If you’re reading this a day late, blame President Jimmy Carter.

A national day of remembrance was held Thursday to honor the former president, who smashed the record for ex-presidential longevity, living to be 100, and also living for almost 44 years after leaving the White House.

Contrast that with Lyndon Johnson who lived just four years after returning to his ranch in Texas in 1969.

As a result of the day to honor Carter, we have our third straight week of postal disruptions, so your paper is likely a day late if you receive it by mail.

History has not been too kind to Carter’s one term as president, but in contrast his activities since leaving office have been highlighted as a shining example of how to live in service to others.

He was the last Democrat to win Texas in a presidential election, in 1976, then was overtaken by Ronald Reagan in 1980.

That 1976 election was special personally, because it marked my first time to vote for the highest office in the land.

The voting age had been lowered to 18 for the 1972 election, but only those classmates whose birthdays fell between Sept. 1 and early November were able to take advantage. The rest of us had wait until we were 21, anyway, to participate.

I did take part in the 1972 election, as a volunteer, most notably handing out George McGovern literature in front of the Gibson’s Discount Center adjacent to the North Texas State University campus.

Some friends and I visited the somber election night watch party as it became clear fairly early in the evening that Richard Nixon would be reelected in a landslide.

He won Texas by a two to one margin after narrowly losing the state to Hubert Humphrey in 1968. Nixon took Denton County by a similar margin and an even larger in Wood County. McGovern won only a handful of counties in the Rio Grande Valley and one small one in the Panhandle by a 7-vote margin.

By contrast, Carter won 191 of the state’s 254 counties in 1976, including Wood with 57%. He dropped to 46.5% in 1980, with Reagan earning 52%. Reagan won statewide 55% to 41%.

Those of you old enough to remember know that, except for presidential elections and U.S. Senator John Tower, almost everyone in Texas voted Democrat for decades. All our state leaders were Democrats. All our local leaders were Democrats. Some counties did not even hold Republican primaries.

But that pendulum began to swing in the 1980s and has given little hint of swinging back any time soon outside of urban areas.

A lot of locally-elected Democrats switched to the Republican Party, primarily out of convenience rather than politics, with the handwriting on the wall that they could no longer earn reelection.

I’ve always found it a bit unsettling that positions like county commissioner are even political at all.

I’m not sure a Republican can pave a road or collect taxes any better than a Democrat, but that’s the system we have been given.