# Who Was the Worst President? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 3, 2011, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242 "2011-08-03T00:00:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/81 "2011-08-03T22:23:21Z")
The vote for William Henry Harrison confuses me. ---
**Author:** ![markdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@markdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markdash)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/82 "2011-08-03T22:23:39Z")
I don’t care how competent Nixon might have been (a matter for another debate), the man tried to subvert the Constitution of the United Fucking States. I’m a Bush/Reagan hater and diehard liberal, but IMHO anyone naming W or Ronald in this poll lacks historical perspective. I’m open to the notion that 19th century presidents were worse than Nixon, but to nominate either Bush or Reagan because you disagree with some or all of their policies is, to me, missing the forest for the trees. ---
**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:** [August 4, 2011, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/83 "2011-08-04T00:28:17Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > George W. Bush wins this contest by a mile. Given that he’s been out of office for almost three years and politics have been rather heated during those three years, perhaps it’s no surprise that some folks are forgetting how terrible he was. Just consider a a few of his most major sins: > > - Authorizing that many prisoners be tortured, in some cases to death. US troops have used waterboarding before (for instance in the Philippines) and when did he have people tortured to death? > [@](#): > > - Ordering a war in Iraq that killed over a million people, based on claims about WMDs that he knew were false. The million figure is disputed (see the Lancet studies), he may have been mistaken about WMDs, and finally he cleaned up his own mess via the Surge strategy and allowed us to emerge victorious from Iraq. > [@](#): > > - Presiding over not one but two major waves of corporate crime, and disabling the regulatory bodies responsible for preventing such crime, thus setting off a worldwide financial catastrophe. Much of his attempts at reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were rejected by Democrats in Congress. > [@](#): > > - Sabotaging attempts to fight global warming, publishing false information about climate change, and covering up the truth. Oh you mean just like the scientists in Climategate? > [@](#): > > - Putting incompetent loons in charge of FEMA, thereby botching relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina and other disasters. And no blame goes to Governor Blanco or Mayor Ray Nagin… > [@](#): > > - Running up an enormous federal deficit by giving huge tax cuts to the rich and a massive new Medicare benefit, thus squandering the opportunity to bring entitlement spending under control. I hope you don’t mind then the calls for cuts to Medicare and Social Security > [@](#): > > - Undermining government agencies in charge of environmental protection, worker safety, product safety, &c… Be more specific here. > [@](#): > > - Passing the No Child Left Behind Act. Which enjoyed massive bipartisan support. > [@](#): > > - Spying on American citizens via illegal wiretaps and other means. You don’t think any other President did that? > [@](#): > > - Having a disastrous approach to foreign policy that brought America’s reputation to an all-time low. No, all our allies remained allies while at the same time the US strengthened ties with Colombia, Georgia, India, and other countries. > [@](#): > > - Increased penalties for minor drug offenses, thus preventing people from rebuilding their lives. Cite… > [@](#): > > - Misusing the powers of the presidency to harass political opponents. > - Running a generally sleazy, corrupt administration. So did Grant, JFK, Nixon, Clinton… > [@](#): > > - Campaigning based solely on sleaze and lies, and poisoning national politics with nonstop attacks and negativity. > - and so forth. Negative attack ads have been part of political history > [@](#): > > I honestly can’t comprehend why anyone would list any other President as the worst ever. So Tyler joined the confederacy? So Harding had the Teapot-Dome scandal? So Nixon almost got impeached? None of them caused suffering for hundreds of millions of people both at home and abroad that lasted indefinitely. George W. Bush did that. The recession is fortunately far less painful than the Great Depression nor did any of Bush’s wars kill as many as in Vietnam or the Philippines. > [@Chefguy](#): > > I had to go with Millard Fillmore and his stance on slavery: to allow the newly annexed territories to have slaves in order to appease the south; signed the Fugitive Slave Act into law; signed onto the Compromise of 1850; opposed Lincoln as president. And I’m related to him. > > In modern times, 1900 - Present, George W. Bush, no question. Herbert Hoover? Jimmy Carter > [@beartato](#): > > Don’t blame me. _I_ voted for Buchanan. > > Anyway what did you expect when you posted this poll? If you wanted to avoid partisan bickering and discuss actual historical goodness/badness, make a poll that goes from Washington to, I don’t know, Coolidge or something. Anything beyond that and people start thinking along party lines, not accomplishments. Of course this forum is supposed to “fight ignorance” not be blinded by partisanship. > [@robert\_columbia](#): > > If it’s on the internets in must be true. That number more or less is used in most websites and history books. > [@Frank](#): > > I tend to agree that these best/worst President threads shouldn’t include Presidents from the last 20 or 30 years or so. > > I voted Polk, primarily due to the Mexican-American War. He was a great President who massively increased American territory and he was the only President to keep all his campaign promises. