Jimmy Carter has been in the news again lately.

Not for hanging with his good bud, Kim Jong Il, dictator supreme of North Korea.

Not for decrying Israel's right to exist within its own sovereign borders.

This time he is calling critics of President Obama's policies racist.

Please. This is so tired. First critics were branded un-American, then a mob, then evilmongers, next Nazi's. Now racist.

But I want to thank our least favorite former President for sticking his nose in the nation's business once again. It gives me this opportunity to share my favorite recollection of his term in office.

It was election day, November 1980. I was in seminary in St. Paul at the time. But that day I was making a business trip for the family company that I worked for part-time while in school. So I was flying on election day--from Minnesota to Dallas and then on to Abilene in west Texas. My flight arrived at DFW airport about 5:00 or 6:00 in the evening. Interested in the election returns, I made my way to the first airport bar I could find to watch the results before heading for my connecting flight. What I saw I will never forget. To me it says all you need to know about Jimmy Carter's debacle administration.

At 5:00 in the evening, Central Standard Time--6:00 on the east coast, 3:00 on the west coast--the major networks had called the election for Ronald Reagan. Obviously the polls had not yet closed anywhere in the country, but the election was decided. Carter himself conceded just an hour or so later--again before the polls had closed in the west. (This was before federal law prevented the networks from calling an election before the polls had closed--indeed, it was this election that led to this law being passed.)

But here is what I remember that evening in the airport bar. The local stations in Dallas were showing lines out the door at polling places in and around Dallas. People were waiting in line to vote--many of them knowing the presidential race had already been decided.

The next day coming back through Dallas on my way back to Minnesota I picked up a Dallas paper and the long lines at the polls were front-page news. Many polling places had to stay open late because the people were still waiting to vote. Reporters were interviewing these persevering voters--"Why are you standing in line all this time? Don't you know the election has been decided and that President Carter has conceded defeat?"

Here is my remembered synopsis of the many replies quoted in the paper: "I've been waiting about 3 years to vote that S.O.B. out of office! I would stand here all night to cast my ballot against him and vote for Ronald Reagan."

Morning had indeed come to America! I am looking for another dawn about 3 years hence.

RM