His Very Best: Jimmy Carter, a Life

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When Rosalynn grew despondent about the headlines, Jimmy told her to read from John 14:1 (“Let not your heart be troubled”), and her spirits lifted before she embarked on a diplomatic mission to Peru. In the 50 years I’ve voted he was the only President that I had faith in and that fully gave his life in service - at home and national and worldwide.

It’s never too late” to become a believer, he told Gierek, skillfully exploiting the tension between Gierek’s ancestral Catholicism and the atheism of Communist doctrine.He took office in 1977, the year Star Wars dominated cinemas, Björn Borg won Wimbledon and Joe Biden was a dynamic young senator from Delaware.

While this was broadly true, and the tension therein forged his character, his mother was a progressive on race mostly in comparison to her neighbors. Alter points to overseas accomplishments such as the 1978 Camp David accords, ending a conflict between Egypt and Israel that had included four wars in 30 years; the normalisation of relations with China, which “provided the foundation for the global economy as we know it”; establishing human rights as a pillar of foreign policy; and the Panama Canal treaties, which prevented a major war in Central America. Casey, an American, woke up every day and through his efforts, tried to prolong the time fellow Americans spent in Iranian prisons as hostages. He helped get Evangelicals interested in politics and then they ran away from him and went on to vote for Trump. He led by example on renewable energy, installing solar panels at the White House, only for Reagan to take them down with Trumpian spite.The employment of “coded words” was present and he could speak at Black churches and preach equality at the same time he was supporting George Wallace. Sure, he did some good things, like creating the Department of Education, and his work on conservation is right up there with Teddy Roosevelt, and who can forget the Camp David accords? In a year when the current administration scandal books are glutting the bestseller lists this is a most welcome biography of a busy 96-year-old ex-president who is still out there, with Rosalyn, working to build a better world despite the raging political storms.

He was very much an independent, not always forming relationships with other former presidents and often stepping on their toes. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and I really don't care so long as the author keeps it straight and doesn't stray too far from a straightforward/objective biography. He could easily be compared to the founding fathers in his constant desire to know and understand the world whether it be about farming practices, woodworking or international relations. He’s extremely impressive when you spend time with him because of his surpassing intelligence and his ability to charm people up close, which made him a great retail campaigner. Once he'd diagnosed the problem and figured out the solution, he couldn't help but get a one track mind about it.Until he was eleven, his homestead had no running water, no electricity, no insulation, and no mechanized farm equipment; only slop jars and outhouses, hand-pumped wells, kerosene lamps, ancient mule-driven plows, and black laborers to work the land in a feudal system just one step removed from slavery.