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John Kerry praises President Obama’s foreign policy decisions

Senator peppers Romney, calls him ‘extreme’

In referring to President Obama, Senator John Kerry said “we have a president who has made America lead like America again.” He also reminded voters of the president’s foreign policy achievements.JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES

WASHINGTON — Playing the role of both elder statesman and partisan provocateur, Senator John F. Kerry told Democratic convention delegates Thursday that President Obama “is giving new life and truth to America’s indispensable role in the world” and called Republican challenger Mitt Romney “extreme” when it comes to foreign policy.

Kerry, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, played chief foreign policy surrogate for Obama in a rapid-fire speech that swept through a series of international accomplishments over the last four years and pointedly warned voters that electing Romney and running mate Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin would damage American interests overseas.

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“So on one side of this campaign, we have a president who has made America lead like America again,” Kerry said. “What is there on the other side? An extreme and expedient candidate, who lacks the judgment and vision so vital in the Oval Office.”

Kerry also took aim at Romney and Ryan’s foreign policy advisers, many of whom were part of the George W. Bush administration.

“We’ve all learned Mitt Romney doesn’t know much about foreign policy,” said the Massachusetts Democrat who is widely seen as the party’s leading voice on such matters. “But he has all these ‘neocon advisers’ who know all the wrong things about foreign policy. He would rely on them — after all he’s the great outsourcer.

“But I say to you: This is not the time to outsource the job of commander in chief,” he added.

Kerry, who has frequently served as a surrogate and conduit for the White House during crises from Afghanistan and Pakistan to Sudan, seemed to relish a more partisan turn Thursday night. His speech pivoted between a passionate defense of Obama and pokes at Romney.

“Ask Osama bin Laden if he is better off now than he was four years ago,” he said, turning upside down a signature line of Republicans on the economy.

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In a nod to his own failed bid for the presidency in 2004, an effort partly undermined by charges he vacillated on the war in Iraq, Kerry wryly listed a labyrinth of apparent policy shifts by Romney on the war in ­Afghanistan.

“Mr. Romney, here’s some advice. Before you debate Barack Obama on foreign policy, you better finish the debate with yourself,” said Kerry, who is serving as a stand-in for Romney in the president’s debate preparations.

And in a passage that earned one of the biggest bursts of applause, Kerry skewered Romney for not mentioning Afghanistan and the US troops fighting there in his acceptance speech last week.

“No nominee for president should ever fail in the midst of a war to pay tribute to our troops overseas in his acceptance speech,’’ Kerry said. “Mitt Romney was talking about America. They are on the front lines ­every day defending America, and they deserve our thanks.”

Kerry’s remarks come at a unique period in presidential politics: The Democrats are considered by a majority of voters to be better prepared than the Republicans to manage a complicated and unstable world — a first in decades. And Obama and the Democrats appeared to be intent Thursday night on leveraging that confidence.

Kerry used the prime-time speech to remind voters of Obama’s foreign policy achievements, including ending the Iraq war and reducing the spread of nuclear weapons.

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Kerry also insisted that the charges against Obama that he has weakened the alliance with Israel did not reflect the record. Democrats have been on the defensive in recent days after omitting the traditional reference to Jerusalem as the capital of the Jewish state in their party platform — and were embarrassed when they put it back in on Wednesday and many of the convention delegates booed.

Kerry credited Obama with building international support for strong sanctions against Iran for its alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons — seen as a mortal threat to Israel.

“Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu [of Israel] set the record straight — he said, our two countries have ‘exactly the same policy . . . our security cooperation is unprecedented,’ ” Kerry said. “When it comes to Israel, I’ll take the word of Israel’s prime minister over Mitt Romney any day.”

Kerry also tweaked Romney on another issue he had long tried to pass in the Senate: curbs on greenhouse gases blamed for global warning.

“Despite what you heard in Tampa, an exceptional country does care about the rise of the oceans and the future of the planet,” he said, referring to Romney’s derisive comments on Obama last week. “That is a responsibility from the Scriptures — and that too is the responsibility of the leader of the free world.”

Yet, not all members of Kerry’s party thought he was the right choice to make the foreign policy pitch aimed at swing voters in states such as North Carolina. Representative Jim Cooper of Tennessee, a high-ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said the Massachusetts liberal will have a hard time convincing moderate Southerners that Democrats are the best equipped to keep them safe.

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Kerry lost North Carolina by a 12.4-point landslide in 2004 despite choosing then home-state Senator John Edwards as his running mate.

“Just speaking from a Southern perspective, he is not the most effective advocate,” Cooper told The Hill newspaper this week. “Massachusetts is great and wonderful, but if you want to do the South, you’ve got to have somebody who speaks with a Southern accent.”


Bryan Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com.