Posted on 12/22/2006 6:32:23 PM PST by Nasty McPhilthy
WASHINGTON - That is the question many prominent Democrats are asking themselves following the publication of the former president’s new book “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.” In it, Carter blames Israel for impeding peace and pro-Israel advocates in this country for unduly influencing American foreign policy.
Rightly afraid that they will lose Jewish voters — a strong base of support since the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt — Democratic leaders have criticized Carter’s assertions. But dealing with Carter will require more than news releases.
In an advertisement published in the country’s leading newspapers, the Anti-Defamation League printed statements from incoming House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Speaker of the House-elect Nancy Pelosi, and Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean.
Conyers called the book “offensive and wrong,” Pelosi said that, “it is wrong to suggest that the Jewish people would support a government in Israel or anywhere else that institutionalizes ethnically based oppression” and Dean said that “on this issue President Carter speaks for himself, the opinions in his book are his own, they are not the views or position of the Democratic Party.” Yet Dean also couched his criticism by making it clear that “I have tremendous respect for former President Carter.”
This equivocation — that Dean could still have “tremendous respect” for a former president who has used his position, repeatedly, to smear the Jewish state — is what will prove troublesome for Democrats in the months and years to come. Will the Democrats give Carter a prime speaking opportunity at their upcoming presidential convention, as is traditional for former presidents? Recall the 2004 Democratic Convention in Boston, when Carter spent the evening, very publicly, sitting next to Michael Moore.
He may be 82 years old, but Carter is not the sort of man who will go away quietly. Ever since leaving office, he has shown a disregard for protocol in carrying out his own independent foreign policy, often at odds with the actual, elected leader of the country.
In 1994, he defied fellow Democratic President Bill Clinton when he visited then-North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung. The president of South Korea deemed the meeting “ill-timed” and said that it gave cover to the North Koreans and encouraged them to continue their “stalling tactics” on nuclear proliferation. One Clinton administration official said that Carter’s foiling State Department efforts in the region was “near traitorous.”
Carter has made the familiar assertion that critics of Israel cannot get a fair hearing in the United States. “Because of powerful political, economic and religious forces in the U.S.,” he writes, “Israeli government decisions are rarely questioned or condemned, voices from Jerusalem dominate our media and most American citizens are unaware of circumstances in the occupied territories.” Yet that lie was quickly and embarrassingly exposed when prominent Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz offered Carter the opportunity to debate and Carter refused.
Since the end of his ignominious presidency, Carter has made a career of coddling the world’s despots, from Robert Mugabe to the dreadful North Korean father and son to Fidel Castro and Yassir Arafat.
Oddly, this was the same president who announced that under his watch, American foreign policy would place a higher priority on human rights. Democrats who support the state of Israel might want to start questioning their leaders about how they will deal with the problem of Jimmy Carter.
bookmark
Couldn't agree more. Well stated. It does seem the vile humans live forever.
"Carter is a pathetic little puke"
That's as accurate a description of Jimmy as I've ever seen. But, I don't think that he became a "pathetic little puke" because of his failed Presidency -- he was a pathetic little puke even before he failed as President.
That means no one is criticizing you.
bump
I'll go out on a limb here and suggest that 99.9% of Americans are blissfully unaware of Jimmy Carter's book and any controversy attached to it.
Sometimes I think that it is we, the blogophiles,that seem to be living in a bubble...a very complex bubble, but a bubble nonetheless.
Well, the first time I knew about the book was when I saw it in my local SUPERMARKET! (Just published - not in a remainder bin - at Stop & Shop, which has 360 stores in the Northeast.) I figure other supermarkets that carry books are also carrying this tome. So a lot of people will see it...
Car... ter... makes..me... LAUGH! La la la laa...
We in the GOP learned a nasty lesson. I hope we learned it. The voting starts right here at home. Grass roots.
If we can not get out and get the vote we will not survive.
We need for the GOP to get out, canvass the vote, and get voters to participate.
We, the GOP did not lose the last election. We gave it away.
In 08 we all need to grab 2 neighbors and take them to the polls with us. Take it back and regain common sense.
And as I tell a friend who is the DNC chairman here. "Vote early and vote often " (only kidding) I hope I don't get indicted
I had similar thoughts while watching Carter during the funeral observances for President Reagan. It was obviously eating him up inside to see that outpouring of love and respect from millions of Americans for Reagan.
Carter's treasonous behavior derives from the fact that he actually hates his country and its people, for rejecting HIM. His legacy is secure - he will be remembered as the first anti-American ex-President.
"How do Democrats solve their Jimmy Carter problem"?
...uhhh, shoot him? With a nail gun?
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Hillary will take care of the problem before giving her acceptance speech at the convention. Count on it.
There is a way to do it, but it's a felony under federal law if they get caught.
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