Cynical Nation

Barry,
I have to make a different admission myself. I like Jimmy Carter a lot and I usually agree with him. He is completely wrong now. His statement is more than idiotic.

WoW! Given Carter's track record, that's certainly food for thought Barry.

On the other hand, "Even a stopped clock is right, twice a day."

So many of those who've reflexively see this as "a disaster in the making," fail to realize that (1) Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co. (POSN) is ITSELF a foreign owned company, and England has far more radical Islamicists living there than we do here (2) the sale of POSN to Dubai Ports World (DPW) occured just last week and (3) the UAE has been one America's most dependable "Allies" in the Arab world, along with both Kuwait and Qutar.

It's odd, at least to me, that many of the very same people who've constantly warned us, "We should NOT even appear to be at war with the entire Islamic world," and who've called for more "nuance" for over four years, now clamor for (1) the U.S. to "do something" about Iran, despite the fact that we're doing everything BUT Military intervention at this time and (2) to scuttle such contracts with Muslim countries even when those countries' governments are freindly to the U.S.

POSN Co. has had this contract for a very long time. POSN Co. is ITSELF, a foreign company. DPW just bought POSN Co. last week and all assurances have been made that those now working with the North American branch of POSN Co. ("mostly Americans, with a smattering of Brits"), will continue to do so.

I've yet to see the evidence that this would be a disaster.

And Blue Wind, WHAT do you "like" and "agree with" about Jimmy Carter?

His economic policies?

They brought on STAGFLATION - double digit inflation, double digit unemployment and double digit interest rates.

I lived through the Carter debacle. It was both a domestic and foreign policy disaster - abandoning ruthless, tyrannical pro-American dictators, in favor of ruthless, tyrannical, anti-American ones abroad and running the American economy into the ground at home.

Carter was the last "unabashed Liberal" to occupy the WH. In the intervening THIRTY YEARS, no Liberal has occupied the WH...and for very good reason.

Bubba showed the Democrats the way.

The DLC sought to marginalize, then jetison the Dem's Left-wing away and embrace a Democratic "Southern Strategy" of their own. He ran to the Right of both George Bush Sr, weakened by his unwillingness to keep his "Read my lips, no new taxes" pledge and Bob Dole. Clinton worked better with Newt Gingrich than he did with Liberal old Tip O'Neill and embraced welfare reform, a balanced budget strategy, reining in race/gender preferences and a pro-business platform.

Apparently the Left's back with a vegeance a la Michael Moore, Cindy Sheehan, Al (Stuart Smalley) Franken, etc and the Dems got them...yeah, try riding that horse to anywhere but Death Valley.

Ain't gonna happen.

JMK,
Carter was a far better president than George W. Bush. He was not the greatest, but he was still far far better than the incompetent guy that you one third of the country still support.

Bush isn't Conservative ENOUGH for me, BW.

And Bush's economy is MUCH BETTER than the one Carter delivered. Low inflation, very low unemployment and low interest rates.

Did you know, for instance, that the unemployment rate for those with a Bachelor's degree is a paltry 2.1%?

And it's 4.1% for those with a HS diploma!

This despite the fact that the current administration was handed an economy in decline. The Tech Bubble broke in March of 2000 and began taking the Dow down before Election Day of that year. By December of 2000 (before G W Bush was sworn in) we were in full bore recession and a scant seven and a half months after taking office, this country was hit by the first foreign attacks on the mainland U.S. since the 19th Century! Attacks that crippled the economy further.

No one can complain about the economy under this administration!

The current foreign policy was thrust upon us.

For decades we've watched as the Islamic fundamentalism, that ironically enough, Jimmy Carter helped unleash, grew in both strength and fanaticism.

The previous administration all but ignored the attacks on America - the USS Cole, the two African Embassy bombings, the 1st World Trade Center attacks and the al Qaeda leader, Aidid's attacks on U.S. forces in Mogadishu, Somalia.

