Jeff doesn't mentioned the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing, where 241 Americans were killed, causing Ronnie Raygun to withdraw our troops from Lebanon, with no retaliation. Jeff, I'm also suprised you didn't mention the Iran–Contra affair, where  senior Reagan administration officials secretly facilitated the sale of arms to Iran in order to fund the Nicaraguan Contras. Under the Boland Amendment, further funding of the Contras by the government had been prohibited by Congress. Regan should have been impeached and thrown in jail.

Think about what you are saying. Obama just recently launched an airwar aginst Lybia that resuled in the death of Qadaffi. The Lybians now have the chance to set up a representative government and nolonger have to live under a dictator. After Obama just killed off the old regime you follow up with the president is exibiting weakness? You can't possibly beleive what you just said.

this column is such a complete rewrite of history and false conclusions one doesn't know where to begin.

Yes, and we're still paying for the reaction to those supposed 'ghosts': thousands of Americans killed in senseless "defensive" missions and trillions of dollars spent in totally useless military activity. Those trillions of dollars represent American resources in the form of money, money that could have been used to build out this country's social and material infrastructure. There's a direct line between the Republican conjuring of Carter's 'ghosts' and the Iraq/Afghanistan wars. What will we get from those wars, what have we gained? Rather than the intelligent diplomacy of Carter and Obama, we have the sabre-rattling of Clint Eastwood ghost-mongering.

Jeff your intellectual dishonesty is an embarrassment to conservatives everywhere.  There is no way Carter would have advocated the killing of Bin Laden, neither would Romney for that matter he said so.  Nor would Carter make the use of drones as Obama has done.  Now that is an assumption because he didn't have them available but it wasn't part of his make-up.  There is no comparison of Obama to Carter. 

What I find most amazing about the criticism of Carter is that you actually had a real life practicing the values Christian in the White House and you hated the guy.  Who would I rather have as an enemy businessman Romney or Chicago Obama.  Businessman Romney makes a lot safer enemy he has no street smarts and wouldn't last five minutes in knockdown dragout.  With Obama you know he'll hurt you your just not sure when and how. 

The foreign policy argument against Obama is a joke.  More bad guys are dead, more despots have been removed and I doubt any Al Qaeda types sleep well at night.  The fact is Obama is probably the meanest, street smart, sneakiest sob we've ever had on foreign policy.  It is in fact one of the things I dislike about him and his Presidency.  To call him weak is a pervert, pathetic joke. 

Another attempt by Jacoby to deflect attention from the right-wing cowardice and foreign policy incompetence of Romney, his neocon puppet masters, and the GOP in general.

the proof, Jeff, is in the pudding, as they say: those who whine about Carter most are always the chicken hawks ... you know the type, many would seem tailor made as your pals ... never served in combat and never pass up a chance to get into war.  the last several decades are a roll call of resource wars and ideological crusades.  and, Reagan NOT increasing the odds of a nuke exchange?  you really are a desk jockey with no accountability for what you say.

Carter, like McGovern and like Kerry ... honorable warriors converted by the right wing white noise machine into pacifists.  one thing that is constant is how your lies are enabled by The Globe to circle the globe before the truth even gets its pants on.  you are a hack.  

Just took a quick look at the comments - before reading the article - to see if I should bother to read the article.  Given what's being said, and my previous troubles with JJ, looks like the answer is, Nope, don't bother to take the time to read it.

JJ,

You have many examples of things you didn't like about Carter.  You have very few examples of things Obama actually did that were similar.  Republicans have built a case against Carter and are trying to stick Obama with this Carter label... without any real evidence.   

Gee, Mr Jacoby, all the trolls are sleeping in this AM or focussing on the newspapers in the swing states. You are being roundly and appropriately criticized for your Soviet-style re-writing of history. Had you thought of going into another profession that you might actually be good at? Eric Fehrnstrom might give you a go.

