Discussing Carter’s new book on faith, Colbert asked about the cardinal virtues and the importance of courage. Said Carter:
It takes courage to have love for people who are different from you. It takes courage to have faith in people that we consider to be inferior to us or enemies of ours. Jesus says we should love our enemies as well as our friends and have so-called agape love or self-sacrificial love, love for people that are not lovable, love for people that don’t love us back. That takes a lot of courage [President Jimmy Carter, speaking to Stephen Colbert, The Late Show, 2018.03.30].
As Stephen Colbert says, “We could use a nice guy in the Oval Office.”
Colbert presented the former President with a T-shirt promoting Carter for President in 2020 noting that he remains constitutionally eligible.
Carter’s grain embargo against the USSR after it invaded Afghanistan was a disaster for America’s farm belt. The Chicago Board of Trade suspended grain trading for two days after the announcement. On re-opening, grain futures plunged and kept doing so. The grain markets saw prices halved during the next few years and took decades to recover. The embargo also opened the Russian market to grain producers in several other countries, which went on to become permanent competitors of American farmers. In fact, farmers were able to ship production to scattered countries around the world, but the psychological blow was profound, as were the changing relationships in world grain trading. I believe the “farm crisis” of the 1980s was to a large extent caused by Carter’s ill-advised decision to use American grain as a weapon. He remains a decent guy, but his ineptitude while in office is pretty well-documented by the economic conditions he left behind. Here’s a nice little recap. https://livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe70s/money_06.htmlhttps://livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe70s/money_06.html
Link isn’t working. I can C & P the piece and post it here on request. Pretty long, but gives a reasonably objective overview of the situtation.
Former President Carter is both criticizing and praising President Trump in his recent press appearances. See the article from The Hill: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/380205-jimmy-carter-i-would-prefer-trump-not-be-impeached
Quoting a CBS Sunday Morning appearance: “But my own preference would be that he not be impeached, but that he be able to serve out his term, because I think he wants to do a good job,” he said. “And I’m willing to help him, if I can help him, and give him the benefit of the doubt.”
The farm crisis of the 80’s was caused by Reagan mometary policies which included escalating double digit interest rates and lack of banking regulations in the farm sector. Blaming the situation on Carter is deceitful and political smearing .
I don’t think Carter is “praising” Trump. Carter is being Carter. A good man that wants to help the country. Trump would be wise to take advice from Carter but we all know he won’t.
A lot of folks have a dislike for Jimmy Carter, mostly having to do with the Iranian issue that we started in the 1950’s when we destroyed democracy there. But the real issue with Carter had to do with the economy. It is easy to pin blame on one instance of the partial Russian embargo on why farms fell on their arse’s, but it was also high interest rates and the idea that farmers could just keep putting their farms up for collateral with their rising value as they were encouraged to do.
“In the post-World War II era, farmers witnessed revolutionary advances in agricultural technology-new machinery, seeds, pesticides, fertilizers, resulting in greater efficiency and greater productivity. During the 1950s and ’60s, American agriculture’s biggest problem was what to do with huge surpluses of grain. All that changed in the 1970s as the massive stockpiles were drawn down, and as a result, commodity prices rose. At the same time, demand for U.S. agricultural products exploded. The Soviet Union negotiated a multiyear contract for wheat and feed grains in 1972. And within a span of two years, wheat prices doubled, corn prices tripled. Farmers responded with increased production, and 1973 and ’74 were prosperous years in rural America.
In an attempt to reduce inflation, the Federal Reserve tightened its monetary policy in 1979. As a result, interest rates rose to levels not seen since the Civil War. The prime lending rate soared from an average of 6.8 percent in 1976 to an all-time high of 21.5 percent in 1981. The impact of the Fed decision was felt throughout the U.S. economy, but its effect on farm families and rural bankers was especially severe.”http://www.iptv.org/mtom/classroom/module/13999/farm-crisis
The CIA reported that at least 500,000 tons of US grain circumvented the embargo to reach the Soviet Union via Romania and other northern European ports. https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP08S01350R000200370002-4.pdf
So, as always, there was a way to sell additional grain on the market to bypass the partial embargo. Interest rates and inflation were the main culprit in the decimating of the farmers in the 1980’s or the price you pay from a 20 year war in Vietnam.
