Ha ha. What do you think the answer is? The piece is by University of Houston polysci prof Brandon Rottinghaus and Boise State University polysci prof Justin S. Vaughn.
Did you guess? Trump is dead last!
Obama is up 10 since their last survey of "presidential politics experts" in 2014. He's now the 8th greatest President. Why would that be? Obama laid the groundwork for the Trump election and failed to fend off the Russians who were, apparently, bent on keeping Hillary Clinton out of office, but he's made the biggest leap in the whole survey.
Amusingly, George W. Bush has the third biggest jump, up 5 and out of the ignominious bottom 10 all the way up at #30 now.
The other big leaper was Ulysses S. Grant, up 7 to #21. Why? Ron Chernow wrote a biography of Grant. You just need the right PR.
One nice thing about this study is that it also provides separate rankings by "Democratic scholars," "Independents/other," and "Republican scholars." The Republicans don't put Trump dead last, but at #40. They put Obama at #16. Rottinghaus and Vaughn say "Trump doesn't get much of a lift from Republican-only vote: Even in their eyes, he’s a bottom-five president."
But who are the "Republican" presidential politics experts? Are they not the "Establishment"-type Republicans who deplore Trump and the people who responded to him?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
127 comments:
What is it by electoral college rules.
The fuck you say!
Who would have thought it?
Obama scored high because he improved inter-racial relations in the USA.
Both the Republican and Democratic participants in the polls are actually Russian trolls. The Independents, naturally, are free from bias and corruption.
I didn't click through. Did they include a hypothetical Hillary and put her in the top ten?
The "experts" surveyed were all members of the American Political Science Association which is a hard left organization. E.g., the notion that a statistically significant number of members of the APSA would self-identify in a survey as Republican is pretty unbelievable.
For a bit of perspective on the ASPA, see this article from National Association of Scholars: https://www.nas.org/articles/why_im_leaving_the_political_science_association
NYT is, of course, just playing to the echo-chamber of the left. To me, this is just the journalistic equivalent of covering your ears and shouting "nanananananana" to avoid hearing some unpleasant truth.
GW, Jackson, Lincoln, TR, FDR, HST, JFK RR and #9 and closing fast is the kid from Queens. That is a list to be proud of. That leaves Benedict Arnold and behind him Mullah Obama at dead last.
I would hypothesize that the validity of these rankings strongly correlates with how low Obama is ranked; the lower his ranking, the better the rankings. Now we just need to wait a couple of centuries and check how he is ranked according the to academic ephemera of that time.
If the authors had indicated Trump was anything but last, they wouldn't be invited on to Panel Discussions at the Annual Meeting, and they'd miss out on Cocktail Parties too.
Click bait by some fourth tier level academics. Bottom line: How can you judge a presidency after just one year and two months?
Last October, Michael Medved wrote an article that has been titled "Underrated presidents have meant for good times". The article includes the following passages:
-----
.... consider six of Trump’s underrated predecessors. The presidents who served between 1868 and 1896 showed that it’s possible for the nation to flourish and rise without acclaimed, accomplished or even popular leadership in the White House.
During those 28 years after the Civil War, a half-dozen personalities with impressive facial hair but tarnished historical reputations occupied the presidency: Ulysses Grant, Rutherford Hayes, James Garfield, Chester Arthur, Grover Cleveland and Benjamin Harrison.
Among them, only the war hero Gen. Grant ever won a majority of the popular vote and two of them (Hayes and Harrison) actually received fewer votes than their rivals, as did President Trump, of course. ...
Since 1981, none of the surveys of leading historians rated these chief executives as “great” or “near great” while Grant, Harrison and Arthur drew derision as “below average” or “failure.” ....
These forgotten presidencies coincided with the most explosive growth in the nation’s history. Between 1868 and 1896, the population nearly doubled, from about 40 million to 70 million, as America welcomed more than 10 million immigrants.
These arrivals powered mighty new industries and soaring cities in every corner of the country. Innovations developed by American inventors and engineers – the phonograph, electric light, telephone, mass-produced automobiles and much more – raised living standards for the nation, and the yearly gross domestic product more than doubled. ....
Yet all this energy and accomplishment unfolded at a time of partisan gridlock in the nation’s capital, without vigorous leadership or sweeping programs of reform from the White House. The conservative presidents of the era offered no equivalent of the “New Deal” or “Great Society” agendas that animated their celebrated successors.
Instead, they contented themselves to stand aside while private initiative and capitalism changed the country. Of the period’s greatest achievements, only the transcontinental railroad (completed under Grant in 1869) relied heavily on the federal government, which provided loans and land grants to the giant corporations that did the actual work. ...
The president [Trump] could provide his ultimate shock by “Making America Great Again,” not through his own muscular exertions but by letting the federal behemoth become increasingly constrained and irrelevant. The dysfunction, scandal and paralysis in Washington might actually spare us from needless new episodes of wrenching change and top-down transformation.
