And economic historians will show the bigger fuck up was ........

[Stinky The Clown]

[Warpy]

1. No contest!

Hoover tried to improve things, although he was confined by party dogma and did all the wrong things.

Stupid just plain doesn't care about anything but protecting his own class.

[SoxFan]

2. Harding/Coolidge

They created the mess, but Hoover took the political fall.

Hoover was actually a decent man who was woefully out of synch with the times. Harding, on the other hand, combined Nixon's integrity, Bush's incompetence, and Clinton's libido in one ungodly package.

[Mike 03]

3. Unpopular Answer: The President has almost no control over these matters.

The Federal Reserve and regulation of financial institutions plays a much bigger role, I believe. That's just my opinion, obviously.

[Caliman73]

5. Although it is true that the President does not have direct control over the economy

The President is still the head of state and as such sets the tone and has influence in policy. Hoover was following policies that up until the time of the Crash and Depression seemed to be working. His main problem was that he thought that the bankers and corporations would "volunteer" to provide fixes to the economy to spare themselves and the citizenry of the full extent of the downturn.

Bush, having 1928 to draw upon for guidance, continued to espouse the failed policies of deregulation that led us to the mess we are in now. That makes him the bigger fuck up. A down turn like the Great Depression was more or less unprecedented. We had the luxury of having had the Great Depression to keep us from handing too much power over to the banks and corporation and Bush led the way for us to do it anyway.

[Mike 03]

6. Okay, I surrender. Some challenges are worth taking and others are not.

I never want to be put in the position of having to "defend" George W. Bush. But this crisis goes way, way back. The economic history books will have a lot to say about this.

We need to be honest.

[Uncle Joe]

7. I would think waging an expensive unnecessary war while giving tax breaks to the wealthiest people,

without curtailing spending, thereby exploding the debt, while simultaneously antagonizing the vast majority of Earth with hubris tic policies; (Bush turned Teddy Roosevelt's Maxim on it's head, whittling down the big stick while using hard bellicose tones), with the result of melting the dollar, and creating uncertainty throughout the commodity markets, not to mention keeping the U.S. addicted to oil instead of weaning us off to more sustainable energy with the strong possibility of making profit in emerging technologies.

I see all of these as affecting the economy in an adverse manner and the "President" certainly had control over those events.

The President is the driver of the car and if Bush were driving a car, I believe he would only be focused on the rear view mirror, to the point of running us in to a semi-truck. Congress, and the Federal Reserve might be the brakes and the steering wheel but if the President doesn't think or see ahead with some measure of vision, those economic policies will make no difference.

[TWiley]

8. hmmm, wrong again mikie

Deregulation, the Iraq war, lack of confidence in our leadership, and the republican controlled Senate on a lusty spending spree for 6 years at the request of their leader.

[endarkenment]

4. It is starting to look a lot like bushmas.

[applegrove]

9. I hope not. I hope this recession doesn't turn into a depression of -4 growth.

That would be horrible.