Hoxha?
Korea
Heroes-Yi-Sun Shin (Korean admiral who helped defeat a Japanese invasion in the late 16th Century using proto-ironclads), Park Chung Hee (Korean president who oversaw economic growth of the country)
Villains-Lee Hwan Yung (Traitor who helped arrange Japan’s dominion and later annexation of Korea)
Jefferson Davis gets a mention in both categories.
Looking back those are the two I should have mentioned. There’s really been no defense of Booth; even the most die-hard defenders of the Confederacy, then and now, never saw him as anything more as a misguided fool. And even the attempts to defend Arnold’s reputation (due to his early military record) have an apologetic quality to them.
I don’t think too many New Zealanders would have a problem with Sir Edmund Hillary as our national hero - understated, laconic, capable. Charles Upham (VC and Bar) rates up there, too, for many of the same qualities.
We probably don’t really have a national villain - at least, I can’t think of one.
Yeah, I thought this one would be a no-brainer. “Benedict Arnold” is (or was, when I was growing up) a synonym for traitor, a go-to metaphor to describe the worst sort of betrayer.
Hitler doesn’t seem like the right U.S. choice. He might be the answer to, “Who was the worst person ever,” but national villain ISTM would be someone specifically targeting your country for horrific harm. I know, I know, we were at war, what could be more harmful? But we were incidental to Hitler’s aims, or so it seems. Maybe if Germany had invaded the U.S. and inflicted that sort of damage? If the Poles considered Hitler their national villain, that would make more sense to me. I think in the U.S., Hitler is more of a general evil bogeyman.
Benedict Arnold, he’s the one to beat! 
Not a national villain exactly because of the smaller scale of his crimes but I would say Charles Manson is the face of evil.
I think most Americans would still say Hitler.
I’m very, very tempted to say that our current prime minister of Canada is the villain… 
Speaking for the sane minority born in the Deep South, I’d say that Abraham Lincoln while a truly great man can’t be considered to be ‘The Hero’ to the majority down here. That honor would either go to George Washington or Robert E. Lee, both Virginians one might note.
As for national villain, I believe Benedict Arnold fits the bill nicely. His name (as noted up-thread) was synonymous with ‘horrible traitor’ when I was a youth.
As an aside, I am certain that if you were able to ask my deceased maternal grandmother she would choose Franklin D. Roosevelt as her hero.
Heroes - I guess Nelson Mandela easily tops that list. Steve Biko probably right behind him, then lots of others.
Villains - I’d say most would agree on Hendrik Verwoerd as the biggest villain. I mean, the title “Architect of Apartheid” kind of says it all.
I think George Washington has to be the national hero. Although I think Lincoln was the greater of the two, admiration for Washington is more universal.
I was going to nominate Booth for villain but was beaten to the post. Shooting an unarmed hero in the back has to be as heinous an act as can be. True, McVeigh killed more people, but he changed history not a whit.
Really, not Kitchener?
I agree on Benedict Arnold. He’s the only one you can use as a generic noun like, “Don’t be a Benedict Arnold.” You can’t put “a” (or an) in front of any of the other suggestions. Heck, my US history courses are so long ago, I couldn’t even tell you exactly what he did, but his name just means “traitor”.
Both vary a lot: by location, by political bent of whomever you ask, by knowledge of history and by definition of “nation”.
Just three months ago at a dinner, someone else mentioned El Cid’s conquest of Valencia. Another person chimed in with “no, it was Jaume I who conquered Valencia!”
double stare
Well, he did. After it had been lost to the Moors again after el Cid conquered it (working for Aragon; he wasn’t a warlord, he was a mercenary and in fact got his Meu Sidi for being compassionate and freeing a prisoner who couldn’t pay a ransom).
Many people from the former Crown of Aragon refer to “going potty” as “visiting Philip V” (he’s the king who declared them ‘conquered by Castille’, destroying their legal systems); in Navarre we curse the aragonese village of Sos in what outsiders think an euphemism for Dios (God): no, it’s a very specific curse, because Sos is where Ferdinand I of Aragon was born and we like him about as much as the former-Aragonese like Philip V.
For most of the country I can honestly say no, he goes in the “Heroes” column.
The name that tops the list of British heroes would have to be Churchill, he almost always is judged to be Britain’s most heroic figure.
The most villainous British villain? Difficult to call, possibly Cromwell, Guy Fawkes or David Beckham.
As others have said, the US is so big that, while almost everyone can agree on George Washington as a hero, there are millions who don’t regard Abe Lincoln thta way.
In the South, there are still plenty of people who’d instantly answer that William Tecumseh Sherman is the most evil man who ever lived (and even Sherman would have admitted they have ample reason to think so).
Hitler remains reviled, of course, but a few decades ago, when there were far more people who remembered Pearl Harbor, I wager Tojo was far more hated than Hitler.
Myra Hindley?
No, I’m not even a woman and she’s dead.
Oh, wait! :smack: I see what you mean, yeah she may qualify for most villainous woman - or second to Thatcher, depending on your political persuasion. She and Ian Brady weren’t as efficient at killing as Cromwell or Fawkes although, obviously, Fawkes wasn’t as good as he thought. We won’t know about Beckham until the posthumous biography comes out. 
Completely off topic but I learned something today from that link.
I never knew Telemark skiing was named after a place. I guess I had made up a totally crap etymology :smack: “tele” meaning distances and “mark” meaning a target to aim for. So “telemark” skiing meant you were also able to travel to somewhere, as opposed to pure downhill, where you just go up and down.
I’m glad I never opened my mouth on that one.
What is the British opinion of John (RTL’s brother), Richard III and Charles I?