Trump calls Bush the "Worst President Ever." Is he correct?

Great Debates
21

[QUOTE=straight man]
All of that is true (to a greater extent, no less) of the SDMB’s favorite villain, Andrew Jackson.

Jackson also:
-tried to destroy America’s monetary system by eliminating the (second) Bank of the United States, even though the public was for it continuing.]
-was responsible for the Trail of Tears, openly flaunting a Supreme Court decision.
-openly claimed that his will was “absolute”.
-was so disliked by Congress that a new party split from his (IIRC, the Whigs).
I’m fairly certain I’m forgetting another dozen or so things that made him a horrible president, but I think the above list is plenty.
[/QUOTE]
I agree. As far as I’m concerned Jackson is at the bottom. The only thing that held off disaster, I think, was the US and the world were a lot simpler. Travel and communications were slow and we were left alone to blunder through. Buchanan was simply paralyzed by the coming Civil War about which he could do nothing just like Hoover was paralyzed by his ideology of the market (in general, not Wall Street) when the market went south in the early 1930’s.

22

::Picks self off floor, pats dust off person. Looks for another scotch, then realizes that would pass limit of 9, a limit to which he keeps in order not to upset the wife and make the dog howl upon smelling his master’s breath. But wait! There’s always sambucca…::

Wazzat really you, Bricker?

Certainly he qualifies in terms of how bad his actions have been, but whether the consequences would lead to such things as, I dunno, really huge wars, depressions, all that stuff, we’ll probably have to wait.
Besides, he was elected by a minority, but then re-elected by a majority, after he’d already made his big mistakes. So if he’s the worst, it’s only because he was elected to be the worst. It’s not like we weren’t given a choice, repeatedly.

23

C’mon, people. Dan Quayle was absolutely the worst president of all time, setting off a nuclear war with the new Russian Federation.Of course, that was in an alternate universe. Never mind.

24

It is definitely too early to assess how Bush rates among all past presidents, and to assert otherwise is typical hyperbole from the short-fingered vulgarian* who can’t go ten seconds without labeling something ‘greatest’ or ‘worst’.

IMO, Johnson was the worst of my lifetime (I was born in 1959), but I think Bush may indeed ‘surpass’ him (and I voted for Bush in 2000). Was Molly Ivins on to something when she said no Texan should ever be president?

Now, if we want to discuss the worst haircut ever…

  • Description of Trump coined in Spy Magazine in 1980s.
25

Very, very poor–the **worst **in living memory.

I honestly believe that America would be better off today with a living, 48-year-old Nixon, who looks pretty darn good in retrospect.

People called Dick Nixon many, many horrible things, many of them perfectly true.

But nobody, nobody ever called Richard M. Nixon “stupid”.

26

We have had arrogant administrations before, and we have had hubristic war-mongering administrations before, and we have had incompetent administrations before, and we have had corrupt administrations before, and we have had ideologically blinkered administrations before. But we have never had any before that combined all those faults for maximum detrimental impact on the body politic as this one has. W’s Admin might not be quite as incompetent as Buchanan’s, quite as corrupt as Harding’s, quite as blinded as Hoover’s, etc.; but look at the sum total, and this is the worst.

27

[QUOTE=F. U. Shakespeare]
Was Molly Ivins on to something when she said no Texan should ever be president?
[/QUOTE]

Eisenhower was competent, and had a few achievements with causing any dsasters to counterbalance them. And LBJ’s heart was in the right place, but he got sucked against his will into the quagmire of Vietnam.

28

Eisenhower moved to Kansas when he was 2 years old. Dubya is as much a Nutmegger as Ike was a Texan, by that standard.

29

There have been very few solid analyses in this thread of the issue presented.

It’s worthwhile to remember that the Presidency has changed dramatically over the years; comparing John Quincy Adams to George W Bush is not all that useful.

But let’s look at Jackson, a candidate mentioned above. In addition to the flaws mentioned previous, his “rotation system” was the effective start of an institutionalized “spoils system” for rewarding cronies and party loyalists with federal posts. Jackson’s approach to the South Carolina response to the “Tariff of Abominations” was to send the Navy to threaten South Carolina’s ports; it was the intercession of Henry Clay that prevented a US Civil War in 1833. (Admittedly, Jackson was correct on the merits of the issue; he was wrong in how he handled the pwderkeg).

