Posted on 10/19/2010 7:07:22 AM PDT by WebFocus
It’s tempting to say that Ronald Reagan was the best U.S. president of the past century, and I’ve certainly demonstrated my man-crush on the Gipper. But there is some real competition. I had the pleasure yesterday of hearing Amity Shlaes of the Council on Foreign Relations make the case for Calvin Coolidge at the Mont Pelerin Society Meeting in Australia.
I dug around online and found an article Amity wrote for Forbes that highlights some of the attributes of “Silent Cal” that she mentioned in her speech. As you can see, she makes a persuasive case.
… the Coolidge style of government, which included much refraining, took great strength and yielded superior results. …Coolidge and Mellon tightened and pulled [income tax rates] multiple times, eventually getting the top rate down to 25%, a level that hasn’t been seen since. Mellon argued that lower rates could actually bring in greater revenues because they removed disincentives to work. Government, he said, should operate like a railroad, charging a price for freight that “the traffic will bear.” Coolidge’s commitment to low taxes came from his concept of property rights. He viewed heavy taxation as the legalization of expropriation. “I want taxes to be less, that the people may have more,” he once said. In fact, Coolidge disapproved of any government intervention that eroded the bond of the contract. …More than once Coolidge vetoed what would later be called farm allotment–the government purchase of commodities to reduce supply and drive up prices. …Today our government has moved so far from Coolidge’s tenets that it’s difficult to imagine such policies being emulated.
But if you don’t want to believe Amity, here’s Coolidge in his own words. This video is historically significant since it is the first film (with sound) of an American President. The real value, however, is in the words that are being said.
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO
Nixon instituted wage and price controls, took us off the gold standard, expanded government and disgraced conservatives leading to the Carter Congress and Reagan having to deal with an unusually large number of leftists in Congress even as he won the Presidency. I stand by ranking him so low.
Clinton had the sense to moderate his policies. He was a pramatist and he came close to balancing the budget with the Republican Congress, as well as ending the welfare regime that did so much damage.
Kennedy I rank highest among the Democrats of the century because he was a patriot who cut taxes and fought the cold war with vigor. I would vote for JFK over the Bushes, Nixon, McCain, Dole, etc., any Republican (except for Reagan) in my lifetime. And the moon shot — if you are going to spend money on national glory — the moon shot will live in men’s minds forever. It’s the Pyramids of the modern age.
To be honest, I’ve barely read a thing about Taft or McKinnley. I’ll take your word for their virtues and learn more about them. Sad that we have to go back one hundred years to find worthy Presidents . . .
RE: Coolidge might have been the best writer
He was also a very unassuming man.
Coolidge and his vivacious wife Grace were invited to quite a few parties, where the legend of “Silent Cal” was born.
It was from this time most of the jokes and anecdotes involving Coolidge originate.
Although Coolidge was known to be a skilled and effective public speaker, in private he was a man of few words and was therefore commonly referred to as “Silent Cal.”
A possibly apocryphal story has it that Dorothy Parker, seated next to him at a dinner, said to him, “Mr. Coolidge, I’ve made a bet against a fellow who said it was impossible to get more than two words out of you.” His famous reply: “You lose.”
It was also Parker who, upon learning that Coolidge had died, reportedly remarked, “How can they tell?”
Alice Roosevelt Longworth supposedly once commented that, “He looks as if he’d been weaned on a pickle.”
Coolidge often seemed uncomfortable among fashionable Washington society; when asked why he continued to attend so many of their dinner parties, he replied, “Got to eat somewhere.
Good grief - please quote examples of when he supposedly did this!
I recall him shutting down the government to get his way on wasteful spending (and weak kneed Republicans caving in to it). The departments of HHS and Education, that he staffed with imbeciles, imposed rules that are still wasting money today.
Clinton fought hard for the bottom of the barrel and deserves to be in the vicinity.
I don’t think we disagree. In a very close contest, U.S. intervention decisively tipped the scales, with what I consider to be disasterous results, a disaster disproportionately visited on East Europeans and European Jews.
I agree with your ranking with the exception of Nixon. Despite his flaws I would rank him above Carter
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When you look at Hoover, Bush II, Carter, Lyndon Johnson, Wilson, and Nixon there are relative degrees of awfulness that could be seriously debated. That said, I ranked Nixon so low because he led to Carter and because he resigned in disgrace (damned quitter), in addition to screwing up things in his own right. Funny that the Left hated Nixon so much when his policies were so big government and controlling.
Obama and Roosevelt are in a class by themselves in my opinion because of their extending the pain of depression for the entire country.
Eisenhower was responsible for the Interstate highway system, a system which continues to pay dividends to the expansion of commerce throughout the United States.
How can Nixon not be head and shoulders above Wilson or Jiminny Carter?
Nixon got croaked by the LSM in the days before the internet. If Nixon had the kind of fawning press that Clinton had, his face would be on Mount Rushmore today.
