US President Ratings

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 8, 2011

Inspired by the recent discussion in another thread, I'm curious what people here think of past U.S. presidents.

"Rankings" however may be too much: none of us are really experts on every last president, and also making an ordered list of 43 presidents is a hassle. So I'll suggest instead that we just place presidents into a simple set of categories:

FAVORITES

LIKE

NEUTRAL

DISLIKE

LEAST FAVORITES

and NO OPINION for presidents we don't feel we know enough about, to judge.

Click to reveal.. (List of all the presidents, for reference)

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 8, 2011

Here are mine, for a start:

FAVORITES:

Washington, Madison, John Quincy Adams, Lincoln

LIKE:

Jefferson, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, FDR, Eisenhower, Nixon, Carter

NEUTRAL:

John Adams, Polk, Buchanan, Coolidge, JFK, Johnson, Ford, George H.W. Bush, Clinton, Obama

DISLIKE:

Monroe, Van Buren, Tyler, Taylor, Johnson, McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson, Harding, Hoover, Truman, Reagan

LEAST FAVORITES:

Jackson, Fillmore, Pierce, George W. Bush

NO OPINION:

Harrison, Arthur, Cleveland

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 8, 2011

FAVORITES

Obama, FDR, Grant, Jefferson, Truman, Eisenhower

LIKE

Lincoln, Teddy, JFK, Wilson

NEUTRAL

Hoover, Reagan, Washington

DISLIKE

Clinton

LEAST FAVORITES

Bush

NO OPINION

All the rest. I don't know/care enough about them to list them, sadly.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 8, 2011

FAVORITES

Clinton, Roosevelt I, Roosevelt II

LIKE

Kennedy, Wilson, Nixon, Eisenhower, Obama, Truman

NEUTRAL

Johnson, Carter, Coolidge, Taft, Ford

DISLIKE

Harding, Hoover, Reagan,

LEAST FAVORITES

Bush I, Bush II

NO OPINION

Anyone before the 20th century

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

FAVORITES

George Washington, 1789-1797

John Adams, 1797-1801

Thomas Jefferson, 1801-1809

James Madison, 1809-1817

Abraham Lincoln, 1861-1865

Grover Cleveland, 1885-1889, 1893-1897

Calvin Coolidge, 1923-1929

Ronald Wilson Reagan, 1981-1989

LIKE

Andrew Jackson, 1829-1837 (espeically for handling the 1832 Nullification Crisis - booyah, South Carolina!)

Zachary Taylor, 1849-1850

Theodore Roosevelt, 1901-1909 (only for foreign policy)

George Walker Bush, 2001-2009

DISLIKE

James Knox Polk, 1845-1849

Andrew Johnson, 1865-1869

William McKinley, 1897-1901

Theodore Roosevelt, 1901-1909 (only for domestic policy)

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 1961-1963

Lyndon Baines Johnson, 1963-1969

James Earl Carter, Jr., 1977-1981

William Jefferson Clinton, 1993-2001

LEAST FAVORITES

James Buchanan, 1857-1861

Woodrow Wilson, 1913-1921

Herbert Clark Hoover, 1929-1933

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1933-1945

Richard Milhous Nixon, 1969-1974

Barack Hussein Obama, 2009-

NEUTRAL or NO OPINION (all the ones I either don't know enough about or know something but can't quite decide how to interpret them)

James Monroe, 1817-1825

John Quincy Adams, 1825-1829

Martin Van Buren, 1837-1841

William Henry Harrison, 1841

John Tyler, 1841-1845

Millard Fillmore, 1850-1853

Franklin Pierce, 1853-1857

Ulysses Simpson Grant, 1869-1877

Rutherford Birchard Hayes, 1877-1881

James Abram Garfield, 1881

Chester Alan Arthur, 1881-1885

Benjamin Harrison, 1889-1893

William Howard Taft, 1909-1913

Warren Gamaliel Harding, 1921-1923

Harry S. Truman, 1945-1953

Dwight David Eisenhower, 1953-1961

Gerald Rudolph Ford, 1974-1977

George Herbert Walker Bush, 1989-1993

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

FAVORITES:

Hamilton (Yes, I know he wasn't a President, but he was the best Founding Father and was easily as or more influential than almost any president. And Secretary of the Treasury is like the president. It's around six steps away at any rate.), Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, FDR, Eisenhower, Nixon (!), Clinton.

LIKE: Washington, Adams, Teddy Roosevelt, Wilson, Carter, some bits of Reagan, JFK (SPAAAAACE!).

