who was the greatest american president

[neanderpaul14]

the discussion on Dakota got me interested -

presidents have come from 21 of the 50 states - so is this a inbuilt bias in the political system?

and why wasn't Clinton included in your poll?

1. George Washington (1789-97) Virginia
2. John Adams (1797-1801) Massachusetts
3. Thomas Jefferson (1801-09) Virginia
4. James Madison (1809-17) Virginia
5. James Monroe (1817-25) Virginia
6. John Quincy Adams (1825-29) Massachusetts
7. Andrew Jackson (1829-37) South Carolina
8. Martin Van Buren (1837-41) New York
9. William Henry Harrison (1841) Virginia
10. John Tyler (1841-45) Virginia
11. James K. Polk (1845-49) North Carolina
12. Zachary Taylor (1849-50) Virginia
13. Millard Fillmore (1850-53) New York
14. Franklin Pierce (1853-57) New Hampshire
15. James Buchanan (1857-61) Pennsylvania
16. Abraham Lincoln (1861-65) Kentucky
17. Andrew Johnson (1865-69) North Carolina
18. Ulysses S. Grant (1869-77) Ohio
19. Rutherford B. Hayes (1877-81) Ohio
20. James A. Garfield (1881) Ohio
21. Chester A. Arthur (1881-85) Vermont
22. Grover Cleveland (1885-89) New Jersey
23. Benjamin Harrison (1889-93) Ohio
24. Grover Cleveland (1893-97) New Jersey
25. William McKinley (1897-1901) Ohio
26. Theodore Roosevelt (1901-09) New York
27. William H. Taft (1909-13) Ohio
28. Woodrow Wilson (1913-21) Virginia
29. Warren G. Harding (1921-23) Ohio
30. Calvin Coolidge (1923-29) Vermont
31. Herbert Hoover (1929-33) Iowa
32. Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933-45) New York
33. Harry S. Truman (1945-53) Missouri
34. Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-61) Texas
35. John F. Kennedy (1961-63) Massachusetts
36. Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-69) Texas
37. Richard M. Nixon (1969-74) California
38. Gerald R. Ford (1974-77) Nebraska
39. Jimmy Carter (1977-81) Georgia
40. Ronald Reagan (1981-89) Illinois
41. George Bush (1989-93) Massachusetts
42. William J. Clinton (1993-2001) Arkansas
43. George W. Bush (2001-2008) Connecticut
44. Barack Obama (2009 -) Hawaii

I'm sorry I hate to keep bringing this up but as a life long resident of Connecticut it just really irks the hell out of me that this person is listed as being from Connecticut. His birth place is listed as New Haven, Connecticut, so I'm picturing some unholy shrine deep beneath the compound of the Skull and Bones headquarters at Yale university. Where he was anointed on an altar beneath an upside down cross. After which he was quickly shipped to a ranch in Texas to begin his, hypocritical, training in militant conservatism.


I mean really can't we find a better champion for our state. Just off hand I'm thinking Benedict Arnold was also born in Connecticut. He caused much less damage to our country than Little Georgie. Or we may also consider John Brown, he may have been a murderous lunatic but he was responsible for far fewer senseless deaths than our former wannabe dictator.

dumb ass

Ohhhh...... targetman377 are you a Bush fan?

[SultanOfSurreal]

Some will actually to go as far as to say that Reagan won the Cold War.

Some will be morons

I didn't say that was my belief, at all, I'm saying that some people do go that far.

i understand and i was adding a qualifier to that statement

[thegreekdog]

Yeah, I wasn't saying it's just the war. I'm saying it wasn't just FDR's domestic policies. In fact, we don't know what would have happened had the war not occurred.

As to your contention that when the war was over we should have gone back down to Depression-era levels... when, again, did we stop building tanks, bombs and guns? Do you think we didn't continue stockpiling after the war was over? Remember the Soviet Union? Remember Korea?

By the way, the war did not start in 1939. Guess again. It started in 1939 for Europe... I guess everyone here is so Euro-centric that they don't realize when World War 2 actually started. Japan occupied Manchuria sometime in 1932 (I think) and invaded China in 1937 (I think).

[captainwalrus]

I mean really can't we find a better champion for our state. Just off hand I'm thinking Benedict Arnold was also born in Connecticut. He caused much less damage to our country than Little Georgie.

Benedict Arnold was a great leader, he practically won us the war. If it weren't for him we would have lost saratoga and therefore the support of the french.

[neanderpaul14]

I mean really can't we find a better champion for our state. Just off hand I'm thinking Benedict Arnold was also born in Connecticut. He caused much less damage to our country than Little Georgie.

Benedict Arnold was a great leader. If it weren't for him we would have lost saratoga and therefore the support of the french.

Very true Benedict Arnold was one of our finest generals, and one of Washington's favorites. It wasn't until his mistreatment by Congress that he decided to turn traitor.

[Juan_Bottom]

I don't understand why Washington gets rated so low in people's minds? Below even Lincoln? Lincoln had the military and industrial might to win the Civil War. All he needed was time.... basically. But he did make MANY CRAZY errors during his presidency that do essentially call his judgement to question don't they?