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/84 "2011-08-04T00:45:04Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > He was a great President who massively increased American territory and he was the only President to keep all his campaign promises. Fifty-four forty or fight? ---
**Author:** ![zamboniracer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e9a140/32.png) [@zamboniracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zamboniracer)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/85 "2011-08-04T00:45:32Z")
> [@MsWhatsit](#): > > Warren Harding should have way more votes than he does. Way more. It is the fault of the polling system. If we could vote for the worst 5, rather than just the worst one, then ol’ Warren would have his share of votes. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/86 "2011-08-04T00:49:13Z")
I love polls with a lack of perspective. Jackson wronged the Native Americans and played games with the banking system. Buchanan essentially precipitated the Civil War, if only through apathy. Harding was the single most corrupt President we’ve ever had. LBJ intentionally escalated a war that ultimately cost the lives of 58,000 Americans and countless Vietnamese. Nixon stupidly covered for his people in an affair about a race he couldn’t have lost. But George W. Bush is overwhelmingly the peoples’ choice as worst President of all time. Yeah, that’s an objective result. If you asked second graders with no knowledge of history, it sure is. ---
**Author:** ![Bri2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/48db29/32.png) [@Bri2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bri2k)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/87 "2011-08-04T01:48:44Z")
Buchanan, hands down. He was the last hope for preventing the Civil War and did nothing. It’s with some sense of shame I mention he’s the only Pennsylvanian to become President. Honorable mention to Grant. His administration was incredibly corrupt, even though he didn’t benefit personlly from any of it. Last of the “top three” would be Harding, Teapot dome and all that. I agree it’s almost impossible to have any sort of historical perspective on Presidents so long as they exist in living memory. Passions must cool before objective analysis can occur. That having been said, in modern times my list would include Hoover, Nixon, and Bush II. The more I see of Obama, the more I think he might make this list too. Reminds me of Nero fiddling while Rome burned. Bri2k ---
**Author:** ![lisacurl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/41988e/32.png) [@lisacurl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisacurl)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/88 "2011-08-04T02:41:27Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > The vote for William Henry Harrison confuses me. Sins of omission rather than commission, perhaps. Considering WHH died 30 or so days into his term from pneumonia contracted at his inauguration, he may have literally done nothing as President since he was gravely ill during the entire time. Should have worn a coat, Tippecanoe. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/89 "2011-08-04T02:49:45Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > He was a great President who massively increased American territory and he was the only President to keep all his campaign promises. He stole 1/3 of Mexico for no reason. Fulfilled his campaign promises? That’s all it takes to be great? If I were elected on a campaign promise of turning the U.S. into a theocratic nation that worshipped me, and I fulfilled that promise, would I be a great President? ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/90 "2011-08-04T03:04:45Z")
Someone voted for LINCOLN??? Nixon – lord only knows what would have happened if Woodward and Bernstein hadn’t exposed the whole mess. It’s a damned shame that we never found out what was on those tapes, or that he never stood trial. The sick thing is that he was truly an intelligent individual, but he was so fucking paranoid and corrupt, that he fucked himself over – and nearly the entire country as well. Historically? John Adams, if only for the Alien and Sedition Act. C’mon, you were there when they wrote the Bill of Rights, you HAD to know it was going to be unconstitutional! Dumbass. ---
**Author:** ![Swords\_to\_Plowshares](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b38774/32.png) [@Swords\_to\_Plowshares](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Swords_to_Plowshares)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/91 "2011-08-04T03:19:27Z")
Buchanan gets my vote (for that little civil war dust-up). Honorable mentions to Harding and Pierce. ---
