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| Old Glory |
“Challenges of a Superpower”
Excerpt, editing by
Carolyn Bennett
Former President Jimmy Carter spoke to a California audience
early this year. These are some of his thoughts.
“America is now the world’s unchallenged superpower in many
ways. And I would say that this is a time of assessing what America is and what
the future of our country should be.
It is “the American heritage that in times of challenge
we have habitually or historically risen to greatness. And we realize that, in
a democracy like ours, change from challenge to greatness is a matter of
responsibility for individual citizens.”
What are the goals of a great nation? “They’re the same as
the goals of a great person.
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| Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter |
“They are the goals that have been established most clearly
in religions that we might adopt as our own — Christianity, Judaism, Islam,
Buddhism, and so forth. And they are all the same. There’s really no
incompatibility between a desire, on the part of a human being, to be a superb
human being in the eyes of whatever God he or she worships; than it is for a
nation to say,
‘I want to be a superb nation; I
want to be a genuine superpower in all the meanings of the word.’
“What are those characteristics?
… A commitment to peace, a commitment to
justice, a commitment to freedom or democracy, a commitment to human rights, to
protecting the environment that we’ve inherited, to sharing wealth with others.
I think those are the hallmarks of a superpower.
As Carter assessed the state of America in the present
moment, he also made clear his personal allegiance, one to which I also subscribe :
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| Conversations with Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter |
“I’m not criticizing my country, which I think is the best nation on earth, and I’m very proud to have served,” he said.
But I’m pointing out that in this time of assessment, I’d say particularly for … children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren … for students and for other young people, we need at least to look at what the possibilities are for improving.
This is some of Carter’s assessment.
FOREIGN RELATIONS
Violence, Absence of Peace: Since World
War II, we [the United States] have been almost constantly at war —
…in Korea and then Vietnam,
Cambodia, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Grenada, Libya, Panama, Somalia, Haiti,
Bosnia, Herzegovina, Iraq, Afghanistan.
I don’t know about the future.
Iran, Syria, Mali? You get the point.
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O
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ur country is now looked upon as the foremost war-like
nation on earth. And there is almost a complete dearth now of a commitment of
America to negotiate differences with others. It is not just Democrats or Republicans or a particular
president. It is a consciousness or attitude of Americans like you and me.
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W
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e need to be working for peace for others as well as
ourselves.… The Middle East is a typical example where there is a need for
peace.
Assessment dark; language, dialogue, talking imperative
Palestine and U.S.: My own belief … is
that [Israeli] Prime Minister Netanyahu for the first time has decided on a
one-state solution.
Under his administration, Israel has been madly building
settlements in East Jerusalem and also in the West Bank — nobody wants Gaza,
and this means that it’s becoming decreasingly likely that you could have a
viable Palestinian state alongside Israel. I’m very discouraged about that, and
the only thing that can be done about it is for the United States to play a
major role.
If President Obama will go back to the two premises that he had
earlier — no more Israeli settlements in Palestine and the 1967 borders would
prevail between the two, modified to accommodate the large settlement that’s
right outside of Jerusalem — then that would be the best solution.
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| Syria |
I think the Arab world will accept this. On two or three
occasions already, every Arab country, in fact, every Muslim country, even
including Iran, has agreed that is a premise they will accept and that they
will recognize Israel equal to all the Arab countries with trade, commerce, and
diplomatic relations. But so far that has not been possible. And I don’t think
the Israelis are going to do it unless the United States plays a very strong
role.
…[Now] is the first time since Israel has been a nation that
the United States has … zero influence, either in Jerusalem or among the
Palestinians. And I’m very grieved about that….
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| Iran |
Iran and U.S.(nuclear issue) : There was an earlier
deal worked out between Brazil and Turkey and Iran that said that they could go
up to 20 percent, and Iran agreed to let the international inspectors come in.
So far, the United States has never offered Iran to lift all
the economic sanctions if they would agree on limiting their nuclear
capabilities at 20 percent and letting the IAEA come in and inspect them.
But even if Iran should develop — this is the worst case and
I hope it doesn’t happen — if they should develop two or three nuclear weapons,
then they know that if they should challenge Israel, for instance, with one of
their nuclear weapons, Israel has, I don’t know, 200 nuclear weapons of a very
advanced nature. We [the U. S.] have 5,000, and I’m not sure that the Iranians
are suicidal enough to want to have their own country wiped off the map by
challenging Israel.
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| North Korea |
North Korea and U.S.: My own
preference is that we negotiate with Iran and with North Korea as well; we have
not been willing even to talk to North Korea for a number of years.
There’s been not a single day of talks with North Korea
since President [Barack] Obama has been in office. I’ve been there twice since
then.
What they want is to have a peace treaty with the United
States. So far, we just have a cease fire between the United States and North
Korea, left over from the end of the Korean War 60 years ago.
