What an honorable man he is. He's 80 years old now and sharp as a whip. He won the Nobel Peace Prize a couple of years ago.
He was talking about The Hornet's Nest his new novel on the Revolutionary War.
She asked him what side he would have taken in the Revolutionary War and he answered that he would have preferred to have been a farmer who cared for his work, family and friends. He then went on to say that with the exception of Dwight Eisenhower he spent more time in the military than any president since the Civil War era.
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The highlight of the conversation was his assertion that if the U.S. presidential election was being monitored by the Carter Center it would not meet international standards.
These standards originated in a national commission on election reform with Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter as co-chairs, along with 40 other bipartisan representatives. They arrived at these guidelines by unanimous consent. That commission was set up as a result of the controversy surrounding the 2000 presidential elections.
He mentioned 4 areas where the U.S. elections do not meet these standards:
1. All qualified candidates have equal access to the public through the media and they don't have to pay for it.
Ability to run for office should not depend on how much money you can collect.
2. Central election commission that is recognized as being non-partisan.
He mentioned Florida's secretary of state Katherine Harris's actions in the 2000 election and how they subsequently led (or at least didn't prevent) her to win a seat in Congress. One of the things that she and Jeb Bush were up to in that election was circulating a list of thousands of purported "convicted felons" to local polling officials. It turned out many of these people were not convicted felons, but most were black people who more than likely would have voted for the Democratic nominee. Her and Jeb had to backtrack on that little imbroglio....but in our short attention span culture not many people paid much attention. We're more interested in the political impact of Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter. Hello.
Katherine is gone on to bigger and better things but the Florida Department of State - Office of the Secretary is a Jeb Bush partisan appointee this time around.
3. All the people should vote in exactly the same way. Punch card, touch screen etc. The assertion being that by allowing various ways of counting votes it's more likely that rich people votes count since the more affluent areas can afford the best vote tallying devices.
4. Technological advanced way to vote must include a way for voter to verify his or her vote and allow for a recount. One example is a system where a paper ballot comes out from touch screen which is put in a ballot box. This allows voter to ensure his vote is accurately recorded and provides a method for recounts.
He talked about how the system favors incumbents since they have access to special interest groups who want to legally buy their help.
Today's candidates win via TV ads which focus not on telling your own story but by destroying the integrity and reputation of your opponent.
It's only in the last 20 years or less that destroying the reputation of your opponent has become the way to win. When Jimmy Carter was running for president the candidates referred to each other as "my distinguished opponent". If they would have attacked each other's character it would have been sure defeat.
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He also talked about his debate with Ronald Reagan mentioning that George Will had given his (Jimmy Carter's) briefing papers to Ronald Reagan prior to the debate. This allowed Ronald's handlers to coach the great communicator on precisely what Jimmy Carter would say in response to particular questions. A fairly unfair advantage in a debate. Although Jimmy is quite gracious about it. Recommend listening to the conversation. It's available on the NPR website.
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Finally Jimmy Carter talks about his religious beliefs and separating them from his political views and speeches. Even though he is an ordained minister he did not use that fact as a talking point when he ran for president or when he was president. An interesting contrast to what we see today.
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My own little claim to fame is that I got to shake Jimmy Carter's hand in Billing's Montana thirty some years ago. I was attending cooking school and he was speaking on the campaign trail there. There's an old picture around here somewhere from the Billings Gazette of me in a cook's outfit in the front of the greeting line. What a good guy in my book.
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Here's a little article on the "convicted felon" scandal from Florida's 2000 presidential election. Interesting to think that the majority of convicted felons are people arrested for such crimes as selling marijuana.
and an article about Mistake forces Harris to resign. But not such a big mistake that she couldn't become a member of congress.
