Jimmy Carter Tells It Like It Is – The US “Has No Functioning Democracy”

by Robert Wilkinson

This is a stunning statement made by our former president that was blacked out by the American media. There’s more.

From the International Business Times story by Alberto Riva titled NSA Controversy: Jimmy Carter Says U.S. "Has No Functioning Democracy" we read that “Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter is so concerned about the NSA spying scandal that he thinks it has essentially resulted in a suspension of American democracy.”

From the story:

"America does not at the moment have a functioning democracy," he said at an event in Atlanta on Tuesday sponsored by the Atlantik Bruecke, a private nonprofit association working to further the German-U.S. relationship....

Carter’s remarks didn't appear in the American mainstream press but were reported from Atlanta by the German newsmagazine Der Spiegel.... The story doesn't appear in the English-language section of the Spiegel website and is only available in German.

There’s a little more to the story if you go to the link, and of course there will be much more if you can read German and go to Der Spiegel. Still, this is a major statement by a former president and Nobel Peace Prize laureate. It seems even he thinks America’s off the rails.

© Copyright 2013 Robert Wilkinson

Comments

[Mel]

Can you paraphrase? You speak/read German do you not!

[Vetch]

The online Spiegel article is quite short and there's not much more in it than what Rober has already written. I'll translate it anyway, if wanted (dunno when I got time, probably this weekend).
I'll try to get the printed Spiegel edition with, hopefully, the whole interview.

I'll be bäck. :)

Oh, and Robert: Thank you, as always and from my heart, for your blog!

[Robert]

Hi Mel - My skills are a bit rusty, but thanks to Vetch, we may actually have some part of the original article beyond what I posted here.

Hi Vetch - Would love it. If you find it, post it here in the comments. And of course you're most welcome.

[caliban]

I was just thinking yesterday that democracy has become a dirty word. That there is something taboo about maintaining a system that supports all its people. To me, that is the great challenge but one that doesn't seem to be exciting enough or self grandizing enough to garner interest right now.

[brett]

just hit the "translate button - chrome has one and i think explorer does to:
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter was in the wake of the NSA Spähskandals criticized the American political system. "America has no functioning democracy," Carter said Tuesday at a meeting of the "Atlantic Bridge" in Atlanta.

DISPLAY

Previously, the Democrat had been very critical of the practices of U.S. intelligence. "I think the invasion of privacy has gone too far," Carter told CNN. "And I think that is why the secrecy was excessive." Overlooking the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden said Carter, whose revelations were long "likely to be useful because they inform the public."
Carter has repeatedly warned that the United States sharply declined due to excessive restriction of civil rights, their moral authority. Last year he wrote in an article in the "New York Times", new U.S. laws "never before seen breach our privacy by the government" allowed the.

Carter was the 39th President of the United States, who ruled from 1977 until 1981. During his tenure, he tried to align U.S. foreign policy that is more about human rights - after his retirement from active politics for his humanitarian work, he received the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize .

DISPLAY

In Atlanta, he also expressed his overall pessimistic about the global situation. There is currently no reason for him to be optimistic, Carter said, referring to the situation in Egypt, which had fallen into a military dictatorship. He also lamented the growing political divide in the United States, the excessive influence of money in U.S. election campaigns and the confusing American election rules. The ex-president whose "Carter Center" operates worldwide including election monitoring, announced skeptical whether the United States, the standard that applies when reviewing the Center of elections might be fulfilled.
As a bright spot, however, Carter called the triumph of modern technology that would have caused some of the countries of the Arab Spring of democratic progress. Exactly these developments but are endangered by the NSA Spähskandal as major U.S. Internet platforms such as Google or Facebook lose credibility worldwide.

[dcu]

No wonder the corporate media censored this. The recent vote in the U.S. House of Representatives to cut off funding for these activities was surprisingly close. Thanks Robert for bringing this important article out and thank you Brett for the translation.