2008 Woodie Awards
Carter's words ring loud and clear
Rodney Wren
Issue date: 10/6/06 Section: Opinion
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Want to know where the Democrat Party stands and where America would be under their leadership? Just ask former President Jimmy Carter.
Carter is certainly not bashful about bashing the United States, even on foreign soil or to the foreign press. He sat for an interview with Der Spiegel, a German news magazine, in August and fired with both barrels at President Bush, "fundamentalist" Christians, and Israel.
The question is, do Carter's views represent those of the Democratic Party? Well, he sure seems to think so. He told Der Spiegel, "I think I represent the vast majority of Democrats in this country." If so, that's scary.
Expanding on the theme of his latest book, Our Endangered Values, Carter said the Bush administration has abandoned the nation's "old" moral principles. That's a curious concept: By upholding traditional moral values President Bush has diverted the nation's moral course?
Carter is particularly exercised about Bush's foreign policy. He said, "Under all of its predecessors there was a commitment to peace instead of preemptive war. Our country always had a policy of not going to war unless our own security was directly threatened and now we have a new policy of going to war on a preemptive basis."
But no less an antiwar Democrat than Senator John Kerry-after savaging President Bush for his "preemptive" attack of Iraq-admitted in the first presidential debate of 2004 that, "The president always has the right, and always has had the right, for preemptive strike. That was a great doctrine throughout the Cold War."
No matter how persistently Carter's Democrats attempt to rewrite history, President Bush attacked Iraq because he believed it was a threat to America's security-and it was, just like Iran is today. Carter is delusional if he believes Bush was just recreationally flexing America's "imperialistic" muscles to spread democracy.
The debate here between Democrats and Republicans isn't over the use of preemptive war-as Senator Kerry reluctantly confessed-but on the assessments of threats to our national security. Specifically, the debate centers on the parties' respective views of the nature and scope of the terrorist threat, whether Israel is seen as more of a victim surrounded by hostile regimes bent on its destruction or a bullying nation, and whether we should defer on these questions to anti-American leaders in Europe and the United Nations.
Carter is certainly not bashful about bashing the United States, even on foreign soil or to the foreign press. He sat for an interview with Der Spiegel, a German news magazine, in August and fired with both barrels at President Bush, "fundamentalist" Christians, and Israel.
The question is, do Carter's views represent those of the Democratic Party? Well, he sure seems to think so. He told Der Spiegel, "I think I represent the vast majority of Democrats in this country." If so, that's scary.
Expanding on the theme of his latest book, Our Endangered Values, Carter said the Bush administration has abandoned the nation's "old" moral principles. That's a curious concept: By upholding traditional moral values President Bush has diverted the nation's moral course?
Carter is particularly exercised about Bush's foreign policy. He said, "Under all of its predecessors there was a commitment to peace instead of preemptive war. Our country always had a policy of not going to war unless our own security was directly threatened and now we have a new policy of going to war on a preemptive basis."
But no less an antiwar Democrat than Senator John Kerry-after savaging President Bush for his "preemptive" attack of Iraq-admitted in the first presidential debate of 2004 that, "The president always has the right, and always has had the right, for preemptive strike. That was a great doctrine throughout the Cold War."
No matter how persistently Carter's Democrats attempt to rewrite history, President Bush attacked Iraq because he believed it was a threat to America's security-and it was, just like Iran is today. Carter is delusional if he believes Bush was just recreationally flexing America's "imperialistic" muscles to spread democracy.
The debate here between Democrats and Republicans isn't over the use of preemptive war-as Senator Kerry reluctantly confessed-but on the assessments of threats to our national security. Specifically, the debate centers on the parties' respective views of the nature and scope of the terrorist threat, whether Israel is seen as more of a victim surrounded by hostile regimes bent on its destruction or a bullying nation, and whether we should defer on these questions to anti-American leaders in Europe and the United Nations.
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