**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:** [August 4, 2011, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/92 "2011-08-04T03:35:07Z")
Even if you exclude recent presidents, I don’t think any meaningful comparison is possible over such a broad swath of history. There are certainly several presidents of whom one might say that they were really, really bad, but within that category, I don’t think ordering is very meaningful. That said, what’s with all of the folks blaming Buchanan for the Civil War, or Andrew Johnson for Reconstruction? If we’re going to put the blame for either of those on one president, surely it would be Jefferson Davis. It was the South that decided they wanted that war, and they paid the lion’s share of the consequences for it. ---
**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:** [August 4, 2011, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/93 "2011-08-04T04:02:22Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > He stole 1/3 of Mexico for no reason. Polk should have done Mexico a favour and annexed all of it IMO. > [@Guinastasia](#): > > Someone voted for LINCOLN??? > > Nixon – lord only knows what would have happened if Woodward and Bernstein hadn’t exposed the whole mess. We might have avoided many of the misfortunes of the Ford and Carter presidencies and today people would just nod on about it like they did about Kennedy’s scandals. > [@Chronos](#): > > Even if you exclude recent presidents, I don’t think any meaningful comparison is possible over such a broad swath of history. There are certainly several presidents of whom one might say that they were really, really bad, but within that category, I don’t think ordering is very meaningful. > > That said, what’s with all of the folks blaming Buchanan for the Civil War, or Andrew Johnson for Reconstruction? If we’re going to put the blame for either of those on one president, surely it would be Jefferson Davis. It was the South that decided they wanted that war, and they paid the lion’s share of the consequences for it. He wasn’t the President of the USA, he was President of the CSA. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/94 "2011-08-04T10:22:20Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I mean, I’m no fan of torture either, but LBJ got the U.S. into the Vietnam War and authorized the first bombing campaigns that slaughtered God only knows how many innocents. So why not LBJ? Vietnam was a much greater disaster than Iraq; why does LBJ get off for that one? Corporate crime in Bush’s tenure wasn’t any worse than it usually has been - God, the late 19th century the companies were _shooting_ people - and so on and so forth. > > Bush was a terrible President, but you really have to consider Martin Hyde’s point; there were Presidents in the 19th century that made Bush look like King Solomon. Buchanan and Pierce (Pierce being drunk so often he was often called “the Hero Of Many A Well-Fought Bottle”) led the USA into a CIVIL WAR that killed six hundred thousand people. Guantanamo Bay is an ugly incident but sort of pales in comparison to… I dunno… Antietam. Broadly I would judge a president’s performance not by what level the country was at during his tenure, but by which direction the country went during his tenure, particularly as affected by decisions he made. In the late nineteenth century corporate abuse of workers was bad, but nonetheless there’s little direct responsibility for it that can be assigned to the presidents. But Dubya came into office at a time in history when we had an apparatus for controlling and investigating financial corporations. He chose to disable that apparatus, and the effects on the economy are quite visible. As for the Vietnam War, I agree that it was an atrocious crime against humanity. However, I don’t think it sinks any president below Dubya’s level. First, the blame for Vietnam gets spread over three presidents, whereas Dubya owns the second Iraq War entirely. Second, Dubya simply did everything badly as president, while Lyndon Johnson was decent of the domestic side. I don’t regard Dubya as a failure for any one thing as much as for totally screwing up everything. I’m unable to name any significant field in which he did well. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/95 "2011-08-04T11:38:43Z")
In looking over the votes I notice that I voted for Franklin Pierce when I meant to vote for John Tyler. Oh well, Pierce is also one of my top 5 worst. As for Bush, it’s hard to think of any specific bad thing he did that a previous President didn’t do to a worse degree. And a lot of the stuff that people blamed on Bush he honestly had little to do with. For example we have a poster saying Bush “disabled” the apparatus for regulating the financial sector, which just isn’t true. When it comes to issues of failures in oversight a lot of it has rightly been levied at the people working at the SEC, for being straight up incompetent in comparison to the savvy individuals they are supposed to police. If you read about how often the SEC looked into Bernard Madoff and didn’t find anything and how glaringly obvious his corruption was to other financial sector individuals, some of whom reported multiple times to the SEC that the dude was operating a massive Ponzi scheme, it shows to me the people in those jobs were incompetent. Not underfunded, understaffed, but genuinely incompetent, to be able to look at something equivalent to Madoff’s schemes and