The Worst President in History?

Google search: Bush worst president

35,500,000 hits

Google search: Bush best president

159,000,000 hits

That's really interesting. I actually looked at some of the hits for "Bush best president", and some of them read like this... "bush best president money can buy...";
"funny pictures helping President Bush put his best face forward...";
"Bush Tops List As US Voters Name Worst President, Quinnipiac University National Poll Finds; Reagan, Clinton Top List As Best In 61 Years..."


I guess context is everything, huh, McG?

Here's page 1 of McG's search:

Results 1 - 10 of about 149,000,000 for bush best president. (0.40 seconds)

News results for bush best president - View today's top stories

Bush turns up heat to prevent same-sex marriages - Houston Chronicle - 10 hours ago
Voters view Bush as worst US president since WWII: poll - 新華網 - Jun 2, 2006
Poll: GW Bush 'worst' president since WWII; Reagan 'best' - USA Today - Jun 1, 2006


Too Stupid to be President
Top 12 suggested Bush administration explanations for the presence of a US plane on the Venezuelan island where President Chavez was held by his generals ...
www.toostupidtobepresident.com/ - 72k - Cached - Similar pages


About.com: George W. Bush HumorView a huge, regularly updated collection of cartoons, doctored photos, and other funny pictures helping President Bush put his best face forward. ...
politicalhumor.about.com/od/georgewbush/ - 29k - Cached - Similar pages


GW Bush : "the best President money can buy"
president-bush.com. This Administration is proudly sponsored by. Enron corporate logo ... The Education of A President · Leaked GW Bush "419" E-Mail ...
www.president-bush.com/enron.html - 3k - Cached - Similar pages


GW Bush: Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American ...President Bush addressed a joint session of Congress and the American people ... Perhaps the NATO Charter reflects best the attitude of the world: An attack ...
www.whitehouse.gov/news/ releases/2001/09/20010920-8.html - 58k - Cached - Similar pages


The White House05.28.2006: Transcript of Late-Night Phone Call Between President Bush and ... 05.09.2006: President Bush Issues Calm, Diplomatic Response to Historic ...
www.whitehouse.org/ - 45k - Jun 4, 2006 - Cached - Similar pages


Poll: Bush Worst President Since 1945, Ronald Reagan Picked As ...Bush Revives Gay Marriage Debate President Pushes Amendment Banning Same-Sex Marriage, • Man's Best Friend Invited To Dinner ...
www.cbsnews.com/stories/ 2006/06/01/politics/main1673345.shtml - 63k - Cached - Similar pages


Quinnipiac University | Search DetailJune 1, 2006 - Bush Tops List As US Voters Name Worst President, Quinnipiac University National Poll Finds; Reagan, Clinton Top List As Best In 61 Years ...
www.quinnipiac.edu/x11385.xml?ReleaseID=919 - 24k - Jun 4, 2006 - Cached - Similar pages


Bush’s best moment? Reeling in perch - Peculiar Postings - MSNBC.comPresident Bush told a German newspaper his best moment in more than five years in office was catching a big perch in his own lake.
www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12683890/ - 46k - Cached - Similar pages


The Raw Story | George W. Bush named worst president in 61 years
Leading the list for best President since 1945 is Ronald Reagan with 28 percent, and Clinton with 25 percent. President Bush is ranked worst by 56 percent ...
www.rawstory.com/news/2006/George_ W._Bush_named_worst_president_0601.html - 17k - Cached - Similar pages


President Bush Impersonation - 2006 White House Correspondents ...Best-selling TV shows. 1. Charlie Rose. 2. Survivor: Panama ... President Bush’s presentation included an impersonator, Steve Bridges, who "interpreted" the ...
video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1921276117304287501 - 56k - Jun 4, 2006 - Cached - Similar pages


Try your search again on Google Book Search


* * *

ROFL

Wow. Instead of realizing how fantastically stupid you appeared by posting a google search, you instead chose to continue acting like a fool by thinking my post was intended to do anything more than to mock yours.

How wonderfully retarded you are. I didn't think my opinion of you could go lower, but just goes to prove I was wrong.

Oh, McGentrix- I usually agree with you but I must really put a stop to your comments.

Don't you know who you are talking about?

That is Debra L A W. Do you know what it means when someone is named L A W? It means that they are expert in every kind of L A W.

However, I must say you have a point,Mr. McGentrix. It appears that Debra L A W is suffering under the delusion that comments on the Internet definitively show that President Bush is the worst president. Debra L A W apparently does not know that comments on the web merely show how many times someone has made such a comment.

