The malicious email written to discredit John Kerry through his wife is quoted in RED, while the response is in BLUE.
Following is a brief background on Mrs. John Kerry. She hates being called that, by the way:
Understandable. I think it's just respectful to call people by the name they prefer.
Maria Teresa Thiersten Simoes-Ferreira Heinz Kerry. Married Senator Kerry in 1995. She only took his name eighteen months ago and she is an "interesting" paradox of conflicts.
Teresa and John were indeed married in 1995, on Memorial Day. I do not know if Teresa only recently added Kerry to her last name, and I do not think it is a deciding election issue. I personally have no intention of ever taking on the last name of my life partner. However, if he decided to run for office and asked me to do so, I would reconsider. It might be a good political move for a wife to take her husband's name if a large portion of the electorate to whom they wish to appeal isn't ready to allow a woman to carry on her family name.
The claim that Teresa is a "paradox of conflicts" is unsubstantiated and whether or not such a claim is interesting is subjective.
If you thought John Kerry was scary, he doesn't hold a candle to his wife! Maria Teresa Thiersten Simoes-Ferreira Heinz Kerry was born in Mozambique, the daughter of a Portuguese physician, was educated in Switzerland and South Africa. Fluent in five languages, she was working as a United Nations interpreter in Geneva in the mid-60's when she met a "handsome" young American, H. John Heinz III, who worked at a bank in Geneva. He told her his family was "in the food business."
If you think John Kerry is scary... you're listening to Republican pundits.
There is nothing wrong with having lots of names, being born in another country, having a foreign born parent, or being educated abroad. Teresa is an American citizen. The fact that she is fluent in 5 languages, has travelled and lived abroad, and has worked for the UN, speaks to her intelligence and broad experience. Teresa Heinz Kerry has also received 10 (ten!) honorary degrees.
Teresa Heinz Kerry has received many, many rewards, including the Albert Schweitzer Gold Medal for Humanitarianism (which honored the work she did to protect the environment, promote health care, education, and other issues important to the lives of women and children) and the Women's Leadership Award from the Save the Children organization in 2003 (for her efforts to improve the lives of children throughout the world ). Also in 2003, she received the World Ecology Award from the International Center for Tropical Ecology at the University of Missouri, was among the women honored by the Boston YWCA in the Women Achievers' Class of 2003, and the Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus presented her with a lifetime achievement award. She was also elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2001. Scared yet?
--http://www.johnkerry.com/about/teresa_heinz_kerry/
I do not know if Senator Heinz was indeed handsome, but it is accurate to say he was in the food business.
They were married in 1966 and returned to Pittsburgh where his family ran the giant H. J. Heinz food company. He was elected to the US House of Representatives in 1971, and in 1976 he was elected to the first of three terms in the United States Senate. A Republican, he wrote a burning diatribe against some of the causes backed by young House member John Kerry.
Teresa and Senator Heinz were married in 1966. She met him in grad school and did have three sons with him. What her first husband stood for before 1991 is not a current election issue, except in that it indicates that she has been involved in the political world for over 30 years and has considered more than one side on the issues.
Several years later, in 1991, he was killed when his plane collided with a Sun Oil Company helicopter over a Philadelphia suburb. The senator, his pilot and copilot,and both of Sun's helicopter pilots were killed. He was survived by his wife, Teresa, and their three young sons.
After her husband's tragic death, Teresa turned down the offer to run for her late husband's Senate seat, in order to take care of her three sons.
--http://www.johnkerry.com/about/teresa_heinz_kerry/
Four years later, having inherited Heinz's $500 million fortune, she married Senator John Forbes Kerry, the liberal then-junior senator from Massachusetts. She became a registered Democrat and the process of her radicalization was set in motion.
Teresa first met John Kerry at an Earth Day rally a year before her husband's death. She ran into him again a year after her husband's death at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro when then president G.H.W. Bush appointed her as part of a State Department Delegation representing U.S. non-government organizations. They married three years later as discussed above.
