The greatest President

[Bob The Mercenary]

There are countless different criteria you could use to rate U.S. Presidents: economic prowess, foreign policy effectiveness, credibility and general integrity being just some. But, in your opinion, who is the greatest President of all time?

Not sure if this has been done before.

[P-Sleazy]

My bet is on the guy who is elected president in the year 2060. All time means past, present and future right? Cause I think it should.

[Bob The Mercenary]

Well if we're doing it that way I might as well say the one who's in office in 2021. By that time I'll be eligible to run and will probably win in a landslide due to my astronomical public appeal and landmark policies ensuring everyone who wants ice cream can and will have ice cream damnit.

[Osterbaum]

To select the greatest president requires one to actually be 'great'. Not trying to be sarcastic or anything, I'm just saying that everyone might not find the US presidents so far (obviosly not counting future presidents) to be great.

If I had to go with one, I would propably go with number three.

[Bob The Mercenary]

To select the greatest president requires one to actually be 'great'. Not trying to be sarcastic or anything, I'm just saying that everyone might not find the US presidents so far (obviosly not counting future presidents) to be great.

Okay, the least worst.

You guys are being abnormally difficult today. :shifty:

[Si Civa]

But, in your opinion, who is the greatest President of all time?

Risto Ryti.
President of Finland during World War 2, who we can thank that we could get Germany backing us when Sovient Union striked back during Jatkosota ('Continue war' in English).
Finnish parlament could blame Ryti for high treason against Finland because that contract was between personally "only" between Ryti and Ribbentrop, not Finland itself and peace between Finland and Sovient Union could be made.
In nutshell explaining this nutshell, Ryti sacrefired himself so Finland could maintain its independence. And Finland gently showed middle finger against its former ally, German, even though being hestitate doing that.

Because hey, there's awesome presidents outside of USA.

[Osterbaum]

I'm sorry for going off-topic, but I just need to point out that Risto Ryti wasn't in anyway great.

[Si Civa]

I'm sorry for going off-topic, but I just need to point out that Risto Ryti wasn't in anyway great.

Depends point of view of course, but I pretty much agree you thought.
But Finnish poltical system pretty much showed that they could do their jobs right in need even though they can be blamed for it partly.

[Nique]

Ugh. I guess I could talk about this if we reverse it, cause I could sort of analyze who was the least terrible. It's like the first, what, 5 presidents, ran a country that was slowly exterminating/relocating populations of already established cultures, the first 16 Presidents ran a country where slavery was acceptable, and it's just sort of been a slow uphill battle after that.

Now there's not social injustice on that level but all our leaders play this horrible politics game that makes any clear-headed person want to through their hands up and be done with the whole thing.

[Bob The Mercenary]

Haha, okay, wrong question for this forum.

[Fifthfiend]

Lincoln or FDR. Maybe Johnson if you don't blame him too much for Vietnam.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Best: Prewar FDR. He dropped a ball a bit during the war though. Probably still the top on balance.
Doesn't have a lot of competition though.
Lincoln is usually ranked right up the top but I honestly don't know enough about Lincoln to really rank him properly.
Also good: Nixon- though not really on purpose (not that anyone would ever agree with me on that one) and mostly at the start, Polk, and Jackson.

[Mesden]

Curious as to why you say Nixon.

[Osterbaum]

I am also curious as to why Fifth said Johnson.

[Bob The Mercenary]

I'm going to say George H. W. Bush for jumping out of an airplane today for his 85th birthday.

Kidding of course, but it's still awesome.

[Fifthfiend]

I am also curious as to why Fifth said Johnson.

Great Society programs; Medicare Medicaid and whatever else. War on Poverty. Civil Rights Act. Thurgood Marshall.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Curious as to why you say Nixon.

Vast increase in government benefits, wage and price controls, was crucial in deradicalising China and bringing it into partnership with the rest of the world, detente with the USSR, got rid of the gold standard.
Most critically he was very active in intergrating the US economy with the rest of the world and was really an end to US isolationism.

He fucked up the middle east but then so has basically everybody.
As for Vietnam, it was nowhere near the disaster it has often been made out to be from a US standpoint. He gets major marks against him for the tremendous atrocities commited in Vietnam but if one can overlook those he was quite good.