In the process, the beleaguered president may follow the example of his hirsute, late 19th century forebears: encouraging a private sector surge that allowed this potently powerful beyond-the-Beltway nation to rebuild and re-energize itself.
-----
https://www.northjersey.com/story/opinion/contributors/2017/10/18/opinion-underrated-presidents-have-meant-good-times/776264001/
I am reading, at least for the time being--I don't know how much more I can stand--David Garrow's "Rising Star" about the rise of Obama. Very informative but too detailed.
The thing that stands out to me is how clueless and feckless Obama was all along. As a community organizer and state legislator, one of his signature issues was public education improvement. What constituted improvement? More money (inputs). Did he want better achievement (outputs)? Absolutely. Did he and the lefty think tankers he ran around with have any idea how to achieve better outputs? Not at all.
The acid test was what went on in his own life. He went to Punahou School, Occidental, Columbia, and Harvard Law (all private). Michelle went to Whitney Young (public), Princeton (where she says says she felt like an outsider), and Harvard Law (both private). His daughters went to UC Lab and Sidwell Friends (both private).
So here is a guy who preached the glories of public education, worked to get more money and power for public education, but experienced public education only as an observer.
This was a classic case of an advocate knowing nothing about what he was talking about, but prattling on with total self-confidence.
BAH!
The ranking is literally a popularity contest. It is a silly article, it does not bother to tell us what criteria the survey respondents were supposed to use. The Democrat scholars put Lyndon Johnson and Wilson in the top 10. Johnson earned his place (maybe) for the epic failure he called "The Great Society." Despite resegregating the federal government and getting us into a world war, Wilson, a democrat and a political scientist, was ranked the tenth best president by democrat political scientists.
My principal objection to Trump is the same as my principal objection to Obama--part of the job of the president is to bring the country together. Obama was lousy at that, and Trump is worse.
Trump has other strengths, however, that Obama did not have.
Everything published about Trump for the next several years will be subject to the hatred by the left, which will tolerate no disagreement.
Reagan was treated in similar fashion but not quite the vicious extent.
He was "Ronnie Ray Gun, " and silly things like that. "Amiable Dunce" by the senior Democrat "wise man."
On reason is that Carter was disliked by the left wing of the Democrats but Hillary was the Red Queen.
He will never be forgiven for showing how inept she was.
Do they ever cover actual, you know, news? The three (maybe four) ongoing wars in Syria? The Taliban offering to “talk” with us about Afghanistan? Border disputes between Venezuela and Nicaragua? U.S. energy independence? Veil protests in Iran? Is there any non-fake news to be found in the DNC-media behemoth?
Our local paper rolled out mini-bios for all the presidents. It listed their previous occupations. Some examples:
LBJ: School teacher, Rancher
Bush the Younger: Rancher, oil man, politician.
Obama: Politician, Jr. US Senator, Community Organizer.
Trump: Industrialist
I found one of the above to be somewhat amusing.
"I am reading, at least for the time being--I don't know how much more I can stand"
I've been thinking about reading it. Let me know when you finish if it is worth the trouble.
The Caro Johnson biography is terrific and very, very detailed but Caro, although a liberal Democrats, hated Johnson.
Surveys like this are pretty much useless when it comes to ranking Presidents who served over the 2 or 3 decades. Harry Truman is in the top 10 now but certainly wasn't considered that great after he left office. He wasn't considered very "Presidential" for one thing, much like our current President.
It is amusing, though, to see Obama and LBJ ranked higher than Madison and Monroe, two of the, you know, founding fathers. But also amusing to see that other founding father, Thomas Jefferson, aka slave owner, is still highly regarded although Andrew Jackson, well he dropped because of his treatment towards Native Americans.
This isn't a measure of presidents. It's a measure of how fickle the opinions of scholars have been over time; and calls into question the actual value of their "scholarship."
If Hitler had been an American President where would he be ranked?
Would he be in the bottom ten because he eventually brought downfall and destruction to his country?
Why would he not be considered very successful at implementing his vision, and giving his country a strong identity?
Did he not institute a strong youth program?
How strongly do we hold the Holocaust against him, and does he not get any credit for the efficiencies of his government in executing this program?
Is success at things we now dislike measured against him, or is the success evaluated in terms of itself?
Did he not fulfill his voters' dreams, if only temporarily? Was he not a particularly adept community organizer?
My guess is the scholars would have a tough time deciding on whether to put Hitler or Trump last on the list.
The Germans have a word for this.
How do they hate Trump? Let me count the ways.
They hate Trump to the depth and breadth and height
Their little souls can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
They hate Trump to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
They hate Trump freely, as men strive for right.
Trump is dead last!
Is FDR, probably the worst prez evar, dead first or dead second?
