A few new books are coming out as Fall releases and I fully expect headlines like the one above to be frequent as the authors head out on book tours. Case in point: former Secretary of State John Kerry. Both President Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded to Kerry’s admission of meeting with leaders of other countries and advising them to wait out Trump’s time in office. Needless to say, they rightfully called out Kerry for unprecedented behavior. So, Kerry has begun to personally attack President Trump in a schoolyard bully type of way.

Though it may be so that former secretaries continue to keep in touch with world leaders once they are out of their official position, it is not common for a former Secretary of State to deliberately interfere with policies of a sitting president. In Kerry’s case, for him to advise waiting out the Trump presidency implies he is advising them to not take part in changing policies or negotiations and that is simply not something an honorable man would do. John Kerry likes to reference Henry Kissinger as one who regularly communicates with world leaders. John Kerry’s ego knows no limits – he’s no Henry Kissinger.

So, while appearing on a Fox News afternoon show hosted by former President George W. Bush’s White House press secretary, Kerry flippantly acknowledged that he thinks all the world is just waiting out the Trump presidency. That is an incredible statement, especially given some successes that President Trump has seen in foreign policy. Even NATO has increased its defense spending budget for the second year in a row since Trump came into office. This takes some of the financial burdens off of the United States. Past presidents have nagged NATO to increase spending for many years without success. The same is true with North Korea – the past three presidents tried to work with the leaders of that evil empire yet only Trump has made any progress, tentative as it may be.

Kerry’s new book, a memoir, is titled Every Day is Extra and he’s doing all the shows to promote it. Friday night he appeared on Bill Maher’s HBO show and happily jumped ugly on President Trump. It should be noted that Kerry received a standing ovation from the audience – these are clearly his people. He mocked Trump’s use of Twitter and the conversation devolved to very unstatesmanlike juvenile name-calling. (emphasis mine)

When Maher asked Kerry about the tweet, he brushed it off. “He’s the first president that I know of who spends more time reading his Twitter ‘likes’ than his briefing books or the Constitution of the United States,” cracked Kerry.

It’s tough, you know…Unfortunately, we have a president, literally, for whom the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth are three different things, and you don’t even know what they are.”

And, to add insult to injury, Kerry said of Trump: “He’s got the maturity of an eight-year-old boy with the insecurity of a teenage girl. That’s just who he is.”

John Kerry: Trump has "the maturity of an 8-year-old boy with the insecurity of a teenage girl." #RealTime pic.twitter.com/MkYszsbPWg

— Real Time with Bill Maher (@RealTimers) September 15, 2018

I’m not a psychologist but even my basic Psych 101 course in college taught me that Kerry’s name-calling is called projection. Someone accuses others of behavior that the accuser is doing. You know, like when the failed Hillary Clinton campaign began the accusation that Trump’s campaign colluded with Russians to win the election. Truth be told, special counsel Mueller’s investigation has not found any collusion but lots of evidence has surfaced about Hillary’s campaign and Russia. Just sayin’.

As far as “the truth” mentioned by Kerry to Maher goes, how about that Iran nuke deal, huh? Americans were deceived from the jump on that beauty concocted by the Obama/Kerry team and the final insult was the pallet of cash delivered at the tail-end of Obama’s time in office under the darkness of night. John Kerry interfered with the hopes of saving his only signature piece of diplomacy as President Trump tore up that fiasco of an agreement.

All of this is called shadow diplomacy. Is it any wonder that Trump supporters call out the actions of a shadow government lurking around as bad actors from the past administration continue to operate as though they were still in power?

John Kerry has a very long history of bad behavior as a public figure. His time on the national stage began as he testified during the Winter Soldier hearings on Vietnam and Kerry famously threw American soldiers under the bus as war criminals. He rode that notoriety into public office, as he planned, and remained in public office throughout his career. I don’t think President Trump is a perfect human being but with critics like John Kerry, well, please just spare me the rhetoric.

Perhaps he thinks he’ll still have a shot at another run for president. Heck, with Joe Biden trying to sound like a serious contender for the 2020 Democrat nomination, who knows? Has anyone checked to see if Ms. Heinz is willing to bankroll another attempt? In the meantime, there are books to sell and headlines to grab. That botox and trips to European conferences cost money, you know.