RATING PRESIDENTS

Here's an old favorite game: Rating the Presidents.
 

How good or bad were they? What did they accomplish, or did they just sit there?
 

My ratings, going back to FDR ...

FDR beat the Depression and won the war. His Administration set the political tone at least through the 1960s.

FDR invented Social Security and brought the Welfare State to America. The government increasingly ran the economy after 1939, which resulted in full employment and laid the basis of the post-war WWII boom.

FDR, in my book, ranks with Abraham Lincoln and George Washington: the three greatest Presidents.

Harry Truman

Sorry Harry, FDR was a hard act to follow.

Truman gets an A for ending segregation in the military, thus beginning the end of apartheid in the United States. Truman also gets an A for putting Universal Health Care on the agenda even if, to this day, this need is unfulfilled.

He gets a C for not fighting Sen Joe McCarthy and his ilk enough. Of course, this is balanced by the A he got by firing McArthur, thus saving America from a military coup d'etat or dictatorship.

Truman prevented the use of nuclear weapons in an edgy world, which forestalled World War III. His Containment Policy was sufficient unto the day in countering the USSR. This led to the Berlin Airlift and the Korean War.

Truman listened to Gen Marshall, who saved Europe from disaster. This was a courageous decision on Truman's part, as the country was still not feeling too friendly toward Germans and Italians. On the other hand, fear of the Russians helped Truman.

While not brilliant, Truman and his men did a solid job of establishing successful American post-war policies.

Dwight David Eisenhower

... was a fence sitter. Yes, he settled the Korean War, but that was close to being settled anyway. Yes, there was the famous boom peaking in 1955, but that was accompanied by Charlie Wilson's saying: what's good for GM is good for America. (My father bought a '55 Buick.)

Ike was in charge of the European war against the Nazis, which the United States won. That got him elected President, regardless of his nearly apolitical nature. (Both parties had sought and courted Ike.) Ike was probably the most politically colorless President of the 20^th century.

The '50s were famous for "standing pat" and Schmoos, and that's about where Ike was at. That made him incredibly popular, despite being a do-nothing President. That's also why he get's a "C:" you cannot downrate or upgrade him.

I would add a "+", however, for the famous and prophetic 'Beware the Military-Industrial Complex' in his farewell speech. Like me, Ike has had the misfortune of being a Cassandra.

John F Kennedy

Here's where we start a long series of failed or severely flawed Presidents. They have split personalities.

JFK is the first of these. We still marvel at his speeches, and are still inspired by them. "Camelot" gets an "A" for IMAGE.

But, JFK accomplished very little. He did introduce "advisors" into Vietnam, and ordered Diem's assassination, but it is unclear whether he was for or against a larger war.

He was "for" civil rights, but also for "go slow."

His tax cut to fight the "Kennedy recesssion" has become a pretext for present-day market fundamentalists (ultra-conservatives)to cut taxes more. It is still unclear whether that tax cut had any effect on the 62-63 recession.

JFK brought us nearer than anyone else to nuclear war, Armageddon. I've never forgotten the searing experience of that weekend in October, 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis, when I felt we were goners for sure. For me, Ike's warning connected with that experience: I have been against American Imperialism and foreign adventures ever since.

I am not sorry: I am totally dismissive of the naive and stupid views of Boomers and Neo-cons, survivalists all, who blithely assume they will survive a nuclear war. These people are just jerks and know not whereof they speak. That is Kennedy's legacy.

So, Kennedy gets a "C" for being in the middle of everything, and giving us a roller-coaster ride that eventually ended with "Mutually Assured Destruction," or MAD.

Lyndon Baines Johnson

LBJ took up Kennedy's agenda writ large.

There can be no doubt that LBJ was nearly as great as FDR in his concept of what America could be. The Great Society in fact solved the problem of poverty, as long as it was supported. Until Ronald Reagan (see below) started taking apart the Great Society and the New Deal, poverty and need were on the decline; they hit bottom in 1980.

What Lincoln started, LBJ ended: Free at Last. Our modern concept of personal rights, of a freedom unknown prior to the 1960s, was put into law by LBJ. The Old South, Slavery, and all that goes with apartheid was killed, personally, by LBJ. For this alone, he gets an "A."

But, then there's the war in Vietnam. By 1966, he knew the war was lost, as did his advisers (e.g., McNamara). But he persisted; he could not accept defeat. About 50,000 Americans died, because LBJ could not extract himself, could not just get out. For foreign affairs, LBJ gets an "F."

Richard Milhaus Nixon

Nixon was Nixon.

He was more liberal than any President since. He was for a Guaranteed Annual Income. He started the Environmental Protection Agency. He was willing to control wages and prices, if only for a while and reluctantly. Nixon knew how to use the power of the government to achieve his purposes.

On the other hand, Nixon was deeply paranoid and manipulative. This came out in his foreign policy (the secret bombing of Cambodia), the Saturday Night Massacre, and eventually in Watergate.

Great people are capable of great good and great evil. LBJ and Nixon were both deeply flawed near-greats. I cannot separate the two, as both arouse in me - as I write - a storm of emotions. Anyone who lived through those times surely knows the feeling.

We are only beginning of sorting out the real history and meaning of the "60s," in which LBJ and Nixon are embedded. It takes this long - maybe longer - for "history" to become settled. Maybe those of us who still have strong feelings have to die, before the "unemotional reality" of cause and effect will emerge. It's like polishing fossil-bearing stones.

