President Carter: I'd Rather Redo the 2000 Election Than the 1980 Election

I listened to this early this morning on the Young Turks - I am SO glad that Cenk wrote this summary post about it for those of you who missed it:

I interviewed President Carter on The Young Turks this morning. We talked about his new book Beyond the White House: Waging Peace, Fighting Disease, Building Hope, his work at the Carter Center and the new group of legendary statesmen he is a part of called "The Elders." How cool is that name, by the way? Who doesn't want to one day be part of The Elders?

We also talked about the current Bush administration. President Carter said this administration has done things that are far more radical than anything that happened in the Ronald Reagan or George H. W. Bush administrations. He said it wasn't even comparable. You can watch the interview here.

Then I asked him if he could redo the 1980 election where he lost to Reagan or the 2000 election where Al Gore lost to George Bush. He said he would redo the 2000 election because it had such adverse consequences for the country. As always, the man is selfless and classy.

Cenk Uygur: If you had to redo the 1980 election, where Ronald Reagan won, of course up against you, or redo the 2000 election where George Bush defeated Al Gore, which one would you redo?

President Carter: Well knowing what I know now, and knowing the wonderful experiences I've had at the Carter Center in the last 25 years, I would say I would redo the 2000 election. That, you know, I think has had a profoundly adverse effect on our country, and I've had a personal gratifying experience with my wife and many other people at the Carter Center. That in time, that has healed the disappointment that we felt in not getting elected in 1980.



President Carter also understands the gravity of what this administration has done. The biggest mistake the media and the Democrats are making now is thinking that we live in normal times. Normally, you should have civility and comity and moderation and compromise. But if you are dealing with radicals, those are not positive traits. They encourage an abuse of the system. People outside of D.C. can see this, but the D.C. bubble still doesn't seem to get it. President Carter does.