Simple poll: who was worse, Ronald Reagan or George W Bush?

[Nye Bevan]

36 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Ronald Reagan was worse.
	25 (69%)
	George W Bush was worse.
	9 (25%)
	They were identical in terms of how bad they were.
	2 (6%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[Heather MC]

1. I think Ronald Reagan was the Gateway drug for all the hell that has followed him

[liberalmuse]

6. +1

Dead on!

[alsame]

8. Exactly. Bush was the rotten fruit of

the poisonous tree that was Reagan.

[yurbud]

31. if Reagan was pot, Baby Bush was crack, meth, and bath salts all rolled into one

[bemildred]

36. +1. nt

[hobbit709]

38. you got it.

[tosh]

50. Without a doubt.

Along with his partner in the U.K.

[Dawson Leery]

61. Certainly.

Bush's mis administration was the culmination of the rightward shift of the nation which started with the rural white backlash against the conscious revolutions of the 60's/70's.

Also, amends for many of Reagan's crimes were possible. The damage inflicted by Bush and the Neo-Cons is not.

[calimary]

62. Man, that's a GREAT way to put it, Heather MC!

[1awake]

2. Wow... how to even answer that.

Both were terribly detrimental but in very different ways. My "anger" runs hotter for Bush right now so... dunno what else to say.

[BlueMTexpat]

27. I agree.

Reagan was insidiously (I say "insidiously" because too many Dems for too long could not see what was happening) detrimental in destroying social safety nets, breaking up unions, enabling the income inequality situation we now have and putting budding neocon monsters in place who were then able to move into full flower under Bush II. Yes, indeed, he set the stage, but Bush II jumped in with both feet!

Bush II, together with his merry band of neocon warmongers, who "presided" over two of the worst disasters ever to occur on US soil - (9-11) and the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, who allowed radical RW Xtians to pack the DOJ and other USG agencies and courts, who fecklessly led the US into two disastrous wars - at least one of which was illegal by any accepted international norm, whose administration condoned torture and rendition, and whose unfettered incompetence, selfishness and greed enabled the worst global financial disaster since the Great Depression, is probably the worst US President to date. Hopefully, he will remain as the bottom to which we never again descend.

Still - I find it too difficult to choose between them. We could not have had the same sort of debacle under Bush II without Reagan. In fact, Bush II sans Cheney and Rove might have been more like Daddy Bush, who was also awful, IMO. But he might not have bungled foreign affairs at least quite so badly. So for that, I can never - ever - forgive Reagan.

[Skittles]

3. Reagan made greed and idiocy fashionable

America has yet to recover

[Raine]

4. Raygun ... he made what has come since possible. nt

[Scootaloo]

5. The way I phrased it before...

If right-wing batshittery were a lawnmower, then Nixon primed the pump, Reagan yanked the cord, and Dubya was just a fresh dog turd hiding in a clump of crabgrass.

[BlueMTexpat]

28. Excellent! eom

[Ruby the Liberal]

56. !!!

[Arugula Latte]

7. Reagan was the start of the end of the U.S. as a viable democratic republic.

He started the ball rolling down the hill, and Dubya kicked it hard.

[PeteSelman]

9. Reagan begat Bush.

Every president after him kept his disastrous economic model, so there's plenty of blame to go around.

[YoungDemCA]

19. +100000

This is a bipartisan affair.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

10. Not really a tough choice.

Reagan's recession was the worst since the Depression in his time, but Dubya actually managed to beat him out. We'll be digging out from under his disaster for longer than the one Reagan left us. In foreign policy, Reagan had multiple disasters in Central America (that their still dealing with even today) and the 200 dead Marines in Lebanon for no apparent reason that anyone can think of, but Dubya easily had him beat just with Iraq.

[GoCubsGo]

37. True, but...

Shit-for-Brains was able to "accomplish" his unmitigated disaster only through the steps put in place by Reagan. Most of the Wall St. and bank deregulation that caused our economy to crash under Dumbya was put in place by Brain-dead Ronnie. Even 9/11 is partly Reagan's legacy, as he's the one who first rubbed shoulders with bin Laden and armed him against the Soviets in Afghanistan. Hell, even the current divisive, nasty political climate we have now had its roots in the Reagan misadministration. See: Lee Atwater, for starters.