I did a quick survey, Mr. McGentrix and found that of the 35,000,000 hits about Bush -Worst President- there is an interesting breakdown-

Democratic National Committee--2,343,334 hits

Move On----------------------------2,233,323 hits

Howard Dean----------------------2,132,234 hits

Ted Kennedy----------------------1,945,343 hits ( only of which 1,344,343
were comprehensible)

down to
worthies like Mr. Cyclopitchorn ---------39 hits

So, Mr. McGentrix, as long as you know where the "hits" are coming from and how often the same "usual suspects" are replicating them, you must allow Debra L A W to have fun.


You must, Mr. McGentrix allow me to post the hits I have researched.


Bush- 62,040, 610 "hits"

Kerry-59, 028, 111 "hits"

These are, of course, the votes in the Presidential Election of 2004 and the only votes that count. What Debra L A W may not know,is that unlike the Internet, no one is allowed to vote more than once--unlike Move on, the DNC, Ted Kennedy and Howard Dean do with their repeated "votes: which, because they are repeated so often by the elitist left wing media, add up to 35,000.000.

Mr. McGentrix- I know that Debra L A W is a genius in the L A W. How is she at math, do you know?

She may not know that 62,040,610 is greater than 35,000,000!

BernardR. That's R. As in Rsole.

I love this childish stuff. Thanks guys - needed a laugh.

R as in what, Mr. Hingehead?

**************************************************************
Oh, McGentrix- I usually agree with you but I must really put a stop to your comments.

Don't you know who you are talking about?

That is Debra L A W. Do you know what it means when someone is named L A W? It means that they are expert in every kind of L A W.

However, I must say you have a point,Mr. McGentrix. It appears that Debra L A W is suffering under the delusion that comments on the Internet definitively show that President Bush is the worst president. Debra L A W apparently does not know that comments on the web merely show how many times someone has made such a comment.

I did a quick survey, Mr. McGentrix and found that of the 35,000,000 hits about Bush -Worst President- there is an interesting breakdown-

Democratic National Committee--2,343,334 hits

Move On----------------------------2,233,323 hits

Howard Dean----------------------2,132,234 hits

Ted Kennedy----------------------1,945,343 hits ( only of which 1,344,343
were comprehensible)

down to
worthies like Mr. Cyclopitchorn ---------39 hits

So, Mr. McGentrix, as long as you know where the "hits" are coming from and how often the same "usual suspects" are replicating them, you must allow Debra L A W to have fun.


You must, Mr. McGentrix allow me to post the hits I have researched.


Bush- 62,040, 610 "hits"

Kerry-59, 028, 111 "hits"

These are, of course, the votes in the Presidential Election of 2004 and the only votes that count. What Debra L A W may not know,is that unlike the Internet, no one is allowed to vote more than once--unlike Move on, the DNC, Ted Kennedy and Howard Dean do with their repeated "votes: which, because they are repeated so often by the elitist left wing media, add up to 35,000.000.

Mr. McGentrix- I know that Debra L A W is a genius in the L A W. How is she at math, do you know?

She may not know that 62,040,610 is greater than 35,000,000!

1. Popularity has nothing to do with how effective a person is.
2. Accusing Truman of "giving China to Mao" is no more true today than when first made during the Red Scare of the '50's. Then it was said by Senator McCarthy and others that the FDR and Truman administrations were riddled with Communists and Fellow Travelers who betrayed the U.S. at every opportunity. Mostly B.S., though there were some Communists and Communist agents working in sensitive positions. Not Truman's fault, so why try to blacken the man's reputation? JFK had style and youth which really counted a lot when the front edge of the Baby Boom came to the polls. We blew him and his family up into national heros. He certainly was mistaken when he gave the go ahead to the plan for invading Cuba with "deniable assets". That didn't make him a coward, just a fast learner.

WWII wasn't FDR's war and neither was Vietnam LBJ's war. Vietnam was just one campaign in the long, long Cold War against enslavement of the Free World by the Soviet Union. The truth is we Americans have never been very comfortable with the idea of wars fought with no real expectation of Victory. Our involvement in the U.N. and international treaties have seriously changed the way in which military actions are entered into, and we still aren't used to it. Long before the fall of the Soviet Union there were a lot of folks who yearned for the good old days when wars were openly declared and fought between organized armies fighting directly for their nation's perceived welfare. Obsolete.

