If there is penalty for being bland, there should be one applied to Nichols. He assures you that Carter is not anti-Israeli (notice that it is the only credential that the Nation magazine cares about--I mean, why not try to disprove somebody being anti-Palestinian?). He also uses the Camp David accords (which have caused more war and oppression in the region, not less) as part of the alleged achievements of Carter. And notice the introduction of the piece, where nobody is really guilty because all are. (This is the school of thought that the Arab-Israeli conflict is right-versus-right or wrong-versus-wrong and these schools provide pretexts for Israeli occupation and oppression).