Ben Johnson: Jimmy Carter's Record on Race
As Jimmy Carter portrays conservatives as violent racists, it’s worth remembering Carter’s own history of racial demagoguery. Carter campaigned for governor of Georgia as a self-proclaimed “redneck,” in an era when that word had pronounced racial connotations. His campaign distributed a photo of his gubernatorial opponent Carl Sanders being embraced by black basketball players to a Ku Klux Klan rally. Carter pledged to invite Alabama’s infamous segregationist governor George Wallace to Georgia if elected. He once said he was “proud” to have the equally segregationist Lester Maddox as his lieutenant governor following the 1970 election, calling Governor Axe-handle “the essence of the Democratic Party” (which he was).
In 1972, Carter promised – then broke his promise – to the newly crippled Wallace to nominate or second him at the Democratic National Convention in Miami, jumping at the opportunity to give the nomination speech for Henry “Scoop” Jackson (and the national exposure that would bring; see Obama, Barack)...
... Since the country’s near-unanimous repudiation of his presidency, Carter has lashed out at evangelical Christians, conservatives, the late Pope John Paul II, “Neoconservatives,” and anyone else who — well, everyone who isn’t a Southern “progressive” Baptist who admires Liberation Theology. In his 2005 book, Our Endangered Values, he described “fundamentalists” as people who believe “they are right and that anyone who contradicts them is ignorant and possibly evil.” They tend “to demagogue emotional issues.” Moreover, “They are often angry and sometimes resort to verbal or even physical abuse against those who interfere with the implementation of their agenda.”...
Read entire article at Newsreal
In 1972, Carter promised – then broke his promise – to the newly crippled Wallace to nominate or second him at the Democratic National Convention in Miami, jumping at the opportunity to give the nomination speech for Henry “Scoop” Jackson (and the national exposure that would bring; see Obama, Barack)...
... Since the country’s near-unanimous repudiation of his presidency, Carter has lashed out at evangelical Christians, conservatives, the late Pope John Paul II, “Neoconservatives,” and anyone else who — well, everyone who isn’t a Southern “progressive” Baptist who admires Liberation Theology. In his 2005 book, Our Endangered Values, he described “fundamentalists” as people who believe “they are right and that anyone who contradicts them is ignorant and possibly evil.” They tend “to demagogue emotional issues.” Moreover, “They are often angry and sometimes resort to verbal or even physical abuse against those who interfere with the implementation of their agenda.”...