If you had money in the bank, the interest was something to keep a good cash flow. If you were overextended then there was no way to borrow your way out of the crisis. A lot of the small operators were able to keep going because they were frugal and had socked away some savings. A lot of the bigger operations failed because they had to borrow to pay back for the loans they got for grain handling equipment and exotic livestock they purchased on credit.
Of course, this was not Jimmy Carter’s fault, but it sure makes it convenient to blame him. For the record, the Soviet Union collapsed shortly after the embargo went into play and Ronald Reagan got to say “Tear down this wall” in 1987. BTW, Jimmy Carter left office in 1980. The partial grain embargo continued under Ronald Reagan until he lifted if in 1981 against the judgments of his Secretary of State and several ambassadors in Europe. The reasoning was that by keeping the embargo, the Soviet Union would not invade Poland like they did with Afghanistan. The Soviets did not and the partial embargo was lifted. During all the time of the partial embargo, there were still legal exports of American grains for market in the Soviet Union.
The view from the Board of Trade, where I was trading through the ’80s, is in complete disagreement with yours, Charlie. And fwiw, Reagan didn’t jack up interest rates, Carter’s appointee as Fed Chairman Paul Volcker did.
Here’s a Wikipedia piece on Carter’s grain embargo and its subsequent effects on America’s farm economy. Note that in the ’80 election, Reagan said he would end the embargo, Carter refused to do so. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_grain_embargo_against_the_Soviet_Union
From a farmer at the time of the 16 month partial grain embargo,
“Like many of his farm-belt neighbors, he shrugs off the embargo decision as a political move with far more importance for Washington than for the farm states.
In ending the 16-month-old embargo April 24, Mr. Reagan spelled out his reasons. He said that his campaign pledge to end the embargo was based on his belief that “American farmers had been unfairly singled out to bear the burden of this ineffective national policy.” The decision to lift the embargo was delayed, said Reagan, in order to avoid having the Soviets interpret it as a sign of weakness.
Now, however, Reagan explained, his administration has made it clear to the Soviets that “we will react strongly to acts of aggression wherever they take place. There will never be a weakening of this resolve.” https://www.csmonitor.com/1981/0427/042744.html
Vietnam and the two oil crisis of the 1970’s had to be paid for.
“Carter cannot be blamed for the double-digit inflation that peaked on his watch, because inflation started growing in 1965 and snowballed for the next 15 years. To battle inflation, Carter appointed Paul Volcker as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, who defeated it by putting the nation through an intentional recession. Once the threat of inflation abated in late 1982, Volcker cut interest rates and flooded the economy with money, fueling an expansion that lasted seven years. Neither Carter nor Reagan had much to do with the economic events that occurred during their terms.” http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-carterreagan.htm
Paul Volcker was in charge of the Fed, and remained in charge of the Fed for Ronald Reagan as well. The bills that came due following the Vietnam war as well as the first Arab oil embargo, killed the economy so much so that Paul Volcker had to take drastic actions. He did and they worked. So in the big picture, Carter was a visionary in the choice for the Fed chairman, that was further was shown by his tenure from 1979’s appointment by Carter to 1987, the end of term for Reagan.
Wow, there is a lot of historical revisionism going on here in this thread.
Here is the historical CBOT corn price chart. Note, it didn’t take “decades to recover” after the embargo and the price decline in the immediate aftermath of he embargo was overstated from what I have read on this thread.
http://www.macrotrends.net/2532/corn-prices-historical-chart-data
Our exports typically have more to do with the size of the crops that we raise and the relative price of our commodities.
https://www.indexmundi.com/agriculture/?country=us&commodity=corn&graph=production
You can blame Carter for the immediate effects of the embargo on commodity prices, but assigning blame for low prices on the embargo for decades is way off base. Prices recovered after the embargo and then dipped in the mid eighties to a lower point than in the aftermath of the embargo.