"Bottom line: How can you judge a presidency after just one year and two months?"
Obama=Nobel. Not that hard.
To be fair they should rate them by their first year only.
Just another bogus survey. Nonsense.
It's all fake news now with the leftmediaswine plumbing their already always sources to malign Trump: the Hollywood sex cult, teenage girls (of all ages), black jocks, students, the gay mafia, college professors, etc. You know, today's intelligencia: Rosie, Whoopi, LeBron, Kimmel, deNiro, et al.
Democrat pols need hardly speak, always a plus for the likes of Waters, Pelosi, Schumer and most others.
Blogger Fernandistein said...
Is FDR, probably the worst prez evar, dead first or dead second?
The survey respondents literally want to put FDR's face on Mount Rushmore.
Who won the swimsuit competition?
Obama laid the groundwork for Trump - that is a significant accomplishment.
No matter what you think of Trump, Obama was a horrible president. What got better? Was there any real effort to create bipartisan legislation? It’s completely subjective, the dynamics of the presidency in 1850 and today are vastly different.
Michael K--David Garrow, though a progressive historian, is an honest man, and he went out and interviewed people who knew Obama when. He talked to Obama's friends at Punahou, Occidental, Columbia, and Harvard, and to all of his girlfriends (all of whom were white or multi-racial Asian until Michelle). He fills in a lot of blanks. Who were Obama's best friends at Oxy and Columbia? A bunch of hard-partying, secular Pakistanis. Who helped him with Dreams from My Father? It was his best friend at Harvard Law, Rob Fisher, not Bill Ayers. Garrow points out the myth-making, but gathers plenty of evidence that from the time that Obama came to Chicago he had the aura of a man of destiny.
I am bogged down in his years in the Illinois Senate, which are truly depressing.
With your background in South Shore, I think you will find the first 1/3 really interesting. The big background set-up is the collapse of the steel mills in southeast Chicago after 1979. 50,000 well-paying union jobs disappeared in five years in a small neighborhood. Between 1940 and 1980, you could drop out of Bowen High School, get a job at one of the mills, and make three times what a college professor made. That collapse is what Obama stepped into as a community organizer. He didn't get much done of substance, but he impressed a lot of people, and matured greatly. That gave him an advantage at Harvard Law.
I think you will like it.
"Who won the swimsuit competition?"
Taft. The main criteria was water displacement.
Here's my Fake News test: reduce a news article to one sentence with subject-verb-object. Is that sentence newsworthy?
A newsworthy sentence might be something like "The armed forces of the Japanese Empire have attacked the American navy in Hawaii."
A non-newsworthy sentence (aka "Fake News") would be "Left wing academics hate Donald Trump."
Who did the rankings for the right, the National Review Glee Club?
What Mike Sylwester said...
Two things surprised me. First, President Nixon moved up. Second, once again, I assume to protect Democrats and to make President Trump look bad, President Jefferson Davis, the Anti-President, was not listed.
Regards — Cliff
Follow the money.
Who grants a living to "scholars"?
Who pays the piper calls the tune.
Spouse and I have been visiting presidential homes. Maybe up to ten by now and long way to go. When we visited James Buchanan home in Lancaster, Pa, the line in front of us consisted of one couple. No one behind us. The tour guide said his primary role was to convince us Buchanan was not the worst president ever. Funny.
Polysci professors make good shark bait. Aren't good for much else.
Which President had the darkest moods?
Re: Obama and public education.
Fen's law in action.
If Trump can keep it up, RR Jr.
Truman #6 and LBJ is #10 are vastly overrated. LBJ at least should go below GWB.
You know who will be #1. The first openly gay kissing President, that's who.
Jupiter said: "Polysci professors make good shark bait. Aren't good for much else.
Your comment made me laugh. Just guessing that PolySci majors today become skilled in dirty tricks, misinformation, fake news plants, spin, aliases, and social media bots. Graduate degrees available with in computer servers and surveillance.
A best President list has to include James Polk near the top. No educated historian argues with that.
It's good we have such scholars to give us historical perspective. Being learned, they know all about "availability bias," yet George W. Bush was the worst and dumbest president ever until Donald Trump came along. Amazing how it's always the most recent. There must be a real worsening trend among Republican presidents.
Of course I'm being unfair. These aren't the same scholars who made the case for Bush as worst and/or dumbest. There's a very large stable to choose from, so in any given Republican presidency I can find some highly accomplished scholars whose opinion is, OK, I may not be fond of Republicans generally but this one is really beyond the pale.
I just find it bizarre that professional historians think that a "best Presidents" list can be useful.
Grant was considered the greatest American around the end of the nineteenth and early 20th century. As to Historians, they're not as wise as most of us would tend to think. You can watch the interviews of some of them on CSPAN. David McCullough, Robert Caro and Ron Chernow though they do tell a good story.
