Bunny Wunny Jimmy Carter Goes After Dead Ted Kennedy

We have learned from a reliable source that any day now, we can expect Jimmy Carter to attack the late Shah of Iran for getting cancer and losing control of Iran and dying. The selfish act by the Shah caused Jimmy pain and grief and cost him to be denied his second term to the rascally rabbit and coincidentally dead Ronald Reagan.

Carter, the decisive, a peanut of a president, rabbit fighter and large thinker that he is will soon be going on a book tour. The gift that keeps on giving.

_______________



SEPTEMBER 16, 2010, 7:08 PM ET
Carter Criticizes Kennedy Over Health Care

By Mary Lu Carnevale WSJ

Former President Jimmy Carter sharply criticized the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, saying the Democratic icon, lionized for his career-long advocacy of health care for all Americans, actually delayed that goal by 30 years.

In an interview to be aired on CBS’s “60 Minutes, Carter tells reporter Leslie Stahl that “we would have had comprehensive health care now, had it not been for Ted Kennedy’s deliberately blocking the legislation that I proposed. It was his fault. Ted Kennedy killed the bill,” according to CBS.

He goes on to say Kennedy then challenged him in his 1980 re-election bid because, “He did not want to see me have a major success in that realm of life.”

Kennedy, one of the leading advocates for this year’s health care bill, died of a brain tumor before the sweeping overhaul was enacted in March. As he signed the bill, President Barack Obama honored Kennedy by wearing a blue “TedStrong” wristband. The new law, with a big price tag and requirement that most people must have insurance coverage, has now become an issue in the midterm elections.

Carter is getting ready to launch a new book, “White House Diary,” which is being released Monday by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. In an excerpt provided CBS, Carter writes: “Kennedy continuing his irresponsible and abusive attitude, immediately condemning our health plan. He couldn’t get five votes for his plan.”

Kennedy, too, had written about the clash with Carter – but saw it quite differently. In a July 18, 2009 article in Newsweek, Kennedy blamed Carter. “I tried to negotiate an agreement with President Carter but became frustrated when he decided that he’d rather take a piecemeal approach,” Kennedy wrote. “I ran against Carter, a sitting president from my own party, in large part because of this disagreement. Health reform became central to my 1980 presidential campaign: I argued then that the issue wasn’t just coverage but also out-of-control costs that would ultimately break both family and federal budgets, and increasingly burden the national economy.”

The Carter Center Knows Best.

"On the way home from monitoring the Nepalese election, I, my wife and my son went to Israel. My goal was to learn as much as possible to assist in the faltering peace initiative endorsed by President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice."

Most Presidents, at the end of their terms, are pleased to return to privacy. Few become addicted to celebrity. I doubt we will hear much from George Bush as we didn't from his father and for that matter Reagan, Ford, Nixon, Johnson, Eisenhower and Truman. Then there is Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.

Neither Clinton or Carter seem capable of exiting stage left. Clinton needs the light and Carter fears the darkness. Carter cannot accept the fact that he is not needed, and not invited. He also has devolved into that weird Bob Dole state of referring to himself in the third-party. With Carter it is "the Carter Center". I guess that is the point; Carter being in the Center.

Here's Jimmy:

____________

Pariah Diplomacy

By JIMMY CARTER
Published: April 28, 2008

A COUNTERPRODUCTIVE Washington policy in recent years has been to boycott and punish political factions or governments that refuse to accept United States mandates. This policy makes difficult the possibility that such leaders might moderate their policies.

Two notable examples are in Nepal and the Middle East. About 12 years ago, Maoist guerrillas took up arms in an effort to overthrow the monarchy and change the nation’s political and social life. Although the United States declared the revolutionaries to be terrorists, the Carter Center agreed to help mediate among the three major factions: the royal family, the old-line political parties and the Maoists.

In 2006, six months after the oppressive monarch was stripped of his powers, a cease-fire was signed. Maoist combatants laid down their arms and Nepalese troops agreed to remain in their barracks. Our center continued its involvement and nations — though not the United States — and international organizations began working with all parties to reconcile the dispute and organize elections.

The Maoists are succeeding in achieving their major goals: abolishing the monarchy, establishing a democratic republic and ending discrimination against untouchables and others whose citizenship rights were historically abridged. After a surprising victory in the April 10 election, Maoists will play a major role in writing a constitution and governing for about two years. To the United States, they are still terrorists.

On the way home from monitoring the Nepalese election, I, my wife and my son went to Israel. My goal was to learn as much as possible to assist in the faltering peace initiative endorsed by President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Although I knew that official United States policy was to boycott the government of Syria and leaders of Hamas, I did not receive any negative or cautionary messages about the trip, except that it might be dangerous to visit Gaza.

The Carter Center had monitored three Palestinian elections, including one for parliamentary seats in January 2006. Hamas had prevailed in several municipal contests, gained a reputation for effective and honest administration and did surprisingly well in the legislative race, displacing the ruling party, Fatah. As victors, Hamas proposed a unity government with Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah as president and offered to give key ministries to Fatah, including that of foreign affairs and finance.

Hamas had been declared a terrorist organization by the United States and Israel, and the elected Palestinian government was forced to dissolve. Eventually, Hamas gained control of Gaza, and Fatah is “governing” the Israeli-dominated West Bank. Opinion polls show Hamas steadily gaining popularity. Since there can be no peace with Palestinians divided, we at the Carter Center believed it important to explore conditions allowing Hamas to be brought peacefully back into the discussions. (A recent poll of Israelis, who are familiar with this history, showed 64 percent favored direct talks between Israel and Hamas.)

