Jimmy Carter: Still useless

So after defying the White House, the State Department and common sense, Jimmy Carter’s terrorist tour wound up on Monday with the ex-president claiming he — and he alone! — had made progress in achieving peace in the Middle East by talking to Hamas and Syria.

According to the New York Times:

Mr. Carter said he extracted a promise from Hamas to respect the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip negotiated by Hamas’s rivals in the Palestinian Authority if it were ratified by a referendum of the Palestinian people.

Furthermore, Syrian leaders told him, he said, that “about 85 percent” of the issues between Syria’s government and Israel had been resolved in prior negotiations and that it wanted a peace deal “as soon as possible.”

After criticizing the U.S. for not talking to the good folk of Hamas, Carter claimed that Hamas not only would accept a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as the capital, but that they would accept Israel as their neighbor.

Illustrating the delicate precision of diplomatic language, a spokesman for Hamas made an appearance shortly after Carter’s press conference and clarified that Hamas would not acknowledge Israel’s right to exist, but it might propose a 10-year truce if the Palestinian state was quickly approved, according to the BBC.

Carter’s “breakthrough” might require some translation into common English to fully appreciate: In exchange for the credibility boost that Carter’s visit gives them, at least among liberals, Hamas leaders agreed that they would consider letting Israel live for up to 10 years if Israel gives the Muslims everything they’ve ever wanted. (Historically, the Palestinians have never been content with getting what they want, no matter how Israel or anyone else has tried to appease them.)

In the end, Carter’s trip accomplished what it was probably really designed to achieve: providing Carter another high-profile opportunity to humiliate his own country and the current administration.

Clinton country: Hillary’s terror ties

While Barack Obama has been receiving well-deserved criticism lately for his serious lack of judgment in associating with people involved in anti-American groups, and specifically with home-grown terrorist William Ayers, he’s not the only Democratic candidate with ties to terror.

Hillary Clinton also has a record of involvement with recognized terrorist groups and their supporters.

In the mid-1980s, she served on the board of the New World Foundation, which gave funding to the Palestine Liberation Organization during a time when the PLO was officially designated a terrorist group by the United States.

In 1996, as first lady, she initiated a program to bring Muslim leaders to the White House. The list of invitees was notable for the number of fundamentalist groups represented, including the American Muslim Alliance (AMA) and the Council on American-Islamic Relations, both of which openly support Hamas. Representatives of those groups attended a White House reception hosted by Hillary Clinton. Both groups have published anti-Semitic statements and hosted conferences that encouraged participants to engage in jihad and denounce Jews.

The AMA in the mid-90s was headed by Abdulrahman Alamoudi, who had ties to Musa Abu Marzug, the Hamas official known for organizing the group’s death squads.

When Hillary ran for Senate in 2000, she was thrown a fundraiser by the Massachusetts chapter of the AMA. Somebody in her campaign organization must have realized the donations would be controversial, and in federal filing forms, the Clinton campaign described the AMA as the “American Museum Alliance.” When called on the lie, Clinton’s campaign returned the funds four months later.

Some terrorist groups have made known their support for Hillary in this coming election, according to an October WorldNetDaily.com article. Aaron Klein, Jerusalem correspondent, has quoted Ala Senakreh, West Bank chief of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist group, as saying, “I hope Hillary is elected in order to have the occasion to carry out all the promises she is giving regarding Iraq. … I hope also that she will maintain her husband’s policies regarding Palestine and even develop that policy.”

Few people realize that this country fought a war on Muslim terrorists shortly after its birth. At the time of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, American ships in the Mediterranean were frequently subject to attacks by Muslim terrorists, known at the time as the Barbary pirates. The Muslims would raid ships unprovoked, steal their goods and take the survivors as slaves. It was a practice they had been engaged in for centuries without much opposition.

Then, as now, there was a debate between those who wanted to fight the villains and those who thought it would be easiest to simply give them what they wanted. Even John Adams was in favor of appeasement and attempted to buy off the pirates and ransom Americans. The result of that effort was that tribute to the Muslims grew to become 20 percent of the United States budget at the time. And yet, even in his most pro-appeasement moods, John Adams never willingly associated with terrorists.

It wasn’t until Thomas Jefferson that anybody stood up to the thugs and the states that supported them. Rather than pay tribute, Jefferson used the money that would have been spent on bribes and ordered creation of the Marine Corps and construction of highly advanced (for the time) warships. Then he sent the Marines to the Mediterranean to settle the matter once and for all. The Marines bombarded and invaded Muslim countries until the pirates and their sponsors surrendered and freed all the kidnapped Americans.

Clearly, Jefferson had the right strategy.

The Democrats have fallen far, far from the ideals that once made this country great. They not only are not capable of leading this country, but the extensive ties both front runners have with terrorist groups and America haters should serve as ample warning that either Clinton or Obama may pose a serious danger to this country’s future.