PowerSwitch

'We never dropped a bomb. We never fired a bullet. We never went to war'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/se ... -interview

Somewhat more kindly than the bunch of ******* that followed I think.

A good interview. He sounds like a good man.

Thanks for posting it.

Carter was one of America's best recent-era presidents.

This is a pertinent paragraph:

In the heavyweight journal Foreign Policy, Walter Russell Mead coined a phrase to characterise what he suggested was hampering President Obama's presidency: the Carter Syndrome. The "conflicting impulses influencing how this young leader thinks about the world threaten to tear his presidency apart. And in the worst scenario turn him into a new Jimmy Carter."

While ever money elects governments, this will be true.

emordnilap wrote:Carter was one of America's best recent-era presidents.

... And, sadly, probably the most ineffectual. Idealism, honesty and intelligence don't stand a chance against the stupidity of the public and the nefariousness of vested interests.

Still, I take heart that people like him exist!

Oh Yeah eighteen percent inflation and markets in chaos. Best president ever??
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... 54,00.html

Well, lots of Yanks can't understand why Thatcher is loathed by the vast (powerless) majority over here, many Russians can't understand why Gorbachov is regarded as a great statesman in the West. Counterfactual of course, but I reckon the world would have been a very different place if the US Embassy debacle in Tehran hadn't happened.

On a side note, I once commented to a girlfriend "Oh the Iranian Revolution - you're too young to remember it" She replied "Actually the RAF airlifted us out of Tehran".

featherstick wrote:Counterfactual of course, but I reckon the world would have been a very different place if the US Embassy debacle in Tehran hadn't happened.

For the want of one helicopter, the world might have been a very different place,


Peter.

vtsnowedin wrote: Oh Yeah eighteen percent inflation and markets in chaos. Best president ever??
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... 54,00.html

Oh, sorry, I didn't realise such stuff had only happened during his tenure.

emordnilap wrote:

vtsnowedin wrote: Oh Yeah eighteen percent inflation and markets in chaos. Best president ever??
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... 54,00.html

Oh, sorry, I didn't realise such stuff had only happened during his tenure.

Apology accepted.
I do think he holds the record for post war and post gold standard misery index.
He may be soon surpassed though as both the present administration and the contenders for replacing it ,all appear to be incompetent.

Carter was a very flawed president:

His handling of Iran was awful (although the Reagon-bush covert negiotations can explain in part the failure of the embassy issue)

His handling of the economy was beyond bad.

Some of his energy ideas were sound but he totally failed to get the people on side. You can argue that it was doomed from the begining, but just maybe with a better president who could communicate to the US public some of those good 70's green ideas could have survived into the 80s.

After all, Reagon (the Great Communicator) survived those intital few years of economic 'tough love' as he succeeded in destroying double digit inflation, even though recession and unemployment in the short-term soared.

Imagine those kind of political skills used to sell solar panels and a big generational investment in alt tech?

(tries to imagine Reagan selling solar panels...head explodes )

RenewableCandy wrote:(tries to imagine Reagan selling solar panels...head explodes )

Now now don't get your panties in a bunch. The Gipper spent a lot of time on the TV hosting a show for a major supplier of appliances that used the new fangled electricity.
He was a very good salesman and has been said to be able to persuade a Nun into out of wedlock pregnancy!!!.