To compare Obama to Carter is ridiculous.  The outrage and violence in countries in northern Africa and the Middle East has its roots in a past where the United States was in the habit of supporting the kind of dictators, like the Shah of Iran, that many of those same countries overthrew during the Arab spring.  The fact that the people of Libya are renouncing the violence that took the lives of a beloved Ambassador and three other Americans, not all diplomats, speaks to the success of Obama's nuanced approach to foreign relations.  He knows when to use force and dispatch Osama and he knows when to use diplomacy.  He is neither Jimmy Carter nor what Mitt Romney pretends to be.  Simplistic responses by wannabes who know little about our position in the world would prove to be disastrous and put all of humanity in jeopardy.  

All these ghost stories about the Carter presidency always seem to leave out the part where Reagan gave the Iranians missles.  They also leave out the part about who the Shah was and what sort of viable options Carter supposedly had.  

How about Reagan running from Lebanon as soon as the Marines barracks was attacked? That has been cited as the single incident that convinced a young Osama binLaden that the US was a paper tiger.

I wonder if any connection can be made between Mitt Romney's declaration about the difference between Palestinian and Israeli "cultures" and the 47% of the country he regards as victims and the 53% he regards as independent.  His simplistic thinking applies not only to foreign policy but to domestic policy as well.  Palestinians and the 47% are simply victims who are too busy being dependent on the culturally superior Israelis and/or the United States government, while the voters he wants can stand up on their own and be counted.  He insults all of us, Israelis and Palestinians, citizens who pays taxes and those who don't, all in the name of pandering to the voters he wants to convince that he is worth voting for.  NOT!  

Once again Mr. Jacoby, I see you referred to your republican playbook on how to run a false equivalency option, for your criticism on Obama's foreign policy.   So, Obama's presence in Afghanistan is weak?  His continuation of Bush’s military presence in Iraq was lame?  His decimation of Al-queda is lacking in leadership?  His promise and delivery of Ben Laden was impotent?  Our intelligence and assistance in overthrowing Gaddafi was feeble?   Your assessment of Obama’s foreign policy appears to be a “mile wide and an inch deep” so to speak.  As to the situations in Benghazi and Tehran, they aren’t congruous; except for the region and target in which they were staged and the anti-American sentiment underscoring the two.  And with the details in Benghazi still ambiguous you assertions are presumptuous.   Any basic understanding of history, intelligence ops and military ops would attest to that.   It seems that the Right just espouses the same old tired platitudes while eschewing the reality of an emerging world that is no longer static or suppressed, which for better or worse, has assuaged regional stabilities.  Thus, remaining agile, measured, deliberate and pragmatic is the most effective way to maintain peace while not relinquishing power – which is what the President is doing. 

So he should do what George W did?  Start a war for no reason, killing many thousands, just to show how tough we are?  This article is BS.

Jacoby......obviously you are a republican. Is your next article going to provide evidence that Oabma is a Muslim not born in the United States?

The problem with this article is that the premise is not true. If anything, Pres. Obama has been surprisingly militant, to the point of alarming many of his supporters. I'm actually surprised that the campaign keeps mentioning Bin Laden's death without following up on their many other successes that may be more strategic, if not as satisfying. As the joke goes, if you want to live a long life do not become the number-two man at Al-Queda. What I really think is happening is that the Obama-myths that the GOP has built up over 4 years are now crumbling fast. Think about this: if Obama is as bad as the right wing claims, what does it say about the right that their candidate is so much worse?

All the Democrat/obamaphyles are trolling the waters today.  If you liked Jimmy Carter and his brother Billy, you must love the Obama saga.         For you youngsters who never lived those wonderful Carter years, you really missed a thrill ride.  As a retired military, the memory of his sending a few commandos and aircraft to rescue the hostages at our embassy chills me.  Talk about stupid.

   Believe what you want, but this Obama President is deleting the military.   My son is a Lieutenant in the U.S. Army and the word is out.  Reduction in force is bludgeoning all the armed forces.  It is not neoconservative philosphy nor is it radical right wing to propose that America is less safe today under Obama than it was four years ago.  The middle east is in flames.   Obama's effigy is in flames too.   Let me speak plainly.  Carter was a total failure as a president and a leader.  Gasoline was higher than the bar tenders butt, inflation was raging and getting a mortgage was costing 19%.  Now under Obama, the Blame Bush anthem is being sung at every Democrat news show and every Democrat political rally.  Bush the Demon caused this and Obama is in the process of fixing it.  Well, give him another twenty years and see if anything changes for the better.  I'm taking bets and offering 10:1 odds on every buck you lay on the table.

