Nov 22 2008
Carter And Other Humanitarians Blocked From Zimbabwe
Former President Jimmy Carter, former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and Graca Machel, the wife of Nelson Mandela, were all denied entrance into the poor nation of Zimbabwe yesterday. They were going to address humanitarian needs, such as disease and hunger among political turmoil. The group still hopes to help as best they can, but the government of Zimbabwe is not cooperating.
I wanted to take this opportunity to do more than just summarize the problems Carter, Annan, and Machel met. I also want to say how much I have to respect Jimmy Carter. He won the presidency decades ago on a platform of revolutionary change. Many, even to this day, did not appreciate the horrible mess he had inherited and the means he went about fixing it. I am not saying everything he did was flawless, he is only human, and he did what he had to. Just speaking about issues in Latin America, human rights were being violated greatly. What could be worse than that? The U.S., for decades, was supporting the regimes who committed these deeds. This is the world Jimmy Carter had to deal with and he helped to bring these issues into the forefront, and to this day, he is still doing it. He has not gotten younger in the last few years, so it impresses me even more. He is far from the worst U.S. President there ever was, and even if that is untrue, he is making up for it. He could have easily retired to a life of leisure, but the path he did choose gets my respect. As the years go on, it will become more and more unlikely that he will run for his former position of power over the U.S. again, but if he did, I would probably shake off my disillusionment with the American political system, and actually go out there to vote. I think he has done a good job in gaining respect, shown he has an eye for important values, and proven that age does not slow him. He may not win in a landslide, but I believe he will have some support from an America that is leaning more left. Should it never happen, Jimmy Carter is still following his life’s calling.
