5 Worst Presidents in U.S History

[WilliamTheWise]

Who would you say are the worst 5 presidents in U.S History?

______________________________________________________________________​

Rules:​

1) You can't say the following Presidents mainly because we haven't seen the full effects they've had on history yet.

• Carter​
• Reagan ​
• Bush​
• Clinton​
• Bush​
• Obama​

 

[Angel]

Well, 2 of the presidents with the lowest approval ratings are on that list.

 

[Aucune Raison]

fuck your rules

1. Bush jr. (Patriot Act, two wars, huge deficit, Gitmo, the list goes on)
2. Bush sr. (A gigantic tool of the oil companies and military industrial complex, he also carried on the economic policies of Reagan)
3. Reagan (Ultimately responsible for our economy being in a shitfest, the creator of "fiscal conservatism")
4. Eisenhower (Why so many countries hate us, the CIA's main man, and also oil crazy)
5. Nixon (Liar)

 

[WilliamTheWise]

Well, 2 of the presidents with the lowest approval ratings are on that list.

I know, but presidental approval ratings are fairly new so don't go by that alone. Use the facts.

 

[Angel]

I know, but presidental approval ratings are fairly new so don't go by that alone. Use the facts.

in that case, my AS1 class is too far back for me to pick and choose.

although that Trail of Tears stuff with Jackson was BULLSHIT.

 

[WilliamTheWise]

1) Grant- Did nothing, Firgure head, Corrupt cabinet
2) Nixion- Liar Liar pants on fire
3) Hoover- Let the U.S economy crash under his watch, and did little to nothing to help.
4) Garfield- Corrupt
5) Buchanan - Did nothing to stop the events leading up to the Civil War

 

[Bukkake Sensei]

In no particular order:

James Buchanan - Did nothing to prevent the civil war, and left Lincoln to clean up his mess. He was also a huge advocate of slavery, which makes him a detestable prick by default.

Warren G. Harding - Without a doubt the most corrupt president in history; his scandals make Nixon look like a saint.

Herbert Hoover - Stood by and let the Great Depression spiral out of control. Historians also widely agree that most other politicians found him impossible to work with.

George Bush Jr. - He signed the Patriot Act into law (read: took away the fucking rights that everybody in this country is so proud of), initiated two wars based on faulty intelligence, created a multitrillion dollar fiscal deficit, managed to turn every country in the world except for Israel against us...I don't give a shit about how history remembers him; I lived through his administration and I can tell you that he was an awful president.

Andrew Johnson - A white supremacist shithead who fucked up reconstruction after the civil war, and took a firm side with the ex-confederates.

Carter, Nixon, Reagan, Grant, Bush Sr., Pierce, Coolidge, Truman, and several others also rank high on my shit list. USA has had far more bad leaders than good.

EDIT: Hey, somebody make a thread opposite to this since I'm too lazy to.

 

[scubasteve]

obama - black
lincoln - look who he freed
washington - isolationism is bullshit
fdr - fireside chats
kennedy - sucks

 

[Ordeith]

Aside from George W. Bush, my list goes as follows:

1. Warren G. Harding: This man was not only steeped up to his neck in corruption, as Sam previously stated, but wasn't even mentally stable; he was admitted to an insane asylum at one point during his term.

2. Andrew Jackson: Utterly cruel and deceptive towards any non-caucasian human; case-in-point: the Trail of Tears.

3. Richard Nixon: I'm fairly certain we're all well familiar with this fellow, so there isn't much need to go into any further depth.

4. Herbert Hoover: The president who sat back and relaxed in his cushioned executive chair in the oval office, sipping a glass of champagne, while the remainder of the nation huddled together over trash can fires in their rightly named "Hoovervilles".

5. James Buchanan: As so many before me have stated, Buchanan took absolutely no action to prevent the tragedy and bloodbath that was the Civil War.

 

[Aucune Raison]

I know that since Jackson was the President then, he is remembered for the Trail of Tears, but there was nothing he could have done south of sending troops into Alabama, and that would have led the already frail country into an uproar.

 

[Apollo]

In no particular order:

James Buchanan - Did nothing to prevent the civil war, and left Lincoln to clean up his mess. He was also a huge advocate of slavery, which makes him a detestable prick by default.





George Bush Jr. - He signed the Patriot Act into law (read: took away the fucking rights that everybody in this country is so proud of), initiated two wars based on faulty intelligence, created a multitrillion dollar fiscal deficit, managed to turn every country in the world except for Israel against us...I don't give a shit about how history remembers him; I lived through his administration and I can tell you that he was an awful president.

I don't know if this is allowed, but I'm going aruge those two.

Buchanan: The Civil War was brewing ever since the US began to expand westward. If you watch the evolution of the Compromise legislation you can tell it was only a matter of time before the "House Divided" fell. (Missouri Compromise of 1820 to the Great Compromise of 1850 to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854). Also, I don't think judging any President before Wilson (or so?) on the basis of prejudice is fair since it was the norm of the time. Lincoln even held the racist views of the time.

Bush. JR: The provisions of the PATRIOT Act are not new. Every president during war time has taken power to suppress dissent. The same with the draft. They're not 20/21st century ideas. Adams, Lincoln, Wilson and FDR did it, too.

