The Reincarnation of Jimmy Carter and the return of Scarface
In 1980 president Jimmy Carter negotiated a deal with Fidel Castro to allow an open door policy for Cuban refugees seeking a safe haven in the U.S. Anyone who could get here, could stay. Some came by raft, braving shark-infested waters to escape the beautiful, socialist hellhole that was communist Cuba. It was only considered beautiful, of course, by anti-capitalists, a few of whom were in our own government. But, eventually, 125,000 came by boat to Florida in what became known as “The Mariel Boatlift.” Some were simply looking to be repatriated with family. There were plenty of cretins, misfits, thieves and murderers loosed from Cuba's prisons and mental institution that made the passage as well. President Carter had spent a lot of time and effort making friends with Fidel, and now that they were close pals, he believed that Fidel would do the right thing, which he did—the right thing for Cuba, that is. For the U.S., it turned out pretty bad.
Recently I read a scholarly paper on this difficult period in Miami's history. A paper that was clearly written by someone who had never actually been to Miami, at least not in 1980, or any time shortly thereafter. The paper was filled with words like; Capitalism, American-bigotry, racism, and, occasionally, the writer used words like; communism and socialism. I was there, though, living and hanging in Miami at the time. Prior to the mass exodus of Cubans fleeing to Florida's welcoming shores, Miami's Cuban population was about a quater of the city's demographic, made up of industrious, law-abiding immigrants looking for a better life. Virtually overnight, it all changed. Spanish became the unofficial language of the city proper and guns, drugs and murder, and, I do mean plenty of murder, was the order of the day. Within a few short years, Miami, that sun-drenched mecca for Jewish retirees, with lot's of early bird specials, became the murder capital of the industrialized world—where Cocaine Cowboys and Scarface merged to exploit new business opportunities—just like good, hardworking, lethal entrepreneurs have always sought to do.
There were other problems as well. With such a substantial increase in Miami’s population, unemployment rose by nearly 40%, as more people competed in an already struggling labor market. It didn't help that real unemployment across the nation was nearing double digits. Or, that interest rates for a 30-year mortgage were at 13%, eventually hitting an obscene 18%. This had the effect of virtually shutting down any new construction, not just in Miami, but across the country, to say nothing about the stifling impact on business creation. Inflation made things even worse, reaching almost 10% in 1980, the highest levels since 1947.
How had it gotten so bad so quickly? It began in the early seventies as the cost of gas skyrocketed, the result of artificial oil shortages created by our trading partners in the Middle East. Since we no longer extracted much oil from the rich vein of crude that was buried deep in our own country—something we had regularly done only a few years before—Americans found themselves being held hostage by the Middle Eastern oil cartel, OPEC.
With oil shortages came rising prices. Inflation became the new normal for Americans. This continued off and on throughout the decade of the seventies and into the eighties, driving the cost of everything, from food to fuel, from housing to cars. If politicians had a clue about how to solve the problem, it wasn't evident.
For American's, it seemed like one long stream-of-consciousness nightmare. From multiple political assassinations in the sixties, to Vietnam and Watergate, and, inevitably, Jimmy Carter, the man from Plains, Georgia—the the humble peanut farmer chosen to save a crumbling nation—the new kid on the block with the brains and audacity to turn it all around.
Jimmy Carter was seen as a breath of fresh air, a political neophyte, uncorrupted by Washington's relentless cronyism. In only a few short years, that breath of “fresh air” would turn into an odious blast of bureaucratic halitosis. Not surprisingly, audacity alone, wasn't enough. This isn't some movie where a bunch of kids figure out how to put on a show and raise enough money to deal with the problem at hand. This is real life, rough and tumble politics, diversity of opinion, trench warfare fought by steely-eyed men and woman of will and resolve. Not some feel-good platitude that could fit on the back of a post card. That is the nature of politics. Real politicians understand that evil and good sit right next to bland and indifferent, all occupying a place at the table. It's the ability to distinguish the two, and broker a deal, that separates the men from the boys. Without a leader who could get things done, the country was deadlocked, stuck, flailing like a fly caught in a spiders web.
