Posted on 12/31/2004 3:04:23 PM PST by pissant
The top REAL MAN Presidents in our history:
5. Ulysses S. Grant: A serious General, a very smart man, and unafraid to take a swig of good whiskey.
4. Ronald Reagan: A lifeguard, football player, and unabashed commie stomper. Chopped wood in his seventies like a 20 year old.
3. Andrew Jackson: Indian fighter, fearless politician. Not named Old Hickory for nothing.
2. Theodore Roosevelt: Boxer, hunter, adventurist. Finished his speech with a bullet in his chest.
5. George Washington - True gentleman. Fearless in battle and explorer in his youth.
GWB gets honorable mention for having the fortitude to piss on the europeans and do the right thing in the war on terror. And for being a hot shot pilot in the Air National Guard.
For a while I would even have wanted GWB on that list.
Alas....
You are 100% right, he didn't.
That's a plus in my book.
What do you think of Ike's handling of the Suez?
less than stellar
Just as an aside, the legendary drinking of Dean Martin is now known to have been apple juice and an excuse to avoid being a "celebrity". Makes sense, if you think about it.
Anyone who wishes to defame U.S. Grant, a prolific writer in the same vein as Winston Churchill, only needs to go to a local library for some of his very unique and highly personal correspondence.
Like I said, a very smart man.
Many would say the same of Dwight D. Eisenhower.
I would never say that!
I agree, his autobiography is heralded as the best of any U.S. President........I forgot the title.......stupid me.
Neither would I. Two completely different personalities.
For your information, people in NYC know GWB as George Washington Bridge. May be that is why we refer to the President as W?
pissant,that’s actually a pretty good list of manly-men who served as president. W is a manly-man. Handsom but not pretty, rough around the edges, not afraid to get his hands dirty and has partied hardy in his time. Manly men make mistakes but they get the job done.
Questionable morals? Would you please list them or the actions/behaviours that would indicate them?
Sounds like you took a big ol' bite of that revisionist history bait & swallowed it whole.
Wow. Three contrarian voices in a row. Three strikes. Get a clue & read a bio or something. Grant was a good man of high morals. Was deeply moved by the slaughter of his soldiers but did not let it keep him from bringing the fight to the rebels.
Or perhaps your kind of general is more like George McClennan. Top of his class. Raised a one the finest armies in the world. Thought himself the saviour of the Union & thought Lincoln an ape. Ultimately shown to be a coward, for he couldn't bring himself to actually commit his soldiers to battle, because he was scared.
Lincoln promoted Grant to the rank of General because he was the first one to prove himself a warrior. Win or lose, he fought & didn't stop until somebody won. Made mistakes but never repeated them. He and Abe saved the Union. Where did you learn your history?
I didn't say he was ineffective, just that he was overly wasteful of his men.
My kind of general is more along the lines of Eisenhower, actually.
A myth. During the entire Civil War, the general with the highest casualty rate among his troops was (wait for it) ... R. E. Lee.
If I remember correctly, Lee came in at 13% dead, with Grant second at 11%.
This is despite the fact that Lee normally fought on the defensive, in a military context where the defensive had an enormous advantage.
Grant, to end the war, was forced to attack Lee's fortifications.
His reputation for not caring is probably based on his refusing to fall back and lick his wounds after a repulse, as all preceding commanders of the Army of the Potomac had done. Grant kept fighting, despite his losses, and won the war. His tactics were the least costly, in the long run.
Good for you.
Grant was never even accused of sexual impropriety.
He was apparently totally innocent of financial wrong-doing, during a period of American history in which political corruption was more widespread than any other.
He tried to run his administration as if were the Army of the Potomac. It didn't work. It is likely that any man who was president during this period would have had a corrupt administration, as the corruption was part of the inevitable reaction to the war.
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