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That idealist politician set in place the first and only U.S. foreign policy that was actually intended to really support human rights and democratic choice at the center. (Arabs and Muslims actually look fondly at the Carter-era these days. They see him as an honest broker in the White House—fairly rare in U.S. Middle East history.) Similarly, there had been great relief in America and around the world when the U.S. Congress had actually had the backbone to tell the Executive Branch and the CIA to pull their plug on Angola, i.e. another covert U.S. supported war in Africa in 1975-1976. (George Bush, Sr. was CIA chief around that time, too, and he had had to apologize all over the capitol to help a lot of old spooks who were likely to lose their Cold War era jobs.) I recall, too, how great it was to be in a Kansas high school (Sterling High School) and to remember clearly that in that time and place that American school district did not allow Army recruiters to wander the hallways shagging down students. (In contrast, by the time, I myself was a high school instructor in Great Bend High School in Kansas in 1990, the Army, Navy, Air Force and Army-Reserve recruiters were allowed to wander not only the hallways--but were invited to sit down at lunch in the cafeteria recruiting students in the months leading up to the first Iraq War.) In short, the immediate post-Vietnam Era in America was a relatively safe and secure era —even though the 1940s era of U.S. industrial dinosaurs were hurting and high oil prices were gutting many peoples’ short term hopes for easy money, i.e. as their parents had known so well through the late 1940s through the 1960s. At least, land prices were high for the farmers in those days. (However, land prices would soon fall around 1982, leaving many in the Midwest agricultural sector worse off throughout the subsequent decade of the popular Reagan-era.) 1979 1979 ended with a series of formative trends in full-swing. Certain religious and conservative movements merged and painted the word “liberal” as a dirty word in the U.S. press as the Chicago School of Milton Friedman began to dominate MBA classrooms as Keynesians were kicked out right and left—although Keynesian principles would continue to propel economies & countries, like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan forward for another decade or more. In the international arena, Carter’s policy on promoting real democracy and human rights sent shivers through Latin American and Middle Eastern oligarchies & hegemonies. The Somoza regime collapsed under a popular movement --later co-opted by the Sandinistas to some degree. In Iran, the Shah fell and the Saudis began to shake—as even Mecca was taken over by religious and political fanatics--following in name certain messianic figures. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union decided to throw salt in America’s wounds by starting a small arms race and simultaneously invading Afghanistan. By this time, the U.S. Embassy in Iran had been run over by out-of-control student groups cum-terrorists caught up in the euphoria of a so-called revolution—a movement which has proven to be totally counterrevolutionary in actual practice. This Islamic revolution, led by some religious zealots, caught the Islamic world by storm in the weeks and years to come—eventually leading not only to the U.S. counterrevolutionary support for Saddam Hussein in a War of attrition with Iraq, but also lead the Saudis, Kuwaitis and others in the region to support that monster Hussein in his attempted war for oil property in Iran. 1980s
http://the-teacher.blogspot.com/ KEVIN STODA has been blessed to have either traveled in or worked in nearly 100 countries on five continents over the past two and a half decades. He sees himself as a peace educator and have been a promoter of good economic and social development--making him an enemy of my homelands humongous spending and its focus on using weapons to try and solve global issues. "I am from Kansas so I also use the pseudonym 'Kansas' when I write and publish. I keep two blogs--one with blogger and one with GNN. My writings range from reviews to editorials or to travel observations. I also make recommendations related to policy--having both a strong background in teaching foreign languages and degrees in teaching in history and the social sciences. As a midwesterner, I also write on religion and living out ones faith whether it be as a Christian, Muslim or Buddhist perspective." On my own home page, I also provide information for language learners and travelers http://www.geocities.com/eslkevin/ , http://the-teacher.blogspot.com/ & http://alone.gnn.tv/
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