not immediately see what was going on. The whole subprime mortgage problem was already well stewing under the radar before Bush ever became President, and honestly you can blame Congress for it more than any recent President. It was mostly Congressional leaders that made names for themselves by pushing legislation to insure “every American can own a home”, the banks obviously engaged in risky behavior but it’s essentially very similar to the Panic of 1837. The Panic of 1837 was caused by massive land speculation, but that land speculation only happened because of an action Jackson took (destroying the 2nd Bank of the United States.) Banks were playing so loose with lending precisely because Congress was obsessed with this idea of making it easier and easier for under qualified people to get loans with small down payments. Does Bush have a hand in it? Sure, because he did support such schemes. However you can’t really point to a moment where Bush could have stopped it or a moment where Bush caused it, the growing mess was bigger than him. I mostly wave away anyone who thinks Bush should be considered the worst President for human rights abuses, military adventurism, getting our troops killed or etc. That’s something every President has engaged in and many ended up with more bodies on their watch than Bush. Also, Vietnam was was almost entirely Johnson’s. It’s horrible to me that so many people still keep punting the football somewhere else to avoid blaming LBJ. Yes, Kennedy has some involvement there, so did Eisenhower, it was minor and totally unremarkable. Neither Eisenhower or Kennedy engaged in any sort of policy in regards to Vietnam that bound Johnson’s hands, Johnson chose to escalate our involvement into that of full scale war from a very minor role prior to Johnson. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/96 "2011-08-04T11:47:27Z")
What puzzles me though is what is so radically different between getting involved in Korea as opposed to Vietnam (apart from the outcome). LBJ gets hammered for Vietnam, Truman gets little bad rap for Korea. The one big difference (to me) was that the USA (and allies) were already in Korea rather than helping to prop up a somewhat shakey regime. (if this snowballs I’m happy to start a separate thread). ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/97 "2011-08-04T12:19:42Z")
I think it’s simply that Vietnam lasted much longer and eventually became such a defining issue talked about and debated to this day that the Korean War got eclipsed. Most people don’t think of it much at all anymore as far as I can tell, much less argue over who deserves the blame. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/98 "2011-08-04T12:23:04Z")
I think you are correct. If it wasn’t for MASH it would probably not be remembered much at all. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/99 "2011-08-04T13:51:55Z")
> [@Cicero](#): > > What puzzles me though is what is so radically different between getting involved in Korea as opposed to Vietnam (apart from the outcome). > > LBJ gets hammered for Vietnam, Truman gets little bad rap for Korea. > > The one big difference (to me) was that the USA (and allies) were already in Korea rather than helping to prop up a somewhat shakey regime. > > (if this snowballs I’m happy to start a separate thread). For as much as we might not remember Korea as a huge issue or judge Truman’s decisions largely correct today, the fact remains that the Korean War was not popular at the time, and was a massive political issue in the election of 1952. [This famous speech by Eisenhower illustrates this,](http://tucnak.fsv.cuni.cz/~calda/Documents/1950s/Ike_Korea_52.html) and also shows the deep personal animosity Eisenhower felt toward Truman. This was, incidentally, a rather widely held view in 1952 - Truman’s approval rating dropped to 22% in early 1952 and never climbed much higher before his term ended. History has been kinder to Truman than contemporary voters would have been. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242/100 "2011-08-04T14:55:29Z")
> [@Cicero](#): > > What puzzles me though is what is so radically different between getting involved in Korea as opposed to Vietnam (apart from the outcome). > > LBJ gets hammered for Vietnam, Truman gets little bad rap for Korea. Are we trying to rewrite history? Another post points to a speech by Eisenhower which includes: [QUOTE=D. D. Eisenhower] The record of failure dates back-with red-letter folly-at least to September of 1947. It was then that Gen. Albert Wedemeyer-returned from a Presidential mission to the Far East-submitted to the President this warning: ‘‘The withdrawal of American military forces from Korea would result in the occupation of South Korea by either Soviet troops or, as seems more likely, by the Korean military units trained under Soviet auspices in North Korea.’’ That warning and his entire report were disregarded and suppressed by the Administration. [/QUOTE] See? Ike didn’t claim that defending South Korea was wrong, but the opposite: that the defense should have been stronger in the first place to deter the aggression. A key difference between Korea and Vietnam is that the former was more Communist aggression; the latter was more of a genuine civil war against neo-colonialism. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-worst-president/591242.md?page=6)