[Fifthfiend]

He's really not that bad if you overlook the abuses of power and utter moral bankrupcy.

...That honestly wasn't a sarcastic statement.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

The real problem with Nixon is that he makes such a great villain.
With his voice and his mannerisms and his look and how his presidency ended its very easy to just see him as some kind of over-the-top caraciture and forget allt he good work he actually did.

[Fifthfiend]

He is seriously like the Snidely Whiplash of presidents.

Just look at that nose. Those jowls. Those beady fucking eyes.

That is a face that can't possibly not be up to no good.

[Eldezar]

got rid of the gold standard.

That is not a good thing at all. Because of this, we have absolutely nothing to back our money off of except faith, and faith has never been a good thing to fall back on.

My personal favorite is John Hancock.

That is a face that can't possibly not be up to no good.

Ok, I keep losing count of how many negatives you put into that statement.

[Kepor]

Because of this, we have absolutely nothing to back our money off of except faith, and faith has never been a good thing to fall back on.


Faith is basically all that money has ever revolved around.

[POS Industries]

He's really not that bad if you overlook the abuses of power and utter moral bankrupcy.

...That honestly wasn't a sarcastic statement.
I've been saying this for years. The thing with Nixon was that his primary interest was being President of the United States, and the bulk of this abuses of power largely revolved purely around making sure that he stayed that way forever. Insofar as his actual execution of the duties of the office was concerned, he was totally great at it.

He did what needed to be done in the most objectively effective manner, with little to no regard for personal profit, cronyism, legacy, religion, law, social trends, basic human dignity, or even winning votes. He'd just pull a few strings and steal the election if it looked like he was going to lose.

I mean, it basically was like whenever Marvel did some story where Doctor Doom succeeded in taking over the world, and it turned out that he was totally cut out for the job. Despite being far and away the most evil President the US has ever had, you can't deny the man got shit done, which still puts him ahead of most men that have ever held the office.

Anyway, the thing with LBJ that you always have to remember is that anything that happened while he was in office that was totally awesome was just stuff that Kennedy thought of that got pushed through after his death and all the screwups in Johnson's administration were entirely his own fault.

My personal favorite is John Hancock.
Oh like Continental Congresses count.

[Mesden]

Vast increase in government benefits, wage and price controls, was crucial in deradicalising China and bringing it into partnership with the rest of the world, detente with the USSR, got rid of the gold standard.
Most critically he was very active in intergrating the US economy with the rest of the world and was really an end to US isolationism.

He fucked up the middle east but then so has basically everybody.
As for Vietnam, it was nowhere near the disaster it has often been made out to be from a US standpoint. He gets major marks against him for the tremendous atrocities commited in Vietnam but if one can overlook those he was quite good.

He was only crucial in his influence to China insomuch as he visited, made almost absolutely no concessions, and proceeded to lie to America in proclaiming he recognized the one true People's Republic of China -- well, it was only a half lie, considering he was talking about the political party "People's Republic of China" or whatever similar thing that was based in Taiwan after being kicked out of China, so he more or less proclaimed that Taiwan = All of China as far as the US is concerned.

You can chalk most actual open relations between China and the US up to Carter.

The rest of that is probably spot on, but way too many people give Nixon way too much credit for China, considering the whole thing was a glorified vacation.

[Jagos]

How about Jefferson?

Or hell, even Jackson. The bastard did balance the budget and was against one big bank. But again you have to overlook this:

He's really not that bad if you overlook the abuses of power and utter moral bankruptcy.

Especially when it came to those Injuns and the need for gold.



PS: Not saying this as a snide, just I can't put it better myself.

[Magus]

Yeah, except for fathering illegitimate children with his slaves, Jefferson was totally all right and stuff! Guy was an inventor and "architect" (I actually think Monticello is pretty hideous), that already puts him in much higher actual qualifications for presidency than the other 43 since he actually knew how to do something besides politics and warfare.

Well I guess Lincoln and FDR and all that but then again all the greatest presidents are probably overrated or something since we compare them to all the horrible presidents like Hayes and Harding and Nixon and Bush (and all the other ones).