--http://www.johnkerry.com/about/teresa_heinz_kerry/
It appears that the author of this article does not feel that Teresa was a radical in the years that she was married to a Republican. The idea that registering as Democrat begins a process of morphing into a radical baby eater is an unsubstantiated claim.
Heinz Kerry is not shy about telling people that she required Kerry to sign a prenuptial agreement before they were married. John Kerry may not have check writing privileges on the Heinz catsup and pickle fortune, but he is certainly a willing and uncomplaining beneficiary of it.
I do not know if Teresa Heinz Kerry required John Kerry to sign a pre-nup, and I do not think it is a condemnation of her character or her marriage if she did. It is sometimes prudent for a person of significant means to arrange for the unthinkable rather than be caught off-gaurd by something no one would ever wish to happen, but does never the less does happen on occasion (even to the religiously devout). It is not so much a matter of trust as pragmatics. There is also nothing wrong with couples having separate checking accounts, especially when both are financially independent. Most spouses are willing and uncomplaining beneficiaries on their partner's will.
A lot of hard-earned money, made through many years of hawking catsup, mustard, and pickles has fallen into the hands of two people who despise successful entrepreneurship and who believe in the confiscatory redistribution of wealth.
Is the author suggesting that Americans should not inherit or spend money that they did not earn with their own sweat and tears? That won't make it past congress.
The author provides no evidence of the claim that John Kerry (or his "radical" wife) "despise successful entrepreneurship", so I will provide some to the contrary:
1. John Kerry owned his own small business in 1979, a cookie and muffin shop called Kilveret and Forbes.
2. John Kerry is the current ranking member of the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee.
3. John Kerry has proposed a "Small Business Opportunity Fund" to increase loan programs and venture capital investments for small businesses which in turn will make billions in long-term capital and equity.
4. John Kerry plans to provide small businesses the opportunity to obtain government contracts with federal agencies, and to reduce the current contract "bundling" which combines small contracts into one big one that only huge businesses can compete for.
5. John Kerry plans to simplify tax filing for small businesses, to provide a tax credit to small businesses that purchase equipment that meets energy-efficiency standards and to small businesses that employ called-up reservists, to use tax credits to help offset the start-up costs of pension plans for small businesses, and proposes a New Jobs Tax Credit to cover an employer's share of payroll expenses for net new jobs created by small businesses in 2005 and 2006.
6. John Kerry plans to increase loan and investment limits for manufactures, develop a three-tier manufacturing skills training program for current workers, college, and high school students, increase funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program, and create an Office of Manufacturing at the Small Business Administration.
7. As president, John Kerry will give small business a cabinet level position and a voice at the World Trade Organization to ensure that small businesses are considered in trade issues, and ensure that federal regulations are fair for small business.
8. John Kerry proposes refundable tax credits for up to 50 percent of the cost of health care coverage to small businesses and their employees, as well as access to the Congressional Health Plan to save them an additional 15 percent in health care costs.
Perhaps the author is confusing the Kerrys with G.W. Bush, who gives tax breaks to huge corporations and cuts programs that support small business. Under Bush, more small businesses have gone under than have been created, access to loans and venture capital funding has decreased while health care and energy costs have increased, one in every seven manufacturing jobs have been lost nationwide, and the small business share of federal contracts has decreased by 14 percent despite the fact that total federal contracts have increased by 7 percent.
--http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/economy/small_biz.html
The author seems to believe that the Kerrys want to confiscate the money and possessions of some and give it to others. Perhaps the author is referring to taxes? For example, G.W. Bush has taken hundreds of billions of tax payer dollars and given the vast majority of it to the wealthiest top 2% of the nation, and proposes to continue to do so in the future with trillions of tax payer dollars. Meanwhile, Bush has drastically cut social programs that help the 98% of Americans who are not wealthy. This might be seen as "confiscatory redistribution of wealth." If elected president, John Kerry will give his tax breaks to 98% of all Americans and 99% of American businesses, while raising the minimum wage and cutting costs in everything from health care to education to gas.
