Our Worst Ex-President?
Jimmy Carter was not our best president, but is he our worst ex-president? Joshua Muravchik marshalls the evidence for that conclusion in an essay in February’s Commentary magazine. Make sure to read the entire thing. What struck me in particular was Carter’s consistent anti-Israel-ism, for which Muravchik provides chapter and verse. Criticism of Israel is, of course, entirely within the bounds of acceptable political discourse, but according to Muravchik’s account, Carter’s criticism of Israel is both hypocritical (in that he does not voice similar criticisms of Arab abuses) and borderline anti-Semitic. And that, as Muravchik notes, is ironic: "It is sad that a President whose cardinal accomplishment was a peace accord between Israel and one of its neighbors should have devolved into such a seething enemy of Israel. It will be sadder still if this same man, whose other achievement was to elevate the cause of human rights, ends his career by helping to make anti-Semitism acceptable once again in American discourse."
