NYT Interviews Kerry...must read

As we all know, the New York Times has been pulling out all the stops to help out John Kerry. There's a long interview with him in today's edition that may show more of him than they intended:

When I asked Kerry what it would take for Americans to feel safe again, he displayed a much less apocalyptic worldview. ''We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance,'' Kerry said. ''As a former law-enforcement person, I know we're never going to end prostitution. We're never going to end illegal gambling. But we're going to reduce it, organized crime, to a level where it isn't on the rise. It isn't threatening people's lives every day, and fundamentally, it's something that you continue to fight, but it's not threatening the fabric of your life.''

There's also quite of bit of talk about Kerry dealing with the Muslim world much in the same way that Jimmy Carter did...and we all know where that has gotten us. Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: The Bush campaign has reacted to this and an ad should be on the air within a day or so.

Power Line also has some thoughts:

With this we can agree: ''A new presidency with the right moves, the right language, the right outreach, the right initiatives, can dramatically alter the world's perception of us very, very quickly." We recall how the world's perception of the United States was quickly altered by Jimmy Carter's announcement that we had overcome our inordinate fear of Communism. Mutatis mutandis, John Kerry promises a restoration of the foreign policy of Jimmy Carter -- the looming presence left unmentioned in the Bai article.

We saw a preview of the futility of Carterism in the face Islamism in the Iranian hostage crisis that terminated the Carter presidency. For those who learn from experience, the case for Carterism is even less compelling in 2004 than it was in 1980. Kerry's resurrection of Carterism in the face of the Islamist war against America would indeed alter the perception of us very, very quickly, although I fear we would not be around long enough to appreciate it fully.

And don't miss what Hugh Hewitt, Roger L. Simon and Charles Johnson has to say about this piece.