Jackson’s handling of the Bank of the United States is mentioned above, but we also seem to have conveniently forgotten the Panic of 1837, brought about almost single-handly by his Executive Order requiring payment for public lands to be in gold and silver specie, and consequently forcing nearly every bank to stop payment in specie. Gold and silver flowed to the West to buy land, devaluing the paper dollar, and was thus short in the east, collapsing the cotton market. Since cotton was a common collateral for loans, the result was an economic disaster. Jackson was also largely responsible for the succession of Van Buren to the Presidency, a man who did nothing to reverse the economic disaster.

Of all the people who shouted, above, “Bush was the worst President ever!” – honestly, how many of you considered the Panic of 1837 in your evaluation? It seems to me that many of those holding that view are simply uniformed or under-informed about American history.

30

[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
We have had arrogant administrations before, and we have had hubristic war-mongering administrations before, and we have had incompetent administrations before, and we have had corrupt administrations before, and we have had ideologically blinkered administrations before. But we have never had any before that combined all those faults for maximum detrimental impact on the body politic as this one has. W’s Admin might not be quite as incompetent as Buchanan’s, quite as corrupt as Harding’s, quite as blinded as Hoover’s, etc.; but look at the sum total, and this is the worst.
[/QUOTE]

Bravo.

31

[QUOTE=Bricker]
It’s worthwhile to remember that the Presidency has changed dramatically over the years; comparing John Quincy Adams to George W Bush is not all that useful.

But let’s look at Jackson, a candidate mentioned above.
[/quote]
Wait - if it isn’t useful to compare John Quincy Adams and Bush, why is it useful to compare Bush to the president who immediately succeeded John Quincy Adams?

Hmm… it could be that we are simply just all ignorant of history. Or it could be something else.

32

I also don’t think it’s time yet to make definitive judgments on an incompleted Bush presidency. It would not surprise me if it is ultimately viewed as one of the worst if not the worst in American history, largely based on lost opportunities (for energy independence, Mideast stabilization etc.).

I have to admit I’m not too conversant with the Panic of 1837. But there’ve been a number of severe economic crises in this nation’s history and it’s hard to see how that one stands out as much worse than any other, as regards long-term domestic or foreign impact.

There’s little doubt, however, that Donald Trump is in the running for Biggest Attention Whore of all time. Al, Jesse…he’s gaining on you!

33

[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
Wait - if it isn’t useful to compare John Quincy Adams and Bush, why is it useful to compare Bush to the president who immediately succeeded John Quincy Adams?
[/QUOTE]

It’s not useful to compare Jackson’s foreign policy and the results thereof to Bush’s either, for the same reason: today, the US is the most powerful nation in the world, militarily and economically. In Jackson’s (and Adams’) day, we were more of an upstart pipsqueak in that department. My point was that you don’t get too many apples-to-apples comparisons.

If I were drawing rough periods in place, I might say that the post-WWII presidency has been different from the WWI-WWII period, which in turn was different than the period from about 1880-WWI. And so on.

Of course, someone could easily make an argument that the situation faced, by, say, Woodrow Wilson was sui generis, and we couldn’t judge Mr. “Too Proud To Fight” against any other President, because his situation was so unique. While there’s some merit to that, it leads us down the line at the end of which is the conclusion that we cannot meaningfully compare any President to any other, and I don’t buy that.

We can, however, compare domestic policies with slightly better success; recognizing still that we’re comparing vastly different issues and scales.

To assert that Bush is the worst President we’ve ever had is to display either an ignorance of history or a rating system so biased in favor of current events as to make the “ever” statement virtually meaningless.

34

[QUOTE=Jackmannii]

I have to admit I’m not too conversant with the Panic of 1837. But there’ve been a number of severe economic crises in this nation’s history and it’s hard to see how that one stands out as much worse than any other, as regards long-term domestic or foreign impact.

[/QUOTE]

Which other severe economic crises in our nation’s history are so directly attributable to the President’s action?

35

[QUOTE=Bricker]
Which other severe economic crises in our nation’s history are so directly attributable to the President’s action?
[/QUOTE]
You are not being responsive. What I said was

What in your opinion makes the Panic of 1837 an especially shattering event in U.S. history? Would you say it had more negative impact than the crash of '29 and subsequent Depression - and that Jackson deserves more censure for his role in 1837 than does Herbert Hoover (both for failure to correct dangerous market conditions before the fall of '29 and for his refusal to use government power to relieve suffering afterwards)?

