Jason Reed / AP

Secretary of State John Kerry, accompanied by U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan James Cunningham, left, meets with Afghan President Hamid Karzai at the Presidential Palace in Kabul, Monday.

KABUL -- Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who has infuriated U.S. officials with anti-American rhetoric, on Monday denied suggesting that the U.S. was colluding with the Taliban to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed in the country beyond 2014. 

In a joint news briefing with Secretary of State John Kerry, Karzai said the media misinterpreted comments he made during a visit by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on March 10.

Karzai said the point he was trying to make was that by continuing to bomb and kill innocent Afghans, the Taliban is giving a reason for the U.S. to stay.

It was the media, Karzai said, that misinterpreted that to mean collusion, a word he said he did not use.

"If (Taliban) want the international community to leave this country, their forces, they must stop hurting Afghans or hurting the international community." Karzai said. "To the United States, I'm in full support of saying that they no longer fight the Taliban, that they will focus on fighting al Qaeda and the other terrorist networks."

Kerry arrived in Afghanistan’s capital Monday on an unannounced visit that aims to repair fractured ties with President Hamid Karzai.

For his part, Kerry said the United States and Afghan leaders share the same goals – bringing the Taliban into peace talks.

"I'm confident that the president absolutely does not believe the United States has any interest except to see the Taliban come to the table to make peace," Kerry said.

The meeting came on the same day the U.S. turned over the detention facility at the U.S.-run Bagram military base north of Kabul to Afghan control, which has been a priority for Karzai. U.S. officials say they've been assured the most dangerous prisoners will not be released.

It is Kerry’s sixth visit to Afghanistan since President Barack Obama took office, but his first as secretary of state.

State Department officials told reporters traveling with Kerry that he is optimistic the U.S. and Afghanistan can overcome recent differences, including the awkward moment earlier this month when Karzai accused the U.S. and the Taliban of colluding to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed beyond 2014.

The officials said Kerry was not in Kabul to lecture or chide Karzai, adding that he acknowledged the relationship was “not always going to be easy.”

Kerry is optimistic the two countries can move in from Karzai’s anti-U.S. rhetoric, which the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan warned was putting the lives of Western troops in danger.

Anja Niedringhaus / AP

An Afghan prisoner leaves with his belongings from the Parwan Detention Facility outside Kabul after the U.S. military gave control to Afghan authorities, Monday.

On Sunday, Kerry visited Iraq before leaving for dinner in the Jordanian capital, Amman, with Pakistan's powerful army chief of staff, Ashfaq Kayani.

The secretary of state is not visiting Pakistan during this trip as the country is in the midst of a political transition.

NBC News' Catherine Chomiak and Alastair Jamieson contributed to this report.

Related:

Kerry urges Iraq to stop arms flow to Syria on Baghdad visit

Full Afghanistan coverage from NBC News

This story was originally published on Mon Mar 25, 2013 8:03 AM EDT

On his first day as Secretary of State, John Kerry joked about being a man in what’s been a woman’s agency for nearly a decade.

"Here's the big question before the country and the world and the State Department after the last eight years: can a man actually run the State Department?” Kerry told a large and enthusiastic crowd of Foreign Service Officers and staff at Foggy Bottom. “As the saying goes, ‘I have big heels to fill’.”

Of course, Kerry was talking about replacing Hillary Clinton (D) and Condoleezza Rice (R) before that in the Bush administration, but going slightly further back, there hasn’t been a white male to head State in 16 years, since Warren Christopher under Clinton.

Establishing his "bona fides" with the diplomats, he waved his first diplomatic passport: given him when he was a 12-year-old boy traveling to Berlin with his father and family for their assignment at the post-war U.S. embassy. 

He even told a story about using it to ride his bike into East Berlin on the wrong side of the wall, saying he got a tongue-lashing later from his father, who told him he could have become an international incident. His passport was lifted, and he was grounded.

The State Department has been besieged by bad news in recent months – from the killing of U.S. Amb. Chris Stevens and three other Americans at a consulate in Benghazi, Libya, to the suicide bombing in front of the U.S. embassy in Ankara, Turkey.

“So I pledge to you: I will not let their patriotism and their bravery be obscured by politics, No. 1,” he said of those who died in Benghazi. “No. 2, I guarantee you that beginning this morning, when I report for duty upstairs, everything I do will be focused on the security and safety of our people."

Kerry ended on an idealistic note.

“What other job can you have where you get up every day and advance the cause of nation and also keep faith with the ideals of your country on which it is founded, and most critically meet our obligations to our fellow travelers on this planet?” he said. “That's as good as it gets, and I'm proud to be part of it with you. So now let's get to work.”

After Kerry’s speech, he placed calls to his counterparts in Britain, France, and Germany, three of America’s closest allies.

