# Two term Presidents whose legacy might've been better as one-termers? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [June 22, 2017, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621 "2017-06-22T18:28:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/21 "2017-06-23T00:02:11Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > How would Kerry be blamed for Iraq? Bush got us in, and Kerry would have gotten us out. As we saw when Obama tried, getting us out wasn’t easy. I don’t think he gets us out any faster, really. Which means more of Iraq falls on Kerry. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/22 "2017-06-23T01:39:33Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Obama’s second turn didn’t see an increase in racial tensions. It saw an increase in awareness of racial tensions. Or maybe it did both - increasing the awareness of racial tensions and at the same time also increasing racial tensions. I think Trump’s election could be construed in different ways, but one way to view it was a counter-revolution in which a campaign of white nativism beats back the advancement of minorities. In some ways, this whitelash, to use Van Jones’ term, was inevitable. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/23 "2017-06-23T01:41:49Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > As we saw when Obama tried, getting us out wasn’t easy. I don’t think he gets us out any faster, really. Which means more of Iraq falls on Kerry. Agreed. I seriously question whether Gore would have resisted the temptation to fight a retaliatory war in Iraq, and had Kerry gotten elected, I’ve no doubt he would have been confused by the ever-changing dynamics of the invasion’s aftermath. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/24 "2017-06-23T01:45:44Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Maybe if US Grant had declined to run for reelection? No panic of 1873 on his watch and he gets credit for destroying the first KKK and enforcing civil rights. I doubt it. Abraham Lincoln was the only leader at the time with the vision to temper the North’s desire for revenge while resolving to see that the union come together under a new order. Even had he survived, those first 4 years would have been tumultuous, but the Andrew Johnson presidency essentially ensured that white supremacy would influence politics of the former CSA for the next 100 years. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/25 "2017-06-23T01:47:29Z")
> [@Reddy\_Mercury](#): > > However you want to term it, it’s brought a level of racial divisiveness to this country that hasn’t been seen in decades. There’s a lot of hatred and animosity on both sides now, which I don’t recall being the case in 2009-2012. There’s for example a Facebook Group called “Tales of the Mayosapiens” wherein Whites are labelled “Mayosapians” - to differentiate them from Humans. In this group, Whites are routinely mocked and belittled, and you hear things about how African Americans had advanced civlizations on par with Atlantis before the White Man emerged from caves and erased the history. You’ll go there and see people talking about how MLK was wrong, and Malcolm X (pre Mecca) was right. These are all young POC in this group mind you - not old 60s radicals. And I’ve seen this same attitude elsewhere - Whites are to be feared, hated, and belittled. There have always been blacks who have advocated aggressive resistance to living in a white supremacist society – nothing really new here. I doubt that the groups you’ve alluded to have any real influence or following. But as to your comment “Whites are to be feared, hated, and belittled”, while I certainly don’t want to be on the receiving end of their hatred, Jesus Christ, can you blame them? This is a society that was founded on white supremacy and we’re somehow surprised that people hate whites? ---
**Author:** ![Reddy\_Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@Reddy\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reddy_Mercury)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/26 "2017-06-23T01:58:08Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > There have always been blacks who have advocated aggressive resistance to living in a white supremacist society – nothing really new here. I doubt that the groups you’ve alluded to have any real influence or following. > > But as to your comment “Whites are to be feared, hated, and belittled”, while I certainly don’t want to be on the receiving end of their hatred, Jesus Christ, can you blame them? This is a society that was founded on white supremacy and we’re somehow surprised that people hate whites? Correction: This country was founded on Anglo-Saxon, landowning male supremacy. Germans, Irish, Asians, and other such undesirables weren’t wanted much either. Benjamin Franklin: "Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a Colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to Germanize us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our Language or Customs, any more than they can acquire our Complexion. 