Rate Last 50 years of Presidents.

Rate your top 3 and bottom 3 U.S. presidents in the last 50 years. Here are the 10 elligable contendors: Eisnhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II.

Here's mine:

Best:
1. Kennedy. Pros, handling the Cuban Missle Crisis, reluctantly began civil rights protections. Cons, Bay of Pigs, begining of Vietman.

2. Clinton Pros, moderate democrat, tax increase on upper income and cuts to social programs resulted in balanced budget, Cons, lied under oath, no excuses on this one, even though I smash rep. congress on this witch hunt also

3. Reagan. Pros, cutting taxes did stimulate economy, Cons, Savings and Loan crisis, Iran Conta

Worst.

3. Carter: Ineffectual leader period.

2. Bush II: has run up billions in debt while cutting taxes on wealthiest americans, unnecassary war costing american lives and capitol, should be worst in all of history, except for Nixon.

1. Nixon Watergate, period.

 

I disagree that Tricky Dick is among the worst Presidents. He opened relations with China which has helped the world economy tremendously. Our trade relationship with the Chinese is a vital cog in avoiding another cold war or shooting war.

I could call either Clinton, Reagan, or Kennedy the best President in the last 50 years. I think I lean more towards Clinton because his biggest knock is one of personal immorality. His views on free trade, national debt, and the foreign policy were dead on.

W. Bush is by far the worst President in the last 50 years, and throughout all of history for that matter. He has failed to do anything about immigration or social security despite having a friendly congress for 6 of his 8 years. He has run up massive amounts of debt in a needless war and increased the federal bureaucracy. His tax cuts were to the wrong group and have served to hurt the wage earners. The only redeeming thing he did was signing the partial birth abortion ban.

 

Our lists aren't much different, I like your reasoning :thumb:

 

clinton. by default. very few of the others were even decent. also benefitted from cyclical great global economy/dotcom boom. he had little to do with it, and 9/11 was essentially under his watch. domestic policy largely a failure because got squat done on what he said he'd do--health care and welfare.

nixon. in hindsight, Wgate is overrated. most moderate of the bunch. tons of great domestic plans--EPA, OSHA, comprehensive health insurance (didnt pass), nixed busing.

reagan. guess i have to give him credit for getting out of recession. but never sure of the cause-effect. and what about the huge debt? appointed o'connor, but also scalia.



bush--its the economy stupid. appointed thomas. started nafta. iraq war went well.

kennedy. overrated. too little to go on. he gave good speeches and didnt get the country blown up. he wouldnt have the rep he has today if he werent shot in the head. give him credit for bowing up to wallace.

carter. could be higher. was dealt the worst hand of the bunch. is it his fault that he was the only honest one of the bunch?

W. gets some credit for booming economy in spite of 9/11. no additional successful terrorist attacks. war was stupid/irresponsible. biggest negative---prescription bill $1.2 trillion.



eisenhower. at least he didnt screw things up



ford. he invented the car.

 

easy, i did put clinton first on the list---if i gave more importance to 9/11 he'd be lower. he did not kill bin laden. the 20 saudis came here under clinton. an are you referring to the 2 al qaida specialists out of 200?

not old enough to have felt the emotions of the times. i feel this gives me an unbiased few of the event. i do realize how big of a deal it was in the country. kinda like the first time you realized that your parents have sex.

ok. i just like the guy so much.

Uhhh . . . what booming economy? Did you forget the 2001 stock market collapse that happened on his watch . . . or the recession we're going into?[/QUOTE] i made a heck of a return on my $$$. the economy experienced an unavoidable dip after 9/11 then has boomed til the last 6 mo. ---great stock market, great jobs #s and low inflation. (i know its simplified, but those are common indicators---dont know what GDP has been)

 

well, i did have clinton at the top and bush much lower. i dont think clinton should get credit for the dotcom boom (especially since the bubble burst) and i dont think bush should get the blame for the housing bubble.

 

I'm really begining to doubt how much presidents can really affect the ecomomy.

But Clinton left the U.S. goverment balanced, Cowboy W was a fiscal train wreck. Cutting taxes and expanding goverment, what the hell were he and the republican congress thinking? Just on domestic policies, Bush has done catastrophic damage, without his horrific foreign policies.

Maybe quite possibly the worst president in history.