NEUTRAL: Any presidents between Jackson and Lincoln and any presidents between Johnson and Teddy, because they didn't really do that much, H.W., Ford, Johnson, anyone I forgot to put elsewhere because I don't remember "blah blah blah signed the Missouri Compromise blah blah quasi war etc." stuff from American History two decades ago that was boring.

DISLIKE: Harry S Truman (there's no period, his middle name was S, just the letter S.), Carter, McKinley.

DOWN WITH THIS SORT OF PRESIDENT:

Most bits of Reagan, GWB, Hoover, Coolidge, Grant.

SPECIAL CATEGORY THAT WITHHOLDS HISTORICAL JUDGEMENT UNTIL 2012 (OR 2016 IF ROMNEY IS NOT NOMINATED):

Barack Obama

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

Dantius, you're the second person I've encountered who lists Nixon as one of his favorite presidents. Interesting.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

Originally Posted By: Triumph

Dantius, you're the second person I've encountered who lists Nixon as one of his favorite presidents. Interesting.

There are two reasons for this, actually:

1. I am firmly of the opinion that Nixon did more to end the Cold War than any other president at the time. Detente, China, drawing down Vietnam, etc. I also think that these achievements tend to be overshadowed by the whole Watergate scandal, which is also very unfortunate, since I would certainly place Nixon as among the most intelligent and savviest presidents we've had, and it's a real smae his legacy got tarnished because of his obsessive paranoia.

2. I'm also fairly certain that, if I were elected president, I'd basically be Nixon all over again without pasty makeup, so the fact that he reminds me of me earns him enough brownie points to push him from "like" into "favorite".

I do find it odd that you'd remark on me being the second. If I may inquire, who was the first?

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

Originally Posted By: Tyranicus

LIKE
Kennedy, Wilson, Nixon, Eisenhower, Obama, Truman

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 9, 2011

FAVORITES

Washington, Jefferson, Cleveland

LIKE

Madison

NEUTRAL

Coolidge

DISLIKE

Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Van Buren, Tyler, Polk, Taylor, Fillmore, Pierce, Buchanan, Johnson, Grant, Hayes, Arthur, Benjamin Harrison, McKinley, Taft, Harding, Truman, Eisenhower, JFK, Ford, Carter, Reagan, George HW Bush, Clinton

LEAST FAVORITES

John Adams, Jackson, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Wilson, Hoover, FDR, LBJ, Nixon, George W Bush, Obama

NO OPINION

William Henry Harrison, Garfield

This topic is fun. I found Jackson the most difficult one to place. My favorite president is Cleveland and my least favorite president is FDR.

Unflappable Drayk · September 9, 2011

i like taft because he got stuck in a bathtub

i also love garfield because......forget it wrong garfield

Ineffable Wingbolt · September 9, 2011

Originally Posted By: Darth Ernie

i like taft because he got stuck in a bathtub
i also love garfield because......forget it wrong garfield

Seriously, someone who likes the cat Garfield, which ceased to be funny years ago? (I used to be obsessed with Garfield after reading the early ones, then it became the same freaking jokes continuing endlessly.)

Or do you mean the "Other" one?

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

Originally Posted By: Dantius

I do find it odd that you'd remark on me being the second. If I may inquire, who was the first?

Your argument for Nixon's quality is more compelling than the other guy. It makes me want to investigate him further.

Anyway, the one other person I've ever met who saw past Watergate to consider Nixon one of his favorite presidents was a fellow grad student. He rated Nixon in his top five presidents because he so admired Nixon's measures to the protect the environment (his other top fivers were Washington, Lincoln, and the Roosevelt cousins, IIRC).

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

FAVORITES

Theodore Roosevelt - After the nation had been attending to the needs of corporations for years, Roosevelt roared with the strength of a bull-moose to create environmental regulations and bust trusts. His was the start of my beloved Progressive Era.

Franklin D. Roosevelt - I love the alphabet soup organizations he created to help with the Depression through priming the pump, his promise to free the Filipinos, recognition of the USSR, and Good Neighbor Policy. That said, I dislike his attempt to pack the court, his imprisonment of the Japanese-Americans in internment camps, and his initial appeasement of the isolationists concerning the outbreak of World War Two.

LIKE

George Washington - I think there's too much of a mythos around him. He's good, but only because the situations forced him to be. I wouldn't vote for him.

John Adams - I remember precious little, but I believe that the addition of the midnight judges was a good move on his part.