1. Which leads me to add one Remark: T**hat the Number of purely white People in the World is proportionably very small. All Africa is black or tawny. Asia chiefly tawny. America (exclusive of the new Comers) wholly so. And in Europe, the Spaniards, Italians, French, Russians and Swedes, are generally of what we call a swarthy Complexion; as are the Germans also, the Saxons only excepted, who with the English, make the principal Body of White People on the Face of the Earth. I could wish their Numbers were increased. And while we are, as I may call it, Scouring our Planet, by clearing America of Woods, and so making this Side of our Globe reflect a brighter Light to the Eyes of Inhabitants in Mars or Venus, why should we in the Sight of Superior Beings, darken its People? why increase the Sons of Africa, by Planting them in America, where we have so fair an Opportunity, by excluding all Blacks and Tawneys, of increasing the lovely White and Red? But perhaps I am partial to the Complexion of my Country, for such Kind of Partiality is natural to Mankind**." This country isn’t that racist now. A loud minority are. But the overwhelming bulk of the country - over 50% each time - elected Obama twice. I don’t think a White supremacist society would vote for a Black man twice. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/27 "2017-06-23T03:28:02Z")
Obama. Had Romney won in 2012, the democrats would’ve held the senate making ACA repeal not possible (however the GOP did win the senate in 2014, so who knows). In Obamas first term he did health care reform, helped stop the job loss from the recession, got the economy back on track, passed the stimulus, etc. I don’t think he did much his second term. Pretty much everything he did of significance came in the first 2 years when he had a democratic congress. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/28 "2017-06-23T12:37:48Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > Eh, racial tensions might have increased. However if they increased because a bunch of white nationalists can’t take it that a black man is still president it’s not like it’s Obama’s fault. > > “We’re the most divided ever under Obama.” Yeah, because you’re dividing us. There’s some of that, but I think the biggest issue is simply what happened during the LBJ administration. The first black President created expectations, much as the civil rights era did, and when those expectations weren’t meant it created a lot of rage. It also made white liberals more demanding as well on THEIR issues(Occupy Wall Street! Climate change! Trangenderism!), which creates racial tension all by itself, and splits the party along racial lines(which it did in the Sanders vs. Clinton race). In general, I think most Presidents are better off not running for 2nd terms, at least not right away. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my life, it’s that you get better at doing something if you stop doing it for awhile and spend a lot of time thinking about what you did wrong and what you could do better. Especially with the Presidency I’d think that taking a step back for a few years would better prepare one to come back and do it again. This works at the state level for sure. Bill Clinton and Jerry Brown were much better governors the second time around. Obama could have benefitted from this, and I do think that if Romney had beaten him he would have come back. I can think of only two compelling reasons to run for 2nd terms. First, if you believe your legacy is in danger and it would be hard to elect a successor from your own party. Second, if you still have much to do AND Congress is likely to cooperate because your party will gain more seats. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/29 "2017-06-23T12:39:46Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > How would Kerry be blamed for Iraq? Bush got us in, and Kerry would have gotten us out. In the middle of Iraq’s sectarian meltdown? Followed immediately by a financial collapse? Kerry would get the blame for all of that. In hindsight, he probably would have done worse than Bush. Bush actaully started to figure the job out in the last couple of years. Kerry would have been hit with bad situation after bad situation, starting with Katrina only nine months into office, which is not enough time to reform FEMA, if doing so would even have been on his agenda, which it wouldn’t have been. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/30 "2017-06-23T13:01:32Z")
Katrina wouldn’t have been the clusterfuck that it was if Kerry had been in office. He would have put someone more competent in charge of FEMA and wouldn’t have been so slow to react as Bush was. Iraq was a disaster from Bush’s first term and his incredibly stupid decision to invade. So Bush would have been remembered as the second worst president (to Don The Con) even if he only served one term. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/31 "2017-06-23T14:21:29Z")
> [@Reddy\_Mercury](#): > > This country isn’t that racist now. A loud minority are. But the overwhelming bulk of the country - over 50% each time - elected Obama twice. I don’t think a White supremacist society would vote for a Black man twice. Obama didn’t get anywhere near 50% of the country voting for him, he just got over 50% of the 60% of eligible voters who voted to vote for him. It’s not as inaccurate as the similar claim for Hillary in 2016 (who got less than 50% of votes cast), but it still is both technically inaccurate and paints a very false picture. A large portion of voters, roughly as many as voted for him, didn’t vote either candidate, and it’s not reasonable to ignore that when discussing how popular a president was. ---
