Our best former president
When Jimmy Carter criticized President Bush last week, I was ready to lay in. Carter's assertion that Bush's presidency was perhaps the worst in history struck me as ridiculously stupid, even for someone as historically short-sighted as Carter.
At first, I planned to write a post which would boil down to saying that in Carter's defense, he does know something about being a miserable president.
Still, I keep going back to a conversation I had some years ago with someone who repeated the old, tired line about Carter being a great ex-president.
Carter is, by most accounts, a charitable man, one who has worked to build houses for the needy.
But is that all one has to do to be a good ex-president? More to the point, is that what it takes to be the best?
I knew I could write something, but decided to wait. Christopher Hitchens was bound to write something. And when he did, I knew not only that it would be better than anything I could write, but that I'd post it.
Still, for those who insist Carter is a great ex-president, here is a specific counterpoint involving the first Gulf War:
Many people in retrospect think Bush did a good job in assembling a large multinational coalition, under U.N. auspices, for the emancipation of Kuwait from Iraqi occupation. But Jimmy Carter used his prestige, at that uneasy moment, to make an open appeal to all governments not to join that coalition. He went public to oppose the settled policy of Congress and the declared resolutions of the United Nations and to denounce his own country as the warmonger. And, after all, why not? It was he who had created the conditions for the Gulf crisis in the first place—initially by fawning on the shah of Iran and then, when that option collapsed, by encouraging Saddam Hussein to invade Iran and by "tilting" American policy to his side.
My opinion on those who call Carter the greatest ex-president is that they are simply repeating a phrase. If someone says something wrong once, it's a joke. Twice and it's an odd opinion. Three times and they can teach it as history.
But I can't tell you who started this nonsense. My theory is someone came to the realization that no matter how much time passed, and no matter how old and grandfather-like Carter got, no one was ever going to consider him anything better than a miserable failure in the Oval Office.
So that person decided to create a new title for him: Best Ex-President (or Best Former President, if you prefer).
It's a title that has served Carter well. It has helped people forget the type of president he was.
Luckily for us, almost every time the man opens his mouth, he reminds us.