Carter was the worst president of the post-war era.  I never thought I would ever again see such a bad president again in my lifetime... and yet Carter was ten times the president Obama has been.  Obama has been an utter disaster, well beyond my worst imaginations.  Lots of people loved Carter at first but three years later they saw the error of their choice.  Anyone who votes for Obama a second time will be tooled on for the rest of their lives.  

Jeff conveniently forgot to mention Ronald Reagan's flawed policies that led to the bombing in Beruit in 1983 where 200+ soldiers were killed, or Iran-Contra's shadow government run by the infamous Olie North as the POTUS looked away and safely claimed "not to know." Obama as Carter as the catalyst for Islamic militancy is payback against Carter's grandson's pre-election release of the Romney 47% video. 

RR was responsible for the fall of the Soviet Union to roughly the same degree as it was caused by my Aunt Millie's tuna salad. Margaret Thatcher was just as much the cause.

The real reason was the fact that Saudi Arabia was kicking their butts in an oil price war. The Saudis were upset at all of the drilling and exploration the Soviets were doing those days as well as being upset at their invasion of Afghanistan. They dropped their prices and sunk the economy of the Soviets while here in the west RR takes all the credit.Years and years later we get professional myth perpetrators like JJ to spout this propaganda in an election season.This kind of writing is dangerous and stupid.

It was Jimmy Carter's bad luck to be President, when the Iranians, finally, overthrew the Shah.

Yes, the Shah was a friend of ours.

And well he should have been, since it was our CIA, that arranged the coup that overthrew a parliamentary democracy and put him in power in 1953.

The Iranian Parliament had made the mistake of discussing the possibility of nationalizing the oil fields.

When the crisis started Ronald Reagan (running for but not yet president) sent secret messages to the Iranian dissidents holding the embassy. He promised sell them military arms after the election, if they would hold the hostages till after the election.

This information came out during the Iran-contra hearings.

Only time will tell if Obama's foreign policy is so called "Carteresque". Whatever that means. However the only way Obama can appease the Republician complaints about his "weak" policy is to start nuking the Middle East. We might as well start with Libya because a few crazed muslims attacked and killed a few Americans. Even though those dead Americans knew that what the risk was in the hostile country.

Another way Obama can appease the Republicians is to have a draft and send a greater number of troops into the Midle East and show them who is boss in a more coventional way. At least unemployment would go down.

What would you do Mr. Jacoby to stiffen Obama's Foreign Policy?

If Al Quaeda had kidnapped the ambassador instead of raping and torturing him before leaving him for dead, Obama's re-election chances would already be over!  That's why the White House and the media have lied to us for over ten days now about what really happened: an Al Quaeda terrorist attack on 9/11 that killed an ambassador.  (And not a movie...)

Funny how no one seems to mention the fact that, under "wiretap" laws (at least in Massachusetts and, I believe in Florida as well) young Mr. Carter should be in jail right now. You can't tape someone without their permission under those statutes (which, admittedly, do more to protect corrupt public officials than anything else). So a segment of a private party discussion is revealed (out of any context) and the media and liberals are not only "okay" with that with respect to journalistic "ethics" but are silent on the criminal implications as well. And where is the Khalidi tape that the LA Times has of "revealing" remarks by Mr. Obama in his first campaign? Why is that not exposed when it was taken by a journalist and was, possibly, a perfectly ethical part of their job yet that, likely licit,  tape is hidden while a clearly illicit and incomplete tape is both circulated and "hailed" as "revealing? 

"HHK"  Since when do you go off subject so far and start talking about Rev. Wright when the issue is foreign policy.  Two distinct intellectual approaches and interests whether you're Obama or Romney or Kissinger.  I'm a little shocked by that drift on your part.

Then I get the Administration has lied about Libya.  Do you folks read the paper.  I read the very next day it was thought it was a terrorist attack under cover of the film.

