Saturday, January 12, 2008

Jimmah's Early Trials

It's been said that the older a person gets the longer he or she had to walk to school as a child. Well, it gets worse. Jimmy Carter's got a new book coming out that says he was raised amidst insects and varmints (including rats) and that his mother treated a variety of serious childhood ailments with home remedies.
The New York Post reports: "No matter what kind of hard-luck stories about growing up the presidential candidates can come up with this year, they'll be hard-pressed to match the woeful tales Jimmy Carter can spin.
"In 'A Remarkable Mother,' his upcoming Simon & Schuster memoir about Lillian Carter, Carter says his Georgia home was constantly under siege from armies of insects and rodents, including rats so big they could 'successfully challenge' most cats.
"Worse yet were common ailments like tapeworm, hookworm and lice infestations - with supposed cures just as disgusting. 'I think the most obnoxious medical experience I ever had was when someone convinced Daddy that we children could avoid an outbreak of flu, or some other prevalent illness, by wearing pellets of asafetida, or devil's dung, around our waists,' Carter writes. 'It was a horrible-smelling extract . . . [that kept] bearers of germs at a healthy distance from wearers of the stench.'
"For head lice, 'other than a very short haircut or shaved head, the standard treatment was a concoction of sulfur and kerosene, held in place with a tight stocking cap . . . We didn't have to worry much about red bugs, or chiggers, but Mama made us check for ticks after we'd spent time in the woods and swamps. She knew how to remove them with heat or tweezers . . .'"
Sounds like Jimmah's childhood had all the charm of a Dickens novel. No wonder he turned out to be such a self-righteous sourpuss.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Wow. I would assume that such an a-political sentiment about his mother would be treated with a bit more dignity. Or was that clever sarcasm I detected?