]

On March 13, five Swift boats were returning to base together on the
Bay Hap river from their missions that day. A mine detonated directly
beneath one of the boats (PCF-3), lifting it into the air. Shortly
thereafter, another mine exploded near Kerry's boat (PCF-94).

James Rassmann, a Green Beret
advisor who was sitting on the deck of the pilothouse, was knocked
overboard. Rassmann dived to the bottom of the river. Coming back up
for air, the enemy repeatedly fired at him. Rassmann was heading to the
north bank, expecting to be taken prisoner, when Kerry realized he was
gone and came back for him. Kerry's Bronze Star was awarded for
recognized bravery in rescuing Rassman while under fire.

After the crew of PCF-3 had been rescued, PCFs 43 and 23 left the
scene to evacuate the four most seriously wounded sailors. PCFs 51 and
94 remained behind and helped salvage the stricken boat together with a
damage-control party that had been immediately dispatched to the scene.

During this encounter Kerry sustained shrapnel wounds, leading to his 3rd Purple Heart.

After Kerry's 1972 defeat, he and his wife bought a house in Lowell. He spent some time working as a fundraiser for the Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere
(CARE), an international humanitarian organization. He decided that the
best way for him to continue in public life was to study law. In
September 1973, he entered Boston College Law School at Newton, Massachusetts. In July 1974, while attending law school, Kerry was named executive director of Mass Action, a Massachusetts advocacy association.

He received his Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree in 1976. While in law school he had been a student prosecutor in the office of the District Attorney of Middlesex County,
John J. Droney. After passing the bar exam and being admitted to the
Massachusetts bar in 1976, he went to work in that office as a
full-time prosecutor.

In January 1977, Droney promoted him to First Assistant District
Attorney. In that position, Kerry had dual roles. First, he tried
cases, winning convictions in a high-profile rape case and a murder.
Second, he played a role in administering the office of the district
attorney by initiating the creation of special white-collar and
organized crime units, creating programs to address the problems of
rape and other crime victims and of witnesses, and managing trial
calendars to reflect case priorities. It was in this role in 1978, that
Kerry announced an investigation into possible criminal charges against
then Senator Edward Brooke, regarding "misstatements" in his first divorce trial. [19]

In 1979, Kerry resigned from the District Attorney's office to set
up a private law firm with another former prosecutor. And, although his
private law practice was a success, Kerry was still interested in
public office. He re-entered electoral politics by running for Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts and won a narrow victory in the 1982 Democratic primary. The ticket, with Michael Dukakis as the gubernatorial candidate, won the general election without difficulty.

The position of Lieutenant Governor carried few inherent
responsibilities. Dukakis, however, delegated additional matters to
Kerry. In particular, Kerry's interest in environmental protection led
him to become heavily involved in the issue of acid rain. His work contributed to a National Governors Association resolution in 1984 that was a precursor to the 1990 amendments to the federal Clean Air Act.

During his campaign, Kerry had argued that nuclear evacuation
planning was "a sham intended to deceive Americans into believing they
could survive a nuclear war". Once in office, he drafted an Executive
Order condemning such planning, which Dukakis signed. ^{[citation needed]}

Election to the Senate

The junior U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, Paul Tsongas,
announced in 1984 that he would be stepping down for health reasons.
Kerry decided to run for the seat. As in his 1982 race for Lieutenant
Governor, he did not receive the endorsement of the party regulars at
the state Democratic convention. Again as in 1982, however, he
prevailed in a close primary. In his campaign he promised to mix
liberalism with tight budget controls. As the Democratic candidate he
was elected to the Senate despite a nationwide landslide for the
re-election of Republican president Ronald Reagan,
whom Massachusetts voted for by a narrow margin. In his acceptance
speech, Kerry asserted that his win meant that the people of
Massachusetts "emphatically reject the politics of selfishness and the
notion that women must be treated as second-class citizens." Kerry was
sworn in as a U.S. Senator in January 1985.

"

Famous quotes

"Values are not just words, values are what we live by. They're about the causes that we champion and the people we fight for.

We need to guarantee equal rights and civil rights and say that, here in America, workers have the right to organize - women have the right to choose - and justice belongs to everyone regardless of race or gender or sexual orientation.

While we must remain determined to defeat terrorism, it isn't only terrorism we are fighting. It's the beliefs that motivate terrorists. A new ideology of hatred and intolerance has arisen to challenge America and liberal democracy

And it is time for those who talk about family values to start valuing families.

The hope is there. The sun is rising. Our best days are yet to come.

When Bush had an opportunity to capture or kill bin Laden, he took his focus off of him, outsourced the job to Afghan warlords and bin Laden escaped.

I want to start by saying something nice about President Bush. Of all the presidents we've had with the last name of Bush, his economic plan ranks in the top two.

I figured out Karl Rove's political strategy -- make gas so expensive, no Democrats can afford to go to the polls.

Politics has always been the art of the possible. Today it's too often the art of the probable - tinkering around the edges without any greater vision, without a sense of optimism and imagination.

That is what Americans do. We face a challenge -- no matter how great -- because we know that on the other side there is always hope.