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"He
is, undoubtedly, the most amazing man ever to become President of the
United States.
He is, undoubtedly, one of the more inept.
Rarely in the history of the Republic has there been an occupant of
the Oval Office who demonstrated so quickly an inability to conduct even
the simplest affairs of state."
(Jimmy
Carter: The Man and the Myth. New Tork: Richard Marek Publishers,
1979.) "From
a tempermental standpoint, from a standpoint of emotions, truth and
honesty, he is opposite from the way he appears on radio and television.
He’s a sort of a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde sort of fellow.
He’s cold, cunning, cruel, and will destroy anything or anyone
who stands in his way…He’s a typical politician, the type of person I
have always detested in campaigning or in public office."
(Lester
Maddox (Former Governor of Georgia (D)) Newsweek,
7/19/76, p.25.) "You
can’t go into the Presidency with so little background and experience.
Carter was so inexperienced that no one could make up such lack of
information unless he was a genius, which he hadn’t demonstrated.
Then, when he said he was going to take up speed reading, I knew
the cause was lost." (Eugene J. McCarthy. (Former Sentor –D- Minnesota), Dallas
Times Herald, 8/25/78, C3.) "He
believes that nothing exists beyond himself, not the inflation figures,
the unemployment figures...the growls from the Kremlin … nothing …
Jimmy Cater powers of creation are devoted to the creation of confusion
and the absurd." (Washington
Post, 9/8/80, A21) “This
man is extraordinary in his ability to screw things up.” (Democratic
Congressman quoted in the New York Times, July 20, 1979, as cited in
Donald S. Spencer, The Carter
Implosion (New York: Praeger, 1988), p.117) “Throughout
his term of office, Carter has done nothing but smile, make promises, and
do nothing.” (Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette July 25, 1979 as quoted in The Carter Implosion p.117) “Carter’s
diplomacy is neither bad nor dangerous, nor disquieting, nor remarkable.
It is non-existent.”
(Le
Matin, as cited in the New York
Times, July 20 1980 and quoted in the Carter Implosion p.118) Quotes compiled by Sushila Nayak. Thanks to Netfa Freeman for his transcription help. Institute for Policy Studies Home Page
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Jimmy
Carter There are many who believe that Jimmy Carter is the most successful former president the United States ever had. His activities have been exemplary. Through the Carter-Menil Center in Atlanta, the 39th president has staked out his work as an international peace statesman who operates as a mediator between warring factions in poor nations. He holds to a standard of human rights which is not easily attacked as false or self serving. He comes and goes as he pleases in this role, whether in the middle east, Africa or Asia often to the chagrin of government diplomats who find him difficult to confront or contain. He has made his weight felt in Haiti, in Eritrea and Ethiopia, and in the middle east. Carter has also taken on the role of citizen volunteer, working as a carpenter and painter refurbishing houses in poor neighborhoods. He also has written several books, and a book of poetry with his daughter, Amy. He keeps a deep interest in religious matters and comports himself as a serious, mentally balanced man who seems part evangelist and man of accomplishment. So, why did this farmer, former governor and state senator, a man who mastered the minutiae of public policy documents and a nuclear engineer to boot fail as president? Some have likened his failure to another engineer, Herbert Hoover, although this is a false parallel for Hoover had a comprehensive picture of the presidency, even a vision of what the United States was to be but it did him no good. On the other hand, Carter did not have a clear view of his purpose and therefore he was unable to bring to bear his own imprint on the presidency as the American people were metaphorically catching their breath from Watergate and the end of the American war in Indo-China. He had won the presidency form Gerald Ford, who had to contend with the low morale of the Republican party after Watergate and the fact that rank and file Republicans favored Ronald Reagan "in their hearts." Reagan's turn did not come until 1980 which began the serious unraveling of the conservatives and moderates in the Republican party and the rise of the Right. There was a personal problem as well which Carter had with Congress, his staff and cabinet. He was a micromanager, controlling everything from the use of the White House tennis court to overseeing war plans in Iran. It seemed important for him to appear more knowledgeable on any subject than others and to prove it no matter what the subject matter under discussion. This pose grated on members of Congress as well as administration officials. He was never able to engender warm or even respectful feelings from the Congress. For the purpose of warming up Congress he chose a respected senator from Minnesota as his vice president -- Walter Mondale, who himself had tried for the presidency. Mondale had found primary campaigning not to his liking and dropped out. Carter came to the presidency not knowing whether he wanted to manage the system with its various baronies. This would have required that he act as broker between the barons of business, the military, labor and other institutions. His alternative was to act as a new South populist radical, somewhere ideologically between William Jennings Bryan and George McGovern, who intended to change the distribution of power and wealth in the society using politics as the crucible for this purpose. In his acceptance speech for the 1976 Democratic nomination, Carter made populist claims that if the present economic system didn't work for the American people he was going to get one to replace it. Such talk brought joy to the hearts of public interest lawyers and activists. And when he became President he announced in his Inaugural address that he was for nuclear abolition. He asked the Joint Chiefs of Staff to prepare a memorandum for nuclear abolition. The Joint Chiefs told him that his request was impossible and unrealistic. That ended his program for general nuclear disarmament, although he later committed himself to the SALT 2 agreement which failed passage in the US Senate in part because of the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, but also because a bloc of Democratic and Republican Senators did not want any agreement. In his campaign Carter pledged to cut the Defense budget by 35 billion dollars. As president to get support for SALT 2 he agreed to substantially raise the Defense budget. What he got was no SALT 2 but an increased Defense budget 5% beyond