The six-part series on Jimmy Carter continues at IBD.

The 1970s will not be remembered as America’s greatest decade. Morale was low, inflation and unemployment were high, and the economy was ugly. When Carter took office, he had a chance to end the skid. He made it worse.

The 39th president’s response to our “crisis of confidence” was not a bold move forward. It did nothing to inspire the country. It was a surrender. He had no tax-cut plan but he did increase government spending, his leftist notions only making conditions worse.

Carter’s answer to his counterproductive solutions was to tell America that its best days were over. He nagged us to turn down our thermostats in the winter and turn them up in the summer, since the nation could not possibly overcome its energy problems.

“I think it’s inevitable that there will be a lower standard of living than what everybody had always anticipated,” he told advisers in 1979. “The only trend is downward.”

In July of that year, Carter delivered what has become known as his malaise speech. It was more of an accusatory sermon. In endorsing John Anderson for president in 1980, the New Republic described the speech as “a lot of mystical mumbo jumbo.” Instead of rousing the American spirit, Carter wounded it. He blamed Americans for America’s problems.

“In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption,” he fussed.