THE Jimmy Carter Thread (merged)

BigTex · **Posted:** Sat Jun 14, 2008 8:15 am

Pretorian wrote:

White house had solar panels on? wow

They had Willie Nelson up on the roof too.
Must have been a fun place.
Mos, thanks for posting that. That's an interesting speech to listen to, both because of the things he was right about and the things he didn't seem to even be aware of.
The idea of "running out" seemed to be his concern, as opposed to supply simply being unable to keep up with demand. As we all now know, we will never "run out", it's just that eventually everyone will be priced out of the market. The last barrel in the ground would have a price no one could pay; thus, it will never be extracted.
If he had been able to get into his time machine and spend a few days in the present reading all of the research and discussion regarding the corrosive effects of high energy prices on the entire world economy, I'm sure that the tone of that speech would have been a lot more dire.

PrairieMule · **Posted:** Thu Jul 03, 2008 11:21 am

I found this speech a few months ago. Most folks are probably aware of it . It brings up a lot of interesting things that are applicable to 2008.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/fil ... risis.html

Quote:

Every act of energy conservation like this is more than just common sense -- I tell you it is an act of patriotism.

Plantagenet · **Posted:** Thu Jul 03, 2008 11:32 am

PrairieMule wrote:

I found this speech a few months ago. Most folks are probably aware of it . It brings up a lot of interesting things that are applicable to 2008.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/fil ... risis.html

Quote:

Every act of energy conservation like this is more than just common sense -- I tell you it is an act of patriotism.

Sen. Obama should start using that Jimmy Carter quote. It puts to rest all the concerns about him not being patriotic enough.

hironegro · **Joined:** Tue Apr 08, 2008 12:00 am **Posts:** 432

Plantagenet wrote:

PrairieMule wrote:

I found this speech a few months ago. Most folks are probably aware of it . It brings up a lot of interesting things that are applicable to 2008.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/fil ... risis.html

Quote:

Every act of energy conservation like this is more than just common sense -- I tell you it is an act of patriotism.

Sen. Obama should start using that Jimmy Carter quote. It puts to rest all the concerns about him not being patriotic enough.

How can you plug in such powerful message into some mindless slogan like "hope" or "yes we can" or "change."

strider3700 · **Posted:** Thu Jul 03, 2008 12:56 pm

Carter told the truth. It cost him his job and he became a joke to the vast majority of people.

In the end history is proving him right but he's still vilified.

I'm a doomer not because we couldn't come up with solutions but because we'll laugh and bitch about change until it's too late.

It's probably already too late and I bet Carter knows that.

Graeme · **Posted:** Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:41 pm

Jimmy Carter -- the peak oil president

Quote:

The timing is extraordinarily appropriate, and not just because energy is the campaign issue of the week. The wave of Republican mockery currently assaulting Barack Obama's recommendation that Americans properly inflate their tires flows squarely within the tradition of scorn and derision that conservatives have heaped on Carter for decades -- in part because of his call for conservation and sacrifice in 1977.

But the speech holds up pretty darn well today, even as right-wing flailing increasingly manifests itself, to borrow a slam made by Obama against his critics on Tuesday, as risibly "ignorant." I particularly liked the following passage, if only because of its prescience.

The Rush Limbaugh wing of the Republican Party, happily smacking their lips as they've chowed down on Jimmy Carter's legacy for almost three decades, would have us believe that the threats of climate change and peak oil do not exist. To which point, again, one can think of no better response than Barack Obama's.

"I don't understand it ... It's like these guys take pride in being ignorant."

salon.

mos6507 · **Posted:** Wed Aug 06, 2008 8:15 pm

Jimmy was not a peak oil president. He jumped the gun and framed the debate in terms of oil "running out" in 1977. It wasn't. Only domestic oil was. North Sea was yet to hit the scene. We should have still listened to him, but only in retrospect does he look like a genius. In the 90s that speech looked like a joke.

If you want a real peak oil speech from an elected official, watch one of Roscoe Bartlett's many presentations.

dinopello · **Posted:** Wed Aug 06, 2008 8:33 pm

What Jimmy Said

Quote:

The world has not prepared for the future. During the 1950s, people used twice as much oil as during the 1940s. During the 1960s, we used twice as much as during the 1950s. And in each of those decades, more oil was consumed than in all of mankind's previous history.

World consumption of oil is still going up. If it were possible to keep it rising during the 1970s and 1980s by 5 percent a year as it has in the past, we could use up all the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade.

April 18, 1977

Petrodollar · **Posted:** Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:34 am

...and here's why future historians are likely to be far kinder to Carter than all subsequent US presidents...

Quote:

We are grossly wasting our energy resources … as though their supply was infinite. We must even face the prospect of changing our basic ways of living. This change will either be made on our own initiative in a planned and rational way, or forced on us with chaos and suffering by the inexorable laws of nature.

— Jimmy Carter's Address for the 1976 Democratic Presidential Nomination, December 12, 1976

......Indeed, Jimmy Carter has been the only president in the past 30 years who tryed to convince us that we must begin changing "our basic ways of living" - preferrably before Mother Nature forces us to change via "chaos and suffering..."

In contrast, and despite the rightwing proclamations to the contrary about Carter and Bush, here's why historians will likely be extreme harsh on the presidency of G.W. Bush....

Quote:

We need an energy bill that encourages consumption.

— President George W. Bush, speech in Trenton, New Jersey, September 23, 2002

In essence, Dick Cheney famously stated that the "American way of life is not negotiable"- whereas Carter tried to tell us that the "American way of life" is not only negotiable, but is is actually unsustainable.

Anyhow, assuming he is elected, Barak Obama will likely have to repeat Carter's earlier message in a State of the Union speech circa 2010 or 2011, but this time we won't have 30 years to prepare for these massive changes "on our own initiative in a planned and rational way," as we are already witnessing in the global production and price of oil over the past 3 years, these changes will by 2010-2011 be "forced on us with chaos and suffering by the inexorable laws of nature."

Bottomline: I do not envy the arduous and painful journey that awaits the next US president (or any major political leader for that matter)

dunewalker · **Posted:** Thu Aug 07, 2008 8:07 am

Petrodollar wrote:

Bottomline: I do not envy the arduous and painful journey that awaits the next US president (or any major political leader for that matter)

I do not envy the arduous and painful journey that awaits homo sapiens...

Plantagenet · **Posted:** Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:31 pm

Petrodollar wrote:

Carter ...

Iran was the best friend the US had in the middle east prior to Jimmy Carter's bungling.

When the historians ask "who lost Iran" the answer will be Jimmy Carter.

THE Jimmy Carter Thread (merged)

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