Thomas Jefferson - His belief in a perpetual agrarian republic seems naive in retrospect, but he still did a lot of important things, both in and outside of the presidency.

Andrew Jackson - He's a very divisive figure, and in many senses was the epitome of the common man in American politics. His mythos may only be passed by Lincoln in that respect. Anyway, the triumph of King Numbers was a good precedent over the elite, which set a precedent for the Progressive reforms later on. I don't support a lot of his policies, especially concerning the natives and the Bank of the United States, but his inclusion of the kitchen cabinet, general triumph for popular democracy, and his handling of South Carolina and Texas were admirable.

William Henry Harrison - He wasn't in office long enough to do anything worth evaluating, BUT Tippecanoe is a good nickname.

Millard Fillmore - Well, the Compromise of 1850 was important. If the Civil War had broken out at his time, the North probably would not have had developed well enough economically to win.

Abraham Lincoln - Though I compared Jackson to Lincoln, I actually favor Jackson to Lincoln. The war was fought in a way that was less than amazing, due to poor leadership in generals. This wasn't entirely Lincoln's fault, per se, but that fact, compounded with the civil rights abuses makes him sink down in my view. Of course, he still did a good job, as many know.

Grover Cleveland - In the era of terrible presidents after Lincoln, Garfield was good. In any other era, he's forgettable. I admire his policies trying to reverse the process of the annexation of Hawaii, though.

William Taft - Living in the legacy of Roosevelt was impossible, obviously, but I can admire that, for the time, trying to step away from hard power and utilize dollar diplomacy was a good move. Moreover, he continued to bust trusts in Roosevelt's legacy.

Woodrow Wilson - Wilson would definitely be a favorite president, had it not been for his segregation of the federal government, and also his infringing on civil rights during World War One. That said, his Progressive reforms on economics were admirable, as was his initial idealism trying to end the war with the Fourteen Points.

Dwight D. Eisenhower - Generally, I like Ike. However, he really dropped the ball on civil rights for the most part. Still, the Interstate Highway System is good, as was ending the war in Korea.

John F. Kennedy - Though not in office for long, he did manage to avoid a global thermonuclear war. Cuba was very much the result of American policies in Turkey, and he didn't really resolve that, but he managed to NOT use military force to make the situation diffuse. At least we survived to explore his New Frontier as normal humans, and not irradiated mutants.

Lyndon B. Johnson - Barely makes this list. "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?" being the main reason. However, his good grace to not seek reelection, and also his Great Society and the War on Poverty were both good programs.

Richard Nixon - Cambodia and Watergate aside, detente with the USSR, recognition of the PRC, and the New Federalism program were both beneficial, I would say. He's the last Republican you'll find on this list.

James Carter - He never lied to us, and as a peanut farmer from Georgia, he did well to create moral diplomacy, especially with the Camp David Accords.

Bill Clinton - Temporary Assistance for Needy Families is a true shame of welfare. However, he did try, and Don't Ask, Don't Tell, while still bad, was a step forward, as were his attempts to reform healthcare and immigration. His foreign policy wasn't inspiring, but it at least promised the use of international coalitions and soft power instead of big stick hegemony.

DISLIKE

James Madison - I'm not at all a fan of the wasted war of Mr. Madison, and I think that, while there was no easy solution to the issue of trade with Great Britain and France, the War of 1812 could have been avoided.

James Monroe - In the aftermath of the War of 1812, I don't feel Monroe took enough advantage of the Era of Good Feelings.

Martin Van Buren - The Little Magician was all of the bad traits of Jackson (Divorce Bill? Really) without any real redeeming traits.

John Tyler - Texas really wasn't a good situation, and I mourn the effect that Texas and the Mexican War had on relations between Latin America and the United States.

James Polk - If annexing Texas was a mistake, the Mexican War was a travesty. Boo.

Andrew Johnson - He really hurt Reconstruction efforts devastatingly, though he didn't kill them. He was a racist, and that affected his policies for the Freedmen's Bureau, as well as forcing Congress to become more radical. Historically, this has lead to situations like spiraling insanity in the French Revolution; the United States is fortunate that didn't happen with this situation.

Calvin Coolidge - While not as bad as Harding, he still succeeded to veto the veteran's compensation act, pass the quota-based system of immigration, and try to mandate world peace via the foolish Kellogg-Briand Pact.

Harry Truman - At one of the most forgotten crucial points in history, Truman blundered by building hostilities with the USSR. The distrust that built up and burst out in McCarthyism was irreversible when Truman let it happen; the Cold War started under his steady watch. That said, the Fair Deal was a good idea.