I realized some time ago ranking past presidents is a way for historians to influence current politics, so I ignore them.
Trump will be remembered longer than all of them. Sui generis in world history... take that poli sci "intellectuals".
What would we do without experts to tell us how to think?
Rating Trump's presidency only a year into his presidency is, at best, silly. Actually, rating Obama's presidency at this point is silly. I am not sure if we are sufficiently distant from W's presidency to give it a proper rating. Actions can take generations for their full effects to be felt. The opinions of contemporaries can be embarrassing bad. For instance, Antiochous of the Seleucid Empire was given the honor of "the Great" while he was alive. Towards the end of his reign was a disastrous war against Rome that not only reversed all the gains he had made previously but more or less guaranteed that his empire was doomed.
I'm not entirely sure what the point of these ratings are, other than as historical trivia. I suppose if I ever join that political fantasy league it might be helpful for draft strategies. Alexander the Great is way too expensive so maybe I can find an efficiency in an underrated president and a duke to be named later.
only the transcontinental railroad (completed under Grant in 1869) relied heavily on the federal government, which provided loans and land grants to the giant corporations that did the actual work. ...
What utter and complete bullshit. Have you forgotten the Indian Wars of the 1860's--1890s. Without the pacification and extermination of Native Americans, the country would have gotten nowhere. And how about Reconstruction (you can argue about whether it was carried out effectively but cannot argue that it was not reliant on the Federal Government)? Or the fact that many of those immigrants were homesteaders who were given public land or paid a tiny fraction of its true worth.
But the single greatest Federal Government legacy of the second half of the 19th century was the Land Grant College Act. Granted it was passed in 1862, but most of institutions were established after the Civil War. You would think Ann would know that much at least since she taught at one of the Land Grant colleges.
Truman at #6 is not overrated. He deserves a top 5. But despising him has been a GOP mental illness since 1945. Captain Harry was the original Deplorable hated by the elites and the Segregationist in the FDR coalition as well as the GOP. But he never surrendered. He stopped Stalin. He founded Israel. He desegregated the Military. And he loved being an American. The Americans voters respected and loved him right back.
Trump is dead last!
They really need a new angle: How Terrible is Trump Compared to All Terrible Leaders in History?
Imagine the glee of NYT readers as they find out Trump is worse than Mao, Hitler, Kim, Stalin, Amin, Pol Pot - the worst ever!
Then when someone takes a shot at him, they can use it as yet another argument for gun control.
Jimmy,
You are not using “statistically significant” correctly. Likewise for “e.g.”
Scholars.
You keep using that word....
I find these ratings to be pretty silly. Obama is certainly not in the top 10, he ought to be in the bottom 10. Just what were his achievements again? Obamacare? Iran Deal? Weaponization of key agencies - IRS, DOJ, FBI, BATF, ... - against his political enemies? Eight years of economic stagnation that led to...the election of Trump! How can they even rate Trump at this point when he has only been in office one year?
I don't understand the continuing infatuation with FDR. His leadership in WWII was admirable. But his first two terms were a disaster, despite people continuing to think he "saved us from the Depression." His economic policies were so awful that by 1937-38 conditions were even worse than he inherited in 1933 from Hoover, a period now known as "The Depression Within the Depression." The public was so fed up with The New Deal that Republicans took 88 seats in the House in the 1938 election, a shellacking that always seems to be conveniently ignored by the historians.
Remove Obama and FDR and replace them with Polk and Coolidge, the two most underrated presidents.
The Indians would have been "removed" through entirely private means, if necessary. Heck, some of the worst atrocities vs the Indians were by state militias or purely local ad-hoc forces, as in California and Texas. The Feds stepped in to "protect" the Indians.
As for magnitude - the regular US Army was a tiny and trivially cheap force, 1866-1898.
Education (of the formal sort) follows development, it does not lead it, is the emerging consensus.
Thats one of the more interesting errors in development economics, where it was long held that schooling was a contributor to development. There have been masses of "natural experiments" since then, however.
In that light, the Land Grant Colleges look a lot more like luxury goods, or perhaps "ritual centers" (to use a term of art of Mesoamerican scholars) of the American civic religion.
The only "sciency" thing about Political Science is polling. A President who made professional polling look so bad in the act of getting elected is bound to score low, even apart from the whole Left-wing bias thing.
To follow up on ChuckR's swimsuit competition observation, Trump's like the Miss America contestant who challenges the shallow premise of a panel question. She's not gonna make the first cut, regardless.
Of course, part of the problem is coming up with objective standards of what is a good president. Are you measuring him based on what he wanted to accomplish or the results? Is a man with good intentions but failed policies trump a man who is an asshole but successful? Are you using a contemporary measure or a modern one? Many of the accomplishments of Andrew Jackson are frowned upon today. If the leader was put in a very difficult position, is he rated on a curve?