3. Asking who was the worst President in American History isn't an easy thing to respond to. What makes one "better" than another? Consistently listed by professional Historians as among the worst was James Buchanan. However, a close study of the man, his times and his administration paints a very different picture. Buchanan dedicated his entire life to the American form of government. He built a strong Democratic Party in the contentious political world of 19th century Pennsylvania, and was repeatedly elected to political office where his efforts made him very popular. He was known as a conciliator and mediated many compromises that could easily have degenerated into Civil War. He served as an Ambassador with difficult assignments. In office after a lifetime working for it, Old Buck inherited the Slavery Question after it was beyond any effort to avoid, but he did try and try very hard to keep the union together whilst loud voices, North and South, were calling for disunion. He was unable to exercise military force to prevent seizure of government arms and stores, because the Army was small and had been withdrawn from some of the most critical posts and depots. He never believed the Southern States were legally able to secede from the Union, and many of his policies were quietly continued by Lincoln who became the National Hero.

Andrew Jackson was one of the most popular American Presidents, a national icon, yet his administration was inefficient and largely ineffective. Jackson spent an inordinate amount of time fussing with the social acceptance of one of his cabinet officers wives. His economic policies boiled down to a hatred of the Biddle's Bank of America Charter, and eventually led to a terrible depression during the Van Buren administration. It was Jackson who ordered the removal of the Civilized Tribes, and who today would be held responsible for all the death and suffering of the Trail of Tears. Which of these two was the "better" President.

I've studied in detail many of the Presidents, and the more I study the greater is my conviction that everyone of them had both wonderful and terrible traits. None that I've found are without blemish, and even Nixon had some strong points that shouldn't be forgotten. Nixon was followed by Gerald Ford. President Ford was made a national joke for his poor speaking ability, his tendency to stumble and throw up at State Dinners in Tokyo. Actually, President Ford was a good man, almost the perfect man for the county's need in the wake of Nixon's Impeachment. He was criticised for pardoning Nixon, but it did indeed help the nation get back on track. President Ford deserves better. President Cart is one of the most admirable men to have been elected to the Presidency in the last 100 years. I greatly admire the man, his compassion and honesty are wonderful models for what we hope our children will be. On the other hand, he was also one of the most inept of all the Presidents. His handling of the hostage situation in Iran was about as poorly conceived and carried out as is possible. He made himself into a lame duck and gave up his Presidential powers far too early in his administration, and later couldn't get even the most obvious things accomplished. Which President was "worse", Ford or Carter?

4. The obvious intent of this thread is as a place where the Bush haters can voice their displeasure. This is the place for public polls that have nothing to do with how well the President and his administration are performing. Here is a fine place to point to all the terrible things done since the younger Bush was first elected President. The thread might have been used for more constructive purposes; a joint investigation by A2K posters into Presidential Myths and History, for instance. I would like to have seen at least one fairly objective post on each of our past Presidents. Instead, of bashing Bush why not read authorative accounts of the Pierce Administration? Before rushing to proclaim how great, or how bad a President was, one should seek out and read materials taking the alternative view. However, that's work and its much easier and more fun to make the most outrageous charges against the current administration. "Don't confuse me with the facts".

Mr. Asherman. I do not wish to intrude on your privacy but I must say that if you were not an academic- A teacher on the University Level, you should have been one.

With regard to your excellent and very true comment about looking for a president's good points and bad points, I must refer you to an excellent book( You have probably read it) called- The Presidential Difference by Dr, Fred I Greenstein. He does exactly what you have counseled the posters on this thread to do-He lists the good points and bad points of each president since Hoover using both his studies and the studies of other experts.

EG-

Clinton- Public Communication---Outstanding

Organizational Capacity--rather disorganized

Vision----------------------Excellent Grasp of Policy specifics
but did not translate into a clearly
defined point of view

Cognitive style-------------No doubt about his impressive
intelligence

Emotional Intelligence----His psychic shortcomings were
debilitating.Likely to be remembered
as a politically talented
Underachiever.

Dr. Greenstein does the same for each president beginning with FDR and his analysis is wonderful.

Of course, the Bush haters would never read a book like this since it might give them some kind of intellectual insights that they apparently do not have.

Again, Mr., Asherman--I take my hat off to you-- I hope we can have more of your highly informative essays!

Hi Ash

I thought you bought some sanity to this debate - but let me put this scenario to you:

A president in the future, of any political persuasion, is dragging his nation down through poor advisers, lack of vision, putting self interest above national interest, appealing to the lowest common denominator and short term wants as opposed to long term needs.

