toldailytopic: Who were the best and worst five Presidents according to the book of y

[Nathon Detroit]

The TheologyOnline.com TOPIC OF THE DAY for March 28th, 2013 05:00 AM

toldailytopic: Who were the best and worst five Presidents according to the book of you?

Take the topic above and run with it! Slice it, dice it, give us your general thoughts about it. Everyday there will be a new TOL Topic of the Day.
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[tetelestai]

THE BEST:

1) Abe Lincoln

2) George Washington

3) Ronald Reagan

4) John F Kennedy

5) Dwight D. Eisenhower



THE WORST:

1) Jimmy Carter

2) Barack Obama (may move to #1)

3) George W. Bush

4) Richard Nixon

5) Calvin Coolidge

 

[chrysostom]

nice try tet
truman proved anybody could be president
eishenhower proved you don't need one
so
take him off
and
put h bush on

later you can take kennedy off
and
put jeb on

 

[resurrected]

Nixon would be in my top five

Obama, Kennedy, Johnson and FDR would be in the worst five

 

[aCultureWarrior]

Nixon would be in my top five

Yeah, if it weren't for Nixon starting diplomacy (and hence trade) with China, they wouldn't own us today.

 

[bybee]

The TheologyOnline.com TOPIC OF THE DAY for March 28th, 2013 05:00 AM

toldailytopic: Who were the best and worst five Presidents according to the book of you?

Take the topic above and run with it! Slice it, dice it, give us your general thoughts about it. Everyday there will be a new TOL Topic of the Day.
If you want to make suggestions for the Topic of the Day send a Tweet to @toldailytopic or @theologyonline or send it to us via Facebook.

Best:
George Washington
Thomas Jefferson
Abraham Lincoln
Theodore Roosevelt
Ronald Reagan


Worst:
J. Carter
"
"
"
B. Obama

 

[Town Heretic]

1. Washington, for keeping us on track and delivering a nation.

2. Lincoln, for preserving and setting the foundation for our modern nation.

3. FDR, for stewarding that nation through the greatest economic collapse in history and all but the end of the greatest struggle between nations the world has ever seen.

4. Theodore Roosevelt, for visionary establishment of national stewardship with regard to natural resources and for historic fights against corruption in government.

5. Jefferson, for his vision of an expanding nation.

I'll be back with the worst.

 

[The Barbarian]

Polls taken of historians and popular polls.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_rankings_of_Presidents_of_the_United_States

Surprisingly good agreement. The real impact of recent presidents is less certain, and only in retrospect can we really know who was good and who wasn't.

 

[mighty_duck]

Surprisingly good agreement

with TH :think:

Jefferson, FDR, Washington are almost no-brainers.

Lincoln gets high marks, but his defining decision - to launch the bloodiest war this country has ever seen, pitting brother against brother, in order to "preserve the union" seems to receive too much automatic respect.

The real impact of recent presidents is less certain, and only in retrospect can we really know who was good and who wasn't.

True. An interesting case study is Reagan's ascension in the rankings, from bumbling mediocrity during and shortly after his tenure, to the wave of nostalgia for him passing over current conservatives.

 

[Sherman]

Best:
George Washington
Ronald Reagan
Abraham Lincoln
Calvin Coolidge
Harry Truman

Worst:
Obama
Clinton
Wilson
FDR
Lyndon Johnson

 

[genuineoriginal]

Best:

• George Washington
• William McKinley
• Theodore Roosevelt
• John F. Kennedy
• Thomas Jefferson

Worst:

• Franklin D. Roosevelt
• Barack Obama
• Jimmy Carter
• Abraham Lincoln
• George W. Bush

 

[Totton Linnet]

Clem Atlee
Tony Blair
Herbert Asquith
Harold Wilson
Lloyd George
*
Cameron
Thatcher
Major
Neville Chamberlain
Ramsey McDonald

 

[The Barbarian]

with TH :think:

Jefferson, FDR, Washington are almost no-brainers.

Lincoln gets high marks, but his defining decision - to launch the bloodiest war this country has ever seen, pitting brother against brother, in order to "preserve the union" seems to receive too much automatic respect.

More importantly, I think is Lincoln redefined what it is to be American, and what American stood for. His vision is largely the cause of American rise to prominence in the world. For better or worse, he's the major reason we got there.

(Barbarian notes that it's foolish to make any assessments of presidents before some decades pass)

True. An interesting case study is Reagan's ascension in the rankings, from bumbling mediocrity during and shortly after his tenure, to the wave of nostalgia for him passing over current conservatives.