You can get into all sorts of interesting debates like this. Did Marius save the Roman Republic or doom it? Perhaps both. Were Sulla's efforts help preserve the Republic or make it's downfall inevitable or was the Republic already on the way out? Perhaps all of them? If the Republic was already doomed, does that make Sulla necessarily ineffectual no matter what he actually accomplished (excluding his accomplishments in wrecked Rome's enemies)?
Where did Hillary rank on the list? Oh wait, she didn't!
The op-ed is the resulting Kleenex in academic masturbation.
>Of course, part of the problem is coming up with objective standards of what is a good president.
And that's really where the whole exercise breaks down.
Does FDR get points for going to war against the fascists, or does he lose points for failing to prevent it?
Does giving Obama credit for Trump make up for all the damage Obama's policies caused? Too soon to tell.
The other big leaper was Ulysses S. Grant, up 7 to #21. Why? Ron Chernow wrote a biography of Grant. You just need the right PR.
I've been reading the book. Is kind of a slog. Grant was a better writer than Chernow.
Chernow does point how loyal Grant was to protecting the freed slaves of the south.
But Grant really was a pretty terrible president.
steve uhr: "To be fair...."
Looks like someone doesn't understand the point of the "poll"....
Who ya going to go with, Rotting House or High House?
The lesser presidents presided over periods of growth and prosperity. Funny, isn't it. That was what the Founders intended.
It is difficult to see the big picture when you are living when the first drafts are being written. I have a little more experience with that - I remember Harry Truman. I think it reasonable at this time to say that Donald Trump will be remembered as one of the most consequential Presidents. Love him or loathe him, cheer him on or "stand in the doorway and block up the halls", he is never going to be a footnote.
Field Marshall Freder: "Without the pacification and extermination of Native Americans,....
LIAR!!!
We have a native american as a Senator from Massachusetts RIGHT NOW!!
If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health insurance, you can keep your health insurance. Everyone will save $2500 a year on health insurance. That right there should propel a former President right to the top of the ratings. Oh, that and the fact that the oceans quit rising because of him.
MountainMan: "I find these ratings to be pretty silly. Obama is certainly not in the top 10, he ought to be in the bottom 10. Just what were his achievements again?"
Most Undeserved Awards For A Sitting President of All Time.
Having matriculated at a Big Ten land-grant university, I can attest that the PoliSci profs were completely left-wing 40 years ago, as were most of the students. I encountered a couple of history profs who weren't, but they were rare birds indeed.
Glad to see someone finally mentioned our most underrated president, Calvin Coolidge.
Field Marshall Freder: "But the single greatest Federal Government legacy of the second half of the 19th century was the Land Grant College Act."
Apparently not, if one considers only the quality of the (Insert Identity Group Name Here)-Studies and School of "Education" graduates.
"Likewise for “e.g.”"
E.g. = eg-zample.
"What'd Calvin Coolidge say?"
As the old saying goes, hindsight might be 20/20, but the APSA's foresight is not 2020.
@Henry said: "Grant was a better writer than Chernow."
Yes, he was. I have read the first volume of his memoirs. It is excellent. Still need to get to the second volume.
Many historians consider Grant's memoirs to be among the finest ever written.
Both volumes are available for free in iBooks via the Gutenberg Project.
I didn't read the academic ranking of presidents, which has to be a monumental waste of time - but the Professors' conclusion was easy to understand. Not long ago, i thought that Obama had to be our worst president. Nobody could screw up as much as he did.
But the world turns.
It is a disturbing thought, perhaps -
That formal education is really a sort of Cargo Cult thing, an aping of the true learning process, assuming that the effect will bring about its cause. Thats not the only thing going on of course (signalling, functional and social, are also big), but a considerable part of it.
gadfly: "Not long ago, i thought that Obama had to be our worst president. Nobody could screw up as much as he did."
I'm sorry. You'll have to speak up.
I can barely hear you over the rapidly accelerating GDP Growth, increased employment and wages, and the wailing of the lefties.
Could you repeat what you were saying about things being more messed up now than under obama?
Thanks in advance...
LOL
Yancey Ward said...
Where did Hillary rank on the list? Oh wait, she didn't!
There are those who have said that Hill was the real president and Bill, like the Trumpster, chased skirts.
gadfly: "There are those who have said that Hill was the real president and Bill, like the Trumpster, chased skirts."
Yes. And everyone saying that is an unhinged leftist with no ability to actually analyze what really occurred.
It surprises precisely no one that you seem rather well-versed in what those types are saying.
Bill saved his Presidency by shifting Hillary off to Health Care (which was eventually killed) and then bringing back Dick Morris to guide him to the Center-left in order to win re-election.
But do go on with what the loony left is saying. You are an effective spokesperson for their thoughts...
exhelodrvr1 said...
