MR. MORRISON: Well, thank you. Aloha. I want to welcome everyone. And for our onlineaudience, and also for the Secretary, I’d like to describe who is here in our audience. We havethe mayor of Honolulu, Mayor Caldwell. We have our senator, Mazie Hirono. We have ourformer governor, George Ariyoshi, and our other former governor, John Waihee. We have manymembers of the business and intellectual and public affairs community here in Honolulu. Wehave members of the diplomatic corps. We have members of our men and women in uniform.We have the members of the board of governors of the East-West Center. We have the staff ofthe East-West Center. We have friends of the East-West Center. And most importantly, we havefuture leaders of the Asia Pacific region. And I was just telling the Secretary, I think yesterdaywe welcomed 130 new participants from the United States and 40 other countries. They’re hereon a unique program to prepare them for being future regional and global leaders.
Now, how do you introduce a man who is so well-known for his own leadership and --
SECRETARY KERRY: First thing, you can just tell everybody to sit down.
MR. MORRISON: Oh. (Laughter.) Please sit down, yes. (Laughter.) Thank you, Mr. Secretary.Anyway, as you know, he has served in war and peace. He was a senator for 28 years; 59million Americans voted for him for president, including 54 percent of the voters of Hawaii. (Laughter and applause.) But as a former senate staff person, I thought the way to reallycheck him out was to see how his confirmation hearing went. Now, the issues werecontroversial but the nominee was not controversial, and what his former colleagues saidabout him, Republicans and Democrats, I think give the essence of the man: extremely wellprepared, born in a Foreign Service family, served all 28 years on the Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee, four years as the chairman of that committee. He knows the languages – severalforeign languages, countries, leaders, and issues. He is a man of incredible moral andintellectual integrity. He brings conviction and compassion to his job and great energy. Hehas been, I think, on his seventh trip to Asia, coming back and so we want to welcome him backto the United States. We want to welcome him to our most Asia Pacific state, and we want towelcome him to the East-West Center, an institution that’s building community with thisvast region which is so systemically important to the future of the United States.
Mr. Secretary of State. (Applause.)
SECRETARY KERRY: Thank you. Well, good afternoon, everybody. Aloha. It’s wonderful to behere in Hawaii, and man, I can’t tell you how I wish I was as relaxed as some of you in yourbeautiful shirts. (Laughter.) Here I am in my – whatever you call it – uniform. Uniform, somewould say. But it is such a pleasure to be here. Mr. Mayor, it’s great to be here with you. AndMazie, thank you. It’s wonderful to see you, Senator. I’m very happy to see you. Thanks forbeing here. And governors, thank you for being here very much.
Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guests all, it’s a great, great pleasure for me to be ableto be here. And President Morrison, thank you very much for that generous introduction. Iappreciate it very much.