*Correction: Initiated one war on faulty intelligence....
*Correction: Multitrillion debt. If you look at Obama's budget proposal, he is the one creating the multitrillion deficit.

 

[gelandporn]

I'd potentially add Taft to the list. He had no idea of how to compromise between the parties and ultimately achieved very little.

And let's not forget the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Act.

 

[Bukkake Sensei]

Buchanan: The Civil War was brewing ever since the US began to expand westward. If you watch the evolution of the Compromise legislation you can tell it was only a matter of time before the "House Divided" fell. (Missouri Compromise of 1820 to the Great Compromise of 1850 to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854). Also, I don't think judging any President before Wilson (or so?) on the basis of prejudice is fair since it was the norm of the time. Lincoln even held the racist views of the time.

1) I realize that. How does it change the fact that he did nothing to prevent it?
2) There are a lot of societal norms practiced today that make people disgusting to me. Normalcy is not the same thing as decency, and no, not all politicians of the seventeenth century were assholes.

Bush. JR: The provisions of the PATRIOT Act are not new. Every president during war time has taken power to suppress dissent. The same with the draft. They're not 20/21st century ideas. Adams, Lincoln, Wilson and FDR did it, too.

Suppress dissent? Absolutely, but the scale of the USA PATRIOT Act was unprecedented, and it was not implemented to suppress dissent. There are ten stipulations on the Bill of Rights, and so far only two remain; the right to carry around assault weapons and the right to say no to a soldier who wants to spend the night. It's disgraceful.

*Correction: Initiated one war on faulty intelligence....

He ordered military action in both Afghanistan and Iraq, although I should have been more specific. Afghanistan still accomplished nothing.

*Correction: Multitrillion debt. If you look at Obama's budget proposal, he is the one creating the multitrillion deficit.

What the fuck does that have to do with ANYTHING? I think that Obama's economic policy is shit and I'm not defending it. How does that change the fact that Bush ran up two wars on the credit card while our infrastructure continued to crumble?

 

[SilverJ-17]

Wow.. I never really thought about this beyond Bush Jr. (because I lived through it), Hoover (Hey, let's not worry about the Economy spiraling out of control.. It won't be so bad.), and Nixon. I guess I need to read about Harding and Buchanan (He seemed pretty useless from what I knew already though.). Also, I knew that Taft and Grant weren't all too good presidents either. Taft was nothing like Theodore Roosevelt. As for Andrew Jackson, I think his positives outweighted his negatives (like the Trail of Tears) a bit too much to rank near the bottom. So..

Bush Jr. - Pretty much what was said and come on.. this guy made more people hate us in eight years than pretty much any other president. Oh, and did you know that of all the presidents so far, he's spent the most time on Vacation. Yeah.. That's good job there, Mr. Bush Jr. Just go elsewhere in the world when our economy falls flat on it's face.. It's not like you're making the world like us any better either.

Hoover - Like it's been said before.. Another good job by Mr. President on letting our economy fail..

Nixon - Well, he was the first president to be ran out of office and had Johnson not pardoned him, he could of very well been the first former president to be thrown in Prison.

Johnson - Yeah.. he sucked to.. and reasons already mentioned..

Taft - He somewhat had the opposite effect of one of our best presidents. So bad that it made said president go to extremes (Well, splinter the party into two groups, which allowed Woodwill Wilson to win..) to make sure he didn't become president for a second term. I mean, Roosevelt only wanted to become pres. again pretty much because Taft sucked.

 

[Aucune Raison]

I don't like Taft or Roosevelt, they were both a big part of the American Empire, but Roosevelt actually did things (for good and bad), but Taft did very little, and what he did do made things worse. He's partially responsible, in my mind, for the events leading to the Great Depression.

That being said, he'd probably be on my ten worst list.

 

[SilverJ-17]

America Empire or not, I still like him for his New Deals, cracking down on Big Corporations (such as Meat Packing), and tough attitude. (How many presidents can actually claim to be involved in a war only a few years before becoming president/ vice-president?) Also, this guy was one of the first presidents to set aside land for National parks and conservation. I might not be much of an Environmentalist, but you do got to give the man some props for that. All that Taft pretty much did was undo/ kind of undo some of the (great) things that T. Roosevelt put in place, to protect people and their wallets. You do got to admit, for a guy born into wealth, he sure did care about his people. I mean, the moment he would read about this stuff going on in the US, he was usually disgusted at what the lower classes were exposed to and was usually quick to stamp that bs out.

Sorry about this.. this should be in the best Presidents, for one and for two, I think I've read too much about this president.. lol..

 

[Apollo]

1) I realize that. How does it change the fact that he did nothing to prevent it?
2) There are a lot of societal norms practiced today that make people disgusting to me. Normalcy is not the same thing as decency, and no, not all politicians of the seventeenth century were assholes.

You convinced me on Bush.

Buchanan:
You missed the point I was making. The logic you are using to condemn Buchanan for not doing anything to prevent the Civil War through appropriately (Or, what we would consider appropriate under the 21st century opinion) addressing the slavery issue is applicable to EVERY President before him.

You're also trying to support your argument through claiming that holding the views of the time is the requisite for making the list of "Top 5" worst Presidents.

Just because he was the last President before the Civil War does not hold him above the more notoriously racist Presidents that preceded him.