Obama laid the groundwork for Trump - that is a significant accomplishment.
Romney laid the groundwork for Trump. He was preceded by every republican nominee since Reagan.
Read the list:
Romney McCain Bush Dole Bush. All “severe” conservatives.
The Republican Party hated Reagan as much as they hated trump. The democrats have been enemies of this country since the McGovern wing room over in the late 60’s. The republicans failed to stop them and provide an alternative.
The republicans are the real failure over the last 30 years.
Try to convince me that silhouetted micrometer graphic above the NYT piece wasn't meant to look like an "automatic assault weapon".
Is there any evidence Trump has been "chasing skirts" since his inauguration?
That was my problem with Bill Clinton: not that he, in a loveless/sexless marriage, sought out some strange. It's that he engaged in this behavior after he became President, thus recklessly exposing himself to blackmail.
For the life of me I can’t understand how anyone could rate Obama highly on any metric. He had two years of passing liberal legislation and then six years of doing very little except mismanaging foreign policy and abusing his powers.
I suspect much of Obama's "greatness" comes from who he is and what he represented, rather than what he did. He certainly did not live up to the lofty expectations of many of those who voted for him, IMHO. Arguably, the last "great" president was Reagan, although that's at least partially a function of my own bias. Nobody since has come close, in my eyes.
Richard Taylor: "I suspect much of Obama's "greatness" comes from who he is and what he represented..."
Well, that and the styrofoam Greek-style "columns".
it does not bother to tell us what criteria the survey respondents were supposed to use.
They can't possibly using any criteria. He hasn't been impeached, so if scandal is a thing he's not the worst.
He doesn't have the worst economy.
He hasn't started any wars.
I can't even think of one criterion where Trump would be dead last, let alone multiple ones.
"There are those" and "Some" who say whatever the Leftist narrative needs to pretend has some basis in reality. NYTimes reporters in particular seem to carry around entire armies of these anonymous sources in their shirt pockets, whispering in their ears as they write their stories. Strangely, they all speak in the same voice as the NYTimes reporter him or herself.
Everything Obama did damaged our economy,country and world. Exactly as intended.
top 10
1. Washington
2. Lincoln
3. Jefferson
4. Roosevelt (Ted)
5. Madison
6. Reagan
7. Coolidge
8. Truman
9/ Monroe
10. Roosevelt (Franklin)
Bottom 10
10. Millard Fillmore
9. Warren Harding
8. Barack Obama
7. Richard Nixon
6. Franklin Pierce
5. James Buchanan
4. Andrew Johnson
3. Jimmy Carter
2. Herbert Hoover
1. Woodrow Wilson
Obama started and reset more social justice adventures (e.g. elective wars, elective regime changes, abortion fields, trail of tears, democratic corruption, CAIR) from Africa to the Middle East to Eastern Europe, not the least of which was premature evacuation from Iraq that opened a vacuum for the Islamic State, and that progressed under the so-called "Arab Spring".
Obama devalued the dollar more than any other President in recent years with global consequences.
Obama advanced monopoly formation and a progressive fleecing through the Obamacare-gap and born unPlanned penalty tax.
Obama changed the ROE to favor the enemy, thereby placing Americans and foreign nationals at progressive risk.
Obama spied and turned the government against Americans; Clinton colluded with Britain, Kiev, etc.; and the DNC denied the nomination to the Jew. While journolists from the fourth estate carried out public lynchings, witch hunts, and a progressive cover-up to promote DNC welfare.
The NYT is a wholly owned organelle of Mexico, serving both globalist (e.g. anti-American) and Mexican interests (e.g. incursion, influence, gerrymandering).
If bunch of sniveling, fifth-column leftists think Trump is the worst President one year into his term?
That's good. Perfect, even.
It means he's doing it right.
Which one was the best kisser ?
Jim at: "If bunch of sniveling, fifth-column leftists think Trump is the worst President one year into his term?"
Sniveling fifth-column leftists and their trained LLR allies.
Lotta nice charts at the Rottinghaus survey of Poli Sci Profs. But, ya know ... GIGO.
@Saint Croix - your lists are pretty good.
buwaya said...
"That formal education is really a sort of Cargo Cult thing, an aping of the true learning process, assuming that the effect will bring about its cause."
I don't think that is exactly right. When only a small fraction of the population received education, it tended to be those best equipped to profit by it. The Cargo Cult aspect enters when one imagines that "education" will have the same effect on everyone that it has on very smart people with an intense interest in scholarship. Or indeed, that it can even be the same thing.