After meeting with senior staff, Kerry met the Afghan National Institute of Music Group which was in the building today. Later, he will briefed on the implementation of the Accountability Review Board’s recommendations on how to prevent another attack like the one in Benghazi.

Gallup has released its list of "Most Admired Woman and Most Admired Man" living anywhere in the world, and for the 11th year in a row, Hillary Clinton tops the list of women, while Barack Obama is the most admired man for the fifth year in a row. 

Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivers a speech "Frontlines and Frontiers: Making Human Rights a Human Reality" at Dublin City University in Ireland in this file photo from Dec. 6, 2012.

First Lady Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey and Condoleezza Rice are next behind Clinton.

Behind Obama are Nelson Mandela, Mitt Romney, Billy Graham, George W. Bush and Pope Benedict XVI. 

The "Most Admired Man" poll began in 1946 and was expanded to include "Most Admired Woman" in 1948.  

Clinton has topped the list 17 times in the last 20 years, starting in 1993. Eleanor Roosevelt comes in second as the most "Most Admired Woman," a designation she gained 13 times. 

Dwight Eisenhower was the "Most Admired Man" 12 times, the most for any man, followed by Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, who each had eight first-place finishes.

The results are based on a Gallup poll taken from Dec 19 to 22nd.

Former Amb. R. Nicholas Burns, who has served in both Democratic and Republican administrations, said he was “disappointed” in Mitt Romney’s reaction to the violence in Egypt and Libya, which resulted in the deaths of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three embassy staffers.

“I was, frankly, very disappointed and dismayed to see Gov. Romney inject politics into this very difficult situation where our embassies are under attack, where there’s been a big misunderstanding in the Middle East, apparently, about an American film, where we’re trying to preserve the lives of our diplomats,” Burns said on MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports this afternoon. “This is no time for politics.”

Burns added: “I just think that Gov. Romney has, in a very unwise way, injected himself into a situation where he clearly doesn’t have all the facts.”

Congressman Mike Rogers, a Republican from Michigan and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, avoided Romney’s same level of criticism on the show, appearing to call for a pause in the political rhetoric for a few days.

“I do think there’s room for discussion after we get through these very troubling few days about maybe policies overall and those kinds of discussions and that’s probably a fair debate to have in this upcoming election,” Rogers said. “What we should be focused on now is that we lose a United States ambassador. And what’s key about this is we ask these folks to serve in very dangerous places. They are civilians. They are to represent the United States and just fundamentally try to avoid conflict. So the fact that these guys were deliberately targeted – they knew the ambassador wouldn’t be armed – tells us we’ve got some troubles we’re going to have to deal with, especially in Libya.  This was a well-armed, well-coordinated event.  It had both indirect and direct fire, and it had military maneuvers that were all part of this very organized attack. That’s concerning. That means we are going to have to make sure, working with the Libyans hopefully, that these folks are brought to justice very swiftly.  We cannot allow this to stand for the United States.”

Rogers added, “I’m not exactly sure what Gov. Romney was specifically talking about. I think probably what you saw there was the frustration with a foreign policy that probably is a little out of kilter of where the governor would be when it comes to the Middle East. I think that’s probably what you’re seeing there.”

Romney foreign-policy adviser, former Amb. Richard S. Williamson, stood up for Romney.

"When you don't have the facts, you argue process,” Williamson said of Romney’s critics. In fact, he added that the “substance of what the governor said last night was true then and is true now."

Williamson also dismissed Burns’ criticism, deriding him as someone who first served under former President Jimmy Carter. But Burns, who rose to the third-ranking official in the State Department during the George W. Bush administration, actually began his foreign-service career during the Reagan administration. Burns has also served George H.W. Bush and on Bill Clinton’s national-security council.

Williamson said he believes the choice in this election is between someone who "apologizes" for American values and one who doesn't.

Here was the Egyptian embassy's statement, hours before its compound was breached:

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others.

Here was Romney's response to that in a statement last night:

“It’s disgraceful that the Obama administration’s first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks.”

Today, Romney did not back down, saying it's "never too early to condemn attacks." "I don’t think we ever hesitate when we see something which is a violation of our principles," Romney said. "We express immediately when we feel that the president and his administration have done something which is inconsistent with the principles of America."

Romney also called the embassy's statement an "apology for American principles."

NBC's James Rankin contributed to this report.

On a softball field near the Capitol this week, a scrappy team of bipartisan women from the House and Senate – including four grandmothers – took on a far younger lineup of women from the congressional press corps to raise money for breast cancer research. The women of the press corps won 13 to 10, but not without fighting off a late-inning rally from the politicians. Watching from the sidelines: an 82-year-old retired high school coach, a woman who flew across country to root for one of her former students, California Congresswoman Laura Richardson.  A lot of the women on both teams played high school and college ball. So did UN Ambassador Susan Rice, who showed she had game in a basketball face-off among cabinet secretaries and WNBA players Thursday night. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sibelius also had some moves.   

