Worst American president in history?

[Taoju]

Bush sr., Bush jr., Carter, Hoover, and Reagan.

Carter?

Iran among other things.

[The Scientific States]

Carter?

Iran among other things.

Iran wasn't entirely his fault.

He wasn't good, but he wasn't awful.

[Nervium]

I really want to write Reagan, but... For this time, the Airhead goes free, I'm going with Andrew Jackson...

Although I have my doubts.

[Vulpae]

I was referring to the economic model, and despite the appearance, the US is not run by corporations. it is influenced by them greatly, stupidly so. But those companies have no interest in ruling anything. They just want to make stupid amounts of money.

Thus the country has a Democratic Republic style of government.
Something it has maintained in one form or another since it's inception. It is slow, ponderous, and often bogged down, but the US government is ultimately answering to it's people.
People need to take more of an interest in their country's government, it's the lack of majority involvement over the last 30 years that has created this problem.

The economy waffles between various forms of free market systems depending on economic conditions, and desires of the people at that time.

Corporatism is where the government is run by the corporations, I corrected you to the corporatocracy we are in now and under Bush. Corporatocracy is where the corporate interests are upheld by the government.

That is called corruption. Plain and Simple. Private companies do not run the United States of America because nobody wants to actually run the place, they just want to profit from it.

[Lerodan Chinamerica]

Jimmy Carter

He was pretty poor in most regards, but he has a nice record for deregulation.

[Roski]

It's a tough one. Johnson, Hoover, Eisenhower, LBJ, Nixon, Reagan, W. Bush, Obama...pretty much every president has done less than they could have done really.

Johnson... I do not know enough about his impact to history to make a judgement
Hoover... He was bad, but the president that took over after him was much worse
Eisenhower... All I know about him is he fought in WW2... nothing more
LBJ... Those initials aren't familiar, if you mean Lyndon B Johnson then yes, I agree
Nixon... No argument here
Reagan... Not the worst in my opinion. Probable the best of the most recent.. and better than most post-WW2 presidents
Bush: Both of them were horrible, the most recent did one thing right... nothing else
Obama: Can't agree more here either

[Roski]

Corporatism is where the government is run by the corporations, I corrected you to the corporatocracy we are in now and under Bush. Corporatocracy is where the corporate interests are upheld by the government.

That is called corruption. Plain and Simple. Private companies do not run the United States of America because nobody wants to actually run the place, they just want to profit from it.

You have a point there.

[Roski]

Iran among other things.

Iran wasn't entirely his fault.

He wasn't good, but he wasn't awful.

Iran wasn't his fault, but his lack of doing something was horrible.
Worst of the Post-WW2 Pre-2k in my opinion. Poor Georgia, one president from us and he was terrible

[Roski]

Reagan was great
I think Jimmy Carter or James Buchanan

Reagan and other President lowering taxes as a mean of growth is a big reason why America has a high debt.

He actually helped the economy and put America into a 7-year prosperity. I liked this president

Nixon was bad, Carter was the worst before Reagan and after World War 2, Clinton was bad, but not as bad as either Bush or Obama, I know nothing about the other two mentioned abouve

[Blakk Metal]

You do relax is most of his policies, were scrapped, right?

In fact, his policies helped end the Great Depression. If anything, he was the best president of the 20th century.

So welfare, social security and unemployment were stopped?

oh


Seventeen trillion dollars in debt to China?!

Most US debt is owed to Americans.

Iran wasn't entirely his fault.

He wasn't good, but he wasn't awful.

Iran wasn't his fault, but his lack of doing something was horrible.
Worst of the Post-WW2 Pre-2k in my opinion. Poor Georgia, one president from us and he was terrible

All three of California's presidents suck.

Reagan and other President lowering taxes as a mean of growth is a big reason why America has a high debt.

He actually helped the economy and put America into a 7-year prosperity. I liked this president

Reagan didn't improve the economy, an increase in fuel efficiency did*.