inflation. This policy opened the door to even greater increases during Reagan's presidency. It turned out that his idea of changing the economic system was not federally rechartering powerful corporations as a means of ensuring corporate accountability, an idea which was popular at the time among public interest advocates. Instead, the direction he took was deregulation, which meant that the largest corporations would act as the planners and regulators of the nation. On the other hand, while his plans called for deregulation, as in the case of natural gas, he sought various ways to increase energy efficiency through legislation and government behavior. As in other administrations, Carter's advisors in the government reflected different interests and groups. Thus, in foreign and national security policy he was surrounded by four floating institutional coalitions. The cold warrior geopoliticians represented by Zbignieuw Brzezinski; the multinational corporate wing of the Democratic party, as reflected by Cyrus Vance, who held strongly to a detente and peace making position as Carter's secretary of state; the human rights in the third world group represented by Andrew Young; and, the technocrats of national security policy such as Jessica Matthews, who believed that it was time to shift the agenda of foreign and national security policy to questions of the environment and population Carter himself wandered between these positions while the reality of world politics intruded. He had the bad luck of praising the shah of Iran and having him as a White House guest before the Iranian revolution erupted. Facing the humiliation of American embassy personnel being held hostage with the national media keeping track of the days they were held, President Carter ordered a helicopter raid to rescue the hostages. It failed badly adding to his image of being a bungler. Vance, who had fought a running policy battle with Brzezinski, advised against the raid and then resigned rather than be a part of that fiasco. By the end of his term of office Carter played the game of geopolitics warning the Soviet Union that the United States would use force to repel the Soviet Union's intervention in Afghanistan. The United States then initiated a large scale sublimited war effort through Pakistan to help the various Afghan groups that confronted the Soviet forces. These groups continued the civil war among themselves after the Soviets pulled out and the United States ceased supplying them with arms. Carter's signal accomplishment from a diplomatic standpoint was the Camp David Accords of 1978, which saw the Egyptians and Israelis agreeing to a framework for the settlement of disputes in the middle east. The agreement, which was reached through Carter's negotiating ability, required the United States to militarily aid both the Israelis and Egyptians to keep the peace. The Accords between Sadat of Egypt and Begin of Israel were not universally popular in their own nations. Among the Palestinian nationalists, including the PLO, the agreement was thought to be a sell out of their interests and search for an independent state. Carter's other foreign policy accomplishment was the Panama Canal treaty of 1977 which had been negotiated for close to 13 years. The treaty was meant to return the canal to the Panamanians by 1999. It passed the Senate with two votes to spare. The United States government found it difficult to let go of the Canal and sought to direct the internal politics of Panama. Indeed, an invasion of Panama occurred during the Bush presidency to capture Manuel Noriega, who replaced Omar Torrijos, the Panamanian leader who had negotiated the Treaty. On domestic policy Carter sought ways to aid farmers and the poor by making food stamps available to all in need. While he signed the Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act, the policies he pursued were not able to deal with stagflation, a situation in which the nation faced both recession and inflation at the same time. By the end of his term, full employment did not seem to be an administration concern once having named Paul Volcker as chair of the Federal Reserve, a man who had little interest in full employment. As president, Carter was not able to fire up the liberals although he brought various young policy makers who were liberal into the third tier of the government. On the other hand, he was not a traditional Southern politician so he had little support from that quarter once he was president. He was, in effect, a political loner. Yet it is possible to overemphasize that side of his presidency. He was a politician who knew the value of switching sides when necessary and making tactical alliances, using language and about faces on issues as a way of finding the "middle." When he ran for governor of Georgia, he did so as a racist. Yet he immediately switched his position when he won the governorship stating that apartheid was over and the time required moving on. When he made his move towards national office, he did so by befriending the political movers and shakers from the Trilateral Commission, which he was invited to join through the good offices of Brzezinski. At least thirteen members of the Commission joined his government. As part of his move for national prominence, he was able to have his picture on millions of promotional magazines which TIME gave away to increase subscriptions. He also cemented relations with Griffin Bell, a prominent lawyer in Atlanta whose law firm represented large corporate clients. Bell later became Carter's Attorney General. Having started his political career as a segregationist, Carter changed radically as he moved into national politics. No doubt the shifts in the Baptist church (he taught Sunday School regularly in his hometown of Plains, Georgia) played a role in his own religious and political thought. This influence was probably secondary to the influence of his mother, who favored desegregation and an end to American apartheid. At the age of 68 she joined the Peace Corps and served in India for two years, where as a nurse she concerned herself with birth control problems. Rosalynn Smith married Jimmie Carter when she was 18. While Carter admitted to PLAYBOY magazine that sometimes he had lust in his heart, he was utterly devoted to Rosalynn Carter. They married July 7, 1946, when he was a young Annapolis graduate who was soon to become part of the world of the legendary Admiral Hyman Rickover's nuclear submarines service. Throughout their marriage Rosalynn Carter has served as an advisor to Carter. She still attends important meetings with Carter and she takes copious notes. In the White House she worked for health programs and supported the Equal rights amendment. There are four Carter
children, three men and one woman. |
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