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Concentrating too much on the issue of the moment, Carter has passed so many conflicting signals that people at home and abroad often do not know what they are supposed to be hearing. Like a spinning magnet, Carter alternately attracts and repels constituencies, supporting recession and social justice, growth and inflation, energy and environment, security and human rights. A man who arouses no strong feelings of loyalty, Carter has found himself at the mercy of events with little support on Capitol Hill or in the country. He may lapse into demagoguery on the campaign trail, zapping Reagan, but he abhors strident oratory when trying to sell a program, and his soft-sell approach undermines his effect as a leader.
The appearance too often is of a "passionless presidency," in the words of onetime Chief Speechwriter James Fallows. Even some of his own staff are unsure about precisely what programs Jimmy Carter believes in enough to espouse if re-elected next month. Whether, for example, he will attempt to push the SALT II treaty through Congress or instead concentrate first on defense improvements.
Hamilton Jordan, the President's closest aide, believes the inability to project a vision of where he wants to lead the country and to explain clearly what he has accomplished has plagued the Administration most. "Our greatest single failure is that we have not communicated effectively a description of the country's problems or a pertinent solution to those problems," he says. It is more than that. At times Carter's touch has been so uncertain that he has caused many Americans to lose confidence in him, to wonder if he really had a vision for the country.
To be fair, the nation has come to make vast and probably unrealistic demands on the presidency. Anyone occupying the White House during the past four years would have found his leadership shaken and shaped by events over which he had virtually no control: the relative decline of American strength in the world; the slide in productivity and innovation in the American economy; the lessening of American willingness to compromise and horse-trade; the dramatic growth of lobbies and special interest groups; the evolving independence of Congress. In this environment, to make matters worse, Carter came to office more a dreamer than a realist. But he is learning. Says Jordan: "We have readjusted ourselves in a more pragmatic way to the problems we face."