*simplified

[Sociobiology]

Franklin Pierce.

[Ulvena]

In no particular order: George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Woodrow Wilson, Andrew Johnson, Barrack Obama, Ronald Reagan, Lyndon B. Johnson. To prevent repeats about Obama, I will address all of them except Obama as the reasons I do not like Obama has already been addressed at least Infinity² times.

1. George W. Bush: He created a system of true entitlement. The idea that you can wage two wars, implement retarded unworkable policies such as No Child Left Behind, justify one of the two wars with false information, AND still have low taxes. Bush brought us into a deficit and while Obama can be faulted for many things, he cannot be faulted for the deficit any more than Bush, in fact, less than Bush. Bush put us in a $1.3 trillion deficit.

2. Jimmy Carter: He was a weak President. If he were President in the year 2000, perhaps he wouldn't have been all bad. However, this was the Cold War era. An era in which he oversaw a botched attack on Iran in response to the embassy attack, America not being taken seriously by the rest of the world, as well as the failure to facilitate the Iranian embassy attack.

3. Andrew Johnson: Definitely for failing to control Reconstruction in any way, shape, or form that was logical. He was far too busy fighting with Congress to do anything meaningful in handling the South. While this cannot be considered entirely his fault, Johnson was still very much at fault in handling the South and enmity felt by the Southerners.

4. Ronald Reagan: While he's the champion of Conservatives and Republicans, as well as an amazing orator, Reagan brought us short term prosperity in exchange for long term downturn. He essentially started our debt problem. Not to say there was no debt before Reagan but Reagan expanded the debt greatly.

5. Woodrow Wilson: Woodrow Wilson had little reason to bring the United States to war or establish the Federal Reserve in its current state. The Zimmerman Telegram's deal could not and was not implemented by Mexico, who had just finished a bloody and crippling Civil War. The Lusitania episode was also very much the United States' fault, specifically the citizens, as they were warned before boarding by the GERMANS that British ships will be indiscriminately attacked and they still rode it into a hotspot of attack. In regards to the Federal Reserve, the Federal Reserve itself is a system designed to be independent of the government as well as expanding the inflation of the dollar far more than before. I am not against Central Banking, just the Federal Reserve's methodology and policy.

6. Lyndon B. Johnson. Vietnam was not justified. That is all.

[MERIZoC]

In no particular order: George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Woodrow Wilson, Andrew Johnson, Barrack Obama, Ronald Reagan, Lyndon B. Johnson. To prevent repeats about Obama, I will address all of them except Obama as the reasons I do not like Obama has already been addressed at least Infinity² times.

1. George W. Bush: He created a system of true entitlement. The idea that you can wage two wars, implement retarded unworkable policies such as No Child Left Behind, justify one of the two wars with false information, AND still have low taxes. Bush brought us into a deficit and while Obama can be faulted for many things, he cannot be faulted for the deficit any more than Bush, in fact, less than Bush. Bush put us in a $1.3 trillion deficit.

2. Jimmy Carter: He was a weak President. If he were President in the year 2000, perhaps he wouldn't have been all bad. However, this was the Cold War era. An era in which he oversaw a botched attack on Iran in response to the embassy attack, America not being taken seriously by the rest of the world, as well as the failure to facilitate the Iranian embassy attack.

3. Andrew Johnson: Definitely for failing to control Reconstruction in any way, shape, or form that was logical. He was far too busy fighting with Congress to do anything meaningful in handling the South. While this cannot be considered entirely his fault, Johnson was still very much at fault in handling the South and enmity felt by the Southerners.

4. Ronald Reagan: While he's the champion of Conservatives and Republicans, as well as an amazing orator, Reagan brought us short term prosperity in exchange for long term downturn. He essentially started our debt problem. Not to say there was no debt before Reagan but Reagan expanded the debt greatly.

