Walter Cronkite had about as much to do with that. Carter was in the right place at the right time, and didn't deserve the credit for it, as evidenced by his flaccid diplomatic record since. People try to cast him as another Nixon in terms of ex-president international handshaking, and he couldn't even climb up to where Nixon stood, imho.

It isn't diplomatic to sell out to evil people. I don't see an unabashed ability to shake hands and broker deals with the lowest forms of political life to be something admirable. Anyone who can downplay real genocides and then play Iraq of as if it is one isn't honest, nor diplomatic.

Walter Cronkite had about as much to do with that. Carter was in the right place at the right time, and didn't deserve the credit for it,

walter cronkite didn't get them both to camp david and put them in a room and didn't let em go until they agreed on a peace pact.

i know you can't give carter credit for anything baker. but he does deserve credit for that. no one else has done it. that's a fact. and that has nothing to do with measuring him up with nixon. i never even mentioned him, it is you making that "strawman" argument.

again...how much conflict has isreal and egypt had since the agreement?

zero...case closed.

argue all you want...i still see carter's initiative as a great achievement. and his agreement happened and was followed up and honored where everyone else's (like oslo) fell apart shortly after the public "hand shaking" your so fond of and erroneously put on the same level.

that doesn't mean i wouldn't move carter off this list. i'm just not going to damn him and twist where he did some good. it's called giving credit where it's due. and carter deserves that credit, despite your poo-pooing of it.

but don't let me stop you from hauling off on your favorite whipping boy. be my guest...

How much conflict has Israel had on the state level with anyone since then? The ongoing Arab war against Israel is being fought through proxies. You know that. It's just convenient to ignore it in terms of this. Egypt supported Arafat's terrorist side of it, just like Hamas and Hezbollah and the rest are basically tools of other nations.

You made the claim that no one, before or after, has gotten Israel to broker a peace deal with anyone. That statement is false. As I said above, the two had already agreed to meet in interviews with the press. Granted, he provided the community center to hold the shindig at. They've swapped meaningless ink before and after Carter.

When someone has a talent, it doesn't just disappear after one go. Carter was a diplomatic failure before Camp David, and he was just as bad after. If you want to believe that for one shining moment he found his voice and then immediately lost it, whatever. Remind me to tell you about the time I jumped over tall buildings and caught bullets in my teeth... haven't been able to do it since, though... odd, that.

I accept that F.D.R. operated in extreme times, and that he had decent intentions with the programs he put into place.  Unfortunately, like communism, his intentions were easily corrupted later because the programs he put into place weren't intended to ever be phased out, or at least weren't implemented in ways that would see many of them phased out.

He basically started the long decline in terms of companies providing retirement systems to their employees.  By implementing social security as that big safety net, he got businesses off the hook for doing the proper thing for their employees and let those businesses shift the burden back to the government and to the people.

I could see where F.D.R. could easily be a person that shows up on both the best and the worst lists and would rightfully belong on either.

there are several that different sides see much differently. perspective has a lot to do with it. but not always. after more thought, i don't think i'd put harding on that list. like brad said, his presidency was uneventful, but not horrible or anything. but it's all debatable. after all, it's politics.

Is there some reason people aren't using the quoting?

Quoting in the forums does not transfer over to JU.  They are probAbly using them, but you have to view it in the forums to see it.

did not steal the election

al gore is not the only man to have gotten popular vote and lose

al gore is the only man to take it to the courts

the constitution says that the senate breaks all ties not the courts

but since the senate was republican run al gore decided to go to the courts

the courts should have sent it to the senate period

what warnings were those the ones that said something was going to happen on 9/11 and nobody knew what

the worlds good will which part of world the part that burnt the flag whenever it suited them or the part where they burnt the flag whenever something went wrong


osama is in pakistan or iran pakistan is an ally so what do we do invade an ally
(i would but that is me)

even one i hear talking about torture hasn't actually seen anything or they say it didn't happen

i agree on the constitution mocking but that is still better than the democrats who want to kill the constitution all together

whats the deference borrow and spend or tax and borrow and spend

he is not a war criminal unless your saddam

national disgrace not according to his numbers



the only thing nixon did wrong was end the vietnam war

the laws that he broke WERE NOT laws when he broke them

in other words for you small brained people he didn't brake any laws



and reagon was the best president during my life time



lbj inhereted the rights act and the civil rights act


sent troops into vietnam so that the weapons makers could test weapons


carter INHERETED THE ENERGY CRISIS what energy crisis i was 16 and i was laughing at him over it

and his homes for the homeless the people who are get these homes only get to live there for 5 to 10 years before the property taxes force them out


and the only thing clinton did was try to save face other than that he didn't do anything

except rob the white house when he moved and destroyed computers in the white house

thanks to bill clinton


did you think we forgot that clinton give them the ability to launch rockets

Well also take into account that our medicines are far better today than they were 90 years ago, and that US weaponry is far superior to anything the Iraqi insurgents can throw at us, as opposed to the Germans, whose weaponry was comparable to ours. But just because we suffer less casualties doesnt mean that invading Iraq was the right thing to do, both morally or policy-wise.

when bush was "elected" in 2000 (and i use quotes because of the controversy, not my personal feelings)i was commenting about how he was like that guy (or gal) who "falls up the corporate ladder." that i am sure that most who work in a company with more tha n a dozen people can relate to. before 9/11 people on both sides of the aisle would agree with me. after 9/11, we all "rallied round the flag" and gave bush our full support on the whole in this country.

i wrote an op-ed 2 weeks after 9/11 commenting on whatever we do, it had better be "swift and severe" and that the world would forgive us for being a little sloppy for a little while, but that sentiment would eventually change. at the time, the arab states for the most part were giving us support and the subtle word was put out that in the stricter muslim sects, the "eye for an eye" justice applied here.

now, on one hand, it is vindicating to see the country wake up to the fact that bush & co. are not as advertised. on the other, and more important hand, it really does sadden me to have been right here. i, like many who opposed the iraq war really did want to be wrong about them and their decisions. when i discuss these issues on or off line with neoconservatives or their apologists and defenders, that point often gets missed early and often.

but all anyone had to do was look into the man's past to see he was one of those people who seemingly "prove" the dilbert principle and everything you ever heard about rich folks kids.

the man ruined a pretty good baseball team...traded a guy who would hit more home runs than 99% of anyone who ever put on a uniform. but that wasn't all, he was just a bad owner and was run out of the league in a very short time.

he might be the only texas oil man who couldn't find oil.

his national guard service, while the debate over it got pushed into a ridiculous realm, was not anything anyone could be proud of. questionably meeting the "minumum requirememnts" in the air guard which was a haven for folks who wanted to avoid vietnam but didn't want to look like a "hippie" at the time is nothing to brag about.

his "messianic" attitude about himself should have been a clear warning. combine that with a "12 step mentality" and ya got trouble.

those of us who knew who dick cheney was before 2000 knew that he was trouble. when he announced he was the winner of his fact finding search, any thinking person should have saw the wrongness in that. it was obvious that cheney was going to be the "man behind the curtain." the merging of the neoconservatives and religious right was completed with that ticket.

the biggest irony to me is that cheney's 2000 convention statement, about the clinton's "lectures. legalisms and carefully worded denials" has become the administration's mantra at a level that would even make the clinton's blush. unfortunately, they never delivered on any "siff doses of truth" that were promised.