Talk Elections

LBJ, by far.

Jimmy Carter gets my vote.  And he still stinks, all these years later.

Why are FDR, Truman and JFK on there? and more importantly, why has JFK got a vote?!?!?!?!

Carter. The only contender to him is Wilson, I'd say.

LBJ. He makes me sick.

In all fairness, he included all the Democratic presidents of the 20th century.

Carter or Wilson was the worst. The rest were great presidents.

i went with wilson.

Though I like and respect Carter's commitment to peace and human rights, issues often ignored by American presidents, it was not balanced by a deeper understanding of the outside world. He also never understood how to work with congress. Clearly, he was the least successful of those listed. However, his "failure" is dramatized by conservatives. A great, lasting legacy is the Camp David peace agreement between Egypt and Israel.

What strucks me is that all of those, except for Carter, can be considered as great or good presidents. There are no miserable failures such as Harding, no blockheads such as Reagan, few or none of average/below average presidents such as Bush no. 1, Coolidge, Ford, Hoover and Nixon.

On the basis of achievement, I would list them this way, though those placed 2-6 are very evenly matched:

1. Roosevelt
2. Truman
3. Wilson
4. Johnson
5. Clinton
6. Kennedy
7. Carter

FDR.  Wilson and LBJ participated in pushing socialism in the US, but FDR was the one that truly broke the back of constitutional economic freedom.

Carter.  Fumbling and no sense of direction.

Carter's been an embarrassing and anti-american ex-president.  He certainly has drifted left.  

Carter, followed by FDR and Wilson.

Buchanan

of the twentieth century

Carter

LBJ. No contest.

FDR is the worst.  It's his fault that we live in a welfare state.  It's his fault that the government is so big.  That consitutes the majority of our problems as a nation.  Since he caused most of our problems, he is the most dissatisfactory president ever.

How could anyone vote for Carter over LBJ?

Did Carter murder 60k Americans and countless Vietnamese?

By that logic FDR and Truman murdered hundreds of thousands of Americans not to mention millions of enemy combatents and countless civilians.

Still think murder is the right word?

The problem with Vietnam was that we fought it wrong.  I like LBJ because the civil rights stuff passed under his administration were fantastic.

WWII was a just war. Vietnam was not. There wasn't a single good reason for us to be there. We should've just let the North destroy the corrupt South government, and not a single American live would've been lost.

You don't agree with the war, that doesn't meen LBJ murdered them any more than FDR murdered millions.

There were a few good reasons for us to be in there, but the problem was that we didn't fight the war to win, and thus we lost.  We had politicians running the war and whatnot.  Checking the spread of communism was a reason, and the same reason we were defending South Korea (Did Eisenhower murder 50k in that war?).

I didn't personally agree with it, but LBJ didn't "murder" anybody.

Oh, spread of communism, who cares? Like corrupt military regimes are far better. Not a single American should've been sent to Vietnam, the South totally deserved it.

Also, Carter was never involved in the assasination of a sitting president.

Fft, plenty of Presidents were involved in assassinations of Presidents during the Cold War.

And from the perspective of the time, corrupt military regimes ARE better because they are a chess piece on our side of the board.

I don't agree with going into Vietnam, and I agree with you that it was wrong.  But how does the war being wrong from some perspectives cause the President to be a murderer of his own troops if he believes he is helping the world?

I mean, we could consider the Spanish American War to be morally wrong.  Still doesn't make McKinley a murderer.

sure you could. The same way I consider Bush a murderer.

And I was referring to American Presidents. I don't recall any others being assasinated during the Cold War other than JFK.

My thoughts exactly

LBJ was the worst foreign policy president EVER, not even close.

Go Lunar! :)

I think the Vietnam War was wrong and a bad idea, but it wasn't murder. There was a Cold War going on...the stakes were high and some mistakes were bound to be made.

Corrupt military regimes ARE far better than communism.  

My main complaint was when we ousted Democratic left-leaning guys in favor of corrupt military dictatorships (Pinochet anyone?).