None of this would have happened before Title IX revolutionized women’s athletics, and a lot more. As President Obama (basketball coach to Sasha’s school team) points out today in his web address, “Title IX isn't just about sports. From addressing inequality in math and science education to preventing sexual assault on campus to fairly funding athletic programs, Title IX ensures equality for our young people in every aspect of their education. It's a springboard for success.”

There is perhaps no better example of what women could accomplish through sport and education than Pat Summitt, awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House for her accomplishments. And we shouldn’t forget that Title IX helped young women force their way into math and science courses that, in many cases, they had routinely been discouraged from taking.

For me, it’s personal. When I was the program manager of my college radio station, women couldn’t do sports play-by-play. The barriers went well beyond athletics: after graduating, on assignment for a Philadelphia all-news radio station, I was once barred from the press room in the State Capitol in Harrisburg, Pa. No women allowed. Now, I look around our newsroom and see an incredible team of female executive and senior producers who have options that would have been inconceivable before Title IX. Appropriately, they take sports for granted. My senior producer, Michelle Perry, did crew for Berkeley. Our Senate producer, Libby Leist, was on the swim team in high school. And there is plenty of evidence that women who compete in sports perform better in other pursuits off the field.

For my generation, the imbalance was perhaps best symbolized by the careers of women like Billie Jean King. That’s why her defeat of Bobby Riggs, in the same era as the passage of Title IX, was such an empowering moment. Thanks to Title IX,  Billie Jean and other women athletes were able to break down barriers  for all the women who will be taking the field next month at the London Olympics. I’m going to be cheering them on, and thanking Billie Jean, Pat Summitt and all the others who pioneered the way.

Fresh off last night's victory for Gov. Scott Walker in Wisconsin, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said there could be repercussions for President Obama, because he didn't do much to help liberal activists get Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett elected.

On MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell Reports, the native Wisconsinite said Democrats "were really disappointed in this president for not coming into Wisconsin. He was in Chicago; he was in Minnesota. I mean, he really didn't lift a finger for them and neither did the Democratic Party, and so, they really feel put off."

But in the final exit poll, which included weighting for absentee ballots and showed Walker with a big lead, President Obama led Republican Mitt Romney by a 51-44 percent margin.

Priebus first tried to dismiss the result, which was similar to other polling conducted before the election.

"Well, I mean, those same exit polls said that it was going to be a close night, and it was not a very close race," Priebus said.

The early, unweighted exit polls did show a close race, but later data showed results closer to the eventual outcome. Walker won 53-46%.

Priebus continued, "But let's assume that the exit polls as they relate to Obama are accurate. I think you can't really poll today how people are going to feel in a couple of months."

He added that Democrats "wanted to prove that what happened in Wisconsin in 2010 was just a fluke. And this was their time, their opportunity to show the world that Wisconsin was blue, and they just needed a little help from Barack Obama. And they didn't get it. And for Obama to come back now in a couple of months, and expect some lovefest, that ... he's going to be greeted with open arms, I got a feeling that a whole lot of people and Democratic activists on the other side of the aisle in Wisconsin are going to say, 'Go back to Illinois. You weren't here for us, and we won't be there for you. That's a serious problem for the president."

President Obama’s spiritual adviser, Rev. Joel Hunter, said he disagrees with the president’s support for gay marriage. “I can’t find this in scripture.” Hunter said on MSNBC's "Andrea Mitchell Reports" today.

Hunter said that the president’s announcement was likely prompted by Vice President Biden’s endorsement on "Meet the Press." When asked if he thought Obama’s announcement was personal or politically driven, the pastor said, “When you’re in that office it’s always political. But that doesn't mean it's devoid from a sense of personal responsibility and personal morality.”

When Hunter spoke with the president after last week’s announcement, Hunter said that the president told him he changed his views based on personal anecdotes, gay friends, and servicemen. Hunter said, “He wants to do the right thing. But for him, that doesn't come straight just from scripture.”

Hunter said he did not discuss politics, policy, or even gay marriage with the president before last week. “We had not talked about this specific subject.” Hunter said. “I just talk about his personal life and his understanding of the scripture.”

When NBC's Andrea Mitchell asked if the pastor would preach against gay marriage and what the president said, Hunter said, “I don't preach political matters. I preach scriptural standards. And so, when I preach about marriage, I will say that it's between a man and a woman. And give scriptural references for that. But I simply stay away from politics when it comes to preaching, because the word of God is too important on its own to communicate. And I can't really get detoured from that.”

Hunter’s admiration of Obama has not been changed by his announcement, “The president's a man. You know? And I love him. He's a friend. But with the rest of my congregation -- I never know how much of my counsel they're going to take or not take."