I think the decline America is experiencing now is even deeper, more precipitous than what we suffered under Carter. The big difference is that our enemies don’t even have to take advantage of the weakness; they just have to sit back and let the 0bama cancer continue to do its work. One day the wind will blow a little bit harder and the termite-riddled house will come down around us.
Exposure to the relatively benign Cowpox prevented people from getting Smallpox. The best thing about Obama is he and everybody around him are complete clowns. They may be the political equivalent of Cowpox. Now a full-on dose of Stalin and Lenin would be a societal dose of Smallpox. We probably have gotten off light. We’ll have some bad scars but the body politic will survive and have a stronger immune system. (I prefer this scenario over the OHMYGODWE’RE ALLGONNADIE! scenario.)
I've given this very thing a lot of thought. Things to ponder when I can't sleep at 3am...
I think that things under Carter were likely worse, but we were (obviously) able to recover from them. However, I think that things under BO will be un-recoverable because our "Wonderfully Diverse" nation is a both whole lot more fractured, and worse off financially. So, we may not have hit bottom yet, and we'll be a long time (if ever) climbing out of this hole.
Just my $0.02. YMMV.