[Wigmund]

My personal favorites for top president are the Roosevelts (Teddy and Franklin), Thomas Jefferson, and Lincoln.

Cracked has a list of great bad-ass presidents (http://www.cracked.com/article_15895_5-most-badass-presidents-all-time.html).
And here's a table on presidential rankings from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_rankings_of_United_States_Presidents).

[Osterbaum]

How about Jefferson?
I did say Jefferson. He was by far the clearest choice for me. But then again, I don't remember all of your presidents let alone details about all of their administrations. So I just chose from those I knew well enough to consider. I also possibly chose from a slightly different standpoint than those of you who are US citizends.

[01d55]

Despite being far and away the most evil President the US has ever had, you can't deny the man got shit done, which still puts him ahead of most men that have ever held the office.

Excuse me? More evil than Andrew "Fuck the Indians, Supreme Court, and YOU" Jackson?

Plenty of Presidents are guilty of killing lots of people; by bodycount Jackson isn't nearly tops. But only Jackson can claim to have personally murdered in cold blood. They called it "dueling" and he did it every chance he got. When he was in the army he hanged a stupid big number of his own men, and on his deathbed one of his two regrets was not murdering a dude who worked for him when he was president.

Once, someone tried to assassinate him. The assassin's pistol misfired, and Jackson responded by beating the man with a stick until he was crippled for life.

Andrew Jackson was a raging psychopath, and there are people who to this day refuse to use 5 dollar bills.

Anyway, the thing with LBJ that you always have to remember is that anything that happened while he was in office that was totally awesome was just stuff that Kennedy thought of that got pushed through after his death and all the screwups in Johnson's administration were entirely his own fault.

Gonna have to call bullshit on that. Fucking Vietnam was a Kennedy policy too - in fact, we'd been on the wrong side of that fight since the French still thought they could keep it, before Kennedy was even president.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

He was only crucial in his influence to China insomuch as he visited, made almost absolutely no concessions, and proceeded to lie to America in proclaiming he recognized the one true People's Republic of China -- well, it was only a half lie, considering he was talking about the political party "People's Republic of China" or whatever similar thing that was based in Taiwan after being kicked out of China, so he more or less proclaimed that Taiwan = All of China as far as the US is concerned.



Eh, I'm not so sure. They've released pretty much all the classified government documents from the Vietnam war era now and Nixon early on made China pretty much his major goal. Included in the releases were transcripts of pretty much all the negotiations between different parties. If you look at all the three party peace negotiations the Vietnamese are pretty much ignored as Chinese interests take up the majority of the discussions.
The key achievement was really taking advantage of Chinese disillusionment with the Soviets to open up a healthy channel, combined with a stronger, muhc more open US economy. Carter may have done more of the actual work but Nixon siezed on an opportunity that many of his fellows would not have to really start a relationship.
There are also suggestions that US finegling may have had a key role in causing the Sino-Soviet war. It is a highly controversial argument but in early peace talks, where the Chinese and Soviets were often dealt with seperately, there are quite clear differences in tact and are talks about the problems with other parties- such as US outlining how it can't help a China under soviet wing.


As for the whole republic of china thing:
People's republic of China: Actual Communist China
Republic of China: Taiwan. They are the old nationalist Kuomingtang (KMT) who lost the civil war to the Communists.
But recognising them was no big issue as they had been China's representatives on the UN even after the civil war.
It's a similar situation to the Khmer Rogue who continued to sit on the UN long after they were disposed, mostly because they were deposed by the Vietnamese.



That is not a good thing at all. Because of this, we have absolutely nothing to back our money off of except faith, and faith has never been a good thing to fall back on.
Tying your money to a physical standard generally just limits the ability of your economy to grow and adapt.
The mongols found this out after conquering China but it took the rest of the world a good 700 years to work it out.

[Jagos]

Teddy Roosevelt:

"Death had to take him sleeping, for if Roosevelt had been awake there would have been a fight."

That guy was a badass. It's like Andrew Jackson The Sequel. Only he knew how NOT to kill his friends.

