MY SAY: TWO PRESIDENTS-POLES APART
Former President Jimmy Carter, whose “worst president” title is being challenged by the previous occupant of the White House has lost no time in criticizing President Donald Trump. In an interview with the New York Times on May 24th, 2016 he accused Donald Trump of tapping into “a reservoir of inherent racism.”
It is somewhat risible that he remains a tad silent after Trump’s triumph in Poland.
When Carter visited Poland in 1977 he had a translator, a freelance “linguist” hired by the State Department. This is what happened:
http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20150202-the-greatest-mistranslations-ever
“In a speech given during the US President’s 1977 visit to Poland, he appeared to express sexual desire for the then-Communist country. Or that’s what his interpreter said, anyway. It turned out Carter had said he wanted to learn about the Polish people’s ‘desires for the future’.
Earning a place in history, his interpreter also turned “I left the United States this morning” into “I left the United States, never to return”; according to Time magazine, even the innocent statement that Carter was happy to be in Poland became the claim that “he was happy to grasp at Poland’s private parts”.
Unsurprisingly, the President used a different interpreter when he gave a toast at a state banquet later in the same trip – but his woes didn’t end there. After delivering his first line, Carter paused, to be met with silence. After another line, he was again followed by silence. The new interpreter, who couldn’t understand the President’s English, had decided his best policy was to keep quiet. By the time Carter’s trip ended, he had become the punchline for many a Polish joke.”
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