So there’s a lot of parallelism between them (North Korea and Iran). I don’t
believe either one of those countries is going to be suicidal enough to use
nuclear weapons. I hope we can prevent their nuclear weapon capability by good faith talks with both countries.
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| China |
China and the U.S.: When I travel
around the world now — my wife and I have been to more than 140 countries —you
see that the Chinese are very influential, all over Africa, all over Latin
America, and I think are forming contracts for political and economic benefit.
I think in the future, China wants to stay peaceful.
The Chinese have not been at war since 1979. So they’re
worried about U.S. attitude. But, I think that the best way for us to compete
with China and win, if we want to have a victor or a loser, is for us to adhere
to the principles that I mentioned earlier of peace and justice and democracy
and freedom and environment, and that sort of thing. That’s what I think we
should do to compete with them successfully.
There’s no way that China is going to ever threaten the
United States militarily; and I don’t think they’re ever going to threaten the
United States politically either, unless they change and make the democracy
that exists in their little villages prevail in their big cities and counties
and provinces.
Domestic Assessment
HUMAN RIGHTS USA
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| U.S. diplomat Eleanor Roosevelt Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 |
America was a nation with the foremost commitment to the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was passed with Eleanor Roosevelt’s
leadership when the United Nations was first formed [1948]. And for much of the
time during the interim period, we’ve been the champion of human rights.
That is no longer the case.
Look up the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on your
computer; you’ll find there are 30 paragraphs.
And our staff at The Carter Center has determined that we
[the United States] are now violating 10 of those 30 paragraphs.
We have now
disavowed the application of the Geneva controls on treatment of prisoners at
war.
And …there has been a lot of
altercation back and forth lately about the use of drones to assassinate
Americans living in foreign countries, or not excluding [drone use] within the
United States.
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| Afghanistan |
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| Iraq |
9/11’s illegal “law”: Guantanamo: … Half of [the people
imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay] have never been tried at all and never have been
accused of a crime.
All of them now are faced with the prospect of serving the rest of their lives in prison.
Our president [U.S. President Barack Obama] has announced that
we [the United States]
…have the right to send people to
prison for life without a trial, without legal counsel, and without any
specific charge against them.
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| U.S. Prison Guantanamo Bay |
This policy toward human rights is
generally accepted now, particularly since 9/11; whereas, before then, the
restraints on treatment of prisoners and commitments to human rights were very
firm and unequivocal in the United States.
Death: We [the United States] are the only industrialized
nation on earth that still has a death penalty.
In fact, 90 percent of all the executions in the world are
in four countries — Saudi Arabia, China, Iran, and the United States.
…Almost all of the [U.S.] prison population …, or a large
proportion of them, are poor or minorities, or have mental illnesses. … The
largest mental institution in the United States is a prison in Los Angeles, California.
…. We [The Carter Center] are very much against the death
penalty [and against drones] as a matter of principle. I would like to see the
death penalty eliminated. As a matter of fact, when I was governor and
president, nobody was executed because the Supreme Court at that time had put a
hold on all capital punishment impositions. … My own belief is that the threat
of the death penalty is not a deterrent to crime.
JUSTICE (equity) USA“‘The Greatest Challenge the World [including the United States] Faces in the New Millennium’ [is] the growing chasm between rich people and poor people.
EDUCATION USA
High school graduation rates in America stopped climbing
last year [2012] for the first time since 1890; the cost of tuition in either
public or private institutions has increased from 4 percent of average income
to 10 percent of family income; and the number of Americans living in poverty
has increased 31 percent in just the last five years [2008-2013]. 
DEMOCRACY USA
When I ran for office, first of all as a peanut farmer and a
governor, against the incumbent, [U.S. President] Gerald Ford … the amount of money we raised
for the general election was zero.
When I ran four years later against … Ronald Reagan, we raised
zero. We just used a $2 per person check-off.
Now there’s a massive infusion of money into the primary and
general election system, unrestricted by the stupid decision of the U.S.
Supreme Court. And most of that money is spent on
negative commercials to destroy the reputation of opponents.
NATION DIVIDED USA
And that has fragmented or divided Americans into red and
blue states and also has divided candidates against one another, so that when
they finally get to Washington, there’s no compatibility detectable now between
Democratic and Republican senators or members of Congress, or between a House
of Representatives that is Republican and a Democratic president.
And the blame is both ways; it’s not just one way.
ENVIRONMENT USA
…Up until … George Bush, Sr. [President George H. W. Bush],
America was in the forefront of nations on earth promoting a good environment
and dealing with global warming.
We are now one of the laggard countries. The Europeans and many
others are moving ahead of us.