Other than that, I believe the following Presidents would be murderers under the definition used to define LBJ a murderer:

Madison (1812-maybe)
Polk (Mexican-American)
McKinley (Spanish-American)
Eisenhower (Korea maybe, but Vietnam)
Kennedy (Vietnam)
Johnson (Vietnam)
Nixon (Vietnam)
Reagan (Grenada etc.)
George Bush Sr. (Iraq)
Clinton (Iraq, etc.)
George Bush Jr. (Iraq)

Basically the only President after FDR who hasn't committed serial murder would be Carter.

Horray for loose definitions!

Uh, wait...

Do you watch a lot of Oliver Stone movies?  You just accused Lyndon Johnson of killing John Kennedy.  You are way off the deep end right now.

None of the way with LBJ.

hardly. It's a well known fact "Landslide Lyndon" was probably the most corrupt person ever to occupy the Oval Office at the time and I wouldn't put anything past him. How he compares to Nixon in corruption is debatable, but currently I'd rank him below Bush II however.

Polk and Reagan were also murderers

Yes, he was corrupt...he once lost a senate race b/c he cheated too much, IIRC. But corrupt doesn't equal murder.

What about Kennedy and the rest?

yeah, what's the difference?

I went with Wilson.  I'm Irish Catholic and he completely ignored us and the Germans with the Alien and Sedition Acts.  It is similar to the Patriot Act Bush had and German-Americans paid the price.  There were also some Irish that paid because of their opposition in fighting for England!

Carter or Wilson but I voted for Carter

Lyin' B. Johnson (as Philip Roth called him) was the worst because of the way he mishandled Vietnam, although he had considerable domestic accomplishments earlier in his Presidency. Carter didn't accomplish what LBJ did but he didn't do the bad things LBJ did either.

Carter, the boycott was really useless, and REALLY unfair to the athletes. Followed by LBJ and JFK, but there all good.

FDR by a wide margin
He tried to destroy the foundations of democracy and freedom with his socialist New Deal and the awful court packing plan. Also the Japanese internment during wartime was blatantly racist and unconstitutional. On the personal level he was unfaithful to Eleanor and was buddies with an evil man called Stalin.

LBJ is second, then I'd put Wilson and JFK followed by Carter, Clinton, and Truman.

FDR. Wilson in second, Johnson in third.

Carter was a pretty harmless president.

Woodrow Wilson

James Buchanan -of that there can be no doubt......

Edit: Upon reading further down the thread, Tweed eventually makes clear he is referring exclusively to those Democrats who were president during the 20th century.  So-

Jimmy Carter

Buchanan

20 century: Wilson

Why do people hate Carter so much? He did some really stupid things, yes, but he also deregulated industries, lessened the federal War on Drugs, pardoned the draft dodgers, legalized home brewing, and installed Volcker as chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Don't get me wrong; he completely deserved the landslide defeat. But he was probably the most harmless Democrat of the 20th century.

1) Good
2) Stupid
3) Should've had them thrown away for 10-20
4) Big freedom fighter here
5) Positive

We must certainly measure these actions against his amazing foreign policy of lay down to radical Islam and lay down to the Soviets.

Jimmy Carter

while i think hes a great man outside of politics, he was really bad as president

1. LBJ
2. Wilson
3. Clinton

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Woodrow Wilson

I re-posted the poll at the top of the first post here that used to exist before the massacre that messed up all the data tables and polls.  So now we can all vote in the poll.

Well (to use a Reaganism), Carter had the Midas touch in reverse.  Everything he touched turned to $#!^

Lets review by category:

Foreign Policy - Carter started off by noting that past Presidents had exhibited a fear/loating of the Soviet Union which he did not share.  The result was Soviet expansionism throughout the world.

Defense Policy - Despite being an Annapolis graduate, Carter exhibited a loathing for the Armed Forces, and repeatedly attacked them in a number of ways, including providing increases for civil service compensation by opposing increases for armed service personnel compensation. 

Economic Policy - Carter had a number of policies (including his nutty energy policy) which resulted in double digit inflation.  Not since the great depression was American in such bad economic shape.

Social Policy - Carter attempted an end run around Congress by using the FTC to bring about gun control and banning natural food supplements.  He managed the incredible of bringing righties and lefties together in opposition.

I could go on and on and on about his many stupid polcies and the disasterous results for the country.  He may have meant well, but the results were awful.

