# The President Elimination Game **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [September 24, 2009, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317 "2009-09-24T01:36:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/21 "2009-09-24T18:52:14Z")
People are seriously picking Harding over Buchanan? Harding was a pointless, do-nothing president who did nothing during a period of prosperity; Buchanan was a pointless, do-nothing president who did nothing while the country was falling apart. This is not a difficult choice. ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/22 "2009-09-24T18:53:35Z")
Three-way tie now by my count (Buchanan-Pierce-Harding). This could get interesting. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/23 "2009-09-24T18:57:54Z")
> [@Tom\_Scud](#): > > People are seriously picking Harding over Buchanan? Harding was a pointless, do-nothing president who did nothing during a period of prosperity; Buchanan was a pointless, do-nothing president who did nothing while the country was falling apart. This is not a difficult choice. In defence of Harding, he did nothing while corruption ran wild in his cabinet. He’s also a member of that rare breed: a president who recognised himself that he was not fit to be president ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/24 "2009-09-24T18:58:48Z")
I’d pick Nixon, or Ford for pardoning Nixon. I’ll go for Ford. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/25 "2009-09-24T19:07:56Z")
_Ford_? Really? God, I wish other Republican Presidents were more like Ford. He’s the only president in my lifetime that was religious but didn’t feel the need to get in your face about it. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/26 "2009-09-24T23:16:12Z")
Buchanon, easy ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/27 "2009-09-24T23:32:15Z")
Buchanan ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/28 "2009-09-24T23:41:29Z")
James Buchanan’s been knocked off. George Washington (None, 1789-1797) John Adams (Federalist, 1797-1801) Thomas Jefferson (Democratic-Republican, 1801-1809) James Madison (Democratic-Republican, 1809-1817) James Monroe (Democratic-Republican, 1817-1825) John Quincy Adams (Democratic-Republican, 1825-1829) Andrew Jackson (Democrat, 1829-1837) Martin Van Buren (Democrat, 1837-1841) John Tyler (Whig, 1841-1845) James Polk (Democrat, 1845-1849) Zachary Taylor (Whig, 1849-1850) Milliard Filmore (Whig, 1850-1853) Franklin Pierce (Democrat, 1853-1857) Abraham Lincoln (Republican, 1861-1865) Andrew Johnson (National Union, 1865-1869) Ulysses Grant (Republican, 1869-1877) Rutherford Hayes (Republican, 1877-1881) Chester Arthur (Republican, 1881-1885) Grover Cleveland (Democrat, 1885-1889, 1893-1897) Benjamin Harrison (Republican, 1889-1893) William McKinley (Republican, 1897-1901) Theodore Roosevelt (Republican, 1901-1909) William Howard Taft (Republican, 1909-1913) Woodrow Wilson (Democrat, 1913-1921) Warren Harding (Republican, 1921-1923) Calvin Coolidge (Republican, 1923-1929) Herbert Hoover (Republican, 1929-1933) Franklin Delano Roosevelt (Democrat, 1933-1945) Henry Truman (Democrat, 1945-1953) Dwight Eisenhower (Republican, 1953-1961) John Fitzgerald Kennedy (Democrat, 1961-1963) Lyndon Baines Johnson (Democrat, 1963-1969) Richard Milhous Nixon (Republican, 1969-1974) Gerald Ford (Republican, 1974-1977) James Earl Carter (Democrat, 1977-1981) Ronald Reagan (Republican, 1981-1989) George Herbert Walker Bush (Republican, 1989-1993) William Jefferson Clinton (Democrat, 1993-2001) Eliminated Presidents: 1. James Buchanan (Democrat, 1857-1861) I vote Pierce for next round. ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/29 "2009-09-24T23:47:06Z")
Buchanan. I wrote a book about Civil War music at one point. I needed to track down photos/pictures for the book, and this was in the days before internet access was common or even close, so I wound up sending out lots of letters to various museums, archives, and historical societies asking what they had or requesting info about specific pictures. I had a budget of maybe $350 to work with, for about 45 pictures in all, which limited my options somewhat; most of the pictures I chose wound up costing me $5 or even less when rights, reproduction, and shipping were taken into account. I did get a few that cost as much as $20 or $25, only because they were really cool. Hardly any were priced much more than that, and indeed there was just one that went above $50. The folks at Wheatland, Buchanan’s home-now-museum, wanted $100 for a photo of his piano. It was a nice piano, a fine example of pianos of the time, but I…politely…declined. That’s not why I’m choosing Buchanan. But it helps. ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/30 "2009-09-24T23:48:09Z")
An instant too late. Oh well, he got what was coming to him, ol’ Buchanan I mean. Gotta go with Harding here. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/31 "2009-09-25T00:15:38Z")
Pierce, I suppose. I’m just glad Buchanan got the ax first. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/32 "2009-09-25T02:37:33Z")
Nixon. No other President so flagrantly violated his oath of office to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” ---
**Author:** ![CyclopticXander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@CyclopticXander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CyclopticXander)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/33 "2009-09-25T04:12:06Z")
Andrew Johnson again. Our biggest white supremacist president. The one who didn’t just turn a blind eye to evil like Buchanan and so many other presidents of the period, but actively sought to institutionalize racism immediately after the end of slavery. The guy who congress found a way to impeach just because he was a huge dick. The lame duck right out of the gate who was so often drunk and embarrassing that he was politically toxic even while president. Harding didn’t do anything because that was his political ideology, but it was a time of great prosperity and he was never proven to be directly corrupt. Pierce was indeed bad because he was so stubborn and flawed as a person, but Johnson made him look like a beloved statesman of his time. Furthermore, look how mean this dude looks [http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/images/Andrew\_johnson.jpg](http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/images/Andrew_johnson.jpg) See reason people:) ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/34 "2009-09-25T04:12:26Z")
James Madison. He was a good Constitution-writer, but we’re not voting on that. And picking a fight with the most powerful country on Earth is pretty much by definition the stupidest thing a country’s leader could do. He was just lucky it didn’t go worse. ---
**Author:** ![Boozahol\_Squid\_P.I](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/d9b06d/32.png) [@Boozahol\_Squid\_P.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boozahol_Squid_P.I)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/35 "2009-09-25T05:07:02Z")
Franklin Pierce. Whatever the sins of other Presidents, Buchanan and Pierce both heavily contributed (via neglect) to the worst crisis of this country, and deserve to be outed firstest. ---
**Author:** ![ToeJam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dfb087/32.png) [@ToeJam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ToeJam)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/36 "2009-09-25T05:38:12Z")
Pierce. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/37 "2009-09-25T05:41:59Z")
I gotta go with Nixon. Pure evil. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/38 "2009-09-25T10:59:33Z")
I’m still going with Harding. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/39 "2009-09-25T11:53:13Z")
Grant. ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2009, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317/40 "2009-09-25T12:12:50Z")
Pierce. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-president-elimination-game/511317.md?page=3)