Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] Worst. President. Ever?

[Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Fri, 4 Apr 2008, Vern Green wrote:

> Right now, how can Historians rate anything about Bush, history has not 
> finished the tale.

You really can't figure it out?  They know the history of the presidency, 
they've seen the first 7+ years of the current presidency, then they rate 
and rank everyone.  Now maybe there will be a miracle in the next 9 months 
and everything will change, but for now Bush looks terrible.


> Additionally, the very people who are voting on these things are voting for
> Presidents that follow their ideologies. Of course Bush is going to be voted
> bad when a bunch of liberals are doing the voting.

Yep -- it's those darned liberals!  Now if we could only get Fox News 
pundits to study history, they would tell us that Bush is great and we 
could rest easy.


> That is the problem with these polls, the criteria for ranking the 
> President is not clear, and even if it is, it will take more than 10 
> years to see how the policies of the President have shaped his legacy.

Why would it take so long?  I think we can see it pretty clearly right 
now.  I'm happy to talk about it again in 10 years if you think that will 
help.


> Take Nixon for instance, in 1974, a ranking poll might have very well 
> placed Nixon at the bottom of the list. In fact on Wikipedia, a 1982 
> Sienna poll placed Nixon as the 28th worse President out of 39 possible 
> on the list. That very same poll in 1994 put Nixon in at 23. Why in 12 
> years did Nixon raise 5 spots?

No system is perfect.  If they had different people do the ranking, a 
somewhat different result would emerge.  28th and 23rd are pretty close 
together the two results together lend credibility to the poll.


> FDR is another example. Its funny how he is ranked so high, but I think 
> I understand why. He was the president after all that gets credit for 
> pulling the United States out of the great depression, though I think 
> there is enough evidence in hind sight to say that his economic policies 
> were not as instrumental at pulling us out of the depression as was 
> World War 2.

It could be that he is seen as a great president because he did many great 
things for our country.  His policies were excellent.  He had a lot of 
great lines.  He led us through the war.  I think FDR was almost all good.

Mike

_______________________________________________
discussion mailing list
EMAIL:PROTECTED
http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/discussion