http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/10/12/like_carter_obama_is_right_but_doesnt_get_credit.htmlLike Carter, Obama is Right But Doesn't Get Credit
By Richard Cohen
snip//
You may wonder at this point why, above, I placed Obama in the same paragraph with Carter. It is not because Obama is as politically challenged as was Carter, and it most certainly is not because I think both presidents pursued dumb policies.
On the contrary, from health care to the stimulus, and including the Bush-initiated TARP, Obama has done the right things. He staved off both a collapse of the financial system and a deepening of the Great Recession while, paradoxically, being lambasted for doing so. As Carter himself once said, life is unfair.Jimmy Carter was an odd duck as president and exceedingly hard to like. (I never managed the feat.) Still, on
what was and remains the single biggest challenge facing this country, the energy crisis, Carter was right and bravely so. He laid out his ideas in a much-reviled Oval Office speech while at other times wearing a sweater to suggest turning down the heat. In his speech, he used the phrase "the moral equivalent of war" to characterize the ongoing energy challenge. Americans would have to make sacrifices. The crisis demanded it and the government would insist on it. Break out the sweaters.
Carter called for home insulation, an increase in coal production, a decrease in the importation of foreign oil and, significantly, a reduction by 10 percent in gasoline consumption. He predicted that America would be running out of crude oil -- almost 10 million barrels produced per day in 1970 to less than 6 million today -- and said the "cornerstone" of his policy was conservation. "Those citizens who insist on driving large, unnecessarily powerful cars must expect to pay more for that luxury," he said.
Carter exhorted Americans to increase their use of solar energy. He put our money where his mouth was and installed solar panels on the White House roof. Ronald Reagan removed them in 1986.
snip//
Carter's energy program was right on the money. The message was fine; the messenger was awful. This is exactly the case with Obama, who is far more likable than Carter yet is being cuffed around in a similar manner. Being right is nice. Convincing others you are is essential. Yet even George W. Bush, who left a grateful nation with two wars and a recession -- somehow he forgot the mumps -- hypothetically runs neck and neck with Obama. This is because Obama's insistence on realism comes across as pessimism. It is our national character flaw and it is what did in Carter. He asked for sacrifice. What he got was the door.