# Let's objectively figure out Presidential rankings

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-objectively-figure-out-presidential-rankings/814500>\
**Category:** Politics & Elections\
**Created:** [May 20, 2018, 9:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-objectively-figure-out-presidential-rankings/814500 "2018-05-20T09:15:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2018, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-objectively-figure-out-presidential-rankings/814500/21 "2018-05-26T16:06:05Z")

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> [@adaher](#):
>
> I think I was going for, “Let’s objectively come up with attributes that we can then subjectively rate.”, which is better than what most people do, which is have their favorites and then just figure out reasons why they are awesome.

True, but I would doubt that you could come up with many a-political attributes to rate that would, as an aggregate, tell us if the person was a good president. I would assert that speaking ability, as you suggested earlier, has little to do with being a good president, except, perhaps, in times of peril. Indeed, in some respects, President Reagan’s general aura of “greatness” as President is a result of his ability as the “Great Communicator”. Those who look to see what his administrations actually did (his effectiveness as a President, if you will) might well want to bypass how he dressed things up (“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”). After all, Bush the Younger was notoriously poor as a speaker, and that tends, I think, to cloud viewpoints of him as a President.

Then, there is the trouble of trying to find things that are truly “a-political” to rate. Some things seemingly not touched by politics would nevertheless be viewed differently by people of different political stripes (especially in today’s society, when bi-polarization of viewpoint is so strong). So I suspect that the attempt will fall on the rocks of actuality. ☹

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