And historians and people of the opposite political ilk start writing essays about what a bad president he is, probably the worst in living memory.

Just because other presidents have had good and bad points and on average there isn't much difference between them does not mean that will always be the case. It is just possible that one will be really bad - regardless of the calibre of those before him (or her) the past does not predicate the future. Remember the turkey who rushes to the gate every day because the farmer feeds him. Come late November it wasn't food waiting for him.


It really is to early to judge Bush - though there is plenty of room to debate the immediate consequences of what he's done and is doing.

As a side point I blame Truman for handing Vietnam back to the French post WWII, in spite of Vietnamese appeals for self-determination. But it must have seemed a trivial matter to him and his administration at the time...

That is an extremely logical statement.

For most people,history starts with their birth.
There are people living today that dont know anything about the Vietnam war,because it happened before they were born,so its not part of their history.

The same can be said for WW2,Korea,the great depression,and every other event in history.
If it didnt happen in their lifetime,then it isnt history.

I am always leery of anyone or anything being called the best or worst "in history",because when does that history start,and how are you defining it.

And further to Mysterman's point.

Often a president can be defined by events set in train well before he came to power.

Examples

(as previously mentioned) Truman backing the handing of Vietnam back to colonial France, JFK escalating America's involvement - but Nixon is president as the US fights itself in the early 1970s to extricate itself from the mess it created.

Carter is often defined by the way he dealt with the Iranian hostage crisis. But it would never have happened if the CIA hadn't engineered the Shah's 1953 coup d'etat, under Truman.

I think, as MM says, the majority of people define history as what happens in their memories - but largely those memories are constructed by the media outlets they choose and the social circles they choose to roam in.

For the few of us who do try and learn about what happened before we were born - we still have to realise that the histories we read are coloured by the writers of those histories.

The President is granted great power by the Constitution, and those powers have (of necessity) been extended somewhat by Congress. It is almost inevitable that on occasion, some of the Presidential powers will be abused. That is worry some, but was provided for in the construction of the Constitution. Actually, the Framer's expectations ran into a number of problems early on, but the genius of the system corrected the oversights.

Presidents have pushed their powers to the limits in the past, usually during times of great national crisis ... though not all major challenges are recognized, or even known, to the general public. Since the Great Depression, this nation has undergone almost revolutionary changes in our expectations of what the Federal Government should be/do. The philosophical foundations of the nation have evolved from the world of the 18th century, and will continue to evolve in the future. We can not say what the American People will expect and demand of their government in the future.

In your hypothetical, our representative system and Constitution have several remedies. (There is no wrong, for which the Law does not have some remedy). First, the People elect representatives who are generally pretty diligent in protecting their constituent's interests. You can't effectively have any input into law or policy if you aren't in Office. So elected officials cater to the electorate. If the electorate's interests are not being served they will lose to an opponent of the other Party, and they will do the People's will. The electoral process does not guarantee that the "best man" will win, but it limits and constrains how office holders behave. In these days, when sophisticated PR can spin almost anything, each citizen has a positive duty to "cut through" the rhetoric. Generally, my advice is not to subscribe to the commentariat of either Party. Most of those talking heads have no better knowledge or understanding of the world than I, or any other citizen should have. When in doubt, retreat to the fundamental principles of representative government and the Constitution. We don't need some flak to tell us about those things, do we?

The Founders provided a means for handling public servants whose behavior in office is an affront to the Constitution and Law. That mechanism is Impeachment, but it was never intended to be a commonly used part of the Loyal Oppositions toolkit. That's how the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson came to a vote on the Senate Floor. In the second case in two hundred years, Richard Nixon escaped certain Senate condemnation by resigning the Office. I don't thing many would suggest that Nixon was Impeached as part of a partisan campaign, or that he did not in office act blatantly against the principles of the Constitution and our laws. Personally, I believe that Clinton's felonious perjury before a Federal Grand Jury should have resulted in his conviction ... though admittedly the affair was mostly a result of partisan politics. If George Bush violated our principles of government and the Constitution, he would have been impeached. He wasn't. He might have been defeated in the polls. He wasn't. He may be the "worst" President in history to some, but his behavior in Office has not been illegal, nor so outrageous that the American People can't wait for another election.

Though the electorate can, has and will again in the future, made terrible choices ... that's our system of government. The Will of the People is a risky thing, but the whole system is endangered when we lose our faith in it.