Gerald Ford - He lost a few too many brain cells on the football field, and served much as a shield for Nixon.

Ronald Reagan - Many of Reagan's policies were brilliant. However, his principles were unsettling; Reagonomics has never worked, empirically, in American history. Moreover, when it came to the Soviet Union, echoing Teddy Roosevelt's big stick policy was a bad move, even if the gambit did end up paying off. Finally, his moral politics were regressive on policies like affirmative action, abortion, and gay rights. While expanding government spending, he also set into the American conscious the drive to shrink government drastically.

George H.W. Bush - Read my lips: no good presidency. Also, after the fall of the USSR, he failed to make a definitive US foreign policy.

George W. Bush - 9/11, Iraq and Afghanistan, Katrina, recession are the ones that leap to mind instantly.

LEAST FAVORITES

Franklin Pierce - I dislike the expansionistic presidents, generally. While Pierce threatened Spain with the Ostend Manifesto, the Civil War had already started in Bleeding Kansas.

James Buchanan - Does ANYONE like this guy? Understandably, the nation was going to hell in a handbasket, and while Buchanan didn't let the situation devolve into direct conflict, he also didn't help the situation in any substantial ways.

Ulysses Grant - This man waved the bloody flag such that he tried to hide the corrupt dealings of his admnistration, from Credit Mobilier's shame of the railroad system to Black Friday with the near cornering of the market, as well as tax scandals from the Whiskey Ring... Bad news.

Rutherford B. Hayes - The Compromise of 1877 was one of the worst, forgotten tragedies of American history. The civil rights movement was practically abandoned in order to make this man president,

Benjamin Harrison - The Sherman Anti-Trust Law meant well; it really did. However, its use to bust unions up was clearly against the spirit of the bill, and Harrison should have worked to prevent such abuse of the law by the Supreme Court.

William McKinley - The Spanish-American War was completely unnecessary and foolish. All the United States achieved was the saddling of the country with the burden of further war in the Philippines and the legacy of the Platt Amendment in Cuba.

Warren Harding - Shutting the door on the League of Nations and the world, Harding instead focused on creating the Teapot Dome scandal of selling navy oil for profit, amongst other more minor scandals.

Herbert Hoover - While he would have been an exceptional president during Harding or Coolidge's terms, he got hit with the short end of the stick when the Roaring Twenties roared into a crash. He did not do enough following that, however, to be of benefit, and instead vaguely tried to pass leadership to the states. The Hawley-Smoot Tariff was a badly timed piece of legislation, and the Reconstruction Finance Corporation was too small of a step to deal with the economy. Also, sending MacArthur to attack the Bonus Army probably wasn't a good idea, especially when the gas he used ended up killing a baby.

NEUTRAL/NO OPINION

John Quincy Adams - I dislike the Corrupt Bargain, though I like Henry Clay, but at the same time that is not enough to judge a president.

Zachary Taylor - Sorry, dead white guys, but you tend to blur a little in my mind. Especially when you die in office.

James Garfield - One of the bearded zeroes of the Reconstruction era

Chester Arthur - Another bearded zero

Barack Obama - I will wait until he's finished his term(s). However, Libya, the closing of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Bin Laden, his work on economic reform, healthcare, etc. will all weigh on my mind. Ultimately, I think he's a good president so far, but not necessarily a good leader, due to his seeming eagerness to compromise.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 9, 2011

Whether you like him or not, Nixon was a very capable president. He knew how to do the job much better than a lot of other people I can mention. In my opinion, the only person in recent history that was as good at the job as Nixon was Clinton. I listed Clinton as a favorite and Nixon as merely liked because much of Nixon's ideology is at odds with mine, whereas Clinton's was mostly dead on.

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 9, 2011

Originally Posted By: Goldenking

Quote:

George Washington - I think there's too much of a mythos around him. He's good, but only because the situations forced him to be. I wouldn't vote for him.

What Washington had going for him was his balance of humility and the use of force, which he also applied to the nation's affairs -- see, the unexpected precedent of lack of abuse of power, and the Whiskey Rebellion; also, his contempt of political parties. Eisenhower was similar in this regard, and perhaps not coincidentally also a military leader.

Millard Fillmore - Well, the Compromise of 1850 was important. If the Civil War had broken out at his time, the North probably would not have had developed well enough economically to win.

What makes you say that?

Quote:

Dwight D. Eisenhower - Generally, I like Ike. However, he really dropped the ball on civil rights for the most part.

