Jimmy Carter

My memory is that there was some of that, but also that he brought in a contingent of people from Atlanta instead of filling slots with Washington insiders. That hacked the establishment guys off. Some of the guys he brought in had pretty sharp elbows and were not shy about being disdainful in the press, thinking Hamilton Jordan in particular. Basically they got off on the wrong foot early quite enthusiastically and the insiders left them to twist in the wind instead of helping get things done.

I really need to read up on his Presidency, I was young and not paying close attention.

 

I think you're right on Truman being in office when the Shah was installed. Certainty the CIA interfering in foreign elections to install brutal despots, as long as they were "anti-communist" was a truly bipartisan effort spread over many decades.

 

The CIA-engineered overthrow of Mossadegh happened in 1953 under Eisenhower. Pahlavi took the throne as Shah in 1941 (FDR was president) but the real power was with the parliament and the prime minister. He didn’t take real political control until the 1953 CIA coup. Then he served US interests over the next 25 years while running a repressive regime that led to Khomeini and the revolution.

 

Never forget that Carter was on the path to getting a portion of what Obamacare provided thirty years before, only to see Teddy Kennedy burn the whole thing down because he couldn’t get everything he wanted and wanted to defeat Carter in the primary.

It would’ve been a lasting accomplishment that got taken from him.

 

And that sentiment is why we have Putin.

Yeltsin's prime minister Yevgeny Primakov wanted to bring back some government regulation to a wild-west economy run amok in the late 1990s. But that sounded too much like "Commumism!" to the US, so he was sacked. Next man up? Putin.

 

I haven't read it yet, but Kai Bird wrote the most recent one. And since he cowrote the classic Oppenheimer bio, I'm sure it's good.

One of Carter's staffers, Stu Eizenstat, published a recent, and mammoth tome on his presidency. That I have read and it is very good.

 

When I was a kid, long ago, the schoolbooks ranked presidents as 'below average,' 'average,' 'good' or 'very good.'

Carter's was a completely average presidency. Not the disaster the boobs and ideologues make it out to be.

Too honest for his own good. Inherited Nixon's economy and Eisenhower's coup.

An average president. A great man.

 

Definitely better than the last guy.

 

Russia is why we have Putin.

Russia is why we have Putin still.

 

In little more than two decades we've gone from a position of energy independence to one in which almost half the oil we use comes from foreign countries, at prices that are going through the roof. Our excessive dependence on OPEC has already taken a tremendous toll on our economy and our people. This is the direct cause of the long lines which have made millions of you spend aggravating hours waiting for gasoline. It's a cause of the increased inflation and unemployment that we now face. This intolerable dependence on foreign oil threatens our economic independence and the very security of our nation. The energy crisis is real. It is worldwide. It is a clear and present danger to our nation. These are facts and we simply must face them.

What I have to say to you now about energy is simple and vitally important.

Point one: I am tonight setting a clear goal for the energy policy of the United States. Beginning this moment, this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977 -- never. From now on, every new addition to our demand for energy will be met from our own production and our own conservation. The generation-long growth in our dependence on foreign oil will be stopped dead in its tracks right now and then reversed as we move through the 1980s, for I am tonight setting the further goal of cutting our dependence on foreign oil by one-half by the end of the next decade -- a saving of over 4-1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day.

Point two: To ensure that we meet these targets, I will use my presidential authority to set import quotas. I'm announcing tonight that for 1979 and 1980, I will forbid the entry into this country of one drop of foreign oil more than these goals allow. These quotas will ensure a reduction in imports even below the ambitious levels we set at the recent Tokyo summit.

Point three: To give us energy security, I am asking for the most massive peacetime commitment of funds and resources in our nation's history to develop America's own alternative sources of fuel -- from coal, from oil shale, from plant products for gasohol, from unconventional gas, from the sun.

I propose the creation of an energy security corporation to lead this effort to replace 2-1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day by 1990. The corporation I will issue up to $5 billion in energy bonds, and I especially want them to be in small denominations so that average Americans can invest directly in America's energy security.

Just as a similar synthetic rubber corporation helped us win World War II, so will we mobilize American determination and ability to win the energy war. Moreover, I will soon submit legislation to Congress calling for the creation of this nation's first solar bank, which will help us achieve the crucial goal of 20 percent of our energy coming from solar power by the year 2000.

 

Only if enough of us listened…