Recently I read a scholarly paper on this difficult period in Miami's history. A paper that was clearly written by someone who had never actually been to Miami, at least not in 1980, or any time shortly thereafter. The paper was filled with words like; Capitalism, American-bigotry, racism, and, occasionally, the writer used words like; communism and socialism. I was there, though, living and hanging in Miami at the time. Prior to the mass exodus of Cubans fleeing to Florida's welcoming shores, Miami's Cuban population was about a quater of the city's demographic, made up of industrious, law-abiding immigrants looking for a better life. Virtually overnight, it all changed. Spanish became the unofficial language of the city proper and guns, drugs and murder, and, I do mean plenty of murder, was the order of the day. Within a few short years, Miami, that sun-drenched mecca for Jewish retirees, with lot's of early bird specials, became the murder capital of the industrialized world—where Cocaine Cowboys and Scarface merged to exploit new business opportunities—just like good, hardworking, lethal entrepreneurs have always sought to do.
There were other problems as well. With such a substantial increase in Miami’s population, unemployment rose by nearly 40%, as more people competed in an already struggling labor market. It didn't help that real unemployment across the nation was nearing double digits. Or, that interest rates for a 30-year mortgage were at 13%, eventually hitting an obscene 18%. This had the effect of virtually shutting down any new construction, not just in Miami, but across the country, to say nothing about the stifling impact on business creation. Inflation made things even worse, reaching almost 10% in 1980, the highest levels since 1947.
How had it gotten so bad so quickly? It began in the early seventies as the cost of gas skyrocketed, the result of artificial oil shortages created by our trading partners in the Middle East. Since we no longer extracted much oil from the rich vein of crude that was buried deep in our own country—something we had regularly done only a few years before—Americans found themselves being held hostage by the Middle Eastern oil cartel, OPEC.
With oil shortages came rising prices. Inflation became the new normal for Americans. This continued off and on throughout the decade of the seventies and into the eighties, driving the cost of everything, from food to fuel, from housing to cars. If politicians had a clue about how to solve the problem, it wasn't evident.
For American's, it seemed like one long stream-of-consciousness nightmare. From multiple political assassinations in the sixties, to Vietnam and Watergate, and, inevitably, Jimmy Carter, the man from Plains, Georgia—the the humble peanut farmer chosen to save a crumbling nation—the new kid on the block with the brains and audacity to turn it all around.
Jimmy Carter was seen as a breath of fresh air, a political neophyte, uncorrupted by Washington's relentless cronyism. In only a few short years, that breath of “fresh air” would turn into an odious blast of bureaucratic halitosis. Not surprisingly, audacity alone, wasn't enough. This isn't some movie where a bunch of kids figure out how to put on a show and raise enough money to deal with the problem at hand. This is real life, rough and tumble politics, diversity of opinion, trench warfare fought by steely-eyed men and woman of will and resolve. Not some feel-good platitude that could fit on the back of a post card. That is the nature of politics. Real politicians understand that evil and good sit right next to bland and indifferent, all occupying a place at the table. It's the ability to distinguish the two, and broker a deal, that separates the men from the boys. Without a leader who could get things done, the country was deadlocked, stuck, flailing like a fly caught in a spiders web.
As if things weren’t bad enough with the country slogging it's way through economic malaise, high unemployment and inflation sucking money directly from American's wallets, the Shah of Iran (a not-so-nice guy) was displaced in a coup by the Ayatollah Khomeini (a much worse guy.) The result; for 444 days, fifty-two American diplomats and citizens were held captive in the American Embassy by Iran's new Muslim-fundamentalist government. Attempts to free them by the Carter Administration, using diplomatic methods, went nowhere. When the military was sent in, they were rendered ineffectual as planes fell apart for lack of spare parts and other essential things like screws that could hold them together. The question asked over and over by weary-eyed Americans was simple; "How the hell had the most powerful, prosperous nation on earth been rendered impotent so quickly?"
By 1980, as all seemed to be lost, things took a turn for the better. Americans wised up and voted for Ronald Reagan, sending Jimmy Carter and his family of progressive rednecks packing. The lengthy Iranian hostage crisis that had gone on and on, with Muslims sneering in disbelief at their good fortune in having such a pantywaist like the previous president in the White House, suddenly, were quaking in fear—and immediately, they let the hostages go. With Reagan sitting in the driver seat, there was a new attitude from America's enemies. He was called a cowboy by his detractors, who were mostly Ivy-League, ivory-tower academics and other theoretically-minded, self-professed elites. To a world of hostile dictators, though, he was John Wayne in “The Man who Shot Liberty Valance” staring dead in the eye of Lee Marvin's quintessential bad man, unblinking and ready to do what needed to be done.