Wikipedia says:
"The Eisenhower administration declared racial discrimination a national security issue, meaning that the Communists around the world were using racial discrimination in the U.S. as a point of propaganda attack.[69] The day after the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its decision in Brown v. Board of Education in which segregated ("separate but equal") schools were ruled to be unconstitutional, Eisenhower told District of Columbia officials to make Washington a model for the rest of the country in integrating black and white public school children.[70][71] He proposed to Congress the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960 and signed those acts into law. The 1957 Act for the first time established a permanent civil rights office inside the Justice Department. Although both Acts were much weaker than subsequent civil rights legislation (due mostly to the Democratically controlled Senate opposing the original bills (especially Southern Democrats) lead by Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Baines Johnson), they constituted the first significant civil rights acts since the Civil Rights Act of 1875, signed by President Ulysses S. Grant.
The "Little Rock Nine" incident of 1957 involved the refusal by Arkansas to honor a Federal court order to integrate the schools. Under Executive Order 10730, Eisenhower placed the Arkansas National Guard under Federal control and sent Army troops to escort nine black students into Little Rock Central High School, an all-white public school. The integration did not occur without violence. Eisenhower and Arkansas governor Orval Faubus engaged in tense arguments."

LEAST FAVORITES

Quote:

Rutherford B. Hayes - The Compromise of 1877 was one of the worst, forgotten tragedies of American history. The civil rights movement was practically abandoned in order to make this man president,

Look it up on Wikipedia -- that's not quite how it played out.

Hmm, I suppose I had better justify my choices now.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 9, 2011

I thought about justifying my choices, but it really comes down to the fact that I'm a card-carrying (literally) constructionist member of the Libertarian Party.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 9, 2011

Originally Posted By: Slarty

What Washington had going for him was his balance of humility and the use of force, which he also applied to the nation's affairs -- see, the unexpected precedent of lack of abuse of power, and the Whiskey Rebellion; also, his contempt of political parties. Eisenhower was similar in this regard, and perhaps not coincidentally also a military leader.

He had humility for good cause, I believe; he was a general, but not really a politician. That said, he did good things, most importantly in setting precedents. However, none of the things that he did were amazingly good, in my opinion, and I feel like other people of the time were better politicians, even if he was the most popular.

Also, I disagree with Washington's dislike of political parties. He says we shouldn't have them; I say we should have more of them, and that's never something I've been able to agree with Washington on. Entangling alliances, on the other hand...

Originally Posted By: Slarty

Millard Fillmore
What makes you say that?

Obviously hypothetical situations can always be debated. However, in 1850 the North was not as developed industrially and economically as they were ten years later, while the South stayed under more or less the same cash crop system. So, when the Civil War started, the North had grown in industry, infrastructure (railroads), and population such that it was better able to fight the war.

Had the Compromise not have passed, and sectional tensions continued to magnify into an early Civil War, the North still may have won, but the wait certainly helped.

Originally Posted By: Slarty

Wikipedia says:
"The Eisenhower administration declared racial discrimination a national security issue, meaning that the Communists around the world were using racial discrimination in the U.S. as a point of propaganda attack.[69] The day after the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its decision in Brown v. Board of Education in which segregated ("separate but equal") schools were ruled to be unconstitutional, Eisenhower told District of Columbia officials to make Washington a model for the rest of the country in integrating black and white public school children.[70][71] He proposed to Congress the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960 and signed those acts into law. The 1957 Act for the first time established a permanent civil rights office inside the Justice Department. Although both Acts were much weaker than subsequent civil rights legislation (due mostly to the Democratically controlled Senate opposing the original bills (especially Southern Democrats) lead by Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Baines Johnson), they constituted the first significant civil rights acts since the Civil Rights Act of 1875, signed by President Ulysses S. Grant.
The "Little Rock Nine" incident of 1957 involved the refusal by Arkansas to honor a Federal court order to integrate the schools. Under Executive Order 10730, Eisenhower placed the Arkansas National Guard under Federal control and sent Army troops to escort nine black students into Little Rock Central High School, an all-white public school. The integration did not occur without violence. Eisenhower and Arkansas governor Orval Faubus engaged in tense arguments."

My laziness in justification is evident here. However, what I was trying to say was that Eisenhower was not taking a leadership issues - that came from the Supreme Court. Eisenhower went along with the Supreme Court's will, and facilitated that, especially in Little Rock. However, we didn't get real, substantial and successful leadership from the President on civil rights until near the end of Kennedy's life, and then on to Johnson's term.