Here is the historical US corn export totals which show our exports ebbed and flowed over the years, but one can hardly say the embargo had more than a fleeting effect on our exports.
https://www.indexmundi.com/agriculture/?country=us&commodity=corn&graph=exports
Russia was always capable of growing its own commodities. Their ineptness under the communist system was the main reason they were importing grain from the US.
Reagan pursued a strategy of confrontation with the Soviet Union. This was inevitably going to lead to the USSR ramping up their own grain production again and pursuing any necessary imports from other countries rather than from the US.
The world has been ramping up production of corn since the beginning of modern records:
http://beef2live.com/story-world-corn-production-1960-2014-0-108618
Sometimes production overshoots world demand and low prices result. The combination of low prices during the 1980s coupled with astronomical interest rates brought about the farm crisis. Carter had a relatively small role to play in the large macro economic forces that resulted in the farm crisis during the 1980’s.
John T,
That Wikipedia article is not a great source of knowledge on the subject when I examine this quote from the article:
“The embargo caused the price of grain to drop from $4.39 ($13.04 in 2017 dollars) per bushel in January 1980 to $4.00 ($10.77) per bushel in 1981 resulting in farmers having to burn their crop to make some kind of profit from their harvest.”
The price dropped 39 cents a bushel and farmers burned their crops to make a profit, but they were still getting $4 a bushel. What? This is nonsense.
Although Carter’s presidency is history, he is not.
President Carter made many mistakes during his presidency, some mistakes he made and other mistakes were blamed on him.
One of the qualities most former presidents have is that they rarely criticize a sitting president and President Carter tries not to do that with Trump. In other words, he is being politically kind to this president. When Trump becomes a former president, that can’t be soon enough for me, he’ll break that one quality and continue to degrade presidents, both past and present.
Richard Nixon is without a doubt one of the most corrupt presidents in our history, but he wasn’t stupid in the way that Trump stupid. In the later years of Nixon’s life he began a road to redemption that was widely hailed by political historians.
President Carter immediately began that road to redemption with his philanthropic work and offering his assistance on global political problems and in spite of constant criticism he has prevailed. His faith has always been strong and is likely responsible for the man that he became after his presidency.
I do wonder if there will ever be a picture of former presidents with the current one or has that ship sailed.
Something else that Carter got saddled with, the elimination of the gold standard by Nixon.
“This performance is horrendous compared to the post World War II gold standard era, which lasted from 1947 to 1970. During those 21 years of economic ups and downs, unemployment averaged less than 5% and never rose above 7%.
Growth, too, has slowed. Since able men and women were given the power to manipulate the quantity and value of the dollar, real economic growth has averaged 2.9% a year – more than a full percentage point slower than the 4% growth rate during the post World War II gold standard era.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/charleskadlec/2011/08/15/nixons-colossal-monetary-error-the-verdict-40-years-later/#2ccb1b9269f7
From all of the actions that were put in place by Nixon before Carter, I think he did a pretty good job of the work he did for the country. Jimmy Carter did not invade anyone either, except for trying to recover our hostages that ended in failure. Probably still could have gotten it done had it not been for back channel back stabbing by Reagan and his stooges.
Darin, the cite is to a book out of print, but I’m guessing the prices were basis Chicago, which meant farmers were probably getting substantially less, depending on their distance from the CBOT and local elevator supply/demand situations. That is still a hefty price in ’81 dollars, but recall that this was an era when farm lending agencies were encouraging borrowing up to the hilt, including land values, not just crops, as the basis for loan decisions. Even what seem like a relatively manageable price drop might have created some serious cash flow issues to those who were borrowed to the max. And anyway, it was the start of punishing downtrend. As the Wikipedia piece goes on to note, prices eventually halved during the post-embargo years, causing the ultimate crisis.
Also, Darin, the historical corn chart isn’t inflation-adjusted. As to revisionism, I’m pretty sure my comments are built on facts, not interpretations. Take the last word.
The one major appointment which Carter made that Reagan kept and then reappointed was Federal Chair, Paul Volcker. It was Volcker’s high interest rate policies of the late seventies and early eighties along with an era of strong deregulation under Reagan, which gave us the successful but temporary Reagan economy, which then laid an egg in 1987 with the first major stock market crash since ’29.
