Talk Elections

I was originally planning to make this a poll, but it would've been way too complicated to have every single person whose ever run for president but failed to win, as well as everyone whose ever been hyped as a potential candidate but never run.  So, I just put it as a topic.  Who is the greatest president the US has never had?

(For me, it'd be Eugene V. Debs, but Robert La Follette, Henry A. Wallace, and Frank Zeidler would also be up there.)

Pigasus
Lyndon LaRouche
Vermin Supreme

James Weaver.

Ron Paul, Pat Buchanan, Ross Perot, Eugene McCarthy, George McGovern, and Barry Goldwater.

Horatio Seymour, George B. McClellan and John M. Palmer all stand out for me.

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Eugene McCarthy, Minnesota's best 1960s Senator.

Harold Stassen (and Paul, Goldwater, Johnson, Gravel, Kucinich, Proxmire, Richardson, McCarthy, McGovern, etc).

Al Gore, with hindsight.

Huey Long

Disgusting. Simply disgusting. :P

;)

...but seriously, he supported Ronald Reagan in 1980.

Byron Dorgan.

Jesse Jackson.

I'm shocked no one has said Henry Clay yet.

Well, at least we don't have to argue about how carefully he'd have followed the Constitution. Not much needs to be said there about 29 year old US Senators.

Upton Sinclair

Eugene Debs.

Mrs. Clinton.

Daniel Webster - "Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable!" (