Everything about Trump's success is counter-intuitive, counter-conventional wisdom, and also working very well. Being underappreciated by the kind of people who did this ranking is exactly what to expect, and even desire. If they liked Trump, he would certainly be less valuable to Americans. Trump should revel in his low ranking. I wonder how many of these geniuses thought Trump would even be President, let alone be as successful as he has. I bet they all had great respect for Paul Krugman and his opinion of Trump's effect on the stock market. If your opinion is so demonstrably wrong on things, why do people ask you what you think. Maybe nobody even asked them. I sure wouldn't, but the NYT thought is was good info.
"@Saint Croix - your lists are pretty good."
Where's Polk? Texas and California aren't quite the Louisiana Purchase, but Texas is a great state, and California used to be.
@Jupiter: Yes, I said “pretty good.” I should have finished my comment by saying I would replace FDR with Polk.
How is Obama in the top half when his two biggest domestic policies were giant failures? Neither the ACA or stimulus met the metrics Obama himself laid out as success. That's before we get to foreign fiascos and corruption like firing IGs and spying on journalists.
Top of Ronald Reagan's credits - He won a war without having to fight it (USSR).
Bottom of Obama's credits - He almost lost a war that was almost won (Iraq), he lost a war without fighting it (Libya).
How can Obama be above Reagan?
It's all fine and good to complain about media or academic bias against Trump.
But I sure haven't seen much argument here that Trump deserves to be higher than the bottom five. The most I can ever get out of anyone about Trump's positive attributes is that he's not Clinton and that he pisses off liberals.
By golly, that makes him the greatest president of all time, I guess.
Raise your bar, people.
"But I sure haven't seen much argument here that Trump deserves to be higher than the bottom five."
-- He hasn't even finished out a term yet. I find it incredibly hard to place him historically because of that; as is, unless forced, I'd also not place Clinton, Bush or Obama. The First Bush I'd be hesitant to place, but feel we might be able to.
As is, Trump hasn't placed Americans in internment camps, died within a few weeks of getting the job, lead the country to a Civil War or Great Depression, so he's at least not fighting for the bottom four spots.
Oh wait. I forgot Carter. Trump'll have to do a lot to secure a spot in the bottom 5.
Obama is better than Lincoln?
No. Never. Wrong.
Blogger buwaya said...It is a disturbing thought, perhaps -
That formal education is really a sort of Cargo Cult thing, an aping of the true learning process, assuming that the effect will bring about its cause. Thats not the only thing going on of course (signalling, functional and social, are also big), but a considerable part of it.
2/19/18, 11:47 AM
I think real education still exists, in hard science, math, engineering, medicine, and law at least. only rare folks can learn these subjects on their own. The fraud comes in when college attendance exceeds 20% and kids are cheated by letting them graduate in useless fields. I know that lots of sales reps and such are English or "psych" (tre quelle!) majors, but there is a better way.
tom said: "But I sure haven't seen much argument here that Trump deserves to be higher than the bottom five ..... "
Your joking, right? As someone posited earlier, Trump should not be on any list of greatest/worst. He has only concluded his first year.
Allow me to support my argument with the following: Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009. He then went on to drop more bombs than any of the Nobel Peace Prize winners since the beginning of the prize. (It has been reported, however, that Mother Teresa was a close second.)
PS: What may have confused Barack Hussein O. was that Alfred Nobel invented dynamite.
If I were doing a list like this, I'd start by defining two criteria: How consequential was the President, and how good or bad were the consequences?
Take FDR as an example. He was clearly a VERY consequential President. He governed during the Great Depression. He governed during the early years of WW2 in Europe when the US mostly stayed out. He governed during the post-Pearl Harbor years of WW2 in which the US was a crucial part (and became the leading part) of the coalition that defeated Germany/Italy and Japan and saved the world from fascism.
As for consequences: His domestic policies probably extended the Panic of '29 into the Great Depression (with help from Hoover). Before Pearl Harbor the US under his leadership gave only limited support to the British opposition to Hitler; if anyone other than Churchill had been Prime Minister of Britain, it's easy to suppose that the Brits would have reached a "separate peace" with Hitler. After Pearl Harbor, FDR led the US in a successful war against two powerful antagonists. Yet, in the end, an antagonistic totalitarian regime ended up in control of half of Europe, and another antagonsitic totalitarian regime ended up in control of much of Asia.
Maybe that's the best that anyone could have done as President at that time. I doubt that Hoover, Landon, or Wilkie would have done better, but YMMV.
So how do we rate FDR on the greatness scale? My answer is to quote what Mao supposedly said about the French Revolution: It's too soon to tell.
Of course it's too soon to tell about Trump, and anyone who particpates in a poll that ranks Trump's "greatness" after 14 months is automatically disqualified as a fool.
But I sure haven't seen much argument here that Trump deserves to be higher than the bottom five.
45: James Buchanan
44: William Henry Harrison (not really his fault...he only served 31 days)
43: James Garfield
42: Zachary Taylor
41: Warren Harding
40: U.S. Grant
39: Andrew Johnson
38: Jimmy Carter
There are at least eight presidents who were worse than Trump has already been.
