Bush, worst president in history according the Rolling Stone

Great Debates
21

xtiseme, This is what I “hear” you saying and this is taken mostly from your words:

What I’m groping for to debate here is…

  1. how seriously should such polls be taken?

  2. How accurate is THIS poll (I don’t see much data on the actual poll or who took it)?

  3. Is it really representational of the professional historical community?

  4. I don’t really want to debate if Bush IS the worst president in history (I know there have been several debates on this in the past right here on the SDMB), but on how accurately and unbiased historians can evaluate a sitting president DURING his term.

  5. Can historians really make an unbiased evaluation of GW and state confidently that he is in fact THE worst President in history?

  6. So, are these guys politically biased and allowing their own distaste for GW to color their opinions, or are they giving an accurate and unbiased historical evaluation of the current sitting president.

  7. If the former, what does this say about their OTHER evaluations of past presidents?

  8. If the later, how well will such predictions (i.e. he will go down as the worst President or possibly among the worst) stand up to the test of time?

You seem to be debating several questions and coming at a central issue from a lot of different directions, but here is my general take:

Some surveys should be taken more seriously that others. This was an informal survey and was limited to only 415 historians. We have, as far as I know, no further information about their credentials.

It’s good that the group doing the survey says that they (the group) are nonpartisan, but we don’t have access to the survey questions and can’t judge them for ourselves.

The historians were asked for their opinions. Although they may weigh facts in arriving at their opinions, biases may always be a factor. That is why I prefer to see formal surveys of large groups. I also would prefer to read the opinions of the well-respected historians: those who have excelled academically and those who have the respect of their peers particularly in American and presidential history.

I agree with you that perspective can be important. Certainly most historians will want to wait until 2009 before writing the last chapter. And historians one hundred years from now will still be fine-tuning.

I have no reason to think that the poll wasn’t accurately reported. Considering that “historians” are often academics, I was surprised that only 81% rated Bush’s presidency a failure thus far. Then I noticed that the poll was taken prior to Katrinia and the latest in-fighting in Iraq, revelations about wiretapping, the plans to sell the ports to Dubai, Administration involvement in leaks and other subtle clues that Bush may not, after all, have quite the finesse that Honest Abe did.

22

OK, this is me having just read the OP:

I think they’re biased to some degree, of course. The W regime is still going on, & present crises have a way of looming larger than past ones. Nixon was pretty bad, & those were scary times for the country–although he really did try to do what he thought was right for the country in some ways. Reagan had dangerous fiscal policies that have unfortunately been embraced by those who don’t see the handwriting on the wall, & his attitude of “break the law to fight wars around the world” was also bad precedent.

But that doesn’t mean they’re wrong. It is possible at this point to look at what Bush is doing point by point & compare him to past presidents, by the standards we now use to judge past presidents. Compared to Nixon, Johnson, Reagan, & Eisenhower (all deeply flawed, all “mixed bags” as presidents), he’s not stacking up so well–by the standards we would use today to judge them. Will the judgement of history, 50 years on, be kinder to Bush than present opinion? Maybe, if history changes our sense of good & bad, & we decide that our present criteria are wrong.

But for citizens & Congressmen today, wondering whether we have the wrong man in the job, we have our present understanding to go on. If, at any time, serious students of politics & history consistently think the then-current president’s administration is clearly going down too many wrong paths, then one of four situations would seem to pertain:[list=a][li]The scholars are right, & the administration is foolish;[/li][li]The scholars are wrong, despite appearing right at this point in time, & history will prove the administration right, by sheer dumb luck;[/li][li]The scholars are miseducated & deluded by various prejudices, & the administration is privy to a sounder political theory & tradition;[/li]The scholars are wrong, & the president will be proven right, for he is a prophet.[/list]Choices b & d are unknowable & unlikely by definition, & the people would be irresponsible to make a decision based on either being true. Choice c is attractive to the administration’s political supporters, but it’s at least as reasonable to say that the president is miseducated & deluded by his political allegiances, & that those who criticise him include a few of sounder political theory & tradition. Choice a, in such a case, is compelling.

