The worst president ever?

The Metro West Daily News ^ | Sunday, December 4, 2005 | Richard Reeves

[woofie]

PARIS -- President John F. Kennedy was considered a historian because of his book "Profiles in Courage," so he received periodic requests to rate the presidents, those lists that usually begin "1. Lincoln, 2. Washington ..."

But after he actually became president himself, he stopped filling them out.

"No one knows what it's like in this office," he said after being in the job. "Even with poor James Buchanan, you can't understand what he did and why without sitting in his place, looking at the papers that passed on his desk, knowing the people he talked with."

Poor James Buchanan, the 15th president, is generally considered the worst president in history. Ironically, the Pennsylvania Democrat, elected in 1856, was one of the most qualified of the 43 men who have served in the highest office. But he was a confused, indecisive president, who may have made the Civil War inevitable by trying to appease or negotiate with the South. His most recent biographer, Jean Clark, writing for the prestigious American Presidents Series, concluded this year that his actions probably constituted treason. It also did not help that his administration was as corrupt as any in history, and he was widely believed to be homosexual.

Whatever his sexual preferences, his real failures were in refusing to move after South Carolina announced secession from the Union and attacked Fort Sumter, and in supporting both the legality of the pro-slavery constitution of Kansas and the Supreme Court ruling in the Dred Scott case declaring that escaped slaves were not people but property.

He was the guy who in 1861 passed on the mess to the first Republican president, Abraham Lincoln. Buchanan set the standard, a tough record to beat. But there are serious people who believe that George W. Bush will prove to do that, be worse than Buchanan. I have talked with three significant historians in the past few months who would not say it in public, but who are saying privately that Bush will be remembered as the worst of the presidents.

There are some numbers. The History News Network at George Mason University has just polled historians informally on the Bush record. Four hundred and fifteen, about a third of those contacted, answered -- maybe they were all crazed liberals -- making the project as unofficial as it was interesting. These were the results: 338 said they believed Bush was failing, while 77 said he was succeeding. Fifty said they thought he was the worst president ever. Worse than Buchanan.

This is what those historians said -- and it should be noted that some of the criticism about deficit spending and misuse of the military came from self-identified conservatives -- about the Bush record:

He has taken the country into an unwinnable war and alienated friend and foe alike in the process;

He is bankrupting the country with a combination of aggressive military spending and reduced taxation of the rich;

He has deliberately and dangerously attacked separation of church and state;

He has repeatedly "misled," to use a kind word, the American people on affairs domestic and foreign;

He has proved to be incompetent in affairs domestic (New Orleans) and foreign (Iraq and the battle against al-Qaeda);

He has sacrificed American employment (including the toleration of pension and benefit elimination) to increase overall productivity;

He is ignorantly hostile to science and technological progress;

He has tolerated or ignored one of the republic's oldest problems, corporate cheating in supplying the military in wartime.

Quite an indictment. It is, of course, too early to evaluate a president. That, historically, takes decades, and views change over time as results and impact become more obvious. Besides, many of the historians note that however bad Bush seems, they have indeed seen worse men around the White House. Some say Buchanan. Many say Vice President Dick Cheney.

Richard Reeves' column appears on Sunday.

[bkepley]

This is Richard Reeve's ya know.

[Rummyfan]

I have talked with three significant historians in the past few months who would not say it in public, but who are saying privately that Bush will be remembered as the worst of the presidents.

So what's the big secret? Why is anonymity needed? Are they afraid of the Death Squads? Give me a break!

Worst, hands down: Carter. Second Worst: Clinton.

[kidd]

...maybe they were all crazed liberals ...

Historian = college professor = leftist (generally)

[2 Kool 2 Be 4-Gotten]

And yes LBJ has to be in there somewhere's as well. But I'm sticking with FDR as a lock for the number one position.

[wallcrawlr]

barf alert??

[woofie]

Yea it deseves a Barf Alert

[Alberta's Child]

I've said for some time that JFK was arguably the worst president of all time. Not necessarily all his fault, BTW -- but he served for less than three years and had zero long-standing accomplishments that can actually be attributed to his administration (as opposed to all the "JFK would have wanted this" nonsense that was passed during the Johnson administration).

[Preachin']

Carter, LBJ and Clinton (in that order)

[freekitty]

Clinton was a boob, wasn't he?

[Doctor Stochastic]

Woodrow Wilson was probably the worst.

[pepperspray]

That might make him (kennedy) poorly accomplished, but not the worst-

[Beckwith]

Jimmah Cahtah ~ the worst president of the 20th Century.

[woofie]

See #26 ...Is it too late?

[Kozak]

You left off the barf alert.

[frogjerk]

The fact we had Jimmy Carter who ceeded american LAND and nearly lost the cold war is beyond notice.

The former also caused the problem we had with Pineapple face...

[JennysCool]

I can think of the moon landing and the Peace Corps, to name two. He also kept a nuclear threat out of Cuba. And popularized Ian Fleming! :-)

[hinckley buzzard]

Richard Reeves doesn't know anything about it, but Freepers need to understand--history, as in academic "historians" is not what most people imagine. The discipline of searching for facts and information and guiding these raw data into a coherent rendering of past events has long since been abandoned to the perversions of the left--critical studies, postmodern claptrap, political correctness, etc. Check out the professional historical associations' agendas sometime. This poll result should be no surprise.

[hinckley buzzard]

Richard Reeves doesn't know anything about it, but Freepers need to understand--history, as in academic "historians" is not what most people imagine. The discipline of searching for facts and information and guiding these raw data into a coherent rendering of past events has long since been abandoned to the perversions of the left--critical studies, postmodern claptrap, political correctness, etc. Check out the professional historical associations' agendas sometime. This poll result should be no surprise.

[yankeedame]

I always thought that Franklin Pierce was worse than Buchanan.

How 'bout Grant? Or Jefferson's in his second term? Or Harding and his Hillary Clinton-type wife they nicknamed "the Duchess"?

[floozy22]

Carter laid the groundwork for Iran to get nukes. Bubba let the terrorists lay 8 years worth of groundwork. It's a tie!