It is fair to say that Carter’s Volcker gave us the genuine growth under Reagan and it was Reagan’s deregulation which gave us the ’87 crash; and history has shown that it was the ending of hyper inflation due to Volcker’s high interest rates along with ill conceived deregulation and not supply-side economics and the “Reagan tax cuts,” which gave us the soaring 80s that conservatives often opine about, but which Carter actually played a major part in making happen.
And I say this as one who stood on the floor of Madison Square Garden in August of 1980 having casted my vote as a member of the South Dakota Delegation at the Democratic National Convention that summer for Ted Kennedy…… I was never a big Carter fan back then, but I miss him now; and when Walter Cronkite, who knew every president from Eisenhower to Clinton, said that if you put all of those presidents from Ike to Bill in a room together to take a college entrance exam, that Jimmy would come out on top, and, in my opinion, he still would today…..
John,
I assumed the prices were from the CBOT (Chicago Board of Trade) and were not farm gate prices. However, they still don’t match up with anything that I find with regard to the historical price of corn at that time. Here is the March corn futures chart from 1980:
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/historical/CN/1980/3/linewchart.html
Here is the March 1981 corn futures chart:
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/historical/CN/1981/3/linewchart.html
The wikipedia article is simply wrong.
The main point I was trying to make is that corn prices were depressed 20 cents immediately after the embargo but within days had recovered 10 cents and within months of the embargo showed little lasting effects. If fact, corn was up 50-80 cents a bushel later that year from the time of the embargo.
Here is a farmgate average corn price chart that puts things into perspective:
http://www.farmdoc.illinois.edu/manage/uspricehistory/USPrice.asp
The worst prices for corn in the 1980’s came way later in the decade at a time when US/Russian relations were terrible. Many other macro economic factors were in play at that time.
If we are generalizing, the catastrophic interest rate rises in the early 1980’s along with crop failures put the squeeze on farmers and the ultra low prices of 1986-1988 finished them off. Carter had little to nothing to do with these circumstances.
The press held Carter responsible for the hostage crisis: every day the news opened with the day count Americans had been held.
Bush2 (then Obama, now Trump) ought to be held to the same account – each day we should get a day count Americans have been deployed to Afghanistan.
Carter also took the brunt of an OPEC strategy to squeeze the US. His answer was to talk energy conservation – again taking responsibility for events. Bush2 (then Obama, now Trump) fight unfunded wars, give tax breaks to the wealthy, and NEVER have the citizens of the US face the price of decisions; the current executives kick the can down the road. For all Carter’s well-documented missteps, he never did that.
John and Darin, why was there no grain buy-out by the fed to stabilize the grain market and US farmers? That would have seemed like an appropriate response to a US policy. Decades later, the fed bailed out the US banks after THEY caused their own demise.
o, the short answer to your question is the farm lobby isn’t as good as the Wall Street lobby.
At that time about the only non-military levers we had to pull to try to restrain Soviet action or punish them for bad acting was restricting the grain trade and not going to the Olympics. It’s not like today where we can sanction lots of their economy. Reagan would lift the grain ban, but arm what would later evolve into the Talliban and al Qaeda. The result was 9/11 terror attacks and a two generation war against terror. In retrospect, Carter’s decision seems to have been the better one.
The presidents of my lifetime begin with Eisenhower, of whom I have only the faintest memories. Jimmy Carter is without a doubt the finest human being among them. I’m not entering the discussion about his policies, though I certainly did disagree with some. I’m talking about President Carter’s human qualities. I never felt that his focus was on creating personal advantage for himself or burnishing his image. I was always confident that he was trying to do what he believed was the best thing for us, ALL American citizens.
Isn’t that a wonderful quality for a president to have? I say yes.
Carter also restricted Soviet fishing rights in US waters and restricted trade in computers and other technical equipment.
Carter sold his peanut operation to become president to remove any potential conflict of interest. What are the potential peanut conflicts compared to Trump’s profiteering of the presidency?
O,
How is Trump making money off of being President?
o
Go after Jason big time on this one, I’ll sit back and enjoy the slaughter.