Originally Posted By: Slarty

Rutherford B. Hayes Look it up on Wikipedia -- that's not quite how it played out.

You're right, of course; I oversimplified the issue. However, the Compromise of 1877 meant the end of military reconstruction, which meant that the carpetbaggers and scalawags no longer had any real degree of power in the South anymore. This lead a further degree of backsliding on racial issues in the South.

Also, my memory was just a bit fuzzy on the details in the first place. Looking back over Wikipedia helped me remember what I was trying to say.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Goldenking

Originally Posted By: Slarty

Millard Fillmore
What makes you say that?

Obviously hypothetical situations can always be debated. However, in 1850 the North was not as developed industrially and economically as they were ten years later, while the South stayed under more or less the same cash crop system. So, when the Civil War started, the North had grown in industry, infrastructure (railroads), and population such that it was better able to fight the war.

Had the Compromise not have passed, and sectional tensions continued to magnify into an early Civil War, the North still may have won, but the wait certainly helped.

The north was still more industrialized than the south and they still had many more men. The war may have lasted longer, but the end would still have been a foregone conclusion. Despite their early successes, and as much as I enjoy speculative fiction about what would have happened if they had gained their independence, the south never really had a chance of winning the war.

The president who actually did prevent the very real possibility of the union dissolving was Andrew Jackson. If he had allowed South Carolina to nullify the tariffs, it would have established a precedent of a federal government with no real power over the states.

(Also, Jackson gets badass points for beating a would-be assassin nearly to death with his cane.

)

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 10, 2011

Not only that, both of the assassin's guns misfired. What kind of luck is that?

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Excalibur

Not only that, both of the assassin's guns misfired. What kind of luck is that?

Ask Gerald Ford who faced two assassination attempts with one at arm's length and survived.

Well-Actually War Trall · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Tyranicus

(Also, Jackson gets badass points for beating a would-be assassin nearly to death with his cane.

)

And that totally makes up for the ethnic cleansing!

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Sarachim

Originally Posted By: Tyranicus

(Also, Jackson gets badass points for beating a would-be assassin nearly to death with his cane.

)

And that totally makes up for the ethnic cleansing!

Of course! If Hitler had taken care of assassins himself rather than letting the SS do it, history would look upon him as a wonderful person.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Randomizer

Originally Posted By: Excalibur

Not only that, both of the assassin's guns misfired. What kind of luck is that?

Ask Gerald Ford who faced two assassination attempts with one at arm's length and survived.

Or Teddy Roosevelt, who got shot in the chest in an attempted assassination at the beginning of the speech, and gave his whole speech before going to the hospital.

Ineffable Wingbolt · September 10, 2011

Teddy Roosevelt - First Living Chuck Norris Joke elected to the office of American president.

Magnificent Ornk · September 10, 2011

Teddy bears are named after him. That's hard to beat.

Well-Actually War Trall · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Excalibur

I thought about justifying my choices, but it really comes down to the fact that I'm a card-carrying (literally) constructionist member of the Libertarian Party.

Maybe you can clarify something for me. How is Cleveland a Libertarian hero even though he used the Army to break up the Pullman strike?

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 10, 2011

Cuz strikes are totally socialist.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 10, 2011

Originally Posted By: Sarachim

Originally Posted By: Excalibur

I thought about justifying my choices, but it really comes down to the fact that I'm a card-carrying (literally) constructionist member of the Libertarian Party.

Maybe you can clarify something for me. How is Cleveland a Libertarian hero even though he used the Army to break up the Pullman strike?

The Pullman Strike was Cleveland's biggest regret. It's pretty clear from his biography that he was acting on misinformation from his Attorney General Richard Olney. Cleveland was a lawyer by profession and was notable for reviewing civil war pension claims on his own time. Yet Olney was a friend who Cleveland trusted, and Olney appeared to be very knowledgeable on the subject. So Cleveland gave Olney special appointment as a federal attorney to deal with the strike. Olney knew that Cleveland wouldn't send in troops, so he distorted the truth and convinced Cleveland that the strike threatened the safety of the United States and additionally violated the Sherman Antitrust Act.

Despite all that, it is his worst act as president. Cleveland was angered and removed Olney from his position as attorney general...but he kept him as his Secretary of State. He should have been more attentive and he placed too much trust into his cabinet. It's unclear as to what Olney's intentions were, but I don't think Cleveland would have dealt with the strike in such a manner if he wasn't mislead.

