Who do you think is/are the most UNDERRATED President(s) of all time?

[UrbScotty]

My picks:

1. Jimmy Carter. With the possible exception of FDR, he is arguably the most humanitarian President we've had <cough>Ha<cough>bi<cough>tat<cough>for<cough>Hu<cough>man<cough>i<cough>ty<cough>. He was also soft-spoken, but he did a lot to advance the cause of peace both as President <cough>Camp<cough>Da<cough>vid<cough> and since 1981 <cough>No<cough>bel<cough>Peace<cough>Prize<cough>. He has also written many books. (I've read Always a Reckoning and Christmas In Plains.)

3. Bill Clinton. Duh.

2. James Madison. Not so much for what he did as President, but for what he did before. He was the mastermind behind the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, mainly the checks and balances system. Without that, Democrats mighgt not be able to block Bush's right-wing nominees. Yet, how often do we hear his name scattered about? There's James Madison University and Madison, Wisconsin, but that's it, as far as I know.

[grannylib]

1. I like your picks...always felt that Carter was very underrated and

was horribly abused by the so-called "Christian Right" (who, had they been truly Christian would have had in Carter the perfect candidate, the real deal...and instead they went for Hollywood Ron...yikes.)

[Some Moran]

12. An atheist no less..

Ronnie shared the same bigotry as the Reich.

[scottcsmith]

14. Why is he hated by the Christian right?

From everything I've read, Mr. Carter is a very religious person, someone who spends his time teaching Sunday School classes at his church and devoting himself to humanitarian causes, such as Habitat for Humanity. I've never understood why the Christian right hate him so much.

[Spintronic]

2. James K. Polk

Napoleon of the stump.

[Catholic Sensation]

3. Ronald Reagan, GW, GHW

I'm kidding of course, but wanted to cause some trouble

[MrSoundAndVision]

4. Carter and Jefferson of course...

Carter is obvious as we are still here (no nuclear winter), and Jefferson because he was an extraordinary democratic socialist, check out "The Portable Thomas Jefferson", it's a collection of his various presidential and non-presidential letters and analyses. Incredible stuff. For example, Jefferson thought that it should be a right, in the Constitution, that the homeless be allowed to take ownership of public lands for a very reasonable tariff on their crop yields. He said that to deny them such a right is to deny their natural (god given) rights. That to deny the homeless poor this right was to treat them as animals! I completely agree, so let me change the order of the above, Jefferson first, Carter second.

[nuxvomica]

5. Carter is the president most responsible for the fall of the Soviet bloc

And he never gets credit for it. Instead, even non-conservatives give credit to Reagan, who actually delayed it.

[mitchum]

6. LBJ

The Great Society

[Rhiannon12866]

7. Jimmy Carter, of course

I completely believe that history will prove him to be as good a president as I knew him to be.:-)

[JohnKleeb]

8. I saw that comin

:hi:
I think Truman honestly but Carter is good too.

[Sting]

9. Bill Clinton...

everytime I see him on tv, all they talk about is that damn Clinton/Lewinsky scandal. They always fail to mention that while under Clinton (no pun intended), we had a great economy and our soldiers weren't dying in an unjust war.

[ArkDem]

16. How many presidents have you studied that were pronounced

great because of the economy? The great presidents all served during times of great uncertainty. Washington, Lincoln, Teddy, FDR, Truman, Kennedy................

[The Sushi Bandit]

10. Jimmy Carter

a true man of Peace and community!

[fearsidhe]

11. Jimmy Carter...

Founding presidents are in a different class working with a system that wasn't corrupted.

One thing Carter did that took guts was returning the Panama Canal to Panama. Conservatives rail on that, but Carter (1st Commander of the Sub Nautilus) knew that most American Carriers are too large to fit through the canal and it is almost impossible to defend. In the '60s we ran some scenarios where we found that a single mortar team in the hills could effectively close the canal by sinking a ship in any of the locks.

The major benefit was the positive effect it had on how the US was viewed in South and Central America.

I had the good fortune to work with Jimmy Carter when he was Governor of Georgia. He was really pro environment and went head to head with the Army Corps of Engineers to stop a "recreational" dam on the Flint River. (The dam was proposed by a group of Republicans who had purchased vast tracts of land around where the proposed lake shoreline would be.) Envision gated communities built around a lake provided by taxpayer expense with profits beyond belief.

Carter inspired a groundswell of anti-dam support and after one hell of a battle, the dam was defeated and a wild river remained inviolate.

He also deserves a lot of the credit for the Chattahoochee River National Park.

[ArkDem]

15. Wow, that would be

one BIG mortar!

[leftofthedial]

13. Carter and Eisenhower

I don't think clinton is underrated. Polls showed extemely high favorability. He is just the most hated by the ignorant neocon crowd that are now destroying the country.

[scottcsmith]

17. Comparisons to Carter and other presidents

Feel free to add to the list.

The economy was in bad shape while Jimmy Carter was President, and he was blamed for it.

The economy has been in bad shape under the leadership of George W. Bush, but Clinton is blamed for it.

Carter authorized a military operation to rescue American hostages held in Iran and failed.

Bush authorized a military operation to capture Osama Bin Laden and failed.

Bush authorized a military operation to collect Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and has failed.

As an ex-President, Jimmy Carter teaches Sunday School, builds homes for low-income families, and takes part in numerous human-rights campaigns around the world, through his foundation, the Carter Center.

As an ex-President, George H.W. Bush has spent his time getting richer, as a member of the Carlyle group (although he's not currently listed as a member of that company).