5. Woodrow Wilson: Woodrow Wilson had little reason to bring the United States to war or establish the Federal Reserve in its current state. The Zimmerman Telegram's deal could not and was not implemented by Mexico, who had just finished a bloody and crippling Civil War. The Lusitania episode was also very much the United States' fault, specifically the citizens, as they were warned before boarding by the GERMANS that British ships will be indiscriminately attacked and they still rode it into a hotspot of attack. In regards to the Federal Reserve, the Federal Reserve itself is a system designed to be independent of the government as well as expanding the inflation of the dollar far more than before. I am not against Central Banking, just the Federal Reserve's methodology and policy.

6. Lyndon B. Johnson. Vietnam was not justified. That is all.

You were able to explain why the others weren't good presidents, and you did so using good reasons. All the other people saying Obama was the worst president have given us downright stupid reasons, especially considering the fact that they didn't back their statements up. Since you were able to give reasons for your choice of the other presidents, could you please give us a good reason for why Obama is on the list?

[Jinos]

To be honest I'm a little sick of seeing certain presidents getting put up on here when there are far worse more deserving of the title.

Jimmy Carter: Really? The absolute WORST he ever did to this country was lose some face in Iran (a situation he eventually fixed btw, even though Reagan somehow gets the credit). He's become the go-to scapegoat for conservatives for everything wrong with this country somehow and I don't understand it.

Barrack Obama: His term isn't over and I'll always say you can never judge a president until he's out of office. That said, his "failures" have been grossly over exaggerated and it is extremely clear by the sheer unrepentant vilification that many only label him the "worst" because he's black. No president in history has ever been so put down. Not even Bush during the Iraq war.

FDR: This one's pretty obvious. Ancaps and Austrian-ecos who think he extended the Great Depression (they're wrong but that's another debate). That said, even if his economic policies did fail (they didn't) the simple fact is that his policies kept the country from falling apart in the 3rd most unstable period of its history (the other two being during/just after the Articles of Confederation and the Civil War) had it not been for him, America could've easily fallen to Soviet-style Communism/Nazi-style Fascism.

Honorable Mention goes to Hoover. The Great Depression wasn't really his fault (although his policies certainly made it much worse and he was a pretty bad president). The real blame SHOULD go to Calvin Coolidge, who basically let America run right to financial collapse but left office before we hit the cliff. People remember the prosperity of the 20s and think he did great, but his whole presidency was basically spent setting up a house of cards; his economic policies were never sustainable.

[Yumyumsuppertime]

Even if you don't especially care for President Obama (Disclaimer: I like him reasonably well, but only in comparison to the alternatives presented by the GOP), calling him the worst American President in history shows a stunning lack of either perspective, historical knowledge, or both. It somehow reminds me of the stereotype of the spoiled teenager, someone with so little experience in life that he or she is able to say, in all seriousness, "This is the worst thing to EVER HAPPEN in HISTORY!" when grounded for staying out late, or when refused a new video game console on the day of its release. There's no sense of what actually makes up a bad President. Hell, George W. Bush almost inarguably has a better claim to the title, and even he doesn't hit rock bottom to the degree of a Pierce, Buchanan, or Fillmore.

Seriously, people, crack open a book, or at least do a little online research before making these bold claims. As it is, the posts proclaiming the current President to be the worst reflect far more poorly on the poster than they do on the occupant of the Oval Office.

[Big Jim P]

I can't say about history (having not lived it) but within my adult lifetime, the worst would be a toss-up between Obama and both of the Bushes, Reagan and Clinton being the only good ones.

[Yumyumsuppertime]

I can't say about history (having not lived it) but within my adult lifetime, the worst would be a toss-up between Obama and both of the Bushes, Reagan and Clinton being the only good ones.

