Nobel Peace Prize winner and former President Jimmy Carter is eager to show his skills in North Korea. A few weeks ago, he was reported to desire such a diplomatic mission because — let’s face it — Dennis Rodman’s recent bizarre trip brought the U.S. and North Korea no closer to putting down the threats. Carter, who spent this weekend raising money for hurricane relief alongside four other ex-presidents, also sat down with the New York Times for a Maureen Dowd piece called “Jimmy Carter Lusts for a Trump Posting.”
That headline perfectly encapsulates the soul of the piece. Carter sort-of defends President Trump, who he says “might be escalating” global tensions, but he believes “that precedes Trump.” Carter says that Russia, India, and China have all been making plays to be the “dominant character,” so not every new conflict should be blamed on Trump. The former president isn’t thrilled with Trump’s back-and-forth with Kim Jong-un, but Carter still wants to help the sitting U.S. president. Specifically, he wants to be the North Korea envoy:
“I would go, yes … I’m afraid, too, of a situation. I don’t know what they’ll do. Because they want to save their regime … I think he’s now got advanced nuclear weaponry that can destroy the Korean Peninsula and Japan, and some of our outlying territories in the Pacific, maybe even our mainland.”
However, Carter signals that his desired mission may not happen. At least, that’s the signal he’s received from National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, who is Carter’s friend but provided a “negative response” when he requested to enter peacekeeping talks with North Korea. Still, Carter says, “I told him that I was available if they ever need me.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Carter acknowledged his belief that Trump is “exacerbating” racial tensions in the U.S., “[b]ut maybe not deliberately.” Carter does, however, feel like the press has “been harder on Trump than any other president” that he can recall. Of course, that’s true, but Carter doesn’t really dive into reasons why that’s the case.
(Via New York Times)