Jimmy Carter: A National Disgrace
Former President Jimmy Carter once again embarrassed himself, and frankly, the nation last week. Stretching way into the deck to play the race card over Congressman Joe Wilson’s “You lie” remark, Carter said, “I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he’s African-American.” And this pearl of wisdom as he continued, ”I live in the South, and I’ve seen the South come a long way, and I’ve seen the rest of the country that shares the South’s attitude toward minority groups at that time, particularly African-Americans.”"I think it’s based on racism,” Carter said at a town hall held at his presidential center in Atlanta. “There is an inherent feeling among many in this country that an African-American should not be president.”
Well Mr. Carter, I live in the south, too, and I say you are just a clueless old man who should go back to peanut farming since you apparently have nothing intelligent to say. There is an “inherent feeling” among anybody with an IQ in triple digits that you should just shut up. I apologize to the Office of the Presidency for that language, but I just can’t muster any respect for a lying race baiter. There is absolutley no evidence that Wilson’s comment had anything whatsoever to do with race. Nor is the national opposition to Obama’s heath care proposals based on race. It’s based on a belief that nationalization of health care is a bad idea. I was against it when Hillary tried it in the early nineties, too. Was I racist then? Mr. Carter continues to proudly display his incompetence and irrelevance for all to see.
I get so sick of this disengenuous garbage from people like Carter when they imply that conservatives in general and Republicans specifically are racist. Maybe it’s time for a little history lesson for the former president.
In 1964, it took the leadership of Republican Minority Leader Everett Dirksen to break the Democratic filibuster of the 1964 Civil Rights Bill. That filibuster was led by current Democrat Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia, and then Democrat Senator Al Gore Sr. of Tennessee. In the Senate, only six Republicans voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act, compared to twenty-one Democrats in opposition. In the House, 40% of the Democrats opposed the Civil Rights Act, while only 20% of Republicans opposed it. And yes, that would be the same Democrat Senator Byrd who was a proud former member of the KKK.
Were Republicans racist when they named the first two black Secretaries of State, Powell and then Rice, to office? Were they racist when they put the first black Supreme Court Justice, Clarence Thomas, in place? Would it be fair to say the Democrats were racist when they publicly and unjustifiably vilified Justice Thomas and his family? I make no such claim, but I have no doubt it would have been claimed by the Democrats had the roles been reversed. Does the average liberal genius Democrat out there even know that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican?
Was Democrat former President Clinton racist when he said that William Fulbright was a visionary and was a hero to him? Fulbright was a vehement segregationalist and was one of the Democrats opposed to the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
Carter’s own abysmal record on things racial brings into question his standing to criticize anyone regarding such issues. When Carter returned to Georgia after his Navy tour, he became a member of the Sumter County School Board. As documented in the National review Online (Sep. 18, 2009) “Laughlin McDonald, director of the ACLU’s Voting Project, relates in his book A Voting Rights Odyssey: Black Enfranchisement in Georgia, Carter’s board tried to stop the construction of a new “Elementary Negro School” in 1956. Local white citizens had complained that the school would be “too close” to a white school. As a result, “the children, both colored and white, would have to travel the same streets and roads in order to reach their respective schools.” The prospect of black and white children commingling on the streets on their way to school was apparently so horrible to Carter that he requested that the state school board stop construction of the black school until a new site could be found. The state board turned down Carter’s request because of “the staggering cost.” Carter and the rest of the Sumter County School Board then reassured parents at a meeting on October 5, 1956, that the board “would do everything in its power to minimize simultaneous traffic between white and colored students in route to and from school.”
And this from noted Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz in Frontpage Magazine, April 27, 2007, “If he who pays the piper calls the tune, then Carter’s off-key tunes have been called by his Saudi Arabian paymasters. It pains me to say this, but I now believe that there is no person in American public life today who has a lower ratio of real to apparent integrity than Jimmy Carter. The public perception of his integrity is extraordinarily high. His real integrity, it now turns out, is extraordinarily low. He is no better than so many former American politicians who, after leaving public life, sell themselves to the highest bidder and become lobbyists for despicable causes. That is now Jimmy Carter’s sad legacy.”
Carter had a cozy, personal relationship with former Palestinian dictator Yassir Arafat. In fact, he seems to have some affinity for thug dictators around the world, chumming with the likes of Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein, former Yugoslav strongman Marshal Josef Tito, former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu, former Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos, former Pakistani General Zia ul-Haq, former North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung and now his son Kim Jong Il, among others. His anti-Israel positions are well documented, including in his own book, “Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid.” As an author, Mr. Carter has the dubious distinction of having his book an the must read list of none other than Osama bin Laden.
Jimmy Carter is widely accepted as the worst U.S. President ever. His attempts at Middle East peace were jokes to everyone except him and the Nobel prize committee. His term was a disaster, and he went downhill from there. He has no credibility to be critical of anyone regarding race relations, or frankly, anything else. Just retire already.
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