Will * end up being "worst president in history?"

[FunBobbyMucha]

Someone with more u.s. history knowledge than me please weigh in. Prior to *, what President has been judged the worst?

[fryguy]

1. he already is....

[redqueen]

2. End up?

I thought this was pretty much agreed on already.

[awgoodkitty]

3. Yes!

http://www.dubyamovie.com/

[amber dog democrat]

4. I hope so.

I would hate to try to imagine a worse one than the Chimp.

[BootinUp]

5. As to previous, I think Grant

is rated down there.

And Bush will undoubtedly be remembered for his foreign policy mistakes and his divisive politics.

[medeak]

8. Grant yep...he's hard to beat

raging alcoholic and cocaine addict...wait a minute.....

[fertilizeonarbusto]

6. hands down

Especially all once all the stuff they've hidden so far comes out and all the people quiet out of fear start talking.

[Racenut20]

7. New Mt Rushmore

Bush, Coolidge, Harding, Hoover.

He already outranks them, even Andrew Johnson and John Quincy Adams.

We are just waiting for historians to start reporting it.

[LDS Jock]

9. where should the new Mt Rushmore be?

too bad there aren't any mountains around Crawford. Where else could it be?

[Spinzonner]

12. Shouldn't that be called Mt Flushmore ?

[Ganja Ninja]

10. The W is for Worst!

You have to consider what he started out with and how he ended up. The damage he's done hasn't fully hit us yet. Kerry has his work cut out for him.

[NV Whino]

11. No

Becuase he was never president in the first place.

[greyfox]

13. Amen! n/t

[Spider Jerusalem]

14. Only if he gets another term.

James Buchanan would currently have to rank as "worst". Buchanan sat idly and did NOTHING while the nation was collapsing into sectarian strife. He made no serious effort to halt Southern secession. He basically let the Civil War happen. Bush is not worse than Buchanan. Not yet. And Buchanan's predecessor, Franklin Pierce, ranks up there on the list as well.

[FunBobbyMucha]

15. Okay, sure but did They Might Be Giants ever write a song about

Buchanan? Well, did they? Ha!

[ProfessorGAC]

16. He Will Go Down In History With. . .

. . .Buchanan, Harding, Cooldige, and Hoover. Sort of rogue's gallery of the presidency. All dumber than dirt, clueless on the issues, and unconcerned of their impact on the people.

BTW: In 50 years, historians will decide that Reagan was the most overrated president of the 20th century. When all the dust settles, the prism of history will show that he accomplished practically nothing.
The Professor

[FunBobbyMucha]

18. Richard Dreyfuss was on CSPAN debating * this weekend

and he had a good line: "Mr. Bush, you are no Ronald Reagan. You're not even close. And neither was Reagan."

[NewJeffCT]

26. good one

I always like to point out to Reagan lovers that he had more people in his administration indicted than all other presidents of the 20th century combined.

[Benhurst]

19. I agree; but at least Buchanan, Harding, Coolidge and

Hoover were ELECTED.

[lpbk2713]

21. Agree with regard to Raygun.

And as far as Shit-for-Brains is concerned, his claim to notoriety will be the gift he had for going from a record budgetary surplus to a record deficit in just one term. And the asshole has the nerve to blame it on the previous administration!

[Maddy McCall]

22. Read "Sleepwalking through History."

Historians have already decided that.

[ProfessorGAC]

25. On Reagan??

If so, good. I haven't read the book. But, it is good to know the academics haven't drunk the Kool-Aid.
The Professor

[FunBobbyMucha]

28. Yeah, "Sleepwalking" is a good book.

I forgot about that one! Read it years ago.

[Bucky]

17. Worse than Bush, worse than Grant, worse than Harding

Buchanan and Pierce screwed around for eight years and, despite being northerners, knuckled under to the neocons of their day--the extremist southern slaveocracy interest. Because they dilly dallied away almost a decade of time for political compromise and refused to acknowledge slavery for a system that would corrupt every quarter of the nation that it touched, they allowed the country to degenerate into conditions that produced a civil war.

