The Carter Administration. Were you Alive?

As I ponder my European journey this weekend, I wonder what everyone will think of us NOW... OH I've been through the metal detectors before, during, and after 9/11... and it's only gotten worse from there....

Really, I say, we Like him LESS than you do.... but GW Bush = the Lee Harvey Oswald of US Presidency... let him think he's the Chief... the dumb bunny.

Which brings me to Carter, history might say, one of the worst presidents ever.... you know GW Bush Jr wont go down as the worst, he's certainly no William Henry Harrison... but still it comes back to Carter.

Carter was one of the most generous, courteous, truley religious and spiritual presidents we have ever had. His failing, he couldn't play ball with politics, and as we all know: politics trumps morality. <---

[Edited on May 17, 2004 by thefuckingdaddy]

but, in his defense, he's the best EX-president EVER!!!!!!!!

I was born Dec 15, 1980, after Reagan won the election but before he took office. So I was technically alive when Carter was president. The only really foolish mistake I think Carter made was giving away the Panama Canal. He wasn't a great president, but he wasn't awful either, not even the worst of that decade.

I also appreciate the legislation he signed to allow Cuban families with children born in the US to emigrate, which allowed my stepfather and his entire family to leave Cuba legally and gain residence in the US. I also concur that Carter has probably been the most active and effective ex-president in recent history. So, Carter's cool in my book.

For the record, I think Warren G. Harding was the worst president in US history. He treated the presidency like a corrupt CEO, and is at least partly responsible for the Great Depression. I could draw many comparisons between "Dubya" and "G".

[Edited on May 17, 2004 by AceTracer]

One interesting thing about Carter is that the hostages, and excuse my ignorance, I'm helping my friend move and too lazy to look it up, that were freed when Reagan went into office, were done so primarily on the tennents of Carter, and only done later as a discrace to cater... I would have to do some research to find the worst president... William Henry Harrison only gets the nod because he served for 30 days...

I lived through the entire Carter administration, but my first political memory was a diagram of Reagan's colon on TV.

Interesting that Bush has Colin Powell and Reagan had colon polyps.

Ford was president when I was born.

Well obviously. They released the hostages within moments of Reagan taking office, so it was basically a collective "fuck you" to Carter.

ditto

I was alive, in fact I remember when he was elected.

He came in with grand ideas, but was unable to deal with the events at hand, like the hostage crisis in Iran, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the pervasive 'stagflation' in the economy, and the rampant unemployment.

The one bright spot in his Presidency was the treaty between Begin and Sadat, but it wasn't enough to overcome all his negatives.

It wasn't his political skills that failed him, it was the lack of clear vision to back up his ideals. He won the election because he wasn't Ford, wasn't a Republican, and espoused peace as a foreign policy.

Now Kerry is in the same boat, and will probably share the same fate.

In Europe, Carter was perceived as an ineffectual dolt. Reagan was perceived as a senile puppet. Clinton was seen as a rock and roll president and Bush was seen as a village idiot (but is now seen as a warmonger).

I'm actually old enough to clearly remember Nixon's resignation

[Edited on May 17, 2004 by UpTight]

carter was inefectual, but certainly not because he was a dolt, in fact NOW, previous presidents (well, Clinton at least) have relied on him for geopolictical advice...

reagan really didn't start out as a senile puppet, but in the last few, say 7 months of office they seriously considered taking him out of office due to his senility and alsheimers... responsible for the famous, trickle-down-theory which NEVER works

bush is yes indeed an idiot, but he's far from evil... i'm one of those people that think that self agrandisement hardly ever makes one think that they are performing evil deeds, he may even think that he's the 'head whitey in charge', but that's far from the case, as soon as he was in office (and prior to, w/ planning) iraq was a major target... let him be president, and everyone else does there thing... an office full of 10 george bushes would sink in a heartbeat...

he may go down as the patsy, but certainly, he's no mastermind... i think he truly believes what he does is right, of course, our ability to judge, (and i hate to use the terms 'right and wrong') is most definitely skewed... the overwhelming egomania of going from a slipshod california governor to a world power must be immense on his pea-shaped brain.

I think you mean Texas, not California

What the fuck are you talking about? His meddling with US foreign policies he had no business in borders on treason. He reflexively seems to jump to the side of whatever adversary the United States faces. I can't believe he was actually president, but it explains a lot about what a miserable place America was in the post Watergate, post Vietnam 1970's. We had a fucking president who was ashamed of his country. The best thing about Carter is that he almost legalized pot. If some senator's wife haddn't caught her daughter toking up, pot almost certainly would have been legalized under Carter. Aside from that, I absolutely detest Carter and everything about him.

As The Simpsons said, "Jimmy Carter?!?! He's history's greatest monster!"


I was alive under Carter but too young to know much. I remember the hostages and the election.



[Edited on May 17, 2004 by stockula]

My second cousin was his mother's nurse. By everything I've ever heard he is a great guy.

Let me say this about Jimmy Carter... I still feel that he is the most honest politician to make high office in this country since Lincoln.

Regretably I believe him to be one of the least effective since before the civil war. His unwillingness to 'work the system' lead to his failure to achieve most of his promised reforms even with his party in control of both houses of congress for his entire term. At the end if his administration there were still about 1500 apointees that were never confirmed by the senate because he and Mondale were unable to get cooperation from the Democratic machine of the day.

These negative results probably contribute to many folks labelling him "incompetent."

I also disagreed with a lot of his policies but that's life in america.

yep. building houses for the homeless and espousing peace all over the world. what a bastard. and things were so much better under reagan...

*sigh*

I remember the huge inflation posters in the supermarkets during the Carter administration.

and those posters going away during the Reagan adminstration.

hmmm. i remember the unemployment queues and the deficit growing, but no posters...

oh yeah, there were pretty big warplanes and tanks coming out too.

pity we didn't make it to the space guns.

course, i was all of 8 and didn't see past my parents losing their nest eggs and all.
should've put it in an S&L, i guess...

Remember Jerry Ford's Whip Inflation Now buttons




What a joke that was!

Safeway, we did a lot of shopping at Safeway. They had big posters with current inflation rate and I think they were tieing it into a marketing campaign about your dollar going farther at Safeway. Mind your Ps and Qs.

moi? as in Pennies and Quarters? or as in watch what i'm saying?

whaaa? i'm so confused.

[Edited on May 17, 2004 by rottenart]

I was around for Carter. I remember the gas crisis and the hostage fiasco with some dim memory. I was pretty young. Most of what I know came later. I do know that he meant well and genuinely cared about the country. His downfall, as previously stated, was his inability to play politics. He just wouldn't bend on the things he believed in and they were shot down by Congress and the Senate. It's a shame.

I also agree with him being the best ex-pres ever. Anyone who can be such an amazing ambassador _and_ start Habitat for Humanity is tops in my book.

i think we've established that his major failing was his inability to play the political games required of the position. as far as his integrity goes, there's really no question. man, what a pity that the one guy in the past thirty years with honesty, charity, and decency will be remebered as a horrible president because he didn't do things the "washington way"

Not only was I alive for Jimmy Carter, I actually voted for him in 1980.

I think that he had gotten a raw deal by many because he is an outspoken liberal.

Don't forget that America was founded on the concept of free speech and Jimmy is free to say what ever he wants to. Just because you're an ex-president, that doesn't mean that you surrender your rights to free speech.