The Very Good and the Very Ugly

by Errington C. Thompson, MD –

Jimmy Carter was the 39th President of the United States. He died at the age of 100—the longest-lived former president in US history.

For those who are paying attention, he taught us how to live. Jimmy Carter was a deeply religious man. He was a lifelong Southern Baptist. Yet he believed in the separation of church and state. He believed in women’s rights. He believed in a woman’s right to an abortion.

Let me type that again: Jimmy Carter believed in a woman’s right to choose. He firmly believed that he could be a Christian and fight on behalf of women who thought that abortion was the right choice for them.

Southern Baptists were not happy. As a matter of fact, they were livid. In the late 1990s, President Carter broke away from the Southern Baptists and formed something called the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. Approximately 15 years later he helped form the New Baptist Covenant, which welcomed moderate Baptists.

Hearing the Word, and Living it

This was a man who believed in the teachings of Christ—and living up to them. He believed in helping the poor. He believed in being compassionate. He believed in welcoming the outcast and the disenfranchised. He believed in making this world a better place.

This brings me to the Guinea worm. Guinea worms are found mostly in Africa and thrive in contaminated water and foods. This nasty worm causes recurrent infections of the eyelashes and eyelids. This causes the eyelashes to grow in such a way that they scratch the cornea of the eye. Without treatment, this leads to blindness.

How do you combat a worm? There is no vaccine, no pill to take. Instead, combating the Guinea worm is all about hygiene. So The Carter Center, which Jimmy Carter built after his presidential term, decided to do something about it.

That meant teaching people to use toilets (yes, toilets would have to be built) instead of relieving themselves wherever they were. It meant making sure that people had access to clean water to drink, and that the food they ate was not contaminated. The Carter Center’s Guinea Worm Initiative was about going to small, remote villages and changing people’s behavior—not by force, but by persuasion, education, demonstration, and hard, tireless work. It was something that was not going to happen overnight. It was going to take time. Effort. Cooperation from lots of different organizations.

So back in 1986, working with the World Health Organization, the US CDC, UNICEF, and any number of national ministries and local communities, Jimmy Carter decided to take on the Guinea worm.

The Guinea worm infects around 3 million people per year! 3.5 million just in 1986! But did I say infects? I should’ve said infected. In 2022, there were 13 cases of the Guinea worm worldwide. 13! That’s an accomplishment you can’t wrap your head around!

Jimmy Carter could have used his celebrity to sell gold sneakers, but he did not. He didn’t charge the Secret Service to stay at overpriced hotels he owned. He wasn’t helping the rich buy a second house in the Hamptons or a bigger yacht.

Instead, Jimmy Carter was helping real people. He helped the working poor acquire their first house. Not with money, but with his own hands. Through Habitat for Humanity, he and his wife Rosalyn helped build houses with hammer and nails. In fact, they helped build, renovate, or repair more than 4,447 homes in 14 countries.

Failure? Not at All

Some historians will tell you that Jimmy Carter had a failed presidency. I’m not sure that I’m buying it. He created the Department of Education. He also faced a new kind of inflation—“stagflation.” This was inflation that was out of control, coupled with stagnant growth, but he had the OPEC oil embargo, which helped fuel inflation and cripple the auto industry.

What did he do? He didn’t whine and blame everything on his predecessor. He put the right man on the job—Federal Reserve chair Paul Volcker. This was a crisis. It could not be fixed quickly. It took almost 18 months, but Jimmy Carter and Paul Volcker fixed the economy.

At the same time, Jimmy Carter faced the Iranian hostage crisis. About 300 Iranian students overran the US Embassy in Tehran and captured 66 Americans whom they held hostage. Despite negotiations and diplomacy, Jimmy Carter was unable to win their freedom. A failed military rescue attempt resulted in the death of eight Americans when one of the helicopters crashed. All this made Jimmy Carter look impotent and weak. Unfortunately, some terrible situations don’t have good, easy solutions.