The russian cyber attack continue on American soil https://www.ajc.com/news/local/atlanta-city-computer-network-remains-hobbled-cyberattack/0noLIfqFij5jceqH5w2PNK/ trump does not have the reason to go after Russia because of the income he has received. Jimmy Carter would not have put up with it. trump and his stooges talk tough, but allow Russia to hack our elections, our grids and now the major city of Atlanta with the world’s busiest airport. trump and his stooges will not even place the sanctions voted on by the congress in place. We are now a puppet state of Putin.
trump is too busy making millions to give a care about democracy like Carter did when he was president. Carter did everything possible to ensure to the public that he was not trying to make even a buck from the highest office in the land. trump puts trump first and America dead last. http://www.newsweek.com/trump-family-profiting-presidency-books-deals-business-696244
Trump isn’t taking a salary Jerry.
Who says salary? Just because you do not take a salary does not mean you are not getting a pay off.
Jerry, are you talking about the millions from Russia that went to the Clinton foundation for Uranium?
Trump would have made the same money if he wasn’t President. Clinton wouldn’t have gotten the millions if she didn’t allow the Uranium sale. Those are the facts.
Clinton wouldn’t have gotten the millions if she didn’t allow the Uranium sale. Those are the facts.
Blatant lies, Jason. HRC had nothing to do with the sale of Uranium !. That is a fact.
Those millions given from the former owner of Uranium 1 to the Clinton Foundation at least a year before HRC becames SOS. That is another fact.
The sale of U-1 depended on agreement from 9 federal agencies, including State Dep’t. However, HRC let her deputy handle the approval and if any of the other 8 offices disagreed the sale would have been held up. The only person who could have stopped the sale was the Potus. That is a fact.
Not an ounce of the US uranium will ever see Putin’s homeland because Russia cannot get export licenses, unless Drumpf gives them to Putin.
Mike,
You do know the Obama appointed IG is investigating that right now right?
Of course the money is padi well in advance. That’s how bribes work.
*paid
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/hillary-clinton-uranium-russia-deal/
Read ’em and weep, Jason.
Snopes is not credible.
You haven’t answered my question.
Jason, how did U-! know HRC would be SOS? in advance?
Where’s the quid pro quo?
You ignore all ermpirical evidence that sez HRC was not involved to pursue your wet dreams of making HRC a crook.
he Timing of Most of the Clinton Foundation Donations Does Not Match
Of the $145 million allegedly contributed to the Clinton Foundation by Uranium One investors, the lion’s share — $131.3 million — came from a single donor, Frank Giustra, the company’s Canadian founder. But Giustra sold off his entire stake in the company in 2007, three years before the Russia deal and at least 18 months before Clinton became secretary of state.
Of the remaining individuals connected with Uranium One who donated to the Clinton Foundation, only one was found to have contributed during the same time frame that the deal was taking place, according to The New York Times — Ian Telfer (also a Canadian), the company’s chairman
Why won’t you answer my question Mike?
Here is an article by the lefty news.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/cash-flowed-to-clinton-foundation-as-russians-pressed-for-control-of-uranium-company.html
We will see what the IG finds.
Yes Mike, I know the NYT isn’t a credible news source, but it is more credible than snopes.
Pee on yer questions, Bub. You answer some of mine.
Feel free to try to debunk anything in the Snopes article, if you can. But you won’t. You will just move on and try a different tack to avoid answering questions.
Mike,
Feel free to debunk anything in the NYT article.
There have been a lot of new developments since the New York Times article dated April 24, 2015.
Fact: The Trump Justice Department exonerated Hillary on the Uranium One deal.
Fact: Shepard Smith, the only real FOX reporter, debunked the Uranium One story.
From what I have read most recently the IG is not going to reinvestigate the Uranium One deal.
mike from iowa
Since when does repeatedly asking the same question become a fact?
No, I am talking about the millions reported that went to trump, and nothing like that to President Carter.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/12/22/doj-scrutiny-opens-door-to-new-uranium-one-investigation.html
NYT didn’t refute anything Snopes had to say and they gave more credibility to Schweizer’s book “Clinton Cash” than it deserved. The book was panned as being full of errors before it was ever released.
