Posted on 12/04/2006 11:53:11 AM PST by reprobate
It seems Jimmy has a past. Read on.
Yarbrough: Sanders led Georgia through trying times | | Story updated at 2:03 AM on Saturday, December 2, 2006
Dick Yarbrough
Two significant developments came out of Carl Sanders' race for governor of Georgia against Jimmy Carter in 1970. First, unlike Carter, Sanders refused to compromise his principles in order to get elected. Second, once the election was over, the former governor decided to leave the political arena and devote himself to building his law practice. Today, Troutman Sanders, which he serves as chairman emeritus, is one of the 100 largest law firms in the United States, with more than 650 attorneys. Sanders has done well.
At a recent lunch, Sanders was reluctant to get into the details of his defeat by Carter, saying simply, "The thought process I went through in every campaign I ever ran was to focus my energy on talking about education and things that were needed in my district or in the state. I always assumed that if I worked hard enough, my opponent would not be able to beat me using race, but Jimmy Carter effectively used the issue to drive a wedge between the races."
The dirty tricks he endured included a picture widely circulated in South Georgia showing Sanders, a part owner of the Atlanta Hawks professional basketball team at the time, celebrating a victory with his arms around Joe Caldwell, a black player.
Carter and his apologists have long denied any culpability, but veteran political columnist Bill Shipp told me he saw Bill Pope, Carter's press secretary, hand out leaflets with the photograph at a Ku Klux Klan rally.
Dot Wood, a good friend and former vice president of Gerald Rafshoon Advertising, which handled Carter's media, confirms the story and said she saw boxes of the leaflets in the office. Mysterious leaflets also criticized Sanders for attending the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr. Carter made a point to say that he did not attend. (Aside: Remember Carter's sanctimonious performance at Coretta Scott King's funeral?)
Carter, by the way, got only 5 percent of the black vote in the campaign.
During the campaign, Carter also criticized Sanders for his support of then-President Lyndon B. Johnson. "I did support LBJ," Sanders said, "because he had given Lockheed one of the largest orders ever for C-5 airplanes and a lot of money for rural development in Georgia, and I wasn't going to turn my back on him after what he had done for the people of Georgia."
In his biography of Sanders, author Jim Cooke says Sanders underestimated Carter and thought people would see through Carter's facade of portraying himself as a George Wallace-styled redneck. He refused his staff's recommendations to fight back until it was too late, and Carter was elected governor. Of course, once elected, Carter changed his tune, severely disappointing the arch-segregationists who had supported him.
If you want to judge Carter's gubernatorial campaign for yourself, be prepared to wait. It seems that the papers from that campaign reside at the Carter Center and have not been "processed." Call me naive, but I don't think he and his apologists are anxious for you to see them. I can understand why. His image is bad enough. Why make it worse?
Carter's hypocrisy evidently knows no bounds. After a dinner for former governors at the Governor's Mansion, Carter told the news media he owed much to Sanders for making Georgia such a progressive state, and also talked about how much that image helped him in his presidential campaign.
Pondering that comment, Sanders just shakes his head and smiles.
I asked Sanders how he would like to be remembered by future generations. He thought for a moment and said, "I would like to be remembered for playing the game of politics fair and square, for having made a contribution to my state and for leaving Georgia better than I found it."
I couldn't have said it better. Sanders' leadership pulled Georgia through one of the most difficult periods in its history, and he left the state much better than he found it. Most importantly, he did it with integrity. The man is a class act.
• Reach Dick Yarbrough at P.O. Box 725373, Atlanta, GA 31139, or send e-mail to yarb2400@bellsouth.net.
Published in the Athens Banner-Herald on 120206
Worst President Ever
***
Clinton comes close.
Thanks for the post, I sent a copy to Chris Matthews, whom, I am confident will be outraged (again) at the use of racism in southern politics.
Carter is a pathetic old man. No doubt he is intensely bitter about having lost to Reagan.
***
It's sad because he could have redeemed himself -- even Nixon, toward the end of his life, became the go-to guy on foreign affairs, particularly China. But not Carter.
The highest rank President Peanut reached was Lieutenant. He was never a sub commander. He was in training to be an engineering officer when he resigned from the Navy.
Source: http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq60-14.htm
FDR insisted on making Henry Wallace VP for his third term. By the spring of 1944 FDR's health was so bad he could have died at any time...if he had died before the election Wallace might have been elected for a full term of his own, and there would have been no attempt to restrain the Soviets. Whatever Truman's shortcomings, we could have had someone much worse in place.
Wow!
I was in college during the Truman administration. I opposed him, although I wasn't yet old enough to vote. However, as his term went on, I came to the conclusion that he wasn't as bad as I had first thought. In retrospect, he looks a lot better than Carter, LBJ, or even Kennedy.
And it's a tie for the worst ex-president. He and Bubba are neck and neck.
The thing that gets me is that Jimmy C proposes to be Christian and yet he stands for terrorists and vilifies hiw own country & is such a blatant racist- all things that God obviously doesn't approve of- Either Jimmy is lying about his salvation, or he went so far astray that God finally handed him over to his sin. http://sacredscoop.com
I went to that u Tube video and started to play it and couldn't even look at that man's face.
turned it off.
sorry excuse for a human being, much less a former President.
Oblique, hardly worth a glance ping.
Reckon be bout the same number that consider JFK a Civil Rights Hero, when he voted with the Jim Crow bloc for 20 years.
fore
Jimmy looks like the Evil Emperor in Star Wars!
I can't speak to Buchanan's presidency but I believe all the others (Bubba included) had some positive accomplishments as well as the troubles you mention. Carter on the other hand is credited with one accomplishment, that being the Camp David Accord. However, IMO that credit should be directed towards Sadat.
Buchanan had the Dred Scott Decision....and didn't have much responsibility for that.
At a recent lunch, Sanders was reluctant to get into the details of his defeat by Carter, saying simply, "The thought process I went through in every campaign I ever ran was to focus my energy on talking about education and things that were needed in my district or in the state. I always assumed that if I worked hard enough, my opponent would not be able to beat me using race, but Jimmy Carter effectively used the issue to drive a wedge between the races." The dirty tricks he endured included a picture widely circulated in South Georgia showing Sanders, a part owner of the Atlanta Hawks professional basketball team at the time, celebrating a victory with his arms around Joe Caldwell, a black player. Carter and his apologists have long denied any culpability, but veteran political columnist Bill Shipp told me he saw Bill Pope, Carter's press secretary, hand out leaflets with the photograph at a Ku Klux Klan rally... Mysterious leaflets also criticized Sanders for attending the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr. Carter made a point to say that he did not attend... Carter, by the way, got only 5 percent of the black vote in the campaign.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.