[think of General McClellen, and how many other Generals Lincoln went through before Grant--too much waste]
"If General McClellan does not want to use the army, I would like to borrow it for a time."

Washington on the other hand won a war being the underdog. And he had to launch a nation of loosley banded states with their own governments. That was no tiny task. And in the end, once things were up and running, HE STEPPED DOWN gracefully. I mean, that is a huge deal... he could have been president for life at that point.
I also thought that his handling of the Wiskey Rebellion was particularly great.

Lincoln = saved a nation

Washington = birthed a nation

[SultanOfSurreal]

Yeah, I wasn't saying it's just the war. I'm saying it wasn't just FDR's domestic policies. In fact, we don't know what would have happened had the war not occurred.

As to your contention that when the war was over we should have gone back down to Depression-era levels... when, again, did we stop building tanks, bombs and guns? Do you think we didn't continue stockpiling after the war was over? Remember the Soviet Union? Remember Korea?

By the way, the war did not start in 1939. Guess again. It started in 1939 for Europe... I guess everyone here is so Euro-centric that they don't realize when World War 2 actually started. Japan occupied Manchuria sometime in 1932 (I think) and invaded China in 1937 (I think).

yes i thought you might point to the second japanese-sino war as the start date but that has nothing to do with american involvement at the very least and if you're going to go that far you may as well say that world war 1 and world war 2 were really just one long war

historians generally agree that the war did not become truly global until hitler invaded poland. certainly not before the signing of the tripartite pact.

as for the depression, the new deal was clearly the beginning of economic recovery, and as the graphs i posted go to show, already had america back to pre-depression levels of prosperity before we started lend-lease and the massive industrial gear-up for war. there is no reason to believe that without the war we would have suffered a sudden downturn, since the trend was certainly towards continued recovery.

the claim that the only thing that got us out of depression was the war is so transparently fraudulent that only those truly ignorant of history believe it. exactly where did the infrastructure, money, and manpower for rearmament come from, anyway? did it pop into existence one day in 1940? did franklin roosevelt hire a wizard? or maybe we could afford the rearmament effort because we were no longer in an economic depression.

[thegreekdog]

yes i thought you might point to the second japanese-sino war as the start date but that has nothing to do with american involvement at the very least and if you're going to go that far you may as well say that world war 1 and world war 2 were really just one long war

One of my history professors in college contended that in approximately 50 to 100 years, people will refer to both wars as one long war. As far as I was taught in college, we provided munitions and other resources to both China and Japan during the Sino-Japanese War.

historians generally agree that the war did not become truly global until hitler invaded poland. certainly not before the signing of the tripartite pact.

Yes... fascinating.

as for the depression, the new deal was clearly the beginning of economic recovery, and as the graphs i posted go to show, already had america back to pre-depression levels of prosperity before we started lend-lease and the massive industrial gear-up for war. there is no reason to believe that without the war we would have suffered a sudden downturn, since the trend was certainly towards continued recovery.

Where's your New Deal graph? The one that shows how much economic recovery was generated directly by the New Deal.

the claim that the only thing that got us out of depression was the war is so transparently fraudulent that only those truly ignorant of history believe it. exactly where did the infrastructure, money, and manpower for rearmament come from, anyway? did it pop into existence one day in 1940? did franklin roosevelt hire a wizard? or maybe we could afford the rearmament effort because we were no longer in an economic depression.

Oh, I'm not saying that at all my little friend. Clearly the infrastructure, money and manpower for the war came directly from the New Deal. I believe FDR's policies on the creation of robotic soldiers and his superhuman powers of economic recovery were the entire reason we came out of the Depression.

As I've said, I don't believe it was all the war, I don't believe it was all the New Deal. It was a combination of the two.

[SultanOfSurreal]

historians generally agree that the war did not become truly global until hitler invaded poland. certainly not before the signing of the tripartite pact.

Yes... fascinating.

don't crib off of me you jerkazoid

anyway, "yes fascinating" is better suitied to long missives, not 20 word assertions. consider a simple lol next time

[Snorri1234]

By the way, the war did not start in 1939. Guess again. It started in 1939 for Europe... I guess everyone here is so Euro-centric that they don't realize when World War 2 actually started. Japan occupied Manchuria sometime in 1932 (I think) and invaded China in 1937 (I think).

It's a bit silly to call something a world-war when most of the world isn't even involved or planning to get involved.

Not to mention that the japanese sino war didn't have much to do with the 1939 invasion of Poland. While the 1939 invasion of Poland basically had everything to do with getting almost everyone involved in the war.

[PLAYER57832]

There's an argument that FDR's policies did not help get us out of the Great Depression. Those people argue that World War Two got us out of the Great Depression. Which, frankly, I agree with

then you're another dullard who fell for a conservative canard older than your parents. the depression was effectively over by 1938, well before america entered the conflict.