23

This is a stupid argument. How do objectively measure which president is “worst”? By their blunders? The Bay of Pigs should put JFK up there with the worst then. War? The US decended into Civil War under Lincoln. And what about Johnson and Vietnam? The state of the economy? Well Carter had the gas shortages of the 70s.

Most people (including RS) measure it by how much they disagree with the president’s politics. That doesn’t tell you if their decisions were correct ones.

24

I agree that the question is a difficult one, but I think you can still debate it. That an issue is complex does not make it “stupid”. I agree that you would, if you wanted to arrive at a legitimate measure of the man rather than the administration, you have to measure in relativistic terms (eg. What Would Lincoln Do after 9/11 or What Would Dubya Do about the Civil War?). On the other hand, if you wished to measure a presidency, you could, fairly simply, look at the circumstances when the President came to power, look at the circumstances after he left power, and then try and analyse whether his policies had an impact on that (admittedly a lot more complex):

e.g. When Clinton came to power, we were at war with the ghastly Zergs. When he left power, the war was over and we were victorious. Clinton’s funding policies directly led to the development of the weapon that defeated the Zergs. Ergo, Clinton’s administration was a good one.

25

FEC records indicate that Wilentz gave $500 to the Democratic National Committee in 2004. There are no records of him donating to the Republican party or to Republican candidates.

His right to do so, surely. But the man does have his allegiances. Whether they color his research is a matter of debate.

26

Mr Moto! So glad you stayed! You’re a nice fellow, even if you support the wrong party.

I think that any list of the best or worst whatevers always tend to be skewed to the recent. Remember the greatest 100 American list included Laura Bush, for example. It is possible that Bush will grow in stature over the years, but he needs to turn things around. As of this minute, I’d say he ranks easily in the bottom 5, due to some of the biggest bonehead decisions of modern history. But I don’t think that we can say with certainty at this point that he is the worst ever.

27

Heh. It’s more likely that his research is coloring his allegiances: he gave to the Dems because his research indicated GWB and the Republicans were the wrong choice.

28

I always said I’d run out my subscription. Today is my last day of paid membership.

29

Fair enough, but the chain of reasoning is seldom that crystal-clear. There are Reagan aides that say bankrupting the Soviet Union was part of a deliberate strategy that also included unequivocal moral condemnation; there are Democrats who insist that it wasn’t and that Reagan just blundered his way into office when the Soviets were collapsing anyway. How much credit do we give him for that?

Recent history also presents the “too soon to tell” problem; if, when Russia collapses in 2050, their nukes all go to the highest bidder and China takes possession of Siberia, we may find ourselves wishing the old Sovs were still around.

Finally, and more to the point, people often disagree on what “the circumstances” should be. The welfare reforms of the 90s can be directly tied to more people getting off welfare and working, which was explicitly their intent; and yet some people still disagree they should have been enacted, because they feel it is morally important for society to have that generous safety net. In many cases there is no consensus on what a good outcome is. Head Start is usually regarded as one of the universally accepted as one example of “government doing things right.” Libertarians are still ambivalent at best because they’re opposed to government-run education on principle; sure the program hits what its aiming for, but there is dispute whether that was ever a good target to begin with.

30

So, somebody polled a bunch of people whose job it is to understand the effects of the past on the present, and they’ve projected a dim view of the future in regards to the effects of this presidency.

The main objection appears to be that historians can only speak intelligently about the past, and doing so gives them no useful perspective on present events, nor any ability to forecast reliably.

My question must then be: If historians are not qualified to comment, who is?

31

Questions like this focus on the immediacy of the event. Ask again in 100 years and 5 of the top 10 worst Presidents will be the last 5, including the sitting one.

You can’t judge a person’s place in history until they are history.

32

So…the position, then, should be that no one can answer a question like this validly, or even speculate intelligently, and hence it simply should not be done. Is that a fair characterization of those who oppose such polls? Or is it that academic elitists cannot be taken seriously, and hence such polls are nothing more than a relfection of left-wing politics endemic in academia? Or is it both? If it were a group of respected historians hand-picked by the PNAC and then polled, would their opinion still be just as invalid, due to the simple fact that one cannot judge the present as history? Would they be equally incompetent prognosticators?