Sources and notes
“Challenges of a Superpower” (PDF): Speech by Jimmy Carter
to the Commonwealth Club, San Francisco, California, February 24, 2013, http://www.cartercenter.org/resources/pdfs/news/editorials-speeches/carter-speech-022413-challenges-of-a-superpower.pdf
http://www.cartercenter.org/resources/pdfs/news/editorials-speeches/carter-speech-022413-challenges-of-a-superpower.pdf
THE CARTER CENTER
Waging Peace, Fighting
Disease, Building Hope
Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter and former U.S. President
Jimmy (James Earl) Carter formed The Carter Center after his tenure in the U.S.
presidency. The Carter Center now has programs in 73 countries — 35 of them in
Africa. “We try to go to countries that promote peace, where the United States
is somewhat or totally alienated from them,” Carter said in that February speech.
“The Carter Center — we go to Cuba regularly. We go to North
Korea regularly. We have fulltime offices in Jerusalem and Ramallah and also in
Gaza City. And we deal with both sides within the Palestinian community, as
well as with Israel, and with Jordan, and with Egypt, and with Lebanon, and
even with Syria now, where we deal with both sides in the terrible ongoing
civil war.
“We see the adverse impact of 60 years of economic embargo
as [the United States strives] to destroy the economy of the people of Cuba,
who are already suffering under dictatorship….
The same thing is true in North Korea, where I go into the
countryside and see the starving children, where the World Health Organization
and the United Nations World Food Program measure the upper arms of 10-year-old
children that are just about as big around as a golf ball. And we [the United
States] have a punitive embargo against them, also having lasted now for 60
years.
“But we try to change that. The Carter Center tries to
promote freedom and democracy when countries are facing challenges in their
governments.”
The Carter Center works with human rights organizations all
over the world, Carter says. “We work with Amnesty International, the Lawyers
Committee for Human Rights, the whole gamut of them.
“Every year we have what we call a Human Rights Defenders
Conference, where we bring in human rights defenders or human rights heroes to
The Carter Center to consider a key issue. …
“The Carter Center confronts —drones, the death penalty,
women’s rights, and so forth.”
The Carter
Center, One Copenhill, 453 Freedom Parkway, Atlanta, GA 30307
In partnership with Emory University, The Carter Center is
guided by a fundamental commitment to human rights and the alleviation of human
suffering. It seeks to prevent and resolve conflicts, enhance freedom and
democracy, and improve health.
Five principles guide The Carter Center
·
Action and results: based on careful research
and analysis, it is prepared to take timely action on important and pressing
issues
·
Not to duplicate the effective efforts of others
·
Addressing difficult problems and recognizing the
possibility of failure as an acceptable risk
·
Nonpartisan, acting as a neutral in dispute
resolution activities
·
Belief that people can improve their lives when
provided with the necessary skills, knowledge, and access to resources
·
Collaborative with other organizations, public
or private, in carrying out its mission
http://www.cartercenter.org/about/index.html
First Lady Rosalynn Carter
Rosalynn Carter (née Eleanor Rosalynn Smith, born August 18,
1927, Plains, Georgia, United States): American first lady (1977–1981), the
wife of Jimmy Carter, 39th president of the United States, and mental health
advocate; one of the most politically astute and active of all American first
ladies.
After leaving the White House in 1981 Rosalynn Carter directed
considerable energy to the same causes that had long interested her: she
continued her efforts to improve mental health care and to promote other
projects that, as she said, would result in ‘good for others.’
Among these projects was Habitat for Humanity, a nonprofit
organization that helped people to build their own homes. Mrs. Carter also
wrote several books, including First Lady
from Plains (1984), which was widely praised as giving the greatest insight
into her husband’s administration. Jimmy Carter sometimes pointed out that his
wife's first name was Eleanor and that she had been as valuable a working
partner to him as had Eleanor Roosevelt to her husband, Franklin Delano
Roosevelt (32nd U.S. President, 1933-1945). Rosalynn Carter’s popularity among
Americans was consistently high compared with that of other first ladies.
President Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter (full name: James Earl Carter, Jr., born October
1, 1924, Plains, Georgia, United States): 39th president of the United States
(1977–1981), served as the nation’s chief executive during a time of serious
problems at home and abroad.
After leaving office Carter embarked on a career of
diplomacy and advocacy and in 2002 was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.
He also became a prolific author, writing on a variety of
topics. Two books on the Middle East were Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid (2006) and We
Can Have Peace in the Holy Land: A Plan That Will Work (2009). His
interview with Syria's Forward Magazine, published in January 2009, marked the
first time that a former or current U.S. president had been interviewed by a
Syrian media outlet. Carter also authored The
Hornet's Nest: A Novel of the Revolutionary War (2003) and a collection of poetry.
Britannica bio notes on Carters
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Bennett's books are available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY] • See also: World Pulse: Global Issues through the eyes of Women: http://www.worldpulse.com/ http://www.worldpulse.com/pulsewire http://www.facebook.com/#!/bennetts2ndstudy
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