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rbennett · Joined: 14 Oct 2009 Posts: 39

im starting the post. post stuff.

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wquinn · Joined: 24 Nov 2009 Posts: 15 Location: undisclosed, MA.

why you gotta go and start it, Rachel?

Anyway, The presidency of Jimmy Carter is so pointedly different from Johnson's and Kennedy's. Jimmy Carters focus on human rights was so unexpected after the last readings.

Jimmy Carter was made fun of as weak and childish in his time. He was 'the president who was scared of a rabbit' (i'm serious; the J.C. Rabbit incident).

But what was sad to me is how little difference it made. The three U.S. attempts to be 'the good guys' didn't seem to do much at all. It was uncanny. Some of it seemed like just bad luck.

When i was a kid i asked my dad about Jimmy Carter, and he said "He was good at everything he did except being a president". Do you agree after the reading? Could his attempts at peace and altruism ever have worked?

mmcgowan18 · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 27

I was so happy when I read this article and I saw that the US was doing something that didn’t directly benefit them. Carter was the first president we have read about so far that was actually interested in the people of Latin America, not just the how the government affect the US’s economy. Carter didn’t force the US’s views too much; he just showed Latin America that the US wouldn’t support them if they were treating their people poorly.

I think this reading will spark many different opinions in the class. Human rights, and when governments should become involved in other countries governments is very controversial. I think that what the US was trying to accomplish was very good, but like Will said the US ran into a lot of bad luck, when it came to what they did actually working.

My question is do you think the US should have made different decisions in the countries that so many people were being killed?

rbennett · Joined: 14 Oct 2009 Posts: 39

To answer Maggie’s question, I do think the U.S. should have done things differently in the countries that were full or violence and death. Obviously if there was a lot of violence, then something still was wrong. Even though the U.S. stopped backing dictators and tried to help in terms of human rights, their efforts were not good enough. It seemed like the attempts to protect humans rights were only half hearted. The attempts only helped certain people, and definitely did not fix the whole problem. They only ended up helping the rich, and the gaps between rich and poor grew wider, causing more problems and violence. I feel like the U.S. began its fight for human rights just because it realized they had messed up by helping to implement many horrible dictators, and it realized the rest of the world was scrutinizing and judging its every move. I don’t know exactly what the U.S. should have done differently, but its attempts didn’t really help clean up the mess they helped create.

My question is: what do you think about Carter’s “carrot-and-stick” tactic that he used with military juntas?

soldsman · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 9

i for one was pleasantly surprised with this reading. although there were lots of plans that didn't exactly work, the mood of the reading was a bit lighter.

in response to your question Will, from what i have heard about those times and Carter, is that tons of people were out of jobs and the economy sucked. Although Carter was trying to help other countries, I don't think he did anything that drastically turned anything in the U.S. for the better. I'm not positive about this though..it's more just some of what i might remember hearing/reading.

I did like that the reading made it seem that Carter was mostly trying to help for moral reasons though. Especially in the Human Rights Test 1 in Argentina. The other Human Rights tests seemed a mix of morality led and avoiding conflicts.

my question is..
Carter seemed the have the same point of attack each dilema: taking away aid from that country. Why did it work in some cases, and not so well in others?

RRubbico · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 23

This reading definitely helped me understand what was happening in Latin American and the US at the time. It definitely got complicated at times making some parts of it hard to follow, but overall it was helpful. I thought it was interesting to see how many of the leaders that took control of the Latin American countries actually had no care for their population. In previous reading most of the leaders who took charge had a plan to make their countries stronger and less dependant on larger countries like the US. It seemed like these leader were only interested in getting rich at the cost of their people.

When I was reading I was wondering the whole time if the reason for the new bad leadership in Latina American countries was because of Carter’s new human rights approach. It seemed like the countries no longer had the uniting factor that they used to. This factor was leaving their dependency on the US and becoming self-sustaining. Now that the US was aiming to aid Latin American countries even if it did not benefit them in some way, Latin America could no longer pin them as the bad guys. I have no idea if that makes any sense at all I just thought it was interesting.

Do you think funding dictatorships in Latin America, only to make sure that the county was not communist, was a good tactic the US used?

blee · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 9

First of all, I enjoyed this reading because it was something different, such as human rights more than killing people like we read about for past weeks! To answer your question Will, I think he was a great president. I think it's really daring and pushy of him to declare a human rights as a priority than looking for any other profits from other foreign countries. Also, I guess that little spin might have affected other coutries to think that U.S. also has a warm heart to take care of others while gaining the benefits. I was surprised that U.S. or Carter was willing to give up panama canal because it was one of the core route for trades. Since, U.S. saw no more benefits from it did not hesitate to give up on it. I was very surprised of that bold decision.

My question is Why does U.S. get involved with other countries so much? Was it because it was wealtheir than any other country or it was an effort of U.S. to develop itself?

mlockery · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 7

I enjoyed reading about the broad range of success in different juntas. I think that initially, each rebel group had an equally poor shot at actually staging a successful coup. They usually had leaders who were charismatic enough to get people to turn against the government for them, and smart enough to run a nation in the event that their coup should be successful. The ultimate example of brains-meets-charm would be Castro.

