Jimmy Carter’s
Legacy
Jim Kavanagh
I was part of the Carter Center’s election observation missions
in Palestine (1996 & 2006) and Nigeria (1999), and I met Jimmy Carter
personally. He was, in all my interactions with him, a very nice man. He
impressed me as sincere in his humanistic Christianity and, above all, in his love
and respect for his wife, Rosalynn. There were a lot of problems in the
1996 Palestinian election that caused many of us to urge him not to make a
statement flatly endorsing it as “free and fair,” and it was Rosalynn who
successfully insisted that he make a more nuanced statement,
incorporating our concerns. That relationship with Rosalynn, along with his
surprising passion for wild turkey hunting (I mean going on about it at
great length and in great detail) certainly humanized him for me.
Of course, personal impressions do not determine political
effects. On the occasion of his death, Carter is best known by most Americans
for his "post-presidency,” which shines in contrast with the self-enrichment
and self-aggrandizement of other ex-presidents. Foregoing vanity “library” projects and
collections of six-figure speaking fees in favor of physical labor for Habit for
Humanity, respected international election and health work via the Carter
Center (the latter less well-known but central to its mission), speaking forthrightly
about Israeli apartheid, and meeting with Palestinian resistance groups like
Hamas made him into our most admired ex-president.
His relative honesty about Palestine-Israel is the strongest lingering “political” trait associated with him, and one for which he was shunned by the Democratic Party, including Obama, who forbade him from speaking at the 2008 Democratic convention on the advice of Alan Dershowitz—though you’re not likely to hear that during the liberal mainstream media encomia today. Nor are you likely to hear much about his accurately describing the U.S. as an “oligarchy with unlimited bribery.”