Bad as Bush is, he's not quite that bad. I'd call Harding worse than Grant and Grant worse than Nixon. Bush the younger is worse than all three of them for what he's done to undermine the Bill of Rights alone.

[ProfessorGAC]

27. I Always Give Grant A Pass

Remember, Grant DID NOT WANT TO BE PRESIDENT! He didn't think he was up to the job, didn't think he could handle the pressure, and really didn't want to do it. The "mantle of Lincoln" thing was used to pressure him into taking it, and was told that his staff would handle everything. He was flat out told that he would be a figurehead, and that he owed it to the country to assure that Lincoln's vision would be fulfilled.

The people around him were all sharks and crooks, and the administration was a disaster. But, i always think he deserves the pass because he admitted he wasn't right for the job.
The Professor

[Spider Jerusalem]

29. I give Hoover a pass, for different reasons...

Hoover was a genuinely good and decent man who did, to his credit, try to use his authority as President to ease the horrific economic conditions of the Depression. Unfortunately, he was utterly out of his depth in the office.

He doesn't deserve all of the vitriol flung at him. The corruption of Harding and the hands-off laissez-faire economic policy of Coolidge made what happened on Hoover's watch inevitable; it took Franklin Roosevelt, who was willing to make fundamental changes in the system, the better part of a decade, and the full economic mobilisation and full employment brought about by a world war to fully reverse the Depression.

[ProfessorGAC]

30. Fair Point

I will only differ on one point. The economic condition was turning around as early as 1935. The war mobilization accelerated it substantially, to be sure, but the idea that the war created the momentum is a conservative economic myth.
The Professor

[Spider Jerusalem]

31. I'm aware the Depression was essentially over by 1937...

but the war brought back full employment. Should've been clearer.

[ProfessorGAC]

34. Now We're Completely On The Same Page

Cool!
The Professor

[Maddy McCall]

32. Read how he handled "the indian problem"

Not worthy of a pass, in my opinion.

[ProfessorGAC]

35. I Don't Think HE Handled It

Those were the mistakes of a corrupt group of advisors who were more interested in expediency than fairness.

The point is he DIDN'T want the job, didn't think he should have the job, and took it after being talked into it. He was a figurehead, by his own admission.

I don't disagree about the atrocious behavior of his administration. I just don't think it was him.
The Professor

[Maddy McCall]

20. Yes. Every historian I know, and myself, agree that he is indeed...

the worst president in US history.

[pdx_prog]

23. He's got my vote!

[MsAnthropy]

24. Worst. President. Ever.

no one else comes close.

[LastKnight]

33. republican enthusiasim is nothing more than reactionary.

they are only excited to keep him because we wanna get rid of him so much. give it 10 years after hes outta office, people will start to see the shit that happened and the effects of a 'free and americanized' iraq. and all the other bullshit hes done.

however, if he does get a second term, we are fucked. not we as democrats, i mean we as a country.

-LK

[Iris]

36. Doesn't being an incumbent in a time of war with an under 50% approval

rating pretty much do it already?

[jmowreader]

37. Especially when you START the war in the first place!

I think Bush will come out worse overall than Coolidge and Harding for one very important reason: neither of them invaded a sovereign nation who wasn't engaged in hostilities with us before the initial assault.

If I was going to carve a wall of shame, I'd put Dubya Bush, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Richard Nixon, Poppy Bush and Saint Ronnie on it.

[MrTriumph]

38. W ( the WPE) strained our post WWII alliances

Unity of what we call the West has been severly damaged. Truman started it. All presidents through Clinton understood the value of it.

Let's hope Kerry can mend fences and get us and our allies back on the same page.

[leftofthedial]

39. the little bushturd started out at the worst

and went downhill from there