It is sadly predictable that the worst ex-President ever, Jimmy Carter, has weighed in on the NoKo nuke crisis on the New York Timed op-ed page with a self-serving steaming pile of tripe lionizing his own efforts to ensure peace on the Korean peninsula while excoriating the Bush administration. While politics may end at the ocean’s edge, Carter’s desperate need to stroke his own massive ego knows no borders.
What’s especially rich is Carter’s omission of certain important details that occurred between his characteristically misguided quest for peace in 1994 and 2002 when North Korea became a charter member of The Axis of Evil. Carter writes:
Responding to an invitation from President Kim Il-sung of North Korea, and with the approval of President Bill Clinton, I went to Pyongyang and negotiated an agreement under which North Korea would cease its nuclear program at Yongbyon and permit inspectors from the atomic agency to return to the site to assure that the spent fuel was not reprocessed. It was also agreed that direct talks would be held between the two Koreas.
The spent fuel (estimated to be adequate for a half-dozen bombs) continued to be monitored, and extensive bilateral discussions were held. The United States assured the North Koreans that there would be no military threat to them, that it would supply fuel oil to replace the lost nuclear power and that it would help build two modern atomic power plants, with their fuel rods and operation to be monitored by international inspectors. The summit talks resulted in South Korean President Kim Dae-jung earning the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize for his successful efforts to ease tensions on the peninsula.
But beginning in 2002…
Somehow the fact that North Korea cheated on the Carter-brokered arrangement almost from the moment Carter and Kim Il-Sung exchanged their final farewell smooch doesn’t make it into Carter’s narrative. Strange. And yet the fact that some guy who came along in the wake of the Carter boondoggle won the Nobel Peace Prize warrants a mention. And you can't help but wonder if Carter has ever asked himself why one of history's great monsters, Kim Il Sung, preferred to have Jimmy Carter as his negotiating foil. Jimmy Carter – still schmucky after all these years.
This seems like an opportune time to discuss the new David Zucker advertisement that lampoons Democrat Party-style diplomacy. I think it’s the funniest political ad ever, but I’ve always had a rich appreciation for Zucker’s kind of humor. I watched “Naked Gun 2 1/2 : The Smell of Fear” this weekend for about the 80th time and still laughed myself silly. Anyway, regarding the ad which features Madeleine Albright clinking glasses with Kim Jong Il and singing Kumbuya with a bunch of terrorists, it’s funny because it’s true.
Let’s run the ad. If we’re going to get creamed in November, let’s go down fighting. And laughing. Because lord knows impeachment hearings won’t be anything to howl over.
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