The Plain-Spoken Man from Plains, Georgia

Today is a federal holiday from when we rolled Lincoln's Birthday into Washington's and then decided to acknowledge ALL the other people who had ever been president of the United States. Happy another day with no mail delivery day.

President Jimmy Carter was a one-term president at a moment in American history when we desperately needed him to be the president. If you missed Vietnam, Watergate, or Nixon, look them up. It was a tough time for our nation. Trust me, I was there.

I voted for Jimmy Carter twice. Once when he defeated Gerald Ford in large part because we would've voted for anyone other than a Republican in 1976 and the other time when he lost in a landslide to Ronald Reagan because we so desperately wanted a president who'd act like a president we decided to elect an actor. And those hostages in the US Embassy in Teheran didn't help Carter much either. 

Carter, after leaving the White House, devoted his life to public service as a private citizen and, I suspect, inspired many of those who had not voted for him while he was active in politics to rethink that decision in light of his service to so many. 

He didn't make his living giving speeches to people who paid him or lending his name to corporate think tanks that pontificate while laundering the profits of their masters He used hammer and nails in support of Habitat for Humanity and did a world of good at a time when good was, and remains a scarce commodity. 

I met him once, a lifetime after the White House as he was a former US Navy submarine officer involved in a historical commemoration and he was as kind and patient as you would imagine anyone would ever be. He is the oldest living US president but is in failing health and over the weekend his family announced he was entering home hospice care which I know means his days are drawing down. 

Thank you, sir, for a life well lived in the service of and for others.
-bill kenny