Tag: Jimmy Carter

The last fifty years

February 27, 2026

In 1968, when Richard Nixon was nominated by the Republicans for President, his running mate was Spiro Agnew. Shortly after the 1972 election, some charges of impropriety forced Agnew to resign. With the majority of his second term ahead, Gerald Ford was selected to become the V.P. He had been a congressman for twenty-five years.

Ford became the 38th chief executive and had a difficult campaign against Jimmy Carter, the 1976 Democratic candidate. President Ford pardoned President Nixon before he could even be charged with any crimes from the Watergate Hotel break-in. This was considered by some as the biggest hit on his prospects.

Ford lost to Carter, and the party shift kicked in again. Carter served from 1977 to 1981. During his first term, the Shaw of Iran was overthrown, and a pro-Muslim government took power. The U.S. Embassy was attacked, and hostages were seized on November 4, 1979. The thirty-ninth President lost his second bid for the office in 1980.

The power shifted once again when Ronald Regan defeated the incumbent based on failure to solve the hostage problem and other fiscal problems attributed to his administration. Regan held office until 1989 after winning the 1984 election as well. The hostages were released before Regan was inaugurated as our fortieth chief executive.

“Read my lips, no new taxes” was the campaign promise that convinced many to continue a Republican Presidency under Vice-President George H. W. Bush. His term was from 1989 to 1993. When other Republicans convinced him to sign a tax proposal that Congress passed, the Democrats used it to their advantage.

They nominated Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton as their candidate, and he defeated the forty-first to become the forty-second President. Clinton’s administration featured a joint Presidency with his wife, according to the GOP. She had no official title or authority. They were in the White House from 1993 to 2001.

Do you remember the September 11, 2001, attacks on our country? Muslim radicals hijacked four passenger jets and crashed them. Two took out buildings in New York City, part of the Pentagon building in Washington, D C., and the last went down in Pennsylvania.

When our forty-third President, George W. Bush, the son of the forty-first, addressed us that evening, he launched an investigation to determine how this could happen. We were involved in wars in the Middle East to eliminate factions supposedly responsible for this attack. His administration ran from 2001 to 2009.

Are you getting tired of the constant flip-flop of power from one political party to the other for over one hundred years? In 2008, we elected our first African American President, Barack Obama, a Democrat from Chicago, as the forty-fourth man to hold the office. He served until 2017.

I will not make any comments about the last three Presidents. There are situations that I feel will have to be resolved before we know what should be said without hurting feelings. Both current parties have opposing opinions of what should and should not be commented on. I hope these columns have given you insights into who our leaders have been.

©Copyright 2026 by Charles Kensinger

Jimmy Carter’s Faith

January 10, 2025

With the announcement of the death of thirty-ninth President Jimmy Carter, we are hearing about the man who failed to be re-elected when Ronald Reagan defeated him. He passed away on the twenty-ninth of December 2024 at the age of one hundred.

I remember when this former governor of Georgia first announced that he was going to run. The question was, “Jimmy who?”. Gerald Ford was then President. He had been appointed as Vice President by Richard Nixon after Spiro Agnew resigned in disgrace.

As a sitting President, Ford was a shoo-in for the Republican nomination. I’m not a Republican or a Democrat. I have always been nonpartisan. I look at each candidate and decide which I think will be the most effective as our chief executive. I did not vote for either Ford or Carter.

I did vote for Ronald Reagan when he defeated President Carter. It was not because I thought that we needed a Republican. When Reagan was nominated, I decided he was the better candidate of those that would be on the ballot. Most citizens agreed with me.

It wasn’t until after he became a private citizen again that I saw the kind of man that Jimmy was. I read his book, “Keeping Faith” and remembered the man who put Southern Baptists into the spotlight. As a lifelong Holmanite myself I appreciated his spiritual outlook.

Most importantly is the fact that he emphasized his relationship with Jesus more than the fact that he was referred to as a Christian. Christianity is only a religion to some. To President Carter Jesus was his savior and his life. This is why he taught Bible studies every Sunday in church.

The Greek word that we translate as church is ecclesia. It means a gathering of people. Paul and other writers of the New Testament believed that followers of The Way, what would later be called little Christs or Christians, should meet regularly. These are the followers of Jesus.

One of the things that Jimmie always taught was that there were no grandchildren of God. He was a loving grandfather, but he wanted to be sure that all his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren knew Jesus personally. He would not see them in Heaven unless they had a personal relationship with his Lord and Savior.

I ask you to consider if your faith is like that of James Earl Carter, Jr. Have you accepted Jesus as shown in the Bible? Do you have a relationship with Him? Don’t rely on family history or what you mark on a questionnaire to get you into the presence of the Creator God.

©Copyright 2025 by Charles Kensinger