[Possum Knight]

Teddy Roosevelt:



That guy was a badass. It's like Andrew Jackson The Sequel. Only he knew how NOT to kill his friends.

i believe I heard a story about teddy that he was shot at in the chest, but a book blocked the bullet. After the shooter was captured/got away, he had to do a speech. People told him not to do with, but with blood in his hands he went on with the show.. People saw his determination and were impressed.


He was crazy as a fox though. He's got some of the best quotes from a book about political presidential candidates and the tactics and horrible names they would call each other on the campaign trail. I had to write a story for my college's newspaper(I'm a regular writer) and it was enjoyable ro hear the author talk about the funny things these presidents would call each other. You think back in the day, they;d be a bit more civil, but political correctness didn't exist.

That being said, Teddy was one of the best name callers so I guess that makes him "great" XD

If i can find the article I wrote., I'll post it on here.

[Mesden]

Eh, I'm not so sure. They've released pretty much all the classified government documents from the Vietnam war era now and Nixon early on made China pretty much his major goal. Included in the releases were transcripts of pretty much all the negotiations between different parties. If you look at all the three party peace negotiations the Vietnamese are pretty much ignored as Chinese interests take up the majority of the discussions.
The key achievement was really taking advantage of Chinese disillusionment with the Soviets to open up a healthy channel, combined with a stronger, muhc more open US economy. Carter may have done more of the actual work but Nixon siezed on an opportunity that many of his fellows would not have to really start a relationship.

His glorified vacation did help seize the opportunity, but I'm skeptical as to whether the opportunity would've vanished had Nixon not "acted" when he did. Getting on to your second point --


There are also suggestions that US finegling may have had a key role in causing the Sino-Soviet war. It is a highly controversial argument but in early peace talks, where the Chinese and Soviets were often dealt with seperately, there are quite clear differences in tact and are talks about the problems with other parties- such as US outlining how it can't help a China under soviet wing.

The Sino-Soviet split/confrontation/border dispute/war/whatever it is was being built up way before Nixon was President. Hell the earliest divergence of the two nations started happening back when he was vice president. US involvement under Nixon at the very earliest would've started in 1969, and his whole visit to China deal didn't happen until 3 years into his 5 year term.

I'm not saying Nixon doesn't deserve any credit for US relations to China -- at they very least his visit opened the idea to it, but he's definitely not the man responsible for weakening the USSR's ties to China, that pretty much belongs to the USSR. Nixon did, on the other hand, sneakily dismiss Communist China as a nation, and any real progress between the US and China happened under the very unappreciated presidency of Carter.



Also, to address the thread: While he was pretty much a sleaze, gonna mention JFK. The dude barely skated in to his presidency, only to nominate the most controversial civil rights bill since Lincoln. Most of LBJ's actual success can be tracked back to JFK's ideas, and he's also got an awesome song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7y2xPucnAo&feature=PlayList&p=F27C63A193729058&index=8).


As for the whole republic of china thing:
People's republic of China: Actual Communist China
Republic of China: Taiwan. They are the old nationalist Kuomingtang (KMT) who lost the civil war to the Communists.
But recognising them was no big issue as they had been China's representatives on the UN even after the civil war.
It's a similar situation to the Khmer Rogue who continued to sit on the UN long after they were disposed, mostly because they were deposed by the Vietnamese.

Yeah sorry for the mix up with words. He specifically did only recognize the Taiwanese as China.

[The Wandering God]

Nixon was totally stupid, paranoid, and obstinate when it came to marijuana drug laws.

Link (http://www.alternet.org/story/12666/)
Link (http://www.csdp.org/news/news/nixon.htm)

"I see another thing in the news summary this morning about it. That's a funny thing, every one of the bastards that are out for legalizing marijuana is Jewish. What the Christ is the matter with the Jews, Bob, what is the matter with them? I suppose it's because most of them are psychiatrists . . ."
"You see, homosexuality, dope, immorality in general. These are the enemies of strong societies. That's why the Communists and the left-wingers are pushing the stuff, they're trying to destroy us."
Sure, Nixon did do some things right, but he was still borderline fascist.