Now we've been thrust into this conflict and there's no way out except through a prolonged, most say, two to three decades or more WAR against the global forces of Islamo-cultism.

I once thought that most Liberals merely longed for the days the threat of Islamo-nazism could be ignored. I don't believe that's the case. I honestly believe they despise the current administration more than the vile scum that attacked us on 9/11/01.

Come on BW, at least admit this much, Bill Clinton was a far better and more effective Democratic President then Jimmy Carter.

That shouldn't be too hard to do.

Bill Clinton was better and more effective than Jimmy Carter. Bush is the worst president in the history of the country. By far. He makes Nixon look great.

You can't back that up with anything other than your "feelings" BW.

The current administration inherited a terrible economy, suffering from a cataclysmic Tech Bubble bust in the Spring of 2000, which soon after took down the Dow. The SEC changes that occurred under Clinton's watch, the same ones that allowed for that mirage of a "Tech Bubble" to grow at a record rate (based on nothing) in the late 1990s, also allowed for the accounting shennanigans at places like Arthur Anderson and the "creative accounting" that allowed for the World Com, Adelphia, Enron, etc scandals to occur.

The current administration had to go in and FIX all that.

They've done so with the very expensive and cumbersome Oxley-Sarbannes, which has also created a tremendous drag on the economy...and despite all that, and despite the over $100 Billion one day hit that was 9/11/01, those TAX CUTS (that everyone now loves) turned the economy around rendering incredibly low inflation, near recod lows in unemployment and low interest rates to boot.

On foreign policy, we finally woke up to the war being waged against the West by radicalized Islam. Hey! Europe is just now waking up...and soon to be with a vengeance!

We've stopped ignoring perhaps the greatest global threat in the history of mankind, but we've confronted it, taking down the Taliban-al Qaeda alliance in Afghanistan and toppling the world's leading state sponsor of international terrorism, Saddam Hussein's Iraq. That still leaves a lot more to be done, probably another twenty years worth of bloodshed to go...but we're on the right track there.

The problem you have is that you're just as rabid as is the radical Religious Right!

The Religious Right despised Clinton because of what they perceived as his "base immorality." The fact of the matter was, Bill Clinton was the last best hope for the Dems, a guy who tried to lead that Party away from its tethers to Northeastern Liberalism, and for awhile he succeeded in doing just that.

The radical Left despises Bush for daring to speak of God while in the WH.

What a bunch of dopes.

Bush may not be the best man for the job. Like I said, I don't think he's quite Conservative enough. I'm not happy with the border security, nor the the overall spending done, nor the failure to enact any REAL and MEANINGFUL tax reform (think "Fair Tax"), but he's sure been a lot better than any alternative offered by the Democrats.

In fact, aside from the excessive spending, much of it security and war related, he's actually been a very effective President...and if the war on terrorism is ever fully finished (not at all likely with a Democrat, far more likely with another Republican), than he may even go down historically as a great President.

P.S. Nixon wasn't a terrible President because of Watergate. That was a minor issue, that had no impact on that election. He was impeached over and ultimately resigned over "lying under Oath," (Perjury), the same crime Clinton was guilty of.

Nixon's sins were a steadfast support for Liberal/Keynesian economics ("We're all Keynesians now") and his use of socialistic Wage & Price controls, high tax rates, and among other things, the birth of race/gender preferences and quotas under his watch. Those are the reasons Nixon was a horrible President!

JMK I'm with you on Nixon. When Watergate finally ended, the MSM was all in a dither about how the world would see it. Meanwhile, in the unfree world, (and there was a lot more of it then)everyone was saying: "Americans fired a President? They can do that?"
The wage and price controls were his worst blunder, setting the stage for the shortages and stagflation that Jimmah worsened.
All hail Ronaldus Magnus!

Paul that's the amazing thing!