You see, it takes an individual that can get things done, not the person that thinks the deepest thoughts, or has the greatest good as his/her goal, but, a doer of deeds. That is the simple truth. You can greatly over think this idea of freedom. And, you can just as quickly think it away in an attempt to manage our humanity by writing a new law to govern every human frailty. You can foolishly view your potential enemies as a bunch of wayward teenage hoodlums who are really just in need of some maternal love and care. That is, until they knife you in the back! No, as unfortunate as it may seem, some people need to be killed, it's that simple. How do you determine who needs to be killed? By carefully developing the necessary knowledge, skills and instincts to recognize a threatening predator. If humans really are nothing more than highly evolved animals, they've survived this Darwinian dance of life and death by knowing when to pull the trigger. Trying to unlearn such instincts is cultural suicide—the undoing of civilization at the hands of the barbarians at the gate. If this sounds harsh, blame history. God knows, this same reality has played itself out, over and over again for thousands of years. To ignore history is idiocy, worse still, it's willful childishness masquerading as enlightenment.
That’s why, if all this sound familiar, it should! Jimmy Carter is back, not his ghost (he's not dead) but a man cut from similar cloth, although I admit, I believe Carter loved his country and was proud to be an American, at least on some days. But, Barack Obama is another matter altogether. He has accomplished relatively little in his life before becoming president. Not as a community organizer, or as a junior senator without a single meaningful legislative accomplishment.
As President Obama enters the final phase of his presidency, he's abandoned even the pretense of concern for the Constitution. This is remarkable, considering he's alleged to be a constitutional scholar. That, of course, was just one more gig where having the necessary credentials was set aside to make way for the “New” America. One untainted by white-nepotism and values like scholastic achievement.
If you're a serious academic, you're supposed to publish articles as a way of proving your intellectual merit, exposing your work to the scrutiny of other academics who will test the substance of your arguments. It is a trial by fire. In Obama's case, there was nothing to test, nothing to burn. Possibly, there was one article praising Roe V. Wade and one letter, past that, nothing. So how did he become the president of the Harvard Law Review? Harvard, throughout most of it's history, used academic excellence to determine who received this prestigious position. They changed the rules to allow “other factors" in an effort to expand minority representation.
Recently, Alan Dershowitz, one of the foremost legal scholars in the world admitted that a young Barack Obama tried to get into his prestigious study group at Harvard, but academically didn't have the grades. Ted Cruz, by comparison, not only made the grades, but was referred to by Dershowitz as “Off the charts brilliant!” Dershowitz is a life-long liberal and civil libertarian, who professes no love for Cruz's politics. Michele Obama has, likewise, made evident her dissatisfaction with tests and test taking, stating that she was a poor test taker. Maybe that's why Common Core was designed to work around traditional methods of testing, teaching and grading, in favor of a more generalized approach to teaching that focuses less on actual problem solving. One of it's architects has admitted that undoing white-privilege was a primary motive in helping to create the curriculum. The stench of paternalism reeks so powerfully in such statements that minorities should be outraged. But, apparently, they aren't. The propaganda machine at work in the media filters the language through covert symbolism, obscuring it's meaning to good effect.
And so it goes. Actual qualifications like: knowledge, a bankable track record, a high level of academic achievement, something that might indicate hard work and intellectual resourcefulness was the stuff of yesterday, the stuff of white tyranny. None of that for our president! For Barack, the man who would be king, the most powerful man on the earth and the leader of the free world, race was enough. Collectively, the nation turned it's head in deference, and, as they did, they marveled at their own enlightenment.
By 1980, as all seemed to be lost, things took a turn for the better. Americans wised up and voted for Ronald Reagan, sending Jimmy Carter and his family of progressive rednecks packing. The lengthy Iranian hostage crisis that had gone on and on, with Muslims sneering in disbelief at their good fortune in having such a pantywaist like the previous president in the White House, suddenly, were quaking in fear—and immediately, they let the hostages go. With Reagan sitting in the driver seat, there was a new attitude from America's enemies. He was called a cowboy by his detractors, who were mostly Ivy-League, ivory-tower academics and other theoretically-minded, self-professed elites. To a world of hostile dictators, though, he was John Wayne in “The Man who Shot Liberty Valance” staring dead in the eye of Lee Marvin's quintessential bad man, unblinking and ready to do what needed to be done.