Carter believed in equality. He appointed women and minorities to his staff, his Cabinet, and the Federal bench.

I would argue that Jimmy Carter was dealt an awful set of cards. I think he played those cards as well as he could. He was a great man. He never complained about the circumstances that made it impossible for America to reelect him. I love Jimmy Carter because he was the best of us. Rest in peace, President Carter.

Hate is Taught

I’m not sure if you are familiar with Anthony Ray Hinton. He is a man who was convicted of two fast-food murders in Birmingham, Alabama. He was a death row inmate. While on death row, Mr. Hinton, a Black man, befriended Henry Hays, a Ku Klux Klan member who had beaten a black teenager to death.

Henry was given an order by his father to kill the first Black male that he saw. And that’s what he did. So, imagine this: through the prison bars, Anthony Hinton talks to Henry. Hinton asks, “Why do you hate me?”

Over the years, Hinton and Hays become friends. Anthony gets Henry to read James Baldwin’s Go Tell It on the Mountain. (This classic book is a complex tale of a 14-year-old boy who grows up in Harlem. It’s a story about the boy’s struggle with his parents, with his Christian religion, and with racism.)

Henry Hays read the novel without knowing that James Baldwin was Black. Hays was fascinated by the book. He took pages of hand-written notes. They discussed the book, and through this 1950s novel, Hays began to learn empathy. But then, on the day of his execution, Henry Hays asks for his friend Anthony Hinton to be present. For the first time, they embrace. Hays admits to Hinton that his father and mother taught him to hate, and the society that he grew up in taught him to hate. It was Anthony Hinton who showed him love.

I find this true story extraordinary. Hinton could have been mad at the world. He was wrongly incarcerated and spent more than two decades behind bars. He could have easily told this racist Klansman to take a hike, but he didn’t. He followed the teachings of Christ, Moses, and Mohammad. He showed compassion and love. And maybe because he did the right thing, Karma and/or God smiled on Mr. Hinton. The Supreme Court overturned his conviction. Mr. Hinton is currently, finally, a free man.

A Wake-Up Call . . . ?

A man drove from Colorado Springs to Las Vegas on New Year’s Day. He was driving a Tesla Cybertruck. He pulled up to the Trump International Hotel. It appears the man shot himself in the head as he set off fireworks and explosives in the truck.

The man was a 37-year-old American Army Master Sergeant. He had special forces training. He received five bronze stars. He was active-duty military, on leave from Germany.

He wanted this demonstration to be “a wake-up call.” He wrote what can only be called a deranged message on his cell phone. He described his actions as “not a terrorist attack.” He said that Americans only pay attention to spectacles and violence. He then called for “a national rebirth of masculinity under the leadership of Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Bobby Kennedy, Jr.” Oh, and he said, “Masculinity is good, and men must be leaders.” What the heck?

First of all, this was a distraught man. He probably suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder. Yet this was another American who is bought into the false masculinity of Donald Trump and his minions.

. . . or Wolf Man?

The alpha male is a stereotype derived from research into wolves. A pack of wolves would follow around a dominant male, who would control the pack with an iron fist: it was his way or the highway.

This structure was then translated from wolves into human behavior. This was the drill sergeant. The only way a man, a true man, could lead was through intimidation and violence.

Unfortunately, the research was completely wrong. Subsequent research finds that a male and a female govern a wolf pack. They jointly work to control the pride. Therefore, this dominant, supercharged alpha male is a myth. A real man, a complete man, learns that leadership is more than screaming in someone’s face or belittling them in public. Sometimes, leadership is about compassion. Sometimes, leadership is about understanding. And sometimes, leadership is about leading by example.

This brings me right back to Jimmy Carter, a true leader. We need more Jimmy Carters in this world. We truly do.

Finally, we need to pray for our brothers and sisters who are suffering in Los Angeles. The wildfires are devastating. You can donate at redcross.org or the World Central Kitchen (donate.wck.org).

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed here, as well as assertions of facts, are those of the author. They do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of The Urban News.