I’ve no opinion really, I’m just trying to clarify the objections to the poll cited by the OP.

33

Well, for my part, my ‘objections’ are pretty much what I was trying to say in the OP. Namely that, as professionals, I was under the impression that historians generally don’t attempt to judge events as they unfold, but only in historical context…usually decades after the fact as more data comes in. So, assuming that this poll does in fact represent the majority viewpoint of historians that GW is either the worst or among the worst presidents in history, should we take it seriously? Are these guys giving a real, professional opinion, and if so, how are they projecting the events into a future that hasn’t happened yet? Or are they merely giving their PERSONAL opinion…in which case how seriously should we take it? Obviously the folks who did the poll, and those who reprinted it with further observations in Rolling Stone want us to feel the weight of all those historians, and be influenced by their pronouncements, since they are the professionals in this context…but my question is, should we?

I don’t have an answer…which is why I started this debate when I saw the article. I conceed that its possible that they will be proved right in the fullness of time. I just don’t see how its possible for them to make hard and fast pronouncements or a real professional historical judgement on a presidency that isn’t even over yet. How can they fit it into the larger historical context…since we don’t know how things will eventually play out.

So, the bottom line (for me) is…if the folks taking the poll are giving their personal opinions, then how seriously should we take such things? Should we grant it ‘weight’ in our own evaluations, or dismiss it out of hand…or something in between? If they are giving their professional opinions, well, IS it professional to judge an administration before its over…from a professional historical perspective (obviously WE, as amatures, can speculate all we like :wink: )? How can they make judgements on a professional basis without the future context of events to fit this adminstration into?

-XT

34

I don’t object to the question or the answers. I just note that others may have different answers, including other historians in the fullness of time.

35

Alternatively, Rolling Stone has no serious desire to make “us” feel the weight of anything or to be influenced by anything the scholars say, but are very desirous of promoting an article directed at the demographic in which their normal readership is found that will encourage current non-readers to either pick up this edition or, better, subscribe to the magazine in the hopes of seeing more scholarly articles that validate their own beliefs.

(I am not suggesting that the editorial staff of the Rolling Stone has no political preferences, only noting that their interest in publishing the results of this poll may be as much commercial as philosophical.)

36

I simply find it amusing that a lot of the folks dismissing the “Worst President Ever” nomination attack the source (either Rolling Stone, Professor Wilentz, or historians in general), and gloss over the factual events cited in the article as supporting data for the claim.

37

The judgement of who makes a better president than someone else are not completely subjective. There are duties of the office, after all. By what measures there are to be judged objectively, I think one may make a decision at any time, whether the President is successful.

GWB took an oath to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” tot he best of his ability. One could pass judgement on how well the Union described by the constitution is faring under his watch, how well the duties it describes are being carried out, and how well the rights described within it are holding up. This could get quite subjective however.

He could be judged on his abilities and successes or failures as commander in chief of the armed forces.

He could be judged on the appropriateness of any pardons he granted.

He could be judged on the quality to date of his nominations.

He could be judged on the soundness of the measures he recommended to Congress during his state of the Union speech.

He could be judged on the effectiveness of his interactions with any ambassadors he has met with.

Some of these evaluations lend themselves to subjectivity, certainly, and for many it may bee too soon to tell. But I would be hard pressed to declare it impossible for the fruit of any president’s actions to be evaulated before he leaves office.

38

If you will note the OP, discussing the current presidency, per se, is actually not the point of the thread. Getting into (perceived) “factual events” as (perceived) “supporting data” would be a hijack. I would, however, be willing to bet that if one looked, there just might be a thread around here somewhere, discussing the merits of the GWB presidency.

39

My pardons; I lost track of the OP in the cartoon-like dust cloud from the ensuing dogpile from the apologists.

I’d have to disagree; I believe it’s certainly possible to craft a statement like “Despite pre-war claims by the Administration, no actual WMD stockpiles were found in Iraq” that’s above dispute.

40

Let me rephrase it:
Getting into details of this presidency would be a hijack.

(C’mon! How likely is it that you would find me leading a serious defense of this presidency? I’m defending the thread, not Bush.)