Clinton signed welfare reform in 1996 and supported it strongly and over equally strong objections from the left in his own party.
http://www.ontheissues.org/celeb/Bill_Clinton_Welfare_+_Poverty.htm
Don’t get me wrong. I despised Bill Clinton at the time and now. He’s a corrupt old lecher and his wife is part of the hard left, and not at all pragmatic, as was Bill Clinton. She’d be a terror. But when you look at the harm the other presidents of the last century have done . . . actual results were not bad for Bill Clinton.
RE: They were quite literally at the point of collapse and starvation with riots in the streets. They simply could not continue the war any longer. They were spent.
If I remember my history correctly, Britain actually formed a blockade on all food going to Germany ( the USA had not entered the war then ). The German Empire relied on imports for food and domestic food and such a blockade would be sure to starve their people.
Germany had no choice but to fight back using the U-boats against the trade routes of the Entente Powers. It took place largely in the seas around the British Isles and in the Mediterranean.
The British had the Royal Navy which was superior in numbers and could operate within the British Empire, while the German Kaiserliche Marine surface fleet was mainly restricted to the German Bight, and used commerce raiders and unrestricted submarine warfare to operate elsewhere.
Apparently, non-hostile commercial ships were supposed to be allowed to go through the war zone in the ocean by Germany...
The Germans claimed that a lot of these commercial ships were actually carrying weapons (as well as ordinary passengers) for the enemy.
The US, at that time wanted to stay out of the war ( although it has been claimed by some that President Wilson was secretly supporting Britain ).
What changed American opinion was the Sinking of the Commercial ship, the RMS LUSITANIA. Hundreds of Americans on board were killed.
The Germans claimed that the ship was carrying, not only innocent passengers, but arms as well. The German commander who shot the torpedo actually intended to simply cripple the ship, knowing that there were other boats present that could rescue the passengers, and the example of the Titanic showed that it would take hours to be rescued ( he was hoping that the ship could survive as long as the Titanic, enough time for the passengers to be rescued ).
Unfortunately, the Lusitania sunk very quickly, killing most of the passengers. She was torpedoed by German U-boat U-20 on 7 May 1915 and sank in just eighteen minutes, eleven miles (19 km) off the Old Head of Kinsale, Ireland, killing 1,198 of the 1,959 people aboard.
The sinking turned public opinion in many countries against Germany and contributed to the entry of the United States into World War I.
The sinking of Lusitania was a coup for anti-German sentiment, caused great controversy and became an iconic symbol in recruiting campaigns of why the war was being fought.
Prior to the incident, Americans EVERYWHERE were warned NOT to travel on ships crossing the war zone. In fact, the US policy then was NOT TO GO TO WAR just because a few Americans were foolish enough to risk their lives for such an adventure.
The entry of America to World War 1 helped to ensure Germany’s defeat. Woodrow Wilson rammed the Treaty of Versailles down the defeated and humiliated Germany’s throat, and created the foundation for the rise of Hitler and World War II.
I can’t think of anything that Nixon did right. Now I can’t think of anything that Carter or Wilson did right either, so you may have a point.
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How about open the gate to China and negotiate an end to our war in Viet Nam for starters?
I had always heard stories like that so Coolidge seemed a rather 2-dimensional character to me until I read his autobiography and found out that he was really a very interesting guy.
I don’t know if the “You lose” story is made up. I think it might be true except for the involvement of Dorothy Parker. People probably mixed it up with the other story involving her.
He annoyed liberals no end and kept Democrats out of the White House for eight years, something neither Carter nor Wilson ever accomplished.
How about open the gate to China and negotiate an end to our war in Viet Nam for starters?
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China is more of a threat than Russia now and we lost Viet Nam and let them go communist, let Pol Pot arise in Cambodia, etc. Not saying Nixon didn’t do the right thing in both cases, I was a kid then and don’t know how limited his options were, but opening to China and surrender in Viet Nam are not clear victories given hindsight.
He annoyed liberals no end and kept Democrats out of the White House for eight years, something neither Carter nor Wilson ever accomplished.
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True that. But would the left have so completely captured the Democratic party without Nixon?
“But both Roosevelt and Reagan have to be ranked as high, or higher...”
Since Teddy R.’s term ended more than 100 years ago, you’re saying FDR was a good president. Are you KIDDING me?!? Must’ve forgotten the /s/
Nixon wasn’t all that polarizing along ideological lines. The left always gravitated to the Democratic Party, at least since the days of FDR. The influence of the left has been amplified by the unwarranted expansion of “higher education” (cruel misnomer!) and the ethos of the scribbling classes.
The Left hated Nixon because, unlike McGovern, he did not intend to lose the Vietnam War. Actually, if the Democrats in Congress had honored our pledges to South Vietnam, we would not have lost it, either.
Cal did not have to deal with the Russian Bear. That alone makes Reagan the more historic president.
I think the left hated Nixon for his anti-communist activities in the 1950’s when he was a Congressman as well. The hard left doesn’t forget its enemies and tries to destroy anyone that understands what they are and how they operate. I think it was Nixon’s knowledge of the far left that led him to be so tragically aggressive in elections, and the experience of having an election stolen from him. That said, he needed to play it straight . . . and shut down their cheating . . . rather than emulate them.
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