Many people, I'll bet even many Americans think Nixon was "fired" or "put out of office," when in fact, he like Andrew Johnson and William J Clinton was Impeached (a fancy term for "put on trial by Congress")...Johnson missed getting expelled by 1 vote, Clinton also WAS NOT expelled by Congressional vote...BUT neither was Nixon. He resigned before the Impeachment proceedings began.

His crime wasn't Watergate or any involvement in Watergate. His crime was "lying under oath" (perjury), the same crime Clinton was guilty of.

Only Nixon didn't have the cahoonas to ride it out like Clinton did.

Of course, he also had the decency, in 1960, not to contest an election than many historians still feel he actually won.

You're also right that those Wage & Price controls were the worst decision of his Presidency, one that smacked of outright desperation.

Ironically enough, we punished ourselves big time, by electing that "peanut farmer from Georgia," who promptly proceeded to try and turn the U.S. into a Third World basket case.

I'm with you on "Ronaldus Magnus," whom the rabid Left despised as much as they now despise this lame duck G W.

JMK, I'd disagree on your "Carter was last truly liberal President." He may have been the last truly inept, clueless, misguided President but I'd not call him a true liberal. For one, he was challenged for renomination in 1980 from the LEFT (Kennedy and Brown).
He was an ideological kaleidoscope, of sorts--directionless, confused, clueless and, unlike a kaleidoscope, not fun to look at--or live through.

You're right about the ideological kaleidoscope that was Carter Fred, though, like Nixon and LBJ before him, he continued, in fact, exacerbated, the failed Keynesian policies that nearly brought the country to its knees and did bring NYC to the brink of bankruptcy.

I'll even grant that he probably meant well in abandoning some of the pro-American tyrants we propped up during the Cold War chess match with the Soviets, but it apparently wasn't at all well thought out.

The Shah of Iran had the fundamentalists in that country under his boot heel. Pinochet in Chile had communist expansion into that hemisphere under control.

In that regard, it could well be argued that Bush Sr. was surprisngly almost as inept on foreign policy. Surprising, considering he was an ex-CIA chief, you'd think would've had a handle on such things.

Bush abandoned Saddam Hussein, who we supported against the Soviet-backed Iranians in the 1980s, and then, when Kuwait slant drilled into Iraq, in effect, taking Iraqi oil, when Hussein approached the Bush Sr. administration for help, was told, "We don't get involved in such border disputes" - pretty much greenlighting the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait!

In the 1980s Hussein was as pro-American as Pinochet (backed by Nixon & Ford, abandoned by Carter) or the Nicaraguan Contras, who we also backed under Reagan and abandoned under Bush Sr.

For the life of me, I don't understand these "pangs of conscience" at all. Yeah, we've sometimes had to back brutal tyrants who opposed both Communism and radicalism within their own countries and dealt with both ferociously and visciously.

What should we have said to those "Americans of conscience" that would be sickened by the attrocities that often go on in such places, under governments led by our puported Allies?

I'd tell them, "Look, this is a very brutal world, with many varied civilizations, almost all of which are more brutal, more capricious and arbitrary than our own. We must come to accept these ugly realities as necessities in such cultures, especially in such a dangerous and unsettled world. We must accept that we must take our Allies where we find them."

To be honest, as far as foreign policy goes, I'd rank Carter & Bush Sr very close, as they both abandoned critical Allies that held very volatile parts of the world in check.

In fact, economically Bush Sr wasn't all that much better either. His tax increase, "the largest tax increase in history" (at that time) sent the economy into a recession that it didn't fully recover from until the mid-1990s.

But Carter stands out for his inane ideological "one world, one people" (the foolish idea that we can all get along if we just sit together and sing kumbaya) outlook and his whining "We've just got to learn to tighten our belts," in response to the economic chaos around.

Carter was a tragic figure in the WH, in that he just seemed to be in way over his head.

He has since done some very positive things and said some inane, even unforgivable things about his own country.