It's a classic case of personal failures being eclipsed by the vision and character of a president. Reagan made a lot of mistakes, mostly by trusting people who betrayed his trust. But he knew who he was, and what he wanted America to be, and in the long run, that might be more important than the failures.

To most tea party people, his argument that the rich should pay a greater share of taxes is anathema, but most of them had no idea he thought so, possibly because of the large middle class tax increase he got from Congress in his second term.

 

[Town Heretic]

with TH :think:

Jefferson, FDR, Washington are almost no-brainers.

Lincoln gets high marks, but his defining decision - to launch the bloodiest war this country has ever seen, pitting brother against brother, in order to "preserve the union" seems to receive too much automatic respect.

I don't see how that's possible or even necessarily reasonable. The South set the issue. His role in that was reactionary, though as the cornerstone of our modern understanding of the Union it merits high praise, as does his act of emancipation. Those are just too important not to set him in place. The great tragedy is in his loss. A second term, I believe, would have seen that Union back on its feet faster and might have profoundly impacted the course of the next hundred years.

True. An interesting case study is Reagan's ascension in the rankings, from bumbling mediocrity during and shortly after his tenure, to the wave of nostalgia for him passing over current conservatives.

Reagan did the country a great service by lifting it from Carter's malaise and reviving a sense of national identity, optimism and invention. He was one of the more important presidents in my lifetime. Clinton did a lesser version of that but to even greater success. If it weren't for his personal failings and the ideological nastiness that came in on the heels of the Reagan victory I think that would be clearer to most, though the last time I looked he fared pretty well and would have won the last election taking many a Republican along for the ride. Darn FDR.


My bottom five?

Grant, presided over one of the most corrupt administrations ever, or as I like to think of it, set the stage for modern Beltway politics.

Nixon, for ending the gold standard and cementing the cynicism aimed at institutions of government in the Viet Nam wake with his criminal activity.

Buchannan, whose ineptitude directly led to the civil war.

Carter, who squandered national hopes and whose political ineffectiveness led the nation into what he described as a national malaise without realizing where that malaise had begun.

Pierce, Buchanan's partner in ineffective crime.

 

[Nick M]

Calvin Coolidge and Warren Harding are way under rated. They ushered in tremendouns economic prosperity by cutting taxes on the rich. Hoover ruined it by doing everything Obama is doing now. FDR is also terrible for not trying to pull America out of a depression, and instead extending it as long as possible as a reason to introduce socialism. I also give JFK credit for tax cuts and the resulting prosperity. Ronaldus Maximus goes without saying.

For some excellent reading, click here.

Under the leadership of Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon during the Administrations of Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, tax rates were slashed from the confiscatory levels they had reached in World War I. The Revenue Acts of 1921, 1924, and 1926 reduced the top rate from 73 percent to 25 percent.

Spurred in part by lower tax rates, the economy expanded dramatically. In real terms, the economy grew 59 percent between 1921 and 1929, and annual economic growth averaged more than 6 percent.

Notwithstanding (or perhaps because of) the dramatic reduction in tax rates, personal income tax revenues increased substantially during the 1920s, rising from $719 million in 1921 to $1,160 million in 1928, an increase of more than 61 percent (this was a period of no inflation).4

 

[genuineoriginal]

William McKinley made my list for his actions regarding the gold standard and tariffs on imports to the United States.

 

[The Barbarian]

The tariff increased costs for all Americans in terms of purchasing power and wages. Many items that came from abroad became pricier than local products; overseas products that remained less expensive than local goods still rose in price in relation to local products. This change meant that Americans required higher compensation to compensate for decreased purchasing power and increased expenses. The escalated price of labor subsequently led to mounting costs to produce local goods.
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/mckinley-tariff-act-733.html

 

[tetelestai]

Clem Atlee
Tony Blair
Herbert Asquith
Harold Wilson
Lloyd George
*
Cameron
Thatcher
Major
Neville Chamberlain
Ramsey McDonald

How did Winston Churchill not make either of your lists?

 

[Nick M]

Thatcher is the second best after Churchill.

 

[mighty_duck]

I don't see how that's possible or even necessarily reasonable. The South set the issue. His role in that was reactionary

And his "reaction" is exactly what is being questioned. If you agree that the civil war, which cost the lives of as many Americans as all other wars combined, was worth it to preserve the union, then it follows that Lincoln was a great president.

It is far from a foregone conclusion though. And if you disagree, then his presidency was nothing short of a travesty.

...as the cornerstone of our modern understanding of the Union it merits high praise

As they say, the victors are the ones who write the history books...

as does his act of emancipation.

No argument there. His demeanor and statesmen poise in light of the state of the union he received are quite admirable.