You see, it takes an individual that can get things done, not the person that thinks the deepest thoughts, or has the greatest good as his/her goal, but, a doer of deeds. That is the simple truth. You can greatly over think this idea of freedom. And, you can just as quickly think it away in an attempt to manage our humanity by writing a new law to govern every human frailty. You can foolishly view your potential enemies as a bunch of wayward teenage hoodlums who are really just in need of some maternal love and care. That is, until they knife you in the back! No, as unfortunate as it may seem, some people need to be killed, it's that simple. How do you determine who needs to be killed? By carefully developing the necessary knowledge, skills and instincts to recognize a threatening predator. If humans really are nothing more than highly evolved animals, they've survived this Darwinian dance of life and death by knowing when to pull the trigger. Trying to unlearn such instincts is cultural suicide—the undoing of civilization at the hands of the barbarians at the gate. If this sounds harsh, blame history. God knows, this same reality has played itself out, over and over again for thousands of years. To ignore history is idiocy, worse still, it's willful childishness masquerading as enlightenment.
That’s why, if all this sound familiar, it should! Jimmy Carter is back, not his ghost (he's not dead) but a man cut from similar cloth, although I admit, I believe Carter loved his country and was proud to be an American, at least on some days. But, Barack Obama is another matter altogether. He has accomplished relatively little in his life before becoming president. Not as a community organizer, or as a junior senator without a single meaningful legislative accomplishment.
As President Obama enters the final phase of his presidency, he's abandoned even the pretense of concern for the Constitution. This is remarkable, considering he's alleged to be a constitutional scholar. That, of course, was just one more gig where having the necessary credentials was set aside to make way for the “New” America. One untainted by white-nepotism and values like scholastic achievement.
If you're a serious academic, you're supposed to publish articles as a way of proving your intellectual merit, exposing your work to the scrutiny of other academics who will test the substance of your arguments. It is a trial by fire. In Obama's case, there was nothing to test, nothing to burn. Possibly, there was one article praising Roe V. Wade and one letter, past that, nothing. So how did he become the president of the Harvard Law Review? Harvard, throughout most of it's history, used academic excellence to determine who received this prestigious position. They changed the rules to allow “other factors" in an effort to expand minority representation.
Recently, Alan Dershowitz, one of the foremost legal scholars in the world admitted that a young Barack Obama tried to get into his prestigious study group at Harvard, but academically didn't have the grades. Ted Cruz, by comparison, not only made the grades, but was referred to by Dershowitz as “Off the charts brilliant!” Dershowitz is a life-long liberal and civil libertarian, who professes no love for Cruz's politics. Michele Obama has, likewise, made evident her dissatisfaction with tests and test taking, stating that she was a poor test taker. Maybe that's why Common Core was designed to work around traditional methods of testing, teaching and grading, in favor of a more generalized approach to teaching that focuses less on actual problem solving. One of it's architects has admitted that undoing white-privilege was a primary motive in helping to create the curriculum. The stench of paternalism reeks so powerfully in such statements that minorities should be outraged. But, apparently, they aren't. The propaganda machine at work in the media filters the language through covert symbolism, obscuring it's meaning to good effect.
And so it goes. Actual qualifications like: knowledge, a bankable track record, a high level of academic achievement, something that might indicate hard work and intellectual resourcefulness was the stuff of yesterday, the stuff of white tyranny. None of that for our president! For Barack, the man who would be king, the most powerful man on the earth and the leader of the free world, race was enough. Collectively, the nation turned it's head in deference, and, as they did, they marveled at their own enlightenment.
What does this have to do with the Mariel Boatlift and the economic deprivation of the 1970s?
Here we are, thirty-five years later, watching as a new version of the Mariel Boatlift happen as tens of thousands of underage illegal immigrants pour over our borders. It's beginning to look like this is just one more act of calculated indifference to American interests and sovereignty by the Obama Administration. Just as it was in 1980, there will be substantial, long-term consequences as well; higher crime rates, increased demand for already overly burdened resources at schools and hospitals; for food stamps and for jobs.
Unemployment today is at record levels, just as it was then. It's well above the artificial statistics that track unemployment, but don't take into consideration the number of people who are no longer participating in the labor force. Those numbers are, not surprisingly, higher than at any time since 1979, during the Carter administration. Contrary to media myth makers, it isn't primarily the result of old folks retiring, but people, young and old, abandoning the work force altogether, unable to find gainful employment. Multiple generations living under one roof, pooling their resources in an effort to get by, just as they did during the Great Depression. That is the new America.
Along with all the other bad news comes a troubling new study produced by the non-profit Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) which shows that virtually all growth in the job market since the year 2000 has been by immigrants, both legal and illegal. That means that nearly sixty-million American-born residents are unemployed, forced out of a highly competitive labor market. One with too many workers and too few jobs. And, with so many workers competing for fewer jobs, wages will continue to remain low, even as prices rise due to inflation. Liberals will sit, nursing a dull outrage, manufactured by the very policies they created and continue to offer as the solution. It's simply another case of the dog furiously chasing it's own tail. Conservatives, unfortunately, aren't much better and appear to work solely to preserve their status and power.