Clinton, Bush I and Bush II were three of the worst presidents ever.
And I'm a Conservative.
Andrew Johnson is a perfect example of someone who just become POTUS at the wrong time. If he'd been President during the Civil War or after Reconstruction, we'd all be talking about how great he was.
Same thing with Hoover. If he'd been President during WW 2, or in the 1920s he would have gone down as one of the greatest. But he got left holding the bag when then Depression hit.
I think Obama was basically a big zero. Just a caretaker president. Didn't screw it up, didn't improve anything.
A year is as much time as he's likely to get to actually do anything other than keep the doors open. It'll be like Obama. You get a window at the beginning to get something done, then you spend the rest of the time fending off attacks from a strengthened opposition.
Of course, at such an early point, Trump should not be included at all in such a comparison. It's not reasonable to include him, apples to oranges, but they just couldn't resist, and since there is a chance he might prove to be very good, they had to get this in before it was too late. People at the cocktail parties were gonna ask, and they better have the right answer.
It's silly to judge a president while he's still in office...or indeed, for at least a few decades after. We're just now getting a handle on Bill Clinton, for instance.
"Same thing with Hoover. If he'd been President during WW 2, or in the 1920s he would have gone down as one of the greatest. But he got left holding the bag when then Depression hit."
Can't quite agree with this. The best thing for the US in the 1920's was that Harding, for all his faults, selected Coolidge as his V-P. He had been mayor of Boston and a successful governor of Massachusetts and was just the right person that the country needed at that time. He carried on with efforts started under Harding to roll back the excesses the Wilson administration forced on the country during WWI and successfully managed the country back to prosperity after the 1920-21 depression by aggressively cutting tax rates, controlling spending, and reducing the debt. He was one of our most successful presidents.
Coolidge's Secretary of Commerce was Hoover, and Coolidge hated him. Hoover was one of our most intellectually brilliant, accomplished, and wealthy presidents. He was an engineer who made a fortune in the mining business. But Hoover was a progressive and believed in the power of big government. (I think engineers - and I was one - don't make good presidents. Think of Jimmy Carter, our other engineer President). After the banking and financial crises got rolling in 1929 he would spend the rest of his term drastically increasing the size and spending of the government. He also presided over the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, which would bring world trade to a near halt. Much like Obama, FDR would campaign in 1932 on the need for a balanced budget and limited government and then would double down on every bad mistake Hoover made, and then some, prolonging the Depression until the beginning of WWII.
I think one of the great tragedies of history is that Coolidge elected not to run for re-election in 1928, most likely over the depression he suffered due to the death of his son, who died after a blister he got playing on the White House tennis court became infected. Oh, how history would have turned out differently! He is one of my favorite presidents. Despite being dubbed "Silent Cal" he was actually quite prolific as a communicator. He gave over 500 press conferences during his time in office - more than any president - and also was the last president to write his own speeches. I have read some of them and they are very good.
Though he is famous for his speech that proclaimed "The business of America is business" he is also noted for two quotes that represent very well his success in the office. One was "It is always better to veto a bad bill than to sign a good one." The other is something he supposedly said after the end of his term: "I thought I did a pretty good job minding my own business."
If only we could reincarnate him.
I think Obama was actually one of our dumber presidents. I saw nothing in him over the past 10 years that indicates he was as brilliant as everyone claims he was. I think he would have a hard time managing the drive-through window on the graveyard shift at an all-night McDonalds.
Why should this be a surprise? He's doing everything to subvert the very concept of how you define a successful president as it's come to be understood over 200+ years of presidential history.
The real question is why you revel in his destructiveness so much? Do you really find life so boring that making the most important job in the world fodder for reality tv dramas is one of the few things you still find interesting?
Some people care about posterity and the generations to come after. I guess you'd find that wouldn't be exciting enough, or something.
It's irrational to assess information in a system or process, when the signal to noise ratio approaches zero. This is occult territory, where NYT broadcasts their prophecy, while Mexico, China, etc. watch with intense interest to assess ROI.
Tripe.
How you define a successful president.
We all have our own measurements.
Buwaya@10:58am,
Freder, you just got "schooled."
AllenS @11;27am,
You forgot the "Period" at the end of your first two sentences.
But who are the "Republican" presidential politics experts?
They are the "lifelong Republicans" who are quoted every four years to explain that while they always voted Republican in the past the current candidate is beyond the pale and horrible in every way.
Political SCIENCE.....
Hahahahahahahaha,
Any historian who takes part in such rankings betrays the very idea of history for several reasons. First of all is the assumption "The president" is an unchanging entity that is not itself historically contingent - like the hundred yards in a hundred yard dash. There are many other reasons. All this is is an invitation for a bunch of people to express their preferences.
Post a Comment