Reagan? Cut taxes for the wealthy while actually increasing them for the middle class, tripled the national debt, sold arms to our enemies (the very ones whose actions had embarrassed America before the world, and was the major cause of his predecessor's loss to him), propped up any and every corrupt, violent tinpot dictator willing to give lip service to anti-communism, implemented economic policies that made it easier to ship jobs overseas (Clinton is also at fault here), completely ignored the AIDS epidemic until a close friend died of it (and then barely acknowledged the scope and gravity of the issue), and gave aid and comfort to the brutal apartheid regime in South Africa. That Reagan?

He's not the worst of all time by a long shot, but he may qualify as the most overrated President in history.

[The Nuclear Fist]

I can't say about history (having not lived it) but within my adult lifetime, the worst would be a toss-up between Obama and both of the Bushes, Reagan and Clinton being the only good ones.

Reagan? Cut taxes for the wealthy while actually increasing them for the middle class, tripled the national debt, sold arms to our enemies (the very ones whose actions had embarrassed America before the world, and was the major cause of his predecessor's loss to him), propped up any and every corrupt, violent tinpot dictator willing to give lip service to anti-communism, implemented economic policies that made it easier to ship jobs overseas (Clinton is also at fault here), completely ignored the AIDS epidemic until a close friend died of it (and then barely acknowledged the scope and gravity of the issue), and gave aid and comfort to the brutal apartheid regime in South Africa. That Reagan?

He's not the worst of all time by a long shot, but he may qualify as the most overrated President in history.

Don't forget the part where he sells weapons to America's enemies, thus violating the embargo against doing that, in order to fund death squads and rape gangs in South America that would end up killing not only their own people but also Americans, again illegal, and who also ended up trafficking drugs into the US.

I mean, fuck. What good was there?

[Roski]

6. Lyndon B. Johnson. Vietnam was not justified. That is all.

Not only was it unjustified, if we had actually gone there to fight, and not police them, we could have lost fewer lives and actually won. I do not support the invasion of Vietnam, but we fucked up big time, and was part of the reason America became a laughing stalk.





On an unrelated note, let me address Reagan's term.
Excellent=2 Good=1 Neutral=0 Bad=-1 Terrible=-2
As soon as the term starts, he fires 11,000 workers that were on strike, the first president for a long time to actually have the balls to do so -Good
Reagan helped with the decrease of inflation, dropped it from 12.5 to 4.4 -Excellent
Unemployment rate fell from 7.5 to 5.4 -Good
Increased deficit and National Debt -Terrible
Heavily Increased defense -Excellent
TEFRA -Neutral
Job Training Partnership Act of 1982 -Good
Kept minimum wage at 3.35/hr -Excellent
"Reagan is viewed as an antitax hero despite raising taxes eleven times over the course of his presidency, all in the name of fiscal responsibility"
Reagan cut the budgets of non-military programs including Medicaid, food stamps, federal education programs and the EPA. -Good
In order to cover newly spawned federal budget deficits, the United States borrowed heavily both domestically and abroad, raising the national debt from $997 billion to $2.85 trillion -Terrible
Dropped several agreements being negotiated with the Soviets, wounding them financially -Excellent
Allowed people to use GPS freely -Excellent
Reagan introduced the Strategic Defense Initiative, a defense project -Excellent
SDI Hastened the end of the Cold War -Excellent
War on Drugs -Nuetral
Libya bombing -Terrible
Immigration -Excellent
Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! -Excellent
His decision to go public in 1983 regarding his wearing the small, audio-amplifying device boosted their sales -Excellent
Judiciary -Good

Overall, he gets a 16, meaning he was a decent president, by my standards

[Kalgeron]

To be fair to Andrew Johnson he never really had a chance to be a good president. After Lincoln was assassinated the House and Senate which were heavy Republican majorities after the war were not going to let a southerner be president. He wasn't involved in the assassination attempt on Lincoln and the original plot to kill Lincoln had someone killing Johnson as well, but the assassin got cold feet. They trumped up grounds for impeachment and he quickly resigned after the impeachment failed by a narrow margin.

