The Carter era is over not just because its eponymous figure kicked the last of a long line of buckets to reunite with the Ayatollah Khomeini and Fidel Castro on the world’s worst reunion tour in the world’s worst place, but because the era itself best epitomized by his legacy has come to an end.

Jimmuh Carter waited until nearly the end of the administration of the man who accomplished what most thought was impossible, be an even worse regarded president than Carter. But Joe Biden did it. And along with his career, Biden also unwound Carter’s, his foreign policy, his clueless cheerleading in the face of economic misery, and his tiresome communications style.

It’s all too easy to view the Clinton, Obama, and Biden administrations as extensions of ‘Carterism’, pandering to Iran and other foes, perpetuating failed economic policies, and nudging the country further leftward. Reagan and Trump both served as rebukes of not just these elements of Carterism, but the larger diminution of expectations. America was no longer a great power and should stop acting like one or expecting any more out of life than Europe was getting.

We were just another country in a world of them and what we needed to do was to learn to be humble, get along better with the rest of the world, turn down the heat, and learn to like it.

Clinton and Obama, arguably the best salesmen for Carterism, were bookended by the very worst, Carter himself and Joe Biden. Biden’s defeat was Carter’s political death. The mortal death followed soon after.