The FOX post is dated 12/22/17 and therefore is old news, there have been major developments in this case since that article was published.
Carter was among our most science-educated presidents. The revisionism above is staggering and wasteful – it’s as if one were inventing arguments that Obama was responsible for Bush’s depression or that 45th was responsible for the economy in 2017. Move on.
Here’s what our kids need, teaching and coaching in how to make decisions. Lists of dos and doesn’t are not and have never cut it. They need help in how to think, what to think about.
How I Decide is a non-profit teaching, coaching decision making skills from elementary to high schoolers. Founded by a cognitive psychologist who is a retired world-class poker player. She has 4 kids so walks the talk. Get this program in your kids and grandkids schools. http://www.howidecide.org/
She published, Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When you Don’t Have All the Facts.
Exactly John, Carter was ridiculed by the fossil fuel industry for having the audacity to suggest we conserve energy. Even when there were incredible gas shortages around the country, the fossil fuel industry continued to deny there was a problem. President Carter’s devotion to this country proves he is a national treasure.
John, here was the Science President Jimmy Carter almost exactly 39 years ago in action.
“At 4 a.m. on March 28, 1979, the worst accident in the history of the U.S. nuclear power industry begins when a pressure valve in the Unit-2 reactor at Three Mile Island fails to close. Cooling water, contaminated with radiation, drained from the open valve into adjoining buildings, and the core began to dangerously overheat.
The Three Mile Island nuclear power plant was built in 1974 on a sandbar on Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna River, just 10 miles downstream from the state capitol in Harrisburg. In 1978, a second state-of-the-art reactor began operating on Three Mile Island, which was lauded for generating affordable and reliable energy in a time of energy crises.
After the cooling water began to drain out of the broken pressure valve on the morning of March 28, 1979, emergency cooling pumps automatically went into operation. Left alone, these safety devices would have prevented the development of a larger crisis. However, human operators in the control room misread confusing and contradictory readings and shut off the emergency water system. The reactor was also shut down, but residual heat from the fission process was still being released. By early morning, the core had heated to over 4,000 degrees, just 1,000 degrees short of meltdown. In the meltdown scenario, the core melts, and deadly radiation drifts across the countryside, fatally sickening a potentially great number of people.” https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/nuclear-accident-at-three-mile-island
President Jimmy Carter proved, beyond a doubt that he was fearless because he was knowledgeable in science.
Roger,
link us to a newer article.
Hard to think of such a modest man of science and peace being president of the United States. President Jimmy Carter was not just known as a man of courage, science and peace in the United States, but also in Canada where in 1952 he again proved his knowledge and leadership.
“In 1952, an accident at Canada’s Chalk River Laboratories near Deep River, Ontario caused a partial meltdown in an experimental nuclear reactor. Hydrogen explosions followed and hundreds of thousands of gallons of radioactive water flooded the core, heavily damaging the reactor. When the Canadian government turned to U.S. nuclear experts for help, “Father of the Nuclear Navy” Rear Admiral Hyman Rickover sent his protégé – Lieutenant James Earl “Jimmy” Carter – to lead a team of maintainers into the reactor core to shut it down.” http://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/that-time-jimmy-carter-saved-canada-from-nuclear-destruction
Science is key, as well as faith and bravery. President Jimmy Carter filled those qualities with honor.
Jason
NO
Then my article stands Roger.
No it doesn’t stand, Jason, it is still outdated.
Yes it does Roger. You haven’t provided newer information.
John, on a side note. South Dakota can be proud of our young students that just participated in the Regional National Science Bowl. In particular Stevens High School of Rapid City were the Bowl champs that will represent the state in April in Washington, D.C.
The Stevens High School has won this bowl 4 times in a row starting in 2015, 2016,2017 and now 2018. Congratulations to the participants and to their teachers for all the work and love of science they represent. Jimmy Carter would be proud of them as well.
Democrats are against open science.
It’s truly pathetic.
http://dailycaller.com/2018/04/01/secret-science-epa/
Tucker Carlson is your go to guy for science? childish. Me, I will stick with Neil deGrasse Tyson with degrees in Astrophysics rather than astroturfing like Tucker Carlson.