[indepat]

11. GWB is my all-time worst, followed by St. Ronnie in second based on my perception that a goodly

part of the harm inflicted by Reagan could have been reversed, but most of the harm inflicted by junior is irreversible.

[Cal33]

17. "but most of the harm inflicted by junior is irreversible." It's possible that Junior might look

upon this evaluation of yours as the highest form of compliment. The more pain he can
inflict, the prouder a sociopath feels about himself. It's one of the ways a sociopath
thinks and feels differently from the majority.

[Hekate]

30. Pretty much how I feel...

Dubya still just stuns me by the sheer magnitude of the destruction he wrought on what I thought was the very framework of our country, even renaming our nation The Homeland. So very much of the shit Obama gets blamed for was firmly put in place by Bush the Lesser, and I warned here that it could not be undone in the next administration and possibly not in my lifetime. Regrettably, I was right.

My ancestors started arriving in 1620 and kept coming, including the famine stricken Irish. I look on my husband as just the latest in that stream of immigrants, for his parents came here as survivors of the Holocaust.

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine a time when I might want to leave the US -- until Patriot Act Part 2 was revealed by Bill Moyers. I will never feel the same about my government, and for that I will always hate Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the rest of that evil gang. Not even Nixon ever did that to me.

[indepat]

53. Couldn't agree with you more: my first immigrant ancestor didn't reach these shores until 1650

[lastlib]

12. YES.

[baldguy]

13. Reagan set the stage, W delivered the hoped for catastrophe.

[Warren DeMontague]

14. A poop sandwich or a doody milkshake

Hmmm, how to choose...

[calimary]

63. Hmmm... shit or vomit? Hard to pick.

[Bobbie Jo]

15. That's like asking...

Who was worse, Stalin or Mussolini?

[uponit7771]

16. RayGun was one of the most racially antagonistic presidents since Andrew Johnson

[kimbutgar]

18. Ray gun opened pandora's box that led to republican dominance in this country

Lowering taxes on the rich, destroying unions, Iran contra fiasco and it being sweep under the carpet with no repercussion. The worst president ever. Raygun lied to the people it was his best acting job.

[davleuv]

20. Hmm... That's a tough one.

On the one hand you've got Bush with Iraq, GITMO, the Patriot Act, NSA, ignoring warnings about Al Qaeda, which resulted in 9/11, and dropping the ball in Afghanistan. Plus you had a lack of response after Katrina, and leaking the identity of a CIA agent, I could go on, but won't. Aids relief to Africa was the only good thing he did.

On the other had you've got Saint Reagan who made deficit spending reckless deregulation, and greed fashionable, cut and ran after 240 Marines were killed in Lebanon and invaded Grenada to boost his poll numbers, then you had Iran Contra, supporting Apartheid, arming Saddam, ignoring AIDS, etc... The bright spot on his record was the summit meetings with Gorbachev.


Reagan's bright spot kind of outweighs Bush's because Reagan's good deed did CONTRIBUTE (not single handily end) to the end of a forty year Cold War. Reagan did however make Bush and the mess we know as the Modern GOP possible, and one can't really blame Bush entirely for all the bad things that went wrong on his watch. Clinton deserves some blame for 9/11 for not doing much after all the attacks abroad, and Reagan deserves some blame for 9/11 as well for funding and training Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, and the economic mess was entirely bi partisan and again Reagan and Clinton deserve some blame for '08 as well.

I guess I'll give Dubya the honor of worst because I actually lived it (I was born in '93), but Rancid Ronnie is at a very close second. At least Reagan could speak well.

[moondust]

21. I'm giving you an "A"

Good retrospective coming from a 20-year-old who wasn't even alive when Reagan was in office.

It is a tough one. I somehow survived both and still can't decide which was worse, though I'd probably go with GWB because there was almost nothing to redeem him. At least Reagan didn't start any BIG, LONG WARS.

Welcome to the Democratic Underground, davleuv!