The Wandering God

Edit: On topic, I'm going to go with Abe Lincoln. He was smart and capable, and had a good sense of humor too.

[Odjn]

That is not a good thing at all. Because of this, we have absolutely nothing to back our money off of except faith, and faith has never been a good thing to fall back on.


Good point, of course we'd base our imaginary wealth representation on a shiny rock that happens to be really soft and useless.

Money is an illusion in the first place. The only use for money is to convince other people to give you their valuable possessions such as a loaf of bread which feeds you. Basing it on gold which is precious because we decided it looks nice is no less spurious than issuing bits of paper saying they represent something that only has a use in acquiring other things.

Also, the Great Society would've been really awesome to live in fuck you Vietnam.

[POS Industries]

Also, the Great Society would've been really awesome to live in fuck you Vietnam.
Yet more things we can blame on Lee Harvey Oswald.

Then again, nothing Kennedy wanted to do had a hope of getting through Congress until he died so maybe we should thank Oswald for getting us as much as we did in the long run.

[Solid Snake]

Ugh. I guess I could talk about this if we reverse it, cause I could sort of analyze who was the least terrible. It's like the first, what, 5 presidents, ran a country that was slowly exterminating/relocating populations of already established cultures, the first 16 Presidents ran a country where slavery was acceptable, and it's just sort of been a slow uphill battle after that.

Now there's not social injustice on that level but all our leaders play this horrible politics game that makes any clear-headed person want to through their hands up and be done with the whole thing.

This is kind of a depressing way to look at our nation's history.

Personally, I'm rather against judging 17th and 18th century human beings by 21st century societal standards. Chances are, you and I would have believed racist, sexist, intolerant thoughts if we were born back then just because it was the standard norm. Hell, I give figures like Lincoln and Jefferson a lot of credit for just being comparatively more tolerant than others in their generation -- despite their faults, they both contributed substantially to set the stage for the very Civil Rights accomplishments we've seen in past decades. The Framers of the Constitution themselves established the laws of the United States with the intent to gradually erode at the foundation of slavery.

Sure, they weren't perfect and their beliefs, by our standards, seem rather quaint (at best) and barbaric (at worst.) But by the standards humanity will reach in a few hundred more years, we'll be the ones who look terrible. Better to judge each era relativistically than merely condemn everyone in past generations as eeeevviiilll while allowing our objections to overshadow their accomplishments. (For example, the vast majority of men who fought in World War Two probably had bigoted, backwards thoughts about homosexuals, but that doesn't change the fact that they showed extraordinary bravery in fighting against the Nazis, and we still owe them due deference for their sacrifices...though perhaps the "Greatest Generation" is too laudatory a statement.)

[01d55]

This is kind of a depressing way to look at our nation's history.
Not coincidentally, also the most accurate.

Personally, I'm rather against judging 17th and 18th century human beings by 21st century societal standards. Chances are, you and I would have believed racist, sexist, intolerant thoughts if we were born back then just because it was the standard norm. Hell, I give figures like Lincoln and Jefferson a lot of credit for just being comparatively more tolerant than others in their generation -- despite their faults, they both contributed substantially to set the stage for the very Civil Rights accomplishments we've seen in past decades. The Framers of the Constitution themselves established the laws of the United States with the intent to gradually erode at the foundation of slavery.

Sure, they weren't perfect and their beliefs, by our standards, seem rather quaint (at best) and barbaric (at worst.) But by the standards humanity will reach in a few hundred more years, we'll be the ones who look terrible. Better to judge each era relativistically than merely condemn everyone in past generations as eeeevviiilll while allowing our objections to overshadow their accomplishments.

Frankly our standards today are pretty fucking awful. I mean you say the people who fought in WW2 hated homos? Look at the shitstorm that people kick up right now over the possibility that we might stop using the awesome power of the government to crush their hopes and dreams.

I personally have no problem saying that humanity is by and large governed by rotten bastards, and that the rotten bastards who used to govern humanity N generations ago were just N times the assholes as the assholes we have now.

You wanna judge 18th century humans by an 18th century standard? How about we take the William Lloyd Garrison (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Lloyd_Garrison) standard: If they weren't at least as good a human being, morally, as WLG was, then fuck them. If you ask me that's a standard that no president, from Washington to Obama, could pass.