Among young African American males unemployment is at an astronomical 25%. This does not bode well for the country. Large numbers of unemployed young men, who never get the job skills necessary to compete in the workforce, will only mean more crime and higher rates of incarceration. The fact that 73% of African Americans come from female-headed households, with no father in the home, only adds fuel to an already incandescent fire.
This is what happens when ideologues gain power and act in accordance with their beliefs. And, it's only beginning. Let me stress, I'm not against Mexicans, certainly not Hispanics. One side of my family is Hispanic. This isn't about ethnicity or race. It's about a president who doesn't seem to have a clue, just as his predecessor in 1979 didn't.
When ideas are more important than facts, everyone suffers. The world is, after all, a very complex place (Duh!). Diversity of opinion, of religion, of political methodology, barely scratches the surface of the challenging issues facing a rapidly changing world. As much as we might wish to believe that just doing “this or that” will be the difference, it won't. Or, if we just did (fill in the blank) things would be swell! That, my friends, is bullshit! It isn't rank amateurs with spiffy slogans that's needed, but pros, get 'er done types, ass kicking, take no prisoners, shut the hell up and get out of the way types. That's what we need. Not color coordinated politicians as a sign of our cultivated sensibilities. Or, someone who's primary accomplishment was being married to a former president and having a vagina. I think we need to look a bit deeper than that.
Mark Magula
Here we are, thirty-five years later, watching as a new version of the Mariel Boatlift happen as tens of thousands of underage illegal immigrants pour over our borders. It's beginning to look like this is just one more act of calculated indifference to American interests and sovereignty by the Obama Administration. Just as it was in 1980, there will be substantial, long-term consequences as well; higher crime rates, increased demand for already overly burdened resources at schools and hospitals; for food stamps and for jobs.
Unemployment today is at record levels, just as it was then. It's well above the artificial statistics that track unemployment, but don't take into consideration the number of people who are no longer participating in the labor force. Those numbers are, not surprisingly, higher than at any time since 1979, during the Carter administration. Contrary to media myth makers, it isn't primarily the result of old folks retiring, but people, young and old, abandoning the work force altogether, unable to find gainful employment. Multiple generations living under one roof, pooling their resources in an effort to get by, just as they did during the Great Depression. That is the new America.
Along with all the other bad news comes a troubling new study produced by the non-profit Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) which shows that virtually all growth in the job market since the year 2000 has been by immigrants, both legal and illegal. That means that nearly sixty-million American-born residents are unemployed, forced out of a highly competitive labor market. One with too many workers and too few jobs. And, with so many workers competing for fewer jobs, wages will continue to remain low, even as prices rise due to inflation. Liberals will sit, nursing a dull outrage, manufactured by the very policies they created and continue to offer as the solution. It's simply another case of the dog furiously chasing it's own tail. Conservatives, unfortunately, aren't much better and appear to work solely to preserve their status and power.
Among young African American males unemployment is at an astronomical 25%. This does not bode well for the country. Large numbers of unemployed young men, who never get the job skills necessary to compete in the workforce, will only mean more crime and higher rates of incarceration. The fact that 73% of African Americans come from female-headed households, with no father in the home, only adds fuel to an already incandescent fire.
This is what happens when ideologues gain power and act in accordance with their beliefs. And, it's only beginning. Let me stress, I'm not against Mexicans, certainly not Hispanics. One side of my family is Hispanic. This isn't about ethnicity or race. It's about a president who doesn't seem to have a clue, just as his predecessor in 1979 didn't.
When ideas are more important than facts, everyone suffers. The world is, after all, a very complex place (Duh!). Diversity of opinion, of religion, of political methodology, barely scratches the surface of the challenging issues facing a rapidly changing world. As much as we might wish to believe that just doing “this or that” will be the difference, it won't. Or, if we just did (fill in the blank) things would be swell! That, my friends, is bullshit! It isn't rank amateurs with spiffy slogans that's needed, but pros, get 'er done types, ass kicking, take no prisoners, shut the hell up and get out of the way types. That's what we need. Not color coordinated politicians as a sign of our cultivated sensibilities. Or, someone who's primary accomplishment was being married to a former president and having a vagina. I think we need to look a bit deeper than that.
Mark Magula