Posted on 04/19/2005 10:08:17 PM PDT by RWR8189
Today in Odd History, President Jimmy Carter was attacked by a rabbit during a fishing trip in Plains, Georgia. The rabbit, which may have been fleeing a predator, swam toward his boat, "hissing menacingly, its teeth flashing and nostrils flared." President Carter was forced to swat at the vicious beast with a canoe paddle, which apparently scared it off.
Upon his return to the White House, Carter told his staff about the furry amphibian's assault. Most of them refused to believe him, insisting that rabbits can't swim (although since most mammals can swim, there's no reason to believe that rabbits cannot), and that even if they could, they certainly wouldn't attack humans, and certainly not presidents. Fortunately, a White House photographer had been on the scene, and had recorded the bizarre attack. The photograph showed Carter with his paddle raised, warding off a small creature which might, or might not, have been a rabbit. One staffer was quoted as saying, "You couldn't tell what it was." Undaunted by their skepticism, Carter had the image enlarged, and there it was--a killer bunny rabbit, apparently bent on assassinating the president.
The story might have ended there, except that White House Press Secretary Jody Powell mentioned the incident to Associated Press reporter Brooks Jackson in August. 
The Washington Post ran it as front page news. The original photograph was not available (until the Reagan administration leaked it in 1981), but the paper filled the gap with a cartoon modeled on the poster for the movie Jaws, starring the rabbit and entitled Paws. Powell made a belated attempt to impress the public with the seriousness of the attack, calling the creature a "swamp rabbit," but since Carter had to appease his rabbit-loving constituents by insisting that he had not actually smacked his buck-toothed opponent with his paddle, but only splashed water at it to drive it away, it seemed unlikely that he had been in danger. The entire episode became a 
symbol of Carter's floundering presidency. According to Powell, "[I]t shows the extent to which an insignificant incident can snowball and end up in newspapers and news shows across the country.” Carter biographer Douglas Brinkley says, “It just played up the Carter flake factor.... I mean, he had to deal with Russia and the Ayatollah and here he was supposedly fighting off a rabbit.”
Note: While some presidential apologists have suggested that Carter might actually have been attacked by a nutria, a large, aggressive aquatic rodent, others have insisted that the President's assailant was a simple, if unusually vicious, bunny rabbit. Fulk, the 12th century king of Jerusalem, was killed by a rabbit. (Well, really he was killed by a fall from his horse, but the horse had been startled by a rabbit.) And many years ago, I was the owner of a Blue Dutch rabbit named Sequin. One of my friends still bears the scars of an encounter with Sequin--a perfectly matched set of parallel teeth marks, where Sequin's fangs closed on her hand and ripped through the flesh when she pulled her hand away. Bunnies are, indeed, fiercer than anyone but Monty Python has generally given them credit for.
LOLOLOLOL
And now he looks like one.
Wait...was it Jimmy Carter or Monty Python?
Even Rabbits can sense weakness :-)
I believe it was actually a large badger...
"The entire episode became a symbol of Carter's floundering presidency."
Nah.
This [ http://jschumacher.typepad.com/joe/images/vt_hike_03.jpg ] is a much better symbol of Carter's floundering presidency.
No, that was ANOTHER killer bunny incident! ; )
P.S: Love the tagline...until we see them do the job we elected them to do, my cash stays right where it is.
It's just embarrassing that anyone from Georgia - Democrat or not (Sam Nunn, after all, was from Georgia) - would have been frightened by a wittle bunny wabbit. And then he had to say he hadn't actually "smacked" it?! If a bunny wabbit attacked me, it'd have a .40 caliber hollow-point sized hole in between its floppy, cutsy big ears.
Poor rabbit!! Sounds like he was gasping for air and got hit in the head with a paddle. LOL
LOL!
Thanks for the correction
Kill da wabbit, kill da wabbit...
ROFLMAO!!!!!
Where is Greenpeace when you need them? What I wouldn't give to have seen the Rainbow Warrior moving inbetween the Presidential Dinghy and the rabbit to save the poot creature from the crazed paddle swinging President!
Oh man, the memories, the memories...priceless. On to the Holy Hand Grenade!
OMG. LOL.
The whole PETA, Greenpeace thing escaped me...
Jimmah actually smacked the rabbit? In self defense? He didn't let the thing...uh...gnaw him to death???
Somebody give me a chorus of Kum Ba Yah or something!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
