Secretary of State John Kerry Knows What A Messy Election Feels Like

You are one of the few human beings on earth

who's actually run for president of the United States.

And when you did, they came at you really hard.

When the Swift Boat stuff happened,

they didn't know what to do,

they didn't know how to write the words,

this isn't true.

At the time, that seemed like political nuclear war.

Now, we're in an election, a campaign,

where it seems like that is, let's say, the norm.

Small pickings compared to, yeah, no, I understand.

So, I just wonder if you could talk a little bit

about whether you can wind that back,

or what it maybe feels like to be

in the midst of something like that yourself.

Well, I mean, look, no, it's hard to go back,

and hard to tap into that in the context

of what's happening right now.

I mean, it was ugly, and it was unfair,

and we didn't respond to it adequately,

and, you know, we should have done more.

But, I'll tell you what, I watched last night,

as everybody did, or as a lot of people did,

and I was really dismayed,

I mean, I was just sad watching it, to be honest with you.

For our country.

And I will tell you as Secretary of State,

who has to go out and talk to other people

about their governments.

It's pretty hard to sit there,

and say, hey, you really ought to try our democracy,

and be like us, when you see what was going on.

It's driven by money,

it's driven by a lot of different things.

So, we have some fixing to do here in the United States.

We've got some work to do to restore

the bona fides,

well, no, the bona fides are there,

but to make us legitimate

validators of those bona fides,

to be able to take our values and interests

out to the rest of the world,

we have to practice it a little better ourselves.