In my book, both Benedict and JP II were good, even great, Popes. Not perfect, either as men or Popes, but it's too much to expect every Pope to reach that standard. Before them, we've had a long string of good, even saintly Popes. You'd have to go pretty far back to find one as disappointing as our present model.
Benedict was good but got cut short by commies, likely. JP is the one mostly referred to because he worked with Reagan and Thatcher.
If only we could’ve had them all together longer.