Asherman, you make some good points and write a good summary. My main disagreement is that Clinton's problems were not a result of partisan politics. Perhaps they were partisan simply because the Democratic Party now thinks more of protecting their party than they do the country and moral principles. When Nixon resigned, it is my recollection that some Republicans marched into his office and said, Pal its time to go. Democrats lacked the honor and moral fortitude to do the same.

In the view of many of us, Clinton had the most corrupt administration in all of American history, and only survived because the Democratic machine and its lawyers and defenders circled the wagons repeatedly. He was by far the worst president ever, and I attribute the extreme partisanship now to the divisiveness created during and because of his administration.

Again, the erudite Mr. Asherman reminds us all that our government is a system of "checks and balances". I can hardly improve on his explanation but I will attempt to embellish it with two examples.

l.. In October 2001, President Bush was given full authority to attack Iraq unilaterally. The Congress in a bipartisan and overwhelming vote gave President Bush the full go-ahead to use the military as he determined to be necessary and appropriate.

That is certainly a government operating under the system of checks and balances. The legislature approved the war. The legislature also has the power to fund the continuation of the war or, conversely, to stop funding it.

2. In 2003, the United States Supreme Court decided the cases of Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger. The Bush Administration as reflected in the stance of the Justice Department was not in favor of "quota systems" but Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, writing for the majority of the Supreme Court stated that the law school program was sufficiently tailored to survive a strict scrutiny analysis and said that attaining a diverse student body is at the heart of the Law School's proper institutional mission.

This is clearly a defeat for the Administation's view and again shows "checks and balances" at work.

The learned Mr. Asherman again shows his learning and wisdom when he states "Personally, I believe that Clinton's felonious perjury before the Federal Grand Jury should have resulted in his conviction".

My favorite Jurist, the extremely juridically talented, Richard A. Posner brilliantly echosMr. Asherman. Judge Posner wrote( in An Affair of State--P. 54--"Even if, as I do not for a moment believe, none of President Clinton's lies under oath amounted to perjury IN THE STRICT TECHNICAL SENSE, they were false and misleading statements designed to derail legal proceedings and so they were additional acts of obstruction of justice...His (Clinton's) lies were civil as well as criminal wrongs and Judge Wright has decided to impose monetary sanctions on Clinton for his misconduct in the Jones case."

Ah, Bernard, in October 2001 Bush announced he would invade Afghanistan:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/10/20011007-8.html

To hunt down Al Quaeda in that country.

Sheesh. Though I should be more forgiving, after all as early as January 2001 it was clear Bush was looking for a reason to invade Iraq, On the 30th of that month at Bush's first National Security Meeting:



So I guess you could get cause and effect mixed up....

Mr. Hingehead- May I respectfully suggest that you 1. Read more carefully and 2. Do more background reading.

First of all, President Bush announced that he would order strikes against Afghanistan. The speech says NOTHING about invading Afghanistan. Re-read it please.

This speech was given on Oct.7th. As I pointed out, with documentation, the Congress of the United States gave President Bush full authority to invade Iraq on October 10th and 11th.

I am sure, Mr. Hingehead, that you are familiar with the speech given by President Clinton, who, without any kind of feedback from Congress, unilaterally ordered missles to strike Iraq on Dec. 18th 1998.


On Dec. 18th 1998 Clinton spoke to the Nation and said:

quote

Earlier today, I ordered America's armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq

end of quote

and President Clinton also said in that same speech----


quote

'THE BEST WAY TO END THAT THREAT( FROM IRAQ) IS WITH A NEW IRAQI GOVERNMENT...BRINGING CHANGE IN BAGHDAD WILL TAKE TIME AND EFFORT, WE WILL STRENGTHEN OUR ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FULL RANGE OF IRAQI OPPOSITION FORCES AND WORK WITH THEM EFFECTIVELY AND PRUDENTLY"

end of Clinton quote

Now, read your quote from Jan. 30th. The only thing in that quote that has anything to do with any kind of action against anyone is quote

"It was about what we can do to change this regime"( Iraq).

This is similar to the charge given by Clinton on 12/28/1998 only 3,000 of our fellow citizens hadn't yet been murdered in the WTC.


Go back to read it over, Mr. Hingehead!!!

I should have learnt by now how frivolous you are with truth and integrity.

Congress approved HR114 on October 10 2002

Why on earth do you drag Clinton into it - like I give rats ass about him.

Obfuscator.