Think about how many problems we wouldn't be dealing with if Carter hadn't been dismissed as a joke

[kpete]

...let's give a shout-out to Jimmy Carter, who wanted us to reach 20% of energy from renewables by 2000.

But, I mean, think about how many problems we wouldn't be dealing with if Carter hadn't been dismissed as a joke and a scold, mocked by the right and middle, and sent packing so that evil son of a bitch Reagan could screw us forever.

Link to tweet

?s=20&t=88Jdo81-LJ8HpJGOTXB69A

Link to tweet

?s=20&t=88Jdo81-LJ8HpJGOTXB69A

[dchill]

1. Jimmy Carter is the best of us.

[underpants]

2. The Reagan revolution was simply the old guy's sick of all these changes and rights and stuff

Take this job and shove it - ? What if that caught on???

[Cha]

3. Or Hillary hadn't been fucking

DEMONIZED!

💙💛

[lostnfound]

4. I never dismissed him. But my rightwing Florida brother made fun of him all the time

It seemed some fake macho thing he learned.

[Caliman73]

6. Definitely "Fake" macho...

Did your brother go into a nuclear reactor to clean up and repair it to save the world from a nuclear meltdown?

Jimmy Carter did!

[hlthe2b]

5. Met him many times. He is as kind and soft-spoken as he can be decisive and determined.

That he was painted as a weak or out-of-touch President by Reagan a'holes has always devastated me, but not as much as having Dems turn the page on him for so long.

He is a genuinely good man and, given the chance, a very effective leader--as shown by his ME Peace Accord and so much more.

And yes, he was so prescient on where we needed to go on energy. Sadly, humans seem bent on self-destruction--whether though climate change unaddressed, dictators and authoritarians determined to destroy the rest or whatever other cataclysmic forces have been left unaddressed.

[betsuni]

7. Yes, he was treated as a joke.

Mocked for wearing a cardigan and telling Americans what everyone's parents told children complaining about being cold: Don't turn up the heat, money doesn't grow on trees, PUT ON A SWEATER.

Ironic that he was a real born-again Christian. Right-wingers prefer the fake kind.

And a big You Are Dumb to the both-sides idiots claiming Democrats haven't cared about climate change because beholden to Big Whatever.

[Jim__]

8. In 1979 Jimmy Carter installed solar panels at the White House. Reagan ripped them out in 1986.

From Scientific American:

The White House itself once harvested the power of the sun. On June 20, 1979, the Carter administration installed 32 panels designed to harvest the sun's rays and use them to heat water.

Here is what Carter predicted at the dedication ceremony: "In the year 2000 this solar water heater behind me, which is being dedicated today, will still be here supplying cheap, efficient energy…. A generation from now, this solar heater can either be a curiosity, a museum piece, an example of a road not taken or it can be just a small part of one of the greatest and most exciting adventures ever undertaken by the American people."

...

By 1986, the Reagan administration had gutted the research and development budgets for renewable energy at the then-fledgling U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) and eliminated tax breaks for the deployment of wind turbines and solar technologies—recommitting the nation to reliance on cheap but polluting fossil fuels, often from foreign suppliers. "The Department of Energy has a multibillion-dollar budget, in excess of $10 billion," Reagan said during an election debate with Carter, justifying his opposition to the latter's energy policies. "It hasn't produced a quart of oil or a lump of coal or anything else in the line of energy."

And in 1986 the Reagan administration quietly dismantled the White House solar panel installation while resurfacing the roof. "Hey! That system is working. Why don't you keep it?" recalls mechanical engineer Fred Morse, now of Abengoa Solar, who helped install the original solar panels as director of the solar energy program during the Carter years and then watched as they were dismantled during his tenure in the same job under Reagan. "Hey! This whole [renewable] R&D program is working, why don't you keep it?"

...

[Doc Sportello]

9. Amen and a big K&R

It was despicable what was done to this brilliant, compassionate and visionary man.

You are right, we would not be in so many of these situations if America had stuck with him.

[Texaswitchy]

10. Yes.

He said we needed to get out of the middle east.

He was right.

He wanted us energy independent.

He was right.

No oil wars thanks to the Bush family.