[Egalitarian Thug]

54. Still, without reagan there is no shrub...

[calimary]

64. Welcome to DU, davleuv!

Glad you're here! Good post. I'd still have to go with reagan, myself (Rancid ronnie is a good name for him, btw), because he sold America down the river. The woes we've been saddled with that are in full flower now (like that famous jungle flower whose scent smells like rotting meat) - EVERYTHING that's wrong with America now, EVERYTHING - got started under reagan. From deregulation and renewed racism to Pox Noise.

They're both vile, but for me, reagan edges dubya. I'm 40 years older than you and I lived through both of 'em.

Not that it makes me any kind of expert, but damn - I remember watching reagan during the 1980 campaign and thinking to myself "there's the most dangerous man in America. Because he makes all the bad stuff sound soooooooo good and soooooooo nice and sooooooo harmless.

[BainsBane]

22. I'm very surprised at the results

I don't see it as remotely close. Bush was sooo much worse than Reagan. Reagan wouldn't even be allowed in the Republican party today.

Katrina
Iraq
The Wall Street collapse
Darth Vader

[Wounded Bear]

23. Reagan catapulted some of the worst crooks from the 1970's...

into the Bush administration. Many of Bush's inner circle can trace their roots to Nixonian ratfucking.

He enabled Nixon's "I'm not a crook" to morph into Bush's "What me worry?"

Both were little more than figureheads, manipulated by the dark forces that reside in the very dungeons of the Republican machine.

Reagan was a bad actor in the role of a lifetime, played out in reality.

Bush was a failure, failing at his greatest challenge like he failed everywhere else he tried.

Reagan gets my vote. He snuffed out the last hope that progressivism might prevail at the end of the 20th Century and made it possible for the Bushes to thrive. We didn't get all of 1984 under Reagan, but he sure moved us a long way towards it.

[Douglas Carpenter]

24. Reagan convinced many of Americans and much of the world that selfishness was a virtue,

compassion was a vice and ignorance was something to be proud of.




Ronald = 6

Wilson = 6

Reagan = 6

[Cha]

25. Who was responsible for killing the most people? bush.. and with

bush we always had cheney somewhere pulling strings.

reagun was before my time in politics.. what I know about him I've read on DU for the last 10 years. He sounds like a the worst kind of asshole money can buy.

My experience in politics started with the bush-cheney coup so that traumatic experience is tatooed on my brain for eternity.

[kelliekat44]

40. This could be Reagan if you count the American lives lost because of the results of his social

policies and the long-term impact on the poor and struggling citizens.

[MADem]

26. So far, every response in this thread is brilliant. nt

[JI7]

29. Reagan was a worse person, Bush was a bigger disaster as PRes, Reagan was worse in long term

negative influence.

[yurbud]

32. in a perverse way, Baby Bush did us all a favor...

He tore the mask off the oligarchy, and conservative ideology.

Any pretense that conservative ideas were just a different way of trying to promote the common good were destroyed.

Likewise, any notion that the very wealthy were wealthy because they were smarter, harder working, or morally superior to the rest of us were wiped out just by the very existence of W.

He also made it clear how Washington really works: the rich give orders, and Republicans and too many Democrats do whatever it takes to put those orders into action, Constitution be damned, which makes it a lot harder to take later presidents like Obama seriously when they say procedural roadblocks are keeping them from getting something done.

[davidpdx]

33. I'm going to go with W

Reagan was able to work across the isle with Tip O'Neil on somethings. W got us into two damaging wars and completely botched the intelligence about the terrorist attacks on 9/11. Both are bad, so in my opinion there is no "good" choice. I just see W as worse.

[B Calm]

34. Reagan destroyed the American Dream, so I had to vote

for Reagan. Both POTUS were monsters.

[stevenleser]

35. Reagan by a landslide.

* - Elevated the rancor between Liberals and Conservatives to a new high by telling his Conservative base how bad Liberals were at every opportunity, setting the stage for how bad it is today while at the same time removing the fairness doctrine which created the Conservative punditry who would continue to reinforce this.

* - Ignored AIDS for 8 years refusing to fund research and allowing a deadly communicable disease to gain a foothold here without which untold hundreds of thousands of Americans wouldn't have died and the million Americans who are now infected might otherwise not be

* - Cut revenue (taxes) significantly while at the same time massively increasing spending, particularly defense spending, starting the modern practice of Republican irresponsible massive deficit spending.

I can go on for hours...