36

[QUOTE=Jackmannii]
You are not being responsive. What I said wasWhat in your opinion makes the Panic of 1837 an especially shattering event in U.S. history? Would you say it had more negative impact than the crash of '29 and subsequent Depression - and that Jackson deserves more censure for his role in 1837 than does Herbert Hoover (both for failure to correct dangerous market conditions before the fall of '29 and for his refusal to use government power to relieve suffering afterwards)?
[/QUOTE]

The Great Depression of the 1930s cannot fairly be laid at the feet of any Chief Executive. And 1837 was horribly bad – cotton fell from a high of 16 cents a pound to less than 5 cents a pound. 340 of the 850 banks then extant in the United States failed. Wiki quotes Friedman on the Panic as follows:

37

[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
We have had arrogant administrations before, and we have had hubristic war-mongering administrations before, and we have had incompetent administrations before, and we have had corrupt administrations before, and we have had ideologically blinkered administrations before. But we have never had any before that combined all those faults for maximum detrimental impact on the body politic as this one has. W’s Admin might not be quite as incompetent as Buchanan’s, quite as corrupt as Harding’s, quite as blinded as Hoover’s, etc.; but look at the sum total, and this is the worst.
[/QUOTE]

I was going to say something along these lines but BG stated this very well. I think we don’t have the proper historical perspective yet to completely judge W, but it’s hard to see historians of 2057 being kind to him. Bricker’s point that the presidency has changed dramatically over time is well taken. My workaround for that is to consider how different history would have been for better or for the worse if a given president had been someone else.

Andrew Jackson. Sure his vendetta against a bank caused the panic of 1837. But in the long run, would today’s economy be much different had it not happened? And he was cruel to the Native Americans. But if he didn’t push them out of the way, someone else would have. I don’t know if any repercussions of his reign lasted past the Civil War. Definitely not deserving to be on our currency, but he doesn’t seem to be in Bush’s class for creating long-term damage.

James Buchanan. Like a deer caught in the headlights as the nation moved toward civil war. Perhaps action on his part could have delayed it, but I think the Civil War was essentially inevitable.

Richard Nixon. Except for his fatal character flaw, he was a competent president. Of course, other than that little incident, Mrs. Lincoln enjoyed the play. For all of his faults, though, by the election of Reagan in 1980 the country had pretty much gotten over Watergate.

Now for Bush. He has committed perhaps the greatest blunder in American history. What he has done is destabilize the whole region, perhaps for generations if not permanently. He may be incompetent, he may be corrupt, but THE lasting legacy of his reign of error is going to be Iraq. If, ultimately Iraq stabilizes into any semblence of a civilized nation, the verdict of history may not be so harsh. On the other hand, if the situation continues to disintegrate, leading to global political instability and global warfare, history will be very harsh on him indeed as his impact will be long lasting.

38

[QUOTE=Jackmannii]
There’s little doubt, however, that Donald Trump is in the running for Biggest Attention Whore of all time.
[/QUOTE]

I kind of wonder . . . why.

[BrainGlutton suffers traumatic Ross Perot flashback, needs to be restrained and sedated.]

39

I think BobLibDem has it right. Bush’s legacy will be Iraq, and how it goes will determine how he is perceived.

Many of the bad decisions he’s made are things that can be reversed fairly easily by the next administration. I don’t imagine that emptying Guantanamo will take years if the new Pres wants the prisoners released. For all the talk about rights being taken away, I don’t think there has been, or will be, systematic abuse of the populace before he leaves office. If he can take them away, the next president can give them back.

Iraq, OTOH, is not going to just go away when he leaves office. That is a lasting legacy.

40

I have a hard time with absolutes like this when the criteria isn’t clear-cut.

IMHO, Bush is a mediocre, divisive president with some mean-spirited folks calling shots in his administration. This administration hasn’t been good for the country. They’ve gotten us off in the weeds on a number of issues, and I have no doubt that many people have died because of it.

But I still don’t think whether Bush is the worst president or not is the point, rather that he is the wrong president for us right now.