President Obama has little foreign-policy experience of his own to brag about, but the support team that has emerged in nine months has given him ample time to devote to the mountain of domestic woes on his desk.

The latest evidence is the manner with which John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, jumped into the breach in Afghanistan last week, apparently arm-twisting President Hamid Karzai into accepting a runoff of his tarnished re-election.

Karzai at first balked, but Kerry took him on a little stroll and the Afghan leader finally agreed. Details were not released, but the outcome suggested that Kerry had reminded Karzai that Obama was impatient to get a leader to deal with, before deciding whether to send more U.S troops.

Kerry, elevated to the chairmanship by predecessor Joe Biden's election to the vice presidency, did much to polish his own image by diplomatically congratulating Karzai for his good judgment in accepting an offer he could hardly refuse.

Kerry thus joined a team of high-profile Democrats who have been conspicuously active on the diplomatic front. Biden himself was on a quick tour of Central European allies — Poland, Romania and the Czech Republic — helping the medicine go down of a switch in the region's missile defense system. He got quick acquiescence from this trio's leaders for the plan to substitute newer and smaller but arguably more effective missiles and a delivery system against the perceived threat from Iran.

At the same time, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been traveling extensively, introducing the Obama administration herself beyond U.S. borders, visiting a total of 36 countries in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Central America, plus Mexico and Canada.

In Moscow, Clinton met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and other officials on a range of issues including progress on a successor to the START arms control talks, nonproliferation of nuclear weapons and cooperation on counterterrorism.

Additionally, special emissaries Richard Holbrooke in Afghanistan and George Mitchell in the Middle East have been providing high-profile presences under the guidance of Secretary Clinton. Biden is also chiefly responsible for monitoring the task of easing internal ethnic and regional conflicts in Iraq as the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki approaches scheduled elections in January.

All this has raised questions in some quarters about whether Clinton's role as the administration's chief foreign-policy official has been somewhat marginalized. But the administration response is that with so many trouble spots needing high-profile attention, there is more than enough high-level diplomatic work to go around.

The appointment of Clinton was widely considered as a political masterstroke, going a long way toward dissipating bad feelings among supporters of Clinton's bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. She indicated herself her enthusiasm for her job as secretary of state by declaring recently she has no intention of every running for president again.

Instead, she is heading up what so far has been a powerhouse foreign policy team, with Biden, Kerry, Holbrooke and Mitchell as principal surrogates in what has been a frenetic globetrotting quartet. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, a Republican, has pitched in as well.

Obama's own visits to 16 countries are the most for any American president. So although his plate is full with domestic problems, foreign policy is hardly playing second fiddle in his administration.