So how does Mrs. Heinz Kerry spend John Heinz's money?
Just one example:
"In 1993, Teresa Heinz established the Heinz Awards (in memory of [her husband], the late Senator John Heinz), an annual program recognizing outstanding individual vision and achievement. Each year awards of $250,000 are made in five areas in which Senator Heinz provided leadership and inspiration: arts and humanities; public policy; technology, the economy, and employment; the environment; and the human condition. "
--http://www.johnkerry.com/about/teresa_heinz_kerry/heinz_awards.html
According to the G2 Bulletin, an online intelligence newsletter of WorldNetDaily, in the years between 1995-2001 she gave more than $4 million to an organization called the Tides Foundation. And what does the Tides Foundation do with John Heinz's money?
The Tides Foundation supports things like civic participation, economic development and racial justice, environmental protection, and prevention of violence against women.
-- http://www.tidesfoundation.org/aboutus.cfm
They support numerous antiwar groups, including Ramsey Clark's International Action Center. Clark has offered to defend Saddam Hussein when he's tried.
According to Heinz Endowments President Maxwell King, this "information" originated in an opinion column written by a researcher for the conservative, Washington, D.C.-based Capital Research Center. By supporting projects through Tides, CRC alleged that Heinz has secretly funneled money to every other organization that has ever received funding through Tides Center and the separate Tides Foundation. However, by legally binding contract, every penny of Heinzs support to Tides has been explicitly directed to specific projects in Pennsylvania. The projects Teresa has supported through Tides include programs to test the career readiness of area high school students, protect Pittsburghs environment and retain young people in the region.
-- http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/tides.asp
The Tides Foundation has also issued a statement about this erroneous claim:
"Tides Foundation and Tides Center Statement Regarding Recent Scrutiny over Heinz Endowments Here are the facts: The Heinz Endowments have granted Tides Foundation $230,000 dispensed between 1994 and 1998. These grants were used solely to support a pollution prevention initiative and other environmentally friendly practices by industries in Western Pennsylvania. Tides Center, an independent organization providing administrative and financial services to hundreds of projects across the country, has received additional support from The Heinz Endowments specifically to support projects in Pennsylvania. The vast majority of the projects funded through these endowments were related to either environmental protection or youth education."
-- http://www.tidesfoundation.org/press_rel_04.cfm
On a side note, James Baker, former Secretary of State under G.H.W. Bush, current senior advisor to the Carlyle Group (a defense contractor with G.H.W. Bush as an advisor, invested in by the bin Laden family, and owner of CaterAir, which was headed by G.W. Bush until 1994), and large contributor to G.W. Bush is currently defending the Saudis against U.S. attorney Ronald Motley and the 9/11 victims suing the Saudi financiers who apparently funded the perpetrators of 9/11.
They support the Democratic Justice Fund, a joint venture of the Tides Foundation and billionaire hate-monger George Soros. The Democratic Justice Fund seeks to ease restrictions on Muslim immigration from "terrorist" states.
The author provides no evidence for the claim that democratic philanthropist George Soros is a hate-monger, but I will provide evidence to the contrary:
1. Even though he has already given $2.8 billion to his foundation, Soros is still worth around $5 billion and has promised to give away the rest of his wealth before he turns 80.
http://archive.salon.com/people/bc/2001/03/27/soros/index.html
2. His philanthropy began in 1979, when he began providing funds to help black students attend the University of Cape Town in apartheid South Africa.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Soros
3. According to USA Today, he did more than any other private individual to support the emergence of democracy in Eastern Europe and has bankrolled liberal causes around the world. For example, he paid for construction of a municipal water filtration system in besieged Sarajevo; gave the fledgling government of Macedonia a $25 million loan; and sent hundreds of Xerox machines into Hungary, where photocopying was controlled by the government. He helped underwrite democratic movements in, among other places, Czechoslovakia (1989), Slovakia (1998), Serbia (2000) and the former Soviet republic of Georgia (2003).
