Carter, Worst President Ever, Admits to Meeting with Terrorists "Leaders for Years!"

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Apr13/0,4670,CarterMideast,00.html

Jimmy Carter Defends Meeting With Hamas

Sunday, April 13, 2008

WASHINGTON - Former President Jimmy Carter said he feels "quite at ease"

about meeting Hamas militants over the objections of Washington because the

Palestinian group is essential to a future peace with Israel.

Carter, interviewed Saturday for ABC News' "This Week," airing Sunday, also

said he would oppose a U.S. Olympic boycott and hopes all countries will

join in the Beijing games.

He spoke from Katmandu, Nepal, where his team of observers from the Carter

Center monitored an election that appeared likely to transform rule by royal

dynasty into a democracy with former Maoist rebels in a strong position,

judging by incomplete returns.

Several State Department officials, including the secretary, Condoleezza

Rice, criticized Carter's plans to talk in Syria this week with exiled Hamas

leader Khaled Mashaal in the first public contact in two years between a

prominent American figure and the group. Carter said he had not heard the

objections directly, although a State Department spokesman said earlier that

a senior official from the department had called the former president.

"I feel quite at ease in doing this," Carter said. "I think there's no doubt

in anyone's mind that, if Israel is ever going to find peace with justice

concerning the relationship with their next-door neighbors, the

Palestinians, that Hamas will have to be included in the process."

Although he said the meeting would not be a negotiation, he outlined

distinct goals.

"I think that it's very important that at least someone meet with the Hamas

leaders to express their views, to ascertain what flexibility they have, to

try to induce them to stop all attacks against innocent civilians in Israel

and to cooperate with the Fatah as a group that unites the Palestinians,

maybe to get them to agree to a cease-fire _ things of this kind," he said.

The State Department says it advised Carter twice against meeting

representatives of Hamas, which Washington considers a terrorist

organization.

"I find it hard to understand what is going to be gained by having

discussions with Hamas about peace when Hamas is, in fact, the impediment to

peace," Rice said Friday, after reports of the planned meeting surfaced.

Carter said he'd be meeting Syrians, Egyptians, Jordanians, Saudi Arabians

and others "who might have to play a crucial role in any future peace

agreement that involves the Middle East."

Asked whether it was right to meet a group that has not renounced violence

or recognized Israel, he said, "Well, you can't always get prerequisites

adopted by other people before you even talk to them."

Pressure to drop the meeting has come from his own party. Democratic Reps.

Artur Davis of Alabama, Shelley Berkley of Nevada, Adam Schiff of California

and Adam Smith of Washington state wrote a letter to Carter saying the

meeting could confer legitimacy on a group that embraces violence.

"I've been meeting with Hamas leaders for years," Carter said.

The Carter Center said his "study mission" was taking him to Israel, the

West Bank, Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan this week.

Carter, a broker of the 1978 Camp David peace accords between Egypt and

Israel, won the Nobel Peace Prize for his conflict mediation as president

and since.

As president, Carter led the boycott of the Moscow Olympics in protest

against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. "That was a totally different

experience in 1980, when the Soviet Union had brutally invaded and killed

thousands and thousands of people," he said, rejecting the idea of

boycotting the Beijing games to protest China's crackdown in Tibet. He did

not address whether just the opening ceremonies should be boycotted.

On Apr 13, 8:15 am, "Patriot Games" <Patr...@America.com> wrote:

Carter has been replaced

by George Bush Jr. as worst president ever.

Please update your files and update

your focus from the 1970' and 80's of

the last century to NOW.

THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY.

Just to update your focus, we're about to

go completely bankrupt, our military is in ruins

held hostage by politically connected war

contractors and by agents of foreign

influence who managed to divert a

WARTIME REFUELING JET CONTRACT

to the French Airbus Industries

(look of amazement on my face)

and the presidential race

is a toss up between a Republican just this

side of barking mad or two Democrats

who are for free trade and the American

worker... sort of.

Oh yes, the war in on terror got mixed

up somehow and while Bin laden and friends

are sitting in an air conditioned

cave on the Pakistan border, laughing

hysterically, the U.S. is bogged down

fighting al Quaeda (!!??) in IRAQ... (??!!!!).

Oh, I forgot to mention that Parker brothers

is thinking about replacing its colored

monopoly money for its game "Monopoly"

with U.S. dollars. There may be some cost

savings involved, especially since the treasury

is probably going to outsource dollar production

to Mongolia soon.

They probably already did a production run

but someone made a mistake and

on the reverse of the bills it says

"In Genghis Khan we trust".

Citizen Jimserac