Opinion: Next week's Attorney at Large column

Another Reason I Won’t Be Voting for Obama
By James Castagnera
      Jimmy Carter is our best former president.  He was an ineffectual chief executive, however.   Last week he endorsed Barack Obama.  His endorsement is one more reason I won’t be voting for the candidate who some three years ago was a mere Illinois legislator.
     When Carter ran for president in 1976, I was still in my twenties, about the same age as many of Obama’s most enthusiastic supporters today.  I was much taken by Carter’s sincerity and straight talk.  Carter had been governor of Georgia, which is to say, a far more experienced politician than Senator Obama.
      Just the same, his presidency was somewhere between a mediocrity and a disaster.  His White House sent bill after bill to Capitol Hill, only to see them eviscerated by the powers that were.  His ultimate humiliation came with the taking of American hostages at the U.S. embassy in Tehran, followed by a disastrous attempt by the American military to rescue them.  Heaping on the insults, the Iranian government waited to release the American hostages until Ronald Reagan’s inauguration day.
      A colleague of mine, Political Scientist Michael Brogan, agrees.  “This is the revisiting of the ’76 election, “ he says.  “The economy is close to recession.  People are tired of the Republicans.  Gas prices are creeping up.”  And, so, he adds, American voters are predictably turning to yet another amateur politician in hopes he will work miracles in Washington.
      The trouble, as I’ve pointed out in this space before, is that the White House is no place for on-the-job training. 
      Pundits compare Obama to Kennedy for his youth and charisma.  I compare the two in terms of JFK’s apprenticeship in office.  Humiliated by the Bay of Pigs and his first summit with Krushchev, Kennedy’s perceived weakness and naiveté led to the Soviet adventurism with Cuban-based missiles.  The legend is that Jack and Bobby used masterful diplomacy to better the Reds.  That we came frighteningly close to a nuclear exchange with the Evil Empire is probably closer to the truth.
     Carter is another case on point. Stagflation was one phenomenon of his presidency.  In the words of Wikipedia, “During Carter's administration, the economy suffered double-digit inflation, coupled with very high interest rates, oil shortages, high unemployment and slow economic growth. Productivity growth in the United States had declined to an average annual rate of 1 percent, compared to 3.2 percent of the 1960s. There was also a growing federal budget deficit which increased to 66 billion dollars.”
       Ineffectual on almost all fronts, walking around the Oval Office in a sweater (like some presidential Mr. Rogers) to emphasize energy conservation, in 1979 the former peanut farmer gave his famous “malaise” speech in which he said, “I want to talk to you right now about a fundamental threat to American democracy.... I do not refer to the outward strength of America, a nation that is at peace tonight everywhere in the world, with unmatched economic power and military might. ...  The threat is nearly invisible in ordinary ways. It is a crisis of confidence. It is a crisis that strikes at the very heart and soul and spirit of our national will. We can see this crisis in the growing doubt about the meaning of our own lives and in the loss of a unity of purpose for our nation….  I'm asking you for your good and for your nation's security to take no unnecessary trips, to use carpools or public transportation whenever you can, to park your car one extra day per week, to obey the speed limit, and to set your thermostats to save fuel.”  Wow, was that ever inspiring!
       Carter entered the White House with the same high hopes expressed by JFK and now by Obama.  Meanwhile, the practitioners of “real politick” nationally and internationally salivated, sharpening their cutlery.  They made meals of Kennedy and Carter and would do the same with Obama.
(Jim Castagnera, formerly of Jim Thorpe, is the Associate Provost and Associate Counsel at Rider University.  A Collection of his columns is available at www.lulu.com.]
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