CARTER'S NUTZPAH: That's the title of an editorial in The Investor's Busininess Daily. It's not exactly Yiddish--but it captures the thought.

Carter's Nutzpah

Democracy: Has Jimmy Carter gone off the deep end? He's now scolding the West for refusing to bankroll Hamas terrorists who've just seized power at gunpoint in Gaza. It's a new low in coddling terrorism.

...Carter also misstated and distorted technical aspects of democratic rule in the Palestinian Authority itself, further calling into question his intentions. Hamas' 42% plurality in the last parliamentary election gave the terror group a right to participate in government, but not absolute power.

Carter neglected to notice that President Mahmoud Abbas, Palestine's head of state, not only had a full democratic right to appoint Hamas members to his Cabinet, but he also had the right to dismiss them as he did Thursday. Carter's selective respect for the power-sharing aspect of Palestine's democracy stands out as significantly skewed toward Hamas.

Crazier still, Carter insisted Hamas was entitled to American aid because Fatah had been getting it. But he left out some details: Hamas is a terrorist organization that had broken six previous cease-fires, and its campaign platform vowed to destroy Israel. Hamas would gladly take Western cash to make good on that campaign promise to voters.

No one in the West is obligated to support an international terrorist organization just because it "won" an election. The proper response is to cut it off until it renounces violence.

Read the whole thing.

Technorati Tag: Jimmy Carter.