4. He gave $100 million to free education in the former Soviet Union from Marxist-Leninist dogma by buying new textbooks, training teachers and operating libraries.
5. He has given $12 million to promote high school debate programs in the USA (1998-present).
6. He has given $110 million over the past decade to Step by Step, an early childhood development program in 29 countries.
7. He has given $125 million to the After School Corporation for after-school programs (1997-present).
--http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/president/2004-06-01-soros-cover_x.htm (for points 3-7)
They support the Council for American-Islamic Relations, whose leaders are known to have close ties to the terrorist group, Hamas.
They support the National Lawyers Guild, organized as a communist front during the Cold War era. One of their attorneys, Lynne Stewart, has been arrested for helping a client, Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, communicate with terror cells in Egypt. He is the convicted mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
They support the "Barrio Warriors," a radical Hispanic group whose primary goal is to return all of Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Texas to Mexico.
These are but a few of the radical groups that benefit, through the anonymity provided by the Tides Foundation, from the generosity of our would-be first lady, the wealthy widow of Republican senator John Heinz, and now the wife of the Democratic senator who aspires to be the 44th President of the United States.
Again, from Heinz Endowments President Maxwell King: "The Tides Center is a provider of management and administrative services, and we [the Heinz Endowment] have used it only for those services, not to advance Tides grantmaking agenda. Foundations from all across the country--many, like Heinz, with strong centrist agendas--use these services to incubate an array of nonprofit programs. So does the federal government. It is no more accurate to suggest that Heinz supports every one of these programs than it is to suggest that someone who contributes to a specific group through the United Way supports the agenda of every other United Way beneficiary."
--http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/tides.asp
Aiding and supporting our enemies is not good for America, regardless of your political views. If voters will open their eyes, educate themselves and see the real Teresa Heinz Kerry, they will not appreciate her position as ultra rich fairy godmother of the radical left. They will not want to imagine her laying her head on a pillow each night inches away from the President of the United States.
Aiding and supporting our enemies is definitely not good for America. This is why we need a president who will focus military action on known terrorist organizations, rather than diverting American forces and draining our financial resources into an unnecessary war in Iraq against a threat that was completely contained before our peremptory invasion.
If voters will open their eyes, they will become wary of scathing indictments that are completely undocumented and referenced. If voters will educate themselves, their research will expose articles written solely to defame the life of a public figure and denigrate their honorable public service using unsubstantiated opinion or false information.
Hopefully they love this country enough to decide that the only way these two will ever be allowed into the White House is with an engraved invitation in hand.
Hopefully voters will love our country enough to put aside their loyalty to a particular political party who (despite their rhetoric) may or may not represent their best interest, depending on polling and what issue stances are most likely to keep them in power. Hopefully voters will be true to their hearts and their deeply held moral values and beliefs, rather than to artificially drawn party lines designed to divide America against itself so that the people will never unite to take control from the wealthy elite. Hopefully the voters who love this great country will step back, look at what has happened to America domestically and internationally over the past three and a half years, and vote to restore respect for our nation and prosperity for the middle and lower classes.
Instead of deleting this, pass it on. Let everyone know these people may be unfit to represent this great nation. The uninformed will never hear the truth from the press, who want Kerry elected!
Feel free to forward this to others who have only seen a version designed to insight hatred for Teresa Heinz Kerry and her husband John Kerry.
Those who buy the Kerry facade, beware of what you vote for - - - you may regret what you get!
For those who buy the RNC's, the Bush/Cheney campaign's, and the so-called "liberal" media's characterization of John Kerry, I challenge you to listen to him speak personally, or read about his plans of action on his website and see for yourself if you would really regret the implementation of his vision for America.