Carter critical of Bush performance
Story from Boston Globe
By Richard Hyatt and Serajul I. Bhuiyan/Knight Ridder, 7/24/2001/
PLAINS, Ga. - Jimmy Carter said he is disappointed in President Bush's performance in the Oval Office and said the first-term Republican has ignored moderates in both parties - including Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Interviewed last week at his home in Plains, Carter criticized Bush for not pressuring Israelis to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, for threatening to abandon the antiballistic missile defense treaty, for not supporting human rights, and for ''strictly conforming'' to the views of conservative Republicans.
''I have been disappointed in almost everything he has done,'' Carter said.
Carter said he volunteered to be one of the few Democrats at Bush's inauguration last January because of the high hopes he held for Bush's presidency.
''I hoped that coming out of an uncertain election he would reach out to people of diverse views, not just Democrats and Republicans but others who had different points of view,'' said Carter.
''I thought he would be a moderate leader,'' Carter said, ''but he has been very strictly conforming to some of the more conservative members of his administration - his vice president [Dick Cheney] and his secretary of defense [Donald Rumsfeld] in particular. More moderate people like Colin Powell have been frozen out of the basic decision-making in dealing with international affairs.''
Continuing conflicts between the Palestinians and Israelis make the administration's efforts in the Middle East fruitless, Carter said. He said Bush should follow his father's stance and demand removal of Israeli settlements on the West Bank.
''George Sr. took a strong position on that issue and so did I,'' said Carter, who offered to mediate the conflict - an offer declined by both sides. At the same time, Carter cautioned the current administration not to ignore other parts of the world.
''I noticed when President Clinton was in office his secretary of state made 26 visits to the Middle East before going to any country in Africa. I think the devastation of the wars in Africa is much more serious than the conflicts in the Middle East,'' he said.
A presidential scholar yesterday said it is unusual for former presidents to criticize their successors. Erwin Hargrove, a professor emeritus at Vanderbilt University, said Carter has always been kind to Bush's father, George H.W. Bush. The only time Hargrove remembered him criticizing Ronald Reagan, Carter personally called to ''set him straight'' on statements he had made to the press.
''I think this is just Jimmy calling it like he sees it,'' Hargrove said. ''He must feel remote enough from the office to do this. He must be genuinely disappointed.''
In the wide-ranging interview with the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer, Carter also said the United States should respect the Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement designed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and he questioned the Bush administration's reluctance to ratify the so-called rights of the child treaty.
He also called the proposed shield against incoming missiles ''technologically ridiculous.'' Carter said it goes against the 1972 treaty with the Soviet Union and is a setback for the ''prestige and respect due our country.''
''I think it will re-escalate the nuclear arms race,'' he added. |