However, the deciding factor in who succeeds and who fails seems to always be the United States. For instance, the author spends a lot of time explaining how similar the FMLN (El Salvador) was to the FSLN (Nicaragua). As we know from the reading, the FSLN succeeded in its junta and the FMLN failed. I believe this is largely if not entirely due to the fact that the United States provided support to the FSLN and resistance to the FMLN. This ability to pick and choose which junta succeeds and which junta fails is an extremely useful tool; the United States can defend or radically change the government in any Latin American nation through covert military funding, thus eliminating the need for invasions, which in turn saves the United States a little face.

My question: What (if any) is the reason that the United States intervened in Nicaragua and El Salvador besides Carter’s drive for human rights?

asilver · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 28

In response to Sophie, It did not seem like Carters method of withholding funds from countries, had very much effect on the countries policy's. For instance when Carter tried to take a stance in El Salvador and blocked the development of a bank. He repealed his disison as soon as the juntia put a few people he liked in office. But then they went out and killed a bunch of nuns. So I don't think it was terribly effective. That being said the alternative would be to facilitate revolutions and coups, and we all know how doing that turns out.

My question: Is it right for the US to spend money on helping countries wich we have no attachments to?

cfairless · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 7

Whenever the US has a president who makes a mistake, it always seems to be that it used too much force, invaded where it didn't need to, or made some other hasty choice for the most violent and military-oriented option. Because of this it was nice to hear about a president who may have made some mistakes during his term, but his mistakes were things like providing possibly too much aid, or not choosing the most forceful option. If Carter did anything wrong it was because he was "too nice." I think that if we had more presidents like this, the US might not be a superpower, but the world would be a more peaceful place.

In response to Alec's question, I believe that it is "right" for the US to provide aid to countries that it is not attached to. As a world superpower it is our responsibility to help developing countries, simply because we have the resources to make people's lives better. But providing aid in the form of food or carefully monitored funds is one thing, interfering in elections because we think we know better is much different.

One thing that bothered me about the reading was that it made it seem like Carter was only trying to help those countries because it was his "Christian duty." He may have been a hard-core Christian, but it is not only because of this that he wanted to help people. His personality and morals effected his decision, and these do not necessarily have to come from what religion he was.

My question: Do you think Jimmy Carter's religion had anything to do with the choices he made?

carterp · Joined: 22 Nov 2009 Posts: 6

This reading reminded me of the view point that I had to represent yesterday, I believe it was saying that the U.S. should not intervene because in the end it would be same. With Carter trying to limit human rights abuses it just seemed like a drop in the bucket and that the situation would stay the same no matter how many diplomatic actions we took against them.

Alec's question: "Is it right for the US to spend money on helping countries wich we have no attachments to?" I believe that it is right. I hate to reference this but it is almost a trickle down affect with the worlds countries, where the richer ones must give money to the poorer ones in order for the poor countries to accel. But compared to the alternative of just keeping the money or feeding it back into our own economy it is the "right" thing to do. Of course then you get into issues of how the money is spent and who gets it, but i think in general (maybe not for cash) giving aid and supplies to countries in need, and most importantly helping them build a sustainable infastructure is the right thing to do... if it is done with good intentions.

jcho · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 22

I enjoyed this reading compared to the reading in the past, since this showed a different side of the US. With Jimmy Carter as president, I was surprised that the US was willing to act on a morally unjust issue (without looking for any benefits in return). It was a sad result however, that these just policies just wasn't cut out to stop the violence in Latin America. It was funny to see how many disputes the US had in deciding to help Argentina (a country that had not much threat or connection to the US). The "protector" of the world was having trouble deciding if they should help.
To the question asking why these policies didn't work, I think this just isn't the way of the US. It is a theory that sounds morally just, but one that doesn't work in reality. However, I think that it was good that the US had a time period where "peace" was the one and only goal.
Do you think that the way the US was handling the situations in Latin America were better?

azellweger · Joined: 19 Oct 2009 Posts: 20

It's kind of funny how the three presidents we're focusing on (Kennedy, Johnson, and now Carter) all have very different approaches to problems. Johnson is more aggressive, Carter was more passive and diplomatic, and Kennedy was in the middle. It also reminded me of the 'agree' / 'disagree' exercise at the end of class. You could either agree (more to one wall), you could disagree (more to the opposing wall), or you could be somewhere in the middle.

My question is: Which approach do you think was most effective?

spsmith · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 8

This reading I thought showed that the US was starting to show remorse for what it did to Latin America. Carter wanted to help, but went about it in the wrong way. Whenever he provided aid to countries, it only made the rich richer and the poor poorer and ultimately causing more deaths with the death squads. I think that the fact that the US did nothing for the poverty rate shows that the government was simply making up for the dictators that they put in place. If the US had really wanted to do some good then they should have helped the people who were living in poverty not the small percentage of people who had money. I can see why the US would help those on top though, they were the ones who were in control of the country so if they were friendly with the US then both government gain.

helens · Joined: 22 Nov 2009 Posts: 25

I really did enjoy this reading also. I felt as if I am now seeing the U.S in a new light than I have before. Like I seen the United States as a somewhat bully before, or basically a country that always seem to be in the mix of other peoples problems. But in this reading I like the fact the United States felt sorry for what is happening to Latin America.

I definiatley agree with the Maggie’s post on how Carter is the first president to d something that didn’t benefit the United States. But Charlotte also had a good point when she said, “I think that if we had more presidents like this, the US might not be a superpower, but the world would be a more peaceful place.”

I know this is late and all. But I really would like for her to expand on this or if we could talk about this more in class. :]

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