For worst president maybe Lyndon B. Johnson for getting the country stuck in Vietnam. He did pass some very landmark legislation as president however.

I think people are too close to accurately judge any of the recent presidents like Obama, Bush, and to some extent Clinton.

[Gauthier]

Barrack Obama: His term isn't over and I'll always say you can never judge a president until he's out of office. That said, his "failures" have been grossly over exaggerated and it is extremely clear by the sheer unrepentant vilification that many only label him the "worst" because he's black. No president in history has ever been so put down. Not even Bush during the Iraq war.

No other President since the 20th Century ever had to deal with a pathologically obstructive Congress like Obama had to put up with. It's rather predictable that the hipsters crowing about how Obama got nothing done or broke his campaign promises like to pretend he had a Congress that would bend over backwards for him. That or they bring up the myth of the Democratic Supermajority which never truly existed because Norm Coleman was throwing a bitchfit in Minnesota and by the time that was settled there was only a total of 6 weeks actual supermajority before Ted Kennedy died and history shows us how the Democratic Party fucked that up.

If the Republicans do win back Congress in 2014 I will boldly state my prediction that Obama will become the next Andrew Johnson, with Radical Republicans (and not the kind that do awesome skateboard tricks) filing motions for impeachment on top of cockblocking everything he wants done.

[Roski]

Barrack Obama: His term isn't over and I'll always say you can never judge a president until he's out of office. That said, his "failures" have been grossly over exaggerated and it is extremely clear by the sheer unrepentant vilification that many only label him the "worst" because he's black. No president in history has ever been so put down. Not even Bush during the Iraq war.

No other President since the 20th Century ever had to deal with a pathologically obstructive Congress like Obama had to put up with. It's rather predictable that the hipsters crowing about how Obama got nothing done or broke his campaign promises like to pretend he had a Congress that would bend over backwards for him. That or they bring up the myth of the Democratic Supermajority which never truly existed because Norm Coleman was throwing a bitchfit in Minnesota and by the time that was settled there was only a total of 6 weeks actual supermajority before Ted Kennedy died and history shows us how the Democratic Party fucked that up.

If the Republicans do win back Congress in 2014 I will boldly state my prediction that Obama will become the next Andrew Johnson, with Radical Republicans (and not the kind that do awesome skateboard tricks) filing motions for impeachment on top of cockblocking everything he wants done.

The Republican leader will never support an impeachment vote against Barack Obama because of a fear of Joe Biden

[Gauthier]

No other President since the 20th Century ever had to deal with a pathologically obstructive Congress like Obama had to put up with. It's rather predictable that the hipsters crowing about how Obama got nothing done or broke his campaign promises like to pretend he had a Congress that would bend over backwards for him. That or they bring up the myth of the Democratic Supermajority which never truly existed because Norm Coleman was throwing a bitchfit in Minnesota and by the time that was settled there was only a total of 6 weeks actual supermajority before Ted Kennedy died and history shows us how the Democratic Party fucked that up.

If the Republicans do win back Congress in 2014 I will boldly state my prediction that Obama will become the next Andrew Johnson, with Radical Republicans (and not the kind that do awesome skateboard tricks) filing motions for impeachment on top of cockblocking everything he wants done.

The Republican leader will never support an impeachment vote against Barack Obama because of a fear of Joe Biden

They won't impeach to remove Obama from office. They'll do it to both stir up their insane Tea Party base and try to shit all over Obama's page in the history books.

[Jamjai]

I don't know, I don't like Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War. He just could've made North, South and the West separated, I mean all three of them have their own separate cultures. I don't like how he handled the situation

[The Nuclear Fist]

I don't know, I don't like Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War. He just could've made North, South and the West separated, I mean all three of them have their own separate cultures. I don't like how he handled the situation

The South doomed itself when it fired the first shot, he was just making them pay for it.