**Author:** ![Arrogantly\_Ignorant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Arrogantly\_Ignorant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrogantly_Ignorant)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/32 "2017-06-23T15:16:48Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > A large portion of voters, roughly as many as voted for him, didn’t vote either candidate, and it’s not reasonable to ignore that when discussing how popular a president was. If those people didn’t vote for either candidate (or any candidate, as you seem to be saying) then they aren’t voters. They’re citizens and potential voters. Also, I’d like to add, that a person not casting their vote for a candidate doesn’t mean they dislike them/their policies. Some people are just lazy, have more immediate concerns, believe their candidate will win in their state and therefore their vote is meaningless, etc. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2017, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/33 "2017-06-23T23:36:31Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Katrina wouldn’t have been the clusterfuck that it was if Kerry had been in office. He would have put someone more competent in charge of FEMA and wouldn’t have been so slow to react as Bush was. > > Iraq was a disaster from Bush’s first term and his incredibly stupid decision to invade. So Bush would have been remembered as the second worst president (to Don The Con) even if he only served one term. Think you letting the “Lib Dem” part of your handle affect your judgment. Iraq would have blown up under Kerry. Whenever something happens, the sitting President gets blamed. Fairly or not. The worst of the fighting took place during Bush II’s second term. Kerry would have been blamed for it if he had been President. As for Katrina, while Michael Brown et al did not exactly distinguish themselves, the various federal and state agencies had systemic institutional shortcomings which caused the debacle, no matter how competent a person Kerry appoints, that’s not changing, real life does not work that way. Ditto the financial crises, that would have happened anyway. And unlike the term limited Bush, Kerry would be going in for reelection in September 2008. He might not have managed to be able to push for the first bailout and that would have made th crises worse, Bush barely got it in actuality. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2017, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/34 "2017-06-24T01:58:45Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Katrina wouldn’t have been the clusterfuck that it was if Kerry had been in office. He would have put someone more competent in charge of FEMA and wouldn’t have been so slow to react as Bush was. > > Iraq was a disaster from Bush’s first term and his incredibly stupid decision to invade. So Bush would have been remembered as the second worst president (to Don The Con) even if he only served one term. No agency is just about the one guy at the top. If FEMA was unable to handle Katrina under Bush it wouldn’t be able to handle Katrina just nine months into a new Presidency where FEMA wouldn’t have been seen as a priority. Of course, the media probably would have thrown Blanco and Nagin under the bus to protect Kerry. ---
**Author:** ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2017, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/35 "2017-06-24T13:05:28Z")
> [@Reddy\_Mercury](#): > > Not losing - just declining to run for another term ala Polk or Coolidge. If Coolidge had run for a third term, he’d have gotten the full brunt of the blame for the Great Depression. He bowed out a year before and so it’s Hoover whose name lives on in infamy. The two men had very different philosophies. Very few people remember this now (because Hoover’s actions were eclipsed by FDR’s) but Hoover committed unprecedented meddling with the economy. Coolidge would have remained true to free market and small government principles, and let the economy work itself out. Thus we cannot say that Coolidge would have lived in infamy, because the result would have been sufficiently different that we don’t actually know what would have happened. All we know for sure is that Hoover did major damage. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2017, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/36 "2017-06-24T13:19:16Z")
Can you give us some examples of Hoover’s meddling? All I’m aware of him doing is allowing the fat-cat businessmen to meddle unrestricted in the economy. ---
