The Current - What can today’s leaders learn from Jimmy Carter?

Episode Date: December 30, 2024

Today’s world leaders could learn a thing or two from Jimmy Carter, says political analyst Aaron David Miller. He tells guest host Susan Ormiston that the former U.S. president — who died Sunday ��� never used his office to further his own interests or indulge his own vanity.

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On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts. This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current Podcast. Former President Jimmy Carter was a Georgia peanut farmer who served one term as the U.S.'s 39th president. He died yesterday at 100, becoming the longest- the U.S.'s 39th president. He died yesterday at 100, becoming the longest-lived U.S. president. Aaron David Miller is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he focuses on U.S. foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East. He joins us from Washington to talk about the legacy of Jimmy Carter. Hello.

Hello. Thanks for having me. Thanks for coming on this morning. What word would you use to describe Jimmy Carter's life? Incredibly selfless, meaningful, and purposeful, as was his post-presidency. post-presidency, he showed people, I think, at a time when coarseness and polarization in American politics and selfishness seems to have gained a new currency and crashed through existing norms and institutions of civility and decency in politics. Carter's life involved something else. He did what he thought was right. At times, that was extraordinarily controversial. Would I describe Jimmy Carter as a great president? No. We've had three undeniably great presidents, one a century. Washington in the 18th, Franklin Roosevelt in the,

excuse me, Lincoln in the 19th, and Franklin Roosevelt in the 20th me, Lincoln in the 19th and Franklin Roosevelt in the 20th. Was he a consequential one term president? Absolutely. brokering an agreement between Israel and the most powerful and largest and most politically resonant Arab state, Egypt. And that was the Camp David Accords, of course, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Well, actually, on a technicality, since he was not nominated in time, Begin and Sadat deservedly got that peace prize. Carter's was delayed and it wasn't conveyed on him until 2002. And it was not just for Camp David, although I would have and the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty.

They were two different accomplishments. I would have given Carter that prize along with Reagan and Saddam. So he's often described as the best ex-president the U.S. has ever seen, but his administration, his presidency was described by many as not a success. What were his challenges in the one term? You know, the U.S. presidency in the wake of the two traumas of the 60s and early 70s, Vietnam and Watergate, had plunged the American politics and the presidency itself into a period of instability and crisis. And Carter was a one-term president, and We've never had a an undeniably great president only served one term. So I think it was partly his personality. He was not a politician. And I think he had very little patience, very often for the sorts of political compromises that American politicians make. He was challenged by Ted Kennedy at that time, and stagflation, rising gas prices, and of course, the Iranian hostage crisis

doomed his presidency and opened the door for what would be viewed as the sort of regaining of the optimistic spirit of America with Ronald Reagan's entry into presidential politics. How do you think President Carter's deep faith defined his post-presidency work? Oh, I think faith was critically important. I interviewed Carter for both of my books, one on the Arab-Israeli issue and one on greatness in the presidency. When a man starts a conversation by saying at the age of three, at literally the age of three, because of my Bible study, I was familiar with the Holy Land. You know you're dealing with someone whose faith is a central preoccupying and driving force of their life, as it was with Jimmy Carter, that faith gave rise to an off-putting moralism at times, a capacity to see issues clearly in black and white, when in fact the world as we know it more often delivers in gray. But it became a defining,

defining, dead defining feature, I think, other than public service and selflessness. And that was also tied to his born again Christianity. He had some early ideas. We just have about a minute left, but I was intrigued by the fact he put solar panels on the White House in the 1970s and various other things. You spoke about, you know, the difference between Carter's approach and today. What do you think the politicians in the U.S. should remember from his life now in 2025? I think a commitment, let me reduce it to one sentence. Jimmy Carter, like most of our presidents, all of them actually, perhaps with one exception, had the natural capacity to turn the M in me upside down.

So it became a W in we. Carter eschewed big speaking engagements after the presidency. He didn't look at the office as an ATM machine. He never saw it as a way to enrich or a source of prestige and financial enrichment for his family. That's really the takeaway here. And what we need are presidents who naturally understand that their presidency is tethered to something much bigger than their own personal needs, their financial interests, or their vanity. So Jimmy Carter is juxtaposed, it seems to me, at a critical moment in America's political history.

Indeed. Qualities to reflect on. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Thanks for having me. Aaron David Miller is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.