[TDK]

I second (or third?) the shit out of Teddy Roosevelt for the reasons mentioned.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

His glorified vacation did help seize the opportunity, but I'm skeptical as to whether the opportunity would've vanished had Nixon not "acted" when he did. Getting on to your second point --



The Sino-Soviet split/confrontation/border dispute/war/whatever it is was being built up way before Nixon was President. Hell the earliest divergence of the two nations started happening back when he was vice president. US involvement under Nixon at the very earliest would've started in 1969, and his whole visit to China deal didn't happen until 3 years into his 5 year term.

I'm not saying Nixon doesn't deserve any credit for US relations to China -- at they very least his visit opened the idea to it, but he's definitely not the man responsible for weakening the USSR's ties to China, that pretty much belongs to the USSR. Nixon did, on the other hand, sneakily dismiss Communist China as a nation, and any real progress between the US and China happened under the very unappreciated presidency of Carter.



I did say it was controversial. I mean, yeah the first splits happened in the late 50s and the war happened months into his presidency. It just seems unlikely that the resentement and continual uneasiness and border incidents would have lasted without Nixon's split negotiating with both sides and promises of support. I don't really consider h is trip to China that improtannt, more his wartime negotiations where his negotiators in talking to China were more talking about economic deals and mutual benefits than actually ending the war in Vietnam.
It is difficult to know how much of an influence he actually had on the Chinese as it was pretty much all talk so it is perfectely reasonable to marginalise his role. It just seems important, to me, that the negotiation strategy of the Americans at this time coincided with the start of massive Chinese realignment in thier strategies.
A lot of people attribute this merely to the combined effect of the Russians being unhelpful and the cultural revolution but both of these have been blown up in retrospect as to thier long-lasting importance.

Nixon was totally stupid, paranoid, and obstinate when it came to marijuana drug laws.

Link (http://www.alternet.org/story/12666/)
Link (http://www.csdp.org/news/news/nixon.htm)



Sure, Nixon did do some things right, but he was still borderline fascist.
So we are going to judge Presidents on thier stance towards completely minor, not all that important issues.
And sure Nixon loved power and you could describe him as a bit of a fascist but then you could make that case for practically every American president, especially the early ones. His own personal views on power are not important, what is important is how things actually played out.

[Bob The Mercenary]

Frankly our standards today are pretty fucking awful. I mean you say the people who fought in WW2 hated homos? Look at the shitstorm that people kick up right now over the possibility that we might stop using the awesome power of the government to crush their hopes and dreams.

At least it's not an impossibility anymore. The fact that the government is even considering laws concerning homosexuals is leaps and bounds from the old way of things. Even half of the country is for it. (http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/04/30/1917511.aspx)

I know humans can be awful, but based on the standards of other countries and those of the past U.S., I think we're doing pretty darn good.

[Lady Cygnet]

In my opinion, William Henry Harrison was the greatest President of the USA.

[01d55]

I know humans can be awful, but based on the standards of other countries and those of the past U.S., I think we're doing pretty darn good.

Doing good by those standards is like saying your diet is doing pretty good under the standards of Jabba the Hut.

Going from awful to pretty bad isn't the same thing as going from okay to pretty good. They're both progress, sure, but there's a fundamentally different underlying situation at work. We've had over 200 years of progress and we're still doing awful shit that destroys peoples live basically at random (http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/06/08/boumediene/index.html).

And which other countries are we talking about? If you're referring to the countries that vote the same way as we do on U.N. resolutions on human rights, then yeah we're doing a bit better than Syria. If you're talking about countries that aren't impoverished shitholes, we're actually pretty consistently in or near last place.

Also (http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2009/06/the-limits-of-political-capital.php):
The American presidency is a weird institution. If Barack Obama wants to start a war with North Korea and jeopardize the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, it’s not clear that anyone could stop him. If he wants to let cold-blooded murderers out of prison, it’s completely clear that nobody can stop him. But if he wants to implement the agenda he was elected on just a few months ago, he needs to obtain a supermajority in the United States Senate.