**Author:** ![Some\_Call\_Me.Tim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Some\_Call\_Me.Tim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Some_Call_Me.Tim)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2017, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/37 "2017-06-24T14:24:04Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > Agreed. I seriously question whether Gore would have resisted the temptation to fight a retaliatory war in Iraq, and had Kerry gotten elected, I’ve no doubt he would have been confused by the ever-changing dynamics of the invasion’s aftermath. I honestly have no idea what you are referring to by a ‘temptation to fight a retaliatory war in Iraq’. What did Iraq do during that timeframe that would have inspired a Gore administration toward retaliation? I mean, you are aware that Iraq had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11, right? ---
**Author:** ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2017, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/38 "2017-06-25T01:01:39Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Can you give us some examples of Hoover’s meddling? All I’m aware of him doing is allowing the fat-cat businessmen to meddle unrestricted in the economy. > [@](#): > > Many historians, most of the general public, and even many economists think of Herbert Hoover, the president who preceded Franklin D. Roosevelt, as a defender of laissez-faire economic policy. According to this view, Hoover’s dogmatic commitment to small government led him to stand by and do nothing while the economy collapsed in the wake of the 1929 stock market crash. The reality is quite different. Far from being a bystander, Hoover actively intervened in the economy, advocating and implementing polices that were quite similar to those that Franklin Roosevelt later implemented. Moreover, many of Hoover’s interventions, like those of his successor, caused the Great Depression to be “great”—that is, to last a long time. > **[Hoover's Economic Policies - Econlib](http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/HooversEconomicPolicies.html)** > > When it was all over, I once made a list of New Deal ventures begun during Hoover’s years as Secretary of Commerce and then as president. . . . The New Deal owed much to what he had begun.1 —FDR advisor Rexford G. Tugwell Many historians, most of the... > [@](#): > > Since the crash, Hoover had worked ceaselessly trying to fix the economy. He founded government agencies, encouraged labor harmony, supported local aid for public works, fostered cooperation between government and business in order to stabilize prices, and struggled to balance the budget. . . . > > Roosevelt’s aides later admitted that most New Deal agencies were closely modeled on those that Hoover had attempted, but Roosevelt’s plans differed in financing and scope. > **[Herbert Hoover on the Great Depression and New Deal, 1931–1933 | Gilder...](https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/spotlight-primary-source/herbert-hoover-great-depression-and-new-deal-1931%E2%80%931933)** > > Herbert Hoover on the Great Depression and New Deal, 1931–1933 | The stock market crashed on Thursday, October 24, 1929, less than eight months into Herbert Hoover’s presidency. Most experts, including Hoover, thought the crash was part of a passing... > [@](#): > > Although Herbert Hoover was a registered Republican, his progressive views aligned him with Democrats so fluidly that he was encouraged to run for president as a Democrat. Many of those influential in politics in the 1920s saw him as neither Democrat nor Republican based on his ideology, but Hoover considered himself a progressive Republican. > > During his term as president, Congress was controlled by the Democratic Party who often supported Hoover’s agenda until he began to refuse direct aid to those unemployed and poverty-stricken during the Great Depression. [http://hooverforpresident.com/herbert-hoover-policies/562/](http://hooverforpresident.com/herbert-hoover-policies/562/) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2017, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/39 "2017-06-25T01:23:30Z")
That’s just other historians saying the same thing you just did. But they don’t list any examples, either. Don’t just tell me he created agencies: Tell us what agencies he created. Don’t just tell us he supported public works: Tell us what works he supported. ---
**Author:** ![Arrogantly\_Ignorant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Arrogantly\_Ignorant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrogantly_Ignorant)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2017, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621/40 "2017-06-25T09:12:42Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > That’s just other historians saying the same thing you just did. But they don’t list any examples, either. Don’t just tell me he created agencies: Tell us what agencies he created. Don’t just tell us he supported public works: Tell us what works he supported. Not the OP, but I know Hoover created the President’s Emergency Committee for Unemployment and the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, which gave money to banks, railroads, etc. for loans. He also supported the Glass-Steagall Act, I believe. He was also the first President in a decade to run a deficit (to help struggling Americans). In fact, it was arguably only FDR’s 1932 campaign claim that Hoover didn’t have a balanced checkbook that led to Hoover enacting a tax increase, which is the exact opposite of what the economy needed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-term-presidents-whose-legacy-mightve-been-better-as-one-termers/789621.md?page=3)