Gerald Ford

Here is the quintessential "nice guy" who made it to the Oval Office. I don't agree with a lot of what Ford says, but I do think he is a nice guy. I still listen to him respectfully, when he speaks.

Although I hated him for doing it at the time, Gerald Ford made the right decision by pardoning Richard Nixon. There is no punishment to suit the crime, Nixon's crimes, other than national shunning and the decision of history. Ford's pardon introduced us to the notion of "too big to fail."

WIN - Whip Inflation Now - sticks in the mind. A truly insipid and ineffective program to resolve the economic problems of the times. Keep in mind, there wasn't just the turmoil of Vietnam, Watergate and social revolution going on. OPEC embargoed oil, and forced "stagflation" on the United States.

The Ford Administration did stave off a recession resulting from the oil embargo, by increasing spending and unemployment benefits. Even though many of today's principals in the Bush II Administration worked for Ford, Ford was not an extremist. Ford let the liberal Keynesian solutions, already in place, do their work.

Let us not forget the end of the Vietnam war: those helicopters taking off from the roof of American Embassy in Saigon in 1975. That picture, and the ones left behind, prey on guilty minds.

Betty Ford did the country a great service by talking about BREAST CANCER and ALCOHOLISM. The Fords brought frank honesty to the fore. If only some later Presidents could have done the same! I give a "+" for Betty Ford, who was not President.

Jimmy Carter

I admire Jimmy Carter in his later works, and still support the Carter Center in its doings. But, in 1980, I voted for John Anderson; a vote I regret, as it allowed Reagan to win. In retrospect, I believe Jimmie Carter was a better President than Ronald Reagan.

As President, Carter was beset with the problems of stagflation and defeat in war. He was unable to overcome them, and scarcely anyone raised a hand to help him. His religious nature aggravated a lot of people and seemed "unpresidential." His "misery speech" and the "misery index" were unwelcome, even if they were realistic in describing the problems we faced. Lowering the White House thermostat and wearing sweaters was nice, but an entirely inadequate solution to the problems.

Nonetheless, Carter started programs to deal with energy independence, such as wresting oil from the Colorado shales. He emphasized renewable energy sources, recycling and conservation. We would be far less dependent on Arab oil, had Carter's programs been maintained; but, the Reaganites dismantled all of them.

Carter was unable to deal with the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Near the end of it, there may have been some (illegal) double-dealing by then-candidate Reagan's men. We still don't know what back-channel communications were going on between the Republican campaign and Iran's Khomeini government.

Carter was ineffective in dealing with a Congress run by his own party. The fallout from Watergate was a major weakening of Presidential government. Both Gerry Ford and Jimmie Carter had to face, and submit to, a newly powerful Congress. For the first time since the post-Civil-War period, Congress was at least the equal of the President.

Carter was weak for a lot of reasons, many of them simply not his fault. For example, the disaster in the Iranian desert resulted from dismantling the military after Vietnam. Neither the Congress nor the people wanted any more foreign adventures, and they weren't willing to pay for the discredited Pentagon. Thus, Carter simply didn't have the required tools when an unforgiving world decided to take revenge on America. (It's not so easy for Imperialists to get off the tiger they've been riding.)

Carter's reign was ephemeral, an interlude. Sadly, both Ford and Carter were just caretakers before Thermador.

Ronald Wilson Reagan

I believe Ronald Reagan and his men grabbed the government and turned it against the people. He earned an "A" for convincing a majority that he was doing good by doing well. His campaign manager earned an "F" for inventing negative ads and other ways of manipulating people. Lee Atwater regretted his sins when near death due to cancer. I give Reagan a "B" for image making, for being the "Great Communicator."

I detested Reagan as Governor and President. I was incredibly relieved when he left Sacramento, and truly hoped and believed that was the end of him. I felt he could only be elected president 'over my dead body.' Unfortunately, I did not die.

The elder Bush tried to break away from Reagan, but couldn't.

I give George HW Bush a "B" for waging and winning Gulf War I, which I approved. I also give him a "B" for reversing himself on "Read my lips ..." and agreeing to raise taxes. Bush Sr recognized the danger of the huge Reagan deficits; i.e., "Voodoo economics."

But, in what now seems a family genetic defect, he was unable to manage the economy. The Bush recession started in 1990, and got much worse in 1991. It didn't go away in 1992. For those of us in Northern California, it didn't go away until 1996. No, Bill Clinton didn't help us, either.

If Bush had fixed the economy, I might have voted for his re-election. Unlike Reagan, he seemed well-meaning. He didn't seem to believe in a lot of the crazy things his predecessor advocated. Barbara Bush, for example, is probably pro-choice.

But, he didn't fix the economy, and he didn't get re-elected because of that. One thing recent history shows: winning a war is not worth more than a month or two of good polls.

Probably his worst fate has been his son, George W Bush, who has rejected Bush Sr in favor of Godfather Reagan; a prodigal son. Of course, it doesn't matter how bad the son is, as long as he is President. It's good to be the King.

William Jefferson Clinton

Clinton gets a "B" for fixing the deficit, and for happening to be President during an economic boom.

Where has this President not failed?

I say no more.

June 8, 2004

Last update: 11/02/2007

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