Carter, closely followed by LBJ, even though I like both.

Wilson

Although I disagree with much of Clinton's social policies, I would have to say that Carter was the worst president. 

JIMBO CARTER, BABY!!!

Best to worst:

James Polk
Grover Cleveland
Franklin Pierce
John Kennedy
Jimmy Carter
Harry Truman
Martin Van Buren
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Jackson
Bill Clinton
James Buchanan
Lyndon Johnson
Woodrow Wilson
Franklin Roosevelt

Carter, with Wilson as a not so distant second.

Wilson

They were all alright but I voted Carter. Good guy, great ex-president, but unfortunately not a real effective president.

^^

yeah, Carter was a crummy president, but not horribly destructive to our country like FDR, Wilson, or Johnson.

It was tough deciding between Carter, LBJ, and FDR, but FDR gets my vote.

From them, it would have to be Carter. I like him personally, but as president he was rather weak and ineffective

Dave

Wilson-



imposed nations first graduated income tax

Federal Reserve Act

Federal trade commision

Clayton anti-trust act- recognized trade unions and strikes as legal.

Adamson Act-mandated railroad workers as 8 hour day
   
Fourteen Points plan

        

I voted for(against) LBJ. Viet Nam was just a disgrace and virtually running Humphrey's campaign really planted the seeds of disaster for Democrats for years to come.

I have the feeling if Wilson were around today, he'd be very polarizing. What do you say about a guy who introduced formal diplomatic relations with European powers and getting involved in a war on European soil,  moves Washington warned against when he left office? What about his complete lack of recognition of minority rights? He certainly wouldn't fit in with the Democratic party today, or even the Republican for that matter.

I couldn't give the nod to Carter either. I think if people had actually listened to him and were mindful of things like energy conservation we'd be better off. He also took a serious hit on that rescue business although it wasn't his fault all together. He certainly seemed to be the wrong person for the job at that time.

Carter was the wrong person for the job at any time.

Maybe so, but it wasn't LBJ's fault; he was totally clueless about foriegn policy and generally did whatever he was told (in complete contrast to just about everything else where he was very much in control; just about his entire legislative agenda passed through Congress. Shame that some parts of it weren't thought through enough, but it was an impressive achievement no matter how you look at it).
If you must blame a President for Vietnam, blame Eisenhower. If you must blame a Democratic President for Vietnam, blame St Kennedy of Brookline.

The sheer brutality and untruthfulness of the repeated attacks on LBJ by the liberal left is way out of all proportion and extremely unfair.


Are you seriously blaming LBJ for the Donkey blowing up in Chicago?

Of those listed, Wilson. Clinton a close second. But they were all better than most 19th century Democrat presidents. Though not necessarily better men. (Going by personal character rather than presidency, imy vote goes to Kennedy btw.)

Why Clinton?  Because peace and prosperity are so bad?

Peace? In the 90s? Where? Prosperity off stolen goods.

NAFTA is stealing goods?  Otherwise I don't know what you mean.

Continuing First world prosperity is based - in fact, dependent - in large part on unfair trade practices, was what I was saying. It wasn't aimed specifically at Clinton, but generally at measuring the quality of a First World statesman by the state of the economy.

I understand.  You want to end free trade and hinder the first world economies on the basis of unethical exploitation of third world labor and goods.  I don't believe we should hurt our economies to potentially acheive a better life for Kim-Yang in a sweatshop in Laos--but that's just me.

No. I don't want to end free trade, I can't end free trade, there is no free trade right now. Oh, but I do. I realize it's asking too much, though.

I find it admirable that you care more about others that you will never meet half-a-world away, but I feel differently.  I'd rahter have my money (as would the majority of first-world residents).

Honestly, I do find it admirable, I'm not being sarcastic.  It's kind of like the vegetarians who refuse to eat meat because they don't want animals killed.

But we're getting off topic.  Good luck to you, Lewis.

I do hope to go to Laos some day. And I have lived in a poor neighborhood in India for months, which of course influences my position.
(And I am a vegetarian who refuses to eat meat because I don't want animals raised in captivity all their lives before getting killed. I got no problem with the killing of animals itself - that's an inevitable fact of life.)

Carter, although Wilson's last years were pretty bad.