[LWolf]

39. I wonder

how many of those who think that GWB was worse experienced RR as adults. He made GWB possible.

[reddread]

42. GHWB and Ted Kennedy made Reagan possible. why is Poppy being relegated to the shadows again?

Not just a simple poll, simplistic and misleading.
same as it ever was.

[deutsey]

41. I survived both...after Reagan, I still at least had a naive hope

that we would reverse what he did.

After W, that hope barely exists for me anymore.

My hope isn't dead, but it's burning very, very low.

[Coyotl]

43. Same puppet, new paint job.

[mulsh]

44. Reagan. look at all of his people who continue to infest our government and

airwaves. Add his 2 terms as CA governor for good measure.

[nevergiveup]

45. Reagan was a monster with political power

and W was an idiot with political power. I really think it is sort of a toss-up as to who was worse but I am leaning a tad towards W.....but Reagan did set the table for W and like a good loyal low IQ soldier Idiot Son served up one monumental disaster after another, some from which we will never recover.

[reddread]

47. Reagan SEVERELY disliked GHWB

Poppy insinuated himself rather brilliantly in a place Ron didnt want him
WHY are people not paying attention to the details of history?
To connect GW and DICK Cheney to RR without the crucial facts
is worse than ignorant.
It is doing THEIR work for them.
Get it right.

[Nye Bevan]

46. I have to go against the majority view, and here's why.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

For me, it's not even close.

[reddread]

48. is there a Central American body count in there?

The New World order starts south of the border.

[reddread]

49. and then there is this (think of the children!)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctions_against_Iraq

[tularetom]

51. The question is, who was worse, Reagan or Cheney?

That would be a much closer call.

Bush was a drunken coked up fool, he just signed whatever shit was shoved in front of him. Sure he's evil but not even in the same league as the dick or Ronnie.

[Motown_Johnny]

52. The fool who leads or the fool who follows?

This time I think it was the leader.


Reagan seems to have known what he was doing and did it anyways.

W. was/is just a dumbass who followed that ideology.

[Ruby the Liberal]

55. They were both idiotic puppets who listened to evil people

But save the 2 unfunded wars (and the countless lives lost in them), Reagan set the trajectory that we are STILL trying to reverse.

[derby378]

57. Reagan was a Hollywood B-movie actor - Bush, on the other hand, was evil and manipulative

A spoiled frat boy with uncomfortable connections to the bin Laden family and a Machiavellian streak. Reagan was a fucking choirboy compared to this soulless freak.

[reddread]

59. GW was a frontman, Reagan had Alzheimer's

he was no peach, but after surviving that assassination coincidence, he had a very strong hand up his butt, and GHWB served most of three terms before installing his idiot bastard son.
Now, who had REAL power?
How can you solve a problem you cant even accurately describe?
we're fucked.
Jeb is coming and people are MUCH more concerned with Warren.

[geek tragedy]

58. HIV is the tie-breaker for me. Reagan=worst. nt

[joeybee12]

60. Dumbo was worse, but the Idiot Reagan laid the groundwork for someone as bad

as Dumbo to steal an election and make this country a living hell.

[SheilaT]

65. As awful as Ronnie was, W was infinitely worse

if you ask me.

I was already an adult when Reagan came along. I was horrified at what he did, and knew he was the worse President of the 20th Century. Sigh. I only had to wait a decade or so for an even worse one.

Read the book Time on My Hands by Peter delaCorte to really get it. A travel writer, on a visit to Paris, is contacted by an older American who has a time machine. He'll give the time machine to the travel writer only if the writer will go back and keep Ronald Reagan from becoming President, because Reagan was clearly the worst President ever.

I first read that book when it came out in 1998 and found it disturbing and good. I re-read it a few years ago, toward the end of the George W. Bush Presidency. There was a very different vibe for me, as we now had had a President far worse than Reagan.

It's an excellent book and I wish more people would read it.

[quaker bill]

66. GWB

on power of stupidity alone.

There is a reasonable debate to be had and it can be looked at as a close call in a number of dimensions.

But for sheer violent stupidity, I have to go with GWB. He turned "not giving a sh*t about you" into national policy and an acceptable form of political discourse.

Reagan never turned that corner and at least had to fake "giving a sh*t about you".