Unfortunately, Google Books doesn't have the chapter from the biography about the Pullman Strike. It's Grover Cleveland: A Study in Character by Alyn Brodsky. Since I don't own the book, I guess you shouldn't have any reason to believe me.

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 11, 2011

ANALYSIS TIME!

I put the votes into a spreadsheet. I counted the total number of opinions about each president (not including "no opinion" votes or "neutral/no opinion" votes that sounded more like no opinion than like neutral). I also averaged the feeling we have about each president, where 5 = favorite and 1 = least favorite.

The average president received 5 opinion votes and was rated slightly below neutral, at 2.82. The full numbers are below.

The only president with 8 opinion votes was Carter, while William Henry Harrison, Garfield, and Tyler received only 1.

Most "favorite" votes (4): Jefferson, FDR; (3): Washington, Lincoln

Most "like" votes (4): JFK, Wilson; (3): Eisenhower, Nixon, Carter

Most "dislike" votes (5): Reagan; (4): Truman, Andrew Johnson, McKinley

Most "least favorite" votes (5): George W. Bush; (4): Hoover

Narrowest range of opinions: Andrew Johnson, Monroe, Van Buren, and Tyler all received ONLY "dislike" votes despite receiving at least 3 votes each.

Most polarized opinions (shared by more than 1 voter): FDR's votes included 4 "favorites" and 2 "least favorites." Wilson's included 4 "likes" and 2 "least favorites" while Jackson's included 2 "likes" and 2 "least favorites."

Most diverse opinions: Theodore Roosevelt received 7 votes spread among all 5 categories, and Coolidge received 6 votes spread among all 5 categories. Presidents who received votes for 4 different categories include John Adams, Clinton, Obama, Lyndon Johnson, and Grant.

Code:

 VOTES	 MEAN 	 6 	 4.67 	Jefferson 3 	 4.67 	Cleveland 6 	 4.33 	Washington 6 	 4.00 	Lincoln 6 	 4.00 	Eisenhower 4 	 4.00 	Madison 1 	 4.00 	William Henry Harrison 1 	 4.00 	Garfield 7 	 3.71 	FDR 2 	 3.50 	John Quincy Adams 7 	 3.43 	Theodore Roosevelt 5 	 3.40 	John Adams 7 	 3.29 	JFK 7 	 3.29 	Clinton 6 	 3.17 	Nixon 8 	 3.00 	Carter 6 	 3.00 	Coolidge 5 	 3.00 	Jackson 7 	 2.86 	Wilson 6 	 2.83 	Truman 5 	 2.80 	Obama 4 	 2.75 	Taft 6 	 2.67 	Lyndon Johnson 3 	 2.67 	Taylor 5 	 2.60 	Grant 5 	 2.60 	Ford 7 	 2.57 	Reagan 3 	 2.33 	Fillmore 3 	 2.33 	Hayes 4 	 2.25 	Polk 5 	 2.20 	George H.W. Bush 4 	 2.00 	Andrew Johnson 3 	 2.00 	Monroe 3 	 2.00 	Van Buren 3 	 2.00 	Tyler 1 	 2.00 	Arthur 5 	 1.80 	McKinley 4 	 1.75 	Buchanan 4 	 1.75 	Harding 7 	 1.57 	Hoover 7 	 1.57 	George W. Bush 2 	 1.50 	Benjamin Harrison 3 	 1.33 	Pierce

A suggested point of departure: look at the places where your votes DIVERGED from the average spiderweb numbers, and defend your opinions there.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 11, 2011

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S

[snip]

You haven't even bought me dinner yet, Slarty, and you're jumping straight to statistical analysis?

For shame.

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 11, 2011

Who said anything about a date? This is just a statup.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 11, 2011

It's too bad the sample size is so small.

Also, here's a tidbit I did out of boredom. Obviously, political parties change a lot over time, so it's actually quite meaningless. On the other hand, the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, and Whig parties were not around nearly as long as the Democratic and Republican parties.

Federalist: 3.9 (Counting Washington as a Federalist)

Democratic-Republican: 3.8

Democratic: 2.9

Republican: 2.6

Whig: 2.5

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 11, 2011

That might be more interesting if you split up the parties by era. For example, taking into account the huge realignment of the R's and D's in the middle of the last century, or the various party systems. I'm thinking:

Federalists & D-R's

D's & Whigs

D's & R's (through 1890s)

D's & R's (through 1930s)

D's & R's (through 70s -- state realignment)

D's & R's (through today)

For example, if we look at the last five presidents, the ones who have been elected with a solidly Republican south rather than a solidly Democratic south, we get 3.0 for the Democrats and 2.1 for the Republicans.