Thanks for proving you didn’t read the article.
jerry
The more I research and read Carter’s political history the more I come to realize that in many ways he was ahead of his time.
In an era where Trump and his republican loyalist pooh pooh science it is refreshing to see what might have been.
Exactly Roger, as John pointed out, science is the real element that holds us all together. We cannot even consider such things as space travel or keeping our military at the ready without it. Yet the ignorant are considered leaders of the trump organization. A bunch of trust babies, trump included, making decisions will not bode well for our future.
The government and its citizens have always had disagreements about research and science and for the most part those disagreements have amicable and matters settled.
This Trump administration has declared full out ‘war on science’ like I have never witnessed. Getting rid of Trump by either election or impeachment is the easy part, the hard part is restoring funding for needed science and research. Undoing Trump’s damage is going to be costly.
Now that Jason is in this fray I’m not sure I want to be but would like a couple of word’s.
I have voted for a Republican president twice in my life. The first time was for Nixon when he said he was going to get us out of Vietnam. He did and I don’t regret that.
The second was for Reagan the first time. I deeply regret that and have since shortly after the election. All the media hype about the Iranian hostage thing and the embargo is I suppose the reason for that vote.
I wish to point out to those who haven’t figured it out yet that appointing the head of the federal reserve is a sham! The INDEPENDENT federal reserve bank has far more power in running this country and indeed this world than anyone that us voters are allowed to vote for. Actions of the federal reserve can be blamed for bringing on the great depression as well as the debacle of the 80’s.
Clyde, a couple of things regarding the Fed. Do you think that the issues of the 1980’s also had something to do with recently coming off the gold standard that Nixon sprang upon the world?
As you mention your vote for Nixon to end the war in Vietnam, would it surprise you to know that Nixon actually extended it to get elected? As he did extend it for his own election, shouldn’t the responsibility of runaway inflation having to do with an extended war be placed directly on the repayment of the Vietnam war as a consequence of the Vietnam war and all of its costs?
With the gold standard gone, we see that the deficits of the Vietnam war as well as the Arab Oil Embargo’s, have now been covered up by simply printing more money do to the elimination of the gold standard. So is that where you are going with blaming the federal reserve?
Jerry, I was not aware of Nixon’s extending the war or I may have voted differently. He did end it though not with the “Vietnamization of the war” or the “honorable exit” they claimed at the time. But, hey, there was no easy way out of that.
I first took a real interest in the war in the early 60’s when it began to look like it might involve me. I got all the info I could come up with, took a good long look at the map of the country, and wondered how in “H” we were going to win a war there. Apparently none of our elected leadership did the same.
The huge debt this country ran up fighting that war went a long way towards getting rid of our gold reserve’s. It was replaced with the “Petro Dollar” which has worked in our favor till now. With big players like China and Russia now wanting to trade oil in the Yuan and willing to offer gold as well, we may be in trouble. Our economy that no longer makes anything but imports everything with a ridiculously strong dollar might not be able to get a bargain anymore.
The federal reserve has ADMITTED to causing the great depression by contracting the money supply.
My dad said that FDR’s policy’s were working till 1937 or so when they contracted the money again and according to him everyone was right back into the depression. WW2 ended it and in my opinion was caused by the world wide “Great Depression”. The federal reserve was created right at the onset of WW1 and I’m sure it had a role in that as well. It is an INDEPENDENT banking institution that this country needs to get control of. The information is all out there for anyone wishing to study it and IMO everyone needs to.
No doubt the fed threw the printing presses into high gear to inflate our money to counteract the actions of OPEC and when the inflation went into high gear and OPEC wasn’t going to be calling the shots anymore they clamped down on the supply late in the Carter years. It wouldn’t have mattered who was “appointed” head of the federal reserve the action was preordained.
Reagan could have done the same as FDR with social programs and support for farmers but instead helped with the clean out by insisting that we had to go to the “Great and Glorious FREE market”.
Jerry, if anyone was studied up on the “federal reserve banking system” [doesn’t deserve caps!]I would expect it to be you.