Similarly, Israel cannot gain peace with Syria unless the Golan Heights dispute is resolved. Here again, United States policy is to ostracize the Syrian government and prevent bilateral peace talks, contrary to the desire of high Israeli officials.

We met with Hamas leaders from Gaza, the West Bank and Syria, and after two days of intense discussions with one another they gave these official responses to our suggestions, intended to enhance prospects for peace:

• Hamas will accept any agreement negotiated by Mr. Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel provided it is approved either in a Palestinian referendum or by an elected government. Hamas’s leader, Khaled Meshal, has reconfirmed this, although some subordinates have denied it to the press.

• When the time comes, Hamas will accept the possibility of forming a nonpartisan professional government of technocrats to govern until the next elections can be held.

• Hamas will also disband its militia in Gaza if a nonpartisan professional security force can be formed.

• Hamas will permit an Israeli soldier captured by Palestinian militants in 2006, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, to send a letter to his parents. If Israel agrees to a list of prisoners to be exchanged, and the first group is released, Corporal Shalit will be sent to Egypt, pending the final releases.

• Hamas will accept a mutual cease-fire in Gaza, with the expectation (not requirement) that this would later include the West Bank.

• Hamas will accept international control of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, provided the Egyptians and not the Israelis control closing the gates.

In addition, Syria’s president, Bashir al-Assad, has expressed eagerness to begin negotiations with Israel to end the impasse on the Golan Heights. He asks only that the United States be involved and that the peace talks be made public.

Through more official consultations with these outlawed leaders, it may yet be possible to revive and expedite the stalemated peace talks between Israel and its neighbors. In the Middle East, as in Nepal, the path to peace lies in negotiation, not in isolation.

Why are we not getting Carter's advice on Iran? He usually has more to say.

Carter's hand still felt in Iran
Last Updated:March 26. 2007 11:00PM
Published: March 27. 2007 3:30AM
Times Daily

Where is Jimmy Carter when we need him the most? The former president who has spent his post-White House years giving his successors the benefit of his foreign policy expertise whether they wanted it or not, has been curiously reticent when it comes to Iran. After all, no U. S. president past or present has more experience with the Persian menace than Carter.

The latest U.N. sanctions against Iran for its determination to enrich uranium with the quite obvious goal of becoming a nuclear power mark almost 30 years of unsuccessful efforts by the civilized world to control a radical rogue regime that got its start because of Carter's misguided policies.

In fairness, however, the former peanut farmer's mistakes were compounded by the tunnel vision of several other administrations that focused unswervingly on Saddam Hussein, whom we now know was merely a loud mouthed con artist when it came to international dealings and a vicious thug and bully at home.

George W. Bush's willingness to accept the fiction of Iraq's secret efforts to build weapons of mass destruction, as Oliver Hardy used to say, has gotten us into another fine mess, while the Iranians clapped their hands in glee over the demise of their Sunni enemy and the installation of a pro-Iranian government in Baghdad. While Saddam's efforts to develop WMDs turned out to be so clandestine that even he didn't know about them, the Iranians were on the road to the real thing.

It is now hard to believe that these new sanctions imposed unanimously by the U.N. Security Council will have the impact intended. The Iranians are nothing if not resilient and stubborn and hard nosed when it comes to dealing with the West. Their apprehension of 15 British sailors and marines in Iraqi waters is a case in point. They also realize that the super powered United States is in no position to do much more than call them names like "evil,'' strained as its military is with the twin problems of Iraq and Afghanistan. Certainly, no one else, including the Russians, is about to back up the tough language-militarily.

The real laugh in all this, of course, is the constant insistence by Internet dummies that an invasion of Iran is next on the Bush agenda and that such an action is imminent. Invade with what? U.S. forces are so depleted in men and materiel that they would have a tough time staging a successful landing on Granada (anyway, we've already done that). Oh sure, we could bust Tehran with a hydrogen bomb and set off a chain reaction of death and destruction unlike the world has ever seen. But get serious.

There was a time, of course, when the threat to level the Iranian capital, backed up with the righteousness of a country whose sovereignty had been violated, might have nipped all this in the bud. But that was when the religious fanatics broke into our embassy and held Americans hostage for more than a year while Carter dithered, something he did a lot of despite his Naval Academy education. Not to open old wounds, but as a lesson for those who don't subscribe to the past is prologue concept, it was Carter's decision to pull the rug out from America's longtime ally in Iran, the shah, and clear the way for a religious zealot with 11th century ideas, that started us on the road here in the first place.

Carter then reinforced growing Iranian dislike for American infidels by permitting the shah to receive medical treatment in the United States although he had been warned of the consequences. This led to the embassy invasion and his decision to use such powerful negotiators as his onetime baggage hauler and then White House chief of staff, Hamilton Jordan, in unsuccessfully trying to free the hostages. Brilliant.

It has been all down hill for the United States in this area since. Ronald Reagan, pressured by the relatives of other victims kidnapped with the backing of Tehran, became embroiled in the Iran Contra nightmare and the first George Bush set the stage for the second's actions by kicking Saddam out of Kuwait in Desert Storm, then wisely withdrawing sooner than some would have liked. We knew then how light a threat Saddam was, but Bill Clinton nurtured the strength illusion.

So, pinning much hope on the economic sanctions is probably unwise. The entire Middle East has been so destabilized by the mess in Iraq that to contemplate what might occur next is an exercise in depression. The radical Persians want to fill the power void and are well on their way to doing so. They really should thank Carter.

Dan Thomasson writes for Scripps Howard News Service.