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Tag Archives: Jimmy carter

Rosalynn Smith Carter (1927-2023)

19 Sunday Nov 2023

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

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First Lady, Jimmy carter, Rosalynn Carter

“Do what you can to show you care about others, and you will make our world a better place.” – Rosalynn Carter

Rosalyn Carter [1993 – Carter Center]

Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter Passes Away at Age 96

ATLANTA (Nov. 19, 2023) — Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, a passionate champion of mental health, caregiving, and women’s rights, passed away Sunday, Nov. 19, at 2:10 p.m. at her home in Plains, Georgia, at the age of 96. She died peacefully, with family by her side.

Mrs. Carter was married for 77 years to Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the United States and the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize recipient, who is now 99 years old.

“Rosalynn was my equal partner in everything I ever accomplished,” President Carter said. “She gave me wise guidance and encouragement when I needed it. As long as Rosalynn was in the world, I always knew somebody loved and supported me.”

She is survived by her children — Jack, Chip, Jeff, and Amy — and 11 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren. A grandson died in 2015.

“Besides being a loving mother and extraordinary First Lady, my mother was a great humanitarian in her own right,” said Chip Carter. “Her life of service and compassion was an example for all Americans. She will be sorely missed not only by our family but by the many people who have better mental health care and access to resources for caregiving today.”

The schedule of memorial events and funeral ceremonies will be distributed as soon as possible to media and posted [….]

###

Lawsuit against Jimmy Carter's book is assault on Freedom of Speech

03 Thursday Feb 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

attack on free speech, class action lawsuit, Israel Law Center, israeli palestinian conflict, Jimmy carter, Palestine Peace Not Apartheid

A class action lawsuit has just been filed in New York against former U.S. President Jimmy Carter for his 2006 book, “Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid.” The suit, captioned Unterberg et al. v. Jimmy Carter et al., is the latest salvo from the right-wing activist Israel Law Center, which claims to be an “Israeli based civil right organization”.

According to the five individuals named in the complaint, Carter’s book is, “in fact demonstrably false, misleading, and deceptive,” and because they felt they were “sold” on Carter’s book being truthful, well, they felt they’ve been harmed, and in as much, have now sued the publisher Simon & Schuster, and the author, Jimmy Carter for $5 million dollars.

The fantastical nature of this lawsuit reminds me of the “birther” lawsuits, claiming President Obama wasn’t born in America and therefore disqualified to serve as her President.

This case, attempting to gag a Nobel Peace Prize winning former President, is just as absurd–however, the litigants do graciously offer an alternative where there wouldn’t be cause–if President Carter and Simon & Schuster only had promoted and sold the book as “the anti-Israel screed that it is.”

This misplaced pro-Israeli patriotism is a ridiculous waste of the court’s time and probably qualifies as a harassment lawsuit, which may result in the overly zealous parties having to pay Carter’s and Simon & Schuster’s legal fees. You cannot justify use of a state consumer protection statute to attack the US Constitution’s First Amendment protections for the mere publishing and sale of a book. That’s like trying to say a tugboat’s as big as an Aircraft Carrier. You can say it, but it isn’t.

Now, the people suing “wish to be clear” that they’re not suing to challenge President Carter’s right to publish a book, nor his right to “forward his virulently anti-Israeli bias”, but rather, they’re suing because he wrote a non-fiction book and claimed it to be so.

The suit was announced as, “…the first time a former President and a publishing house have been sued for violating consumer protection laws by knowingly publishing inaccurate information while promoting a book as factual.”  That puts them out on a limb, for sure.  

One of the plaintiff’s attorneys, Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, said,

“The lawsuit will expose all the falsehoods and misrepresentations in Carter’s book and prove that his hatred of Israel has led him to commit this fraud on the public. He is entitled to his opinions but deceptions and lies have no place in works of history.”

The Washington Post reported a response from a spokesman from Simon & Schuster, Adam Rothberg:

“This lawsuit is frivolous, without merit, and is a transparent attempt by the plaintiffs, despite their contentions, to punish the author, a Nobel Peace prize winner and world-renowned statesmen, and his publisher, for writing and publishing a book with which the plaintiffs simply disagree. It is a chilling attack on free speech that we intend to defend vigorously.”

In reading through the complaint, a few things come to mind.

The plaintiffs are claiming harm to the “reading public” due to the fact that:

• Carter and publisher claim his non-fiction work as truthful and accurate while marketing the book, then,

• Carter and Simon & Schuster benefitted financially from selling a supposedly “inaccurate and deceptive” book,

• Because the reading public was “deceived” with the marketing of the book, they were harmed,

• Hence, the lawsuit under New York state consumer protection statute, ala “truth in advertising”.

Problem is, satisfying this complaint would set a precedent undermining a fundamental legal pillar upon which the entire nation rests.  It’s called the First Amendment.

Two problems going after the First Amendment.

#1 Federal Supremacy – New York state business statute cannot trump Federal law, let alone the US Constitution.

#2 Greater Harm – Satisfying the complaint would mean that books and publications of all different stripes would be called into question, most likely by those who didn’t like them, creating the greater harm of damaging the fundamental Freedoms of Speech and Freedoms of the Press enshrined in the US Constitution’s First Amendment protections. This, in turn, would negatively impact an important sector within the “prize of the American economy”, namely, intellectual property (e.g. the publishing industry).

This is clearly a harassment suit, and needs to be thrown out as such.

The presiding judge in one of the birther cases (Hollister vs. Soetoro) said, “the case was a waste of the court’s time”, calling the lawyers “agents provocateurs” and ordered their local counsel, John Hemenway, to show cause why he should not pay the legal fees for Obama’s attorney as a penalty for filing a complaint “for an improper purpose such as to harass”.

Another judge concluded an Orly Taitz birther case,

“The Court is not willing to go tilting at windmills with her.”

With this attempt to gag a former U.S. President–or squeeze $5 million dollars out of him because someone didn’t like what he said–methinks, the “Ingenious Hidalgo Don Quixote of La Mancha” has, lately, been making the book club reading list at the Israel Law Center.

For more info:

The complaint filed on February 1st, 2011 as Unterberg et al. v. Jimmy Carter et al. can be found here:

http://israellawcenter.org//uploadimages/image/Jimmy%20Carter%20Complaint.pdf

The plaintiffs listed are Stephen Unterberg (Israel / New York), Susan Echman (Elizabeth, New Jersey), Ryan Shuman (Orono, Minnesota), Danica Bernard (Marina Del Rey, California), and Steven Tabak (Israel / New York).

The defendants are President Jimmy Carter, and his publisher, Simon & Schuster.

The attorneys listed on the complaint are David I. Schoen, as counsel for the plaintiffs, from Montgomery, Alabama, and the Israeli co-counsel, Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, from Ramat Gan, Israel.

A Thanksgiving story, sort of

26 Wednesday Nov 2008

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

al gore, Bill Clinton, Jed Bartlet, Jimmy carter, Thanksgiving, The West Wing

cookie jill posted this West Wing Thanksgiving clip at skippy. It reminded me that during four days in late August of 2000 at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles I saw four presidents up close. Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Al Gore (hey, he won by 543,895 votes) and…

…Jed Bartlet.

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