I'm remembering Carter Presidency as Carter soon turns 100.

Posted on Facebook Sept. 29 2024.

Happy Birthday to former President Jimmy Carter who I hear turns 100 on Tuesday October 1.

President during my college years and a bit beyond. 1977-1981.

I remember him for advocating less energy consumption to help us get through the energy crisis, back then. We were running out of easy to drill liquid petroleum. One of his famous statements was how dependent we were on a thin line of oil tankers stretching halfway around the world.

He advocated alternative energy and had solar panels installed at the White House. He also advocated American energy independence with something called the Carter Synfuels Program; basically mining shale and cooking it to squeeze out the last drops of American oil. Coal production and gasification was also seen as a solution as USA had plenty of coal reserves.

Since then, new technology has made getting oil out of shale much easier than thought back then. USA is now basically energy independent, but another problem has cropped up; climate change.

Solar, wind and other alternative technologies have significantly improved since those years bringing the price of alternative energy down.

I would like us to see a return to Carter's type of advocacy for conservation and modification of consumptive lifestyles plus continued advancement of the cleaner technologies.

Carter was also noted as an advocate for international human rights with his UN ambassador, Andrew Young, a big figure in that era of hope.

At some point Andrew did have to leave that post, but I forgot the details.

On gay rights, that era could be thought of as ancient history compared to the recent progress made in USA on that topic.

I remember a ground breaking meeting between top White House staff and a group called the National Gay Taskforce. The president wasn't at that meeting, but it was seen as a big step forward at that time. Gay rights was gaining ground at the grass roots level and that was possibly the first recognition at the White House.

Carter's presidency was buffeted many unfortunate events beyond his control such as the Iranian hostage crisis and the Three Mile Island nuclear power incident.

Toward the end of his presidency, there was some feeling that things were floundering. In 1980 Ronald Regan ran against Carter and won the presidency. Tax cuts were popular and gradually things changed with income and wealth inequality now much higher, in USA, than before. Reagan symbolically removed the solar panels from the White House.