On the other hand, Republican presidents from Lincoln through Cleveland's second term score 2.8, and from that point through WW2 the Republicans score 2.4. Then, before the states and issues flip, Eisenhower and Nixon score an average of 3.6.

Well-Actually War Trall · September 11, 2011

FAVOURITES:

Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, Kennedy

LIKE:

Harrison, Taylor, Harding, Roosevelt

NO OPINION:

The others

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 13, 2011

I suspect if this were ratings for the Doctor, you'd have gotten more responses.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 13, 2011

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

I suspect if this were ratings for the Doctor, you'd have gotten more responses.

the dude in the dalek wheelchair was my favorite doctor.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 13, 2011

Best Doctor was the ninth one. The

ninth one.

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 13, 2011

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

Best Doctor was the ninth one. The

ninth one.

Who plays the first regeneration (not Rowan Atkinson, but the guy after him) in that video?

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 13, 2011

Richard E. Grant, according to Wikipedia.

Magnificent Ornk · September 13, 2011

It is. It says right on the video ("Rowan Atkinson, Richard E Grant, Hugh Grant (as Doctor Who)"), and I'd know that face anywhere.

Watching that, I can't help but feel that more recent

episodes of the Doctor are

far

(That last one is in two parts, btw)

Understated Ur-Drakon · September 13, 2011

Originally Posted By: Annhog

It is. It says right on the video ("Rowan Atkinson, Richard E Grant, Hugh Grant (as Doctor Who)"), and I'd know that face anywhere.

I wonder why they don't mention Jim Broadbent.

Ineffable Wingbolt · September 13, 2011

Maybe a more international bent would help. Top 5 Historical Figures?

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 13, 2011

Originally Posted By: Necris Omega

Maybe a more international bent would help. Top 5 Historical Figures?

Oh that's easy. In no particular order:

William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, David Tennant, Matt Smith.

Oh crap, that's six...

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 13, 2011

Originally Posted By: Necris Omega

Maybe a more international bent would help. Top 5 Historical Figures?

That's easy.

1. Napoleon Bonaparte, created the European political map as it still largely stands today, and also the tensions that resulted in wars up to and even including WWII.

2. Muhammad, created Islam as a political and religious force that remains unchanged in core principles, unlike Christianity, which has been all over the place since its inception.

3. Qin Shi Huangdi, created China as it existed for thousands of years, finished the foundation of the longest-lasting and most advanced pre-Enlightenment civilization ever (yes even better than the Romans).

4. Robespierre, inventor of the modern revolution. Everyone from Lenin to Mao to Ataturk followed in his footsteps at some point in their career.

5. Sir Francis Bacon, main inventor of the Scientific Method. 'Nuff said.

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 14, 2011

You would put down the Emperor Qin. That's an awfully rosy picture of his works.

Easygoing Eyebeast · September 14, 2011

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S

You would put down the Emperor Qin. That's an awfully rosy picture of his works.

Most of those people weren't particularly nice guys. I could have put down Newton instead, and then none of them would be nice guys. That still doesn't stop them being the most influential historical figures of all time, it just stops them being the nicest historical figures of all time. Fredrick Douglas and Mother Teresa and Rousseau and MLK or whoever might have been nice people with progressive ideals, but they didn't really have that much effect on the broad sweep of history like some of the not-so-nice people did.

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 14, 2011

Julius Caesar reshaped the Roman Empire, which in turn reshaped the world. Or you could give the credit to Augustus, maybe, for institutionalizing the Empire.

Norman Bortaug reshaped agriculture, saved somewhere around a billion lives. In terms of people, economics, and geography, there are few who can match him.

Louis Pasteur lay the foundation for immunization, put critical support behind germ theory, and helped create microbiology. Yes, another life-saver.

Edison invented invention as a business model.

Haydn invented the symphony. Then he wrote a ton of them.

Adam Smith and Karl Marx articulated the theories that drove one of the largest conflicts in the world and shaped the last half of the 20th century. More credit to the latter than the former, probably. Or maybe more credit is owed to Lenin and Mao.

—Alorael, who can't pick a top list. "History" is too broad. In science? In politics? In philosophy? How about in record sales?

Hatchling Cockatrice · September 14, 2011

I suppose my list would be less utilitarian: Socrates, Shakespeare and Goethe would be a start.

Well-Actually War Trall · September 14, 2011

Where do you think Lenin and Mao got their ideals to support what they were doing in the first place?

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