Is that all some of you have is I can't stand Obama or I can't stand Romney.  Why don't some of you try defending Romney once in awhile. You know tell me why I should vote for him.  So far policy wise he hasn't given me any reason.  Seeing we are in foreign policy let's see.  Do I consider Russia our number one enemy.  No.  You do tell me why.  Romney would kill more Al Qaeda tell me how.  How would he handle Iran differently.  How would he handle China differently considering his own substantial investments.  How about giving me foreign policy reasons to vote for Romeny.  I hear plenty of wacked out weirdo conspiracy junk on why to not vote for Obama, but nothing that makes any sense.  Heck I can give better reasons than you all do not to vote for him. 

"jjag"  Yours is probably the worst.  An incomplete tape.  Your defense of the tape is that it is incomplete.  You don't defend what he said you merely complain about whether it is complete or it is legal.  Somehow that is suppose to make me say, "Oh that's okay I'll skip the evidence." If Mr. Romney has only people like yourself campaigning for him, trying to talk the rest of us into voting for him.  He's got no shot.  That's your idea of support.  It ain't fair and it ain't complete.  Unbelievable.

"HHK"  After re-reading your post I think I mis-read I take it back and apologize.

Please, sir, may I have some more gruel? More pap from the Globe's token Zionist mouthpiece.

Jeff Jacoby, the USSR folded because they were BROKE, not because of Reagan.  The midget with a mighty right arm overspent on defense--much as we are doing & will continue to do if the GOP keeps their hand on the purse strings. 

Most things in life are complicated and full of nuances. History never repeats itself, no matter how it looks at a glance. Any intelligent person should know that when someone says an issue or a solution is "plain and simple" a fraud is being committed.

Jacoby's columns have become tiresome because he engages in "plain and simple" arguments that are a disgrace to the business he's in. Columnists, unlike reporters, have the luxury of time and space to delve into issues and possible solutions in some depth and offer multifaceted possibilites for taking action.

Instead Jacoby here uses selective and apocryphal "facts" to engage in what amounts to character assassination of two Presidents. The attack on Carter was apparently generated by Jacoby's pique that a Carter was involved in the exposure of the 47% video. Since the video was genuine, his anger has to be aimed at the messenger, and if that won't be effective, a better-known relative of the messenger.

If the Globe wanted columnists representing a conservative point of view, they could have done so much better than Jacoby and Sununu.

As I re-read the comments on your "piece" today, I'm struck by how much you have in common with Governor Romney.  The right wing posters don't so much like you, but they're stuck with you like the GOP is stuck with Governor Romney, so any port in a storm is better than none. Also, really enjoy the whole dialogue thing with you that the internet affords. 

I can see the GOP campaign managers huddled together trying to do things to make Obama seem like Jimmy Carter. What they are licking their chops about is the fact that Carter was a one term president, and they want to hang this on Obama before the election happens. 

But as with many things both neocons and other Republicans come up with, the fit is bad. I recall they wanted us to think Bush post-9/11 was Churchill after Pearl Harbor (they sure as heck couldn't use FDR for their model, so they had to outsource, as usual).

All I can to Jacoby is: You wish.

Good article by Jeff Jacoby. See also my blog on AP news article "Obama slams Mitt Romney's foreign policy remarks. Barack Obama doesn't like anyone who tells the truth about Obama's foreign policy.

History has a way of drawing past presidents to be bigger than they were.  Bigger successes, bigger failures.  Everyone loved Reagan -- hated Carter.  Republicans think: if we could just call Obama Carter maybe we could make some headway there.

In my opinion: Obama's performance on Foreign Policy has been pretty good.  He was elected saying he'd get us out of Iraq, he has.  He got bin Laden.  He did a pretty good job in Libya in my opinion.  Iran is a question going forward, Syria too.  Some of that is getting held up because of these elections. 

Romney has not made a good case that he could have done better on any of these things or going forward.  My impression is that he has less interest or knowledge on foreign policy. I just hear the required Republican belief that despite being really upset about the deficit and despite there being no real credible first world threat, we should continue to plow dollars into defense and military rather than keep Medicare and Food Stamps.  What is the current thinking about General/Republican President Eisenhower who famously told us to be aware of the military industrial complex?