At the risk of being subject to nonsensical abuse with no backup information (from the good Sultan)... What was wrong with President Reagan?

he was the progenitor of the modern conservative movement, which has done more to harm america socially, financially, and culturally than anything else in the current era. he ballooned defense spending to insane levels, cutting funding for vital social programs to do it -- among them education and healthcare.

his voodoo economics are the single worst, most discredited economic theory to ever hold sway over the country and represent a transparent attempt to benefit the rich at the expense of the poor that would have been laughable if it hadn't worked.

basically he was a demagogue and by the end of his second term he was a literal doddering moron who barely remembered that he was even president.

further if the ussr hadn't had the single weakest (by a huge margin) head of state to ever serve, and if the ussr hadn't already raped itself to death with obscenely poor planning, reagan would not have been able to "end" the cold war. in fact his "tear down this wall" and other brinksmanship-type antics probably would have led to nuclear war if someone like stalin had been in office. though i prefer to think reagan possessed some semblance of sanity and wouldn't have tried ridiculous stunts like that if he didn't know he could get away with them.

and i haven't even touched on nicaragua, iran, his lasting effects on the supreme court, or about 10,000 other things that make him probably one of the worst figures in all american history

I cannot believe I agree with almost this entire post, other than the "doddering moron" bit. You hit his major faults.

That said, per the conservative movement, I think they key word is "credited". He IS credited with starting what is called the modern conservative movement, but many supporters would be dismayed to find that their "poster president" was almost liberal by today's standards. (which is where I give him more credit than you.. on issue you did not mention, such as immigration.)

[InkL0sed]

Despite the fact that Reagan has way more votes than he deserves and FDR have way too few, I'm happy to see this poll going in a good direction (with Lincoln first and Washington acceptably at second).

[Snorri1234]

That said, per the conservative movement, I think they key word is "credited". He IS credited with starting what is called the modern conservative movement, but many supporters would be dismayed to find that their "poster president" was almost liberal by today's standards. (which is where I give him more credit than you.. on issue you did not mention, such as immigration.)

I think it's more that he did start it but then it warped completely away without him. Had he not created the conservative movement the US wouldn't be so far behind on social and economic issues as it is today, but I don't think you can blame him for that because I doubt anyone would've foreseen that.

[Juan_Bottom]

Despite the fact that Reagan has way more votes than he deserves and FDR have way too few, I'm happy to see this poll going in a good direction (with Lincoln first and Washington acceptably at second).

I haven't voted. Is tough choices.

[nagerous]

LBJ should be up there.

19 votes for Raegan? Seriously?

I voted Lincoln.

[ga7]

Reagan was an actor. Nuff said
It never ceased to amaze me how people are willing to put an unrevised 300 yo text before everything logical; much like evangelist christians...

[thegreekdog]

Reagan was an actor. Nuff said
It never ceased to amaze me how people are willing to put an unrevised 300 yo text before everything logical; much like evangelist christians...

Actually, I'm pretty sure conservative Christians hated Reagan.

But, yeah, Reagan has way too many votes. And I like Reagan.

[thegreekdog]

historians generally agree that the war did not become truly global until hitler invaded poland. certainly not before the signing of the tripartite pact.

Yes... fascinating.

don't crib off of me you jerkazoid

anyway, "yes fascinating" is better suitied to long missives, not 20 word assertions. consider a simple lol next time

Hey man, you treat people like shit, I treat you like shit. Think of me as the comeuppance.

[InkL0sed]

Reagan was an actor. Nuff said
It never ceased to amaze me how people are willing to put an unrevised 300 yo text before everything logical; much like evangelist christians...

Actually, I'm pretty sure conservative Christians hated Reagan.

But, yeah, Reagan has way too many votes. And I like Reagan.

I don't think Reagan was a horrible President, but he is way too glorified by conservatives.

Hmm, I think I'm repeating myself. I must be getting old...

[neanderpaul14]

[ga7]

Reagan was an actor. Nuff said
It never ceased to amaze me how people are willing to put an unrevised 300 yo text before everything logical; much like evangelist christians...

Actually, I'm pretty sure conservative Christians hated Reagan.

But, yeah, Reagan has way too many votes. And I like Reagan.

I wasn't putting in direct correlation the two things; more like a comparition with evangelist christians putting the bible before all

[Juan_Bottom]

our 16th president is the world's most skilled vampire hunter.

A film proposal has already started circulating, with the William Morris agency handling film rights.

Turns out that Abraham Lincoln is the clear winner. I don't think I need to vote.
There is an autobiography being written right now about these newly-discovered archieved FACTS.


http://scifiwire.com/2009/04/zombies-ma ... hor-re.php

[notyou2]

LMFAO

[Martin Ronne]

I voted with the thought of who we could use right now in terms of international relations. T.R.


I don't think there is any way you can determine who is the greatest president. Every man has had his redeeming quality's, and every man has had his faults. To say that one is better than the other is folly.

[Juan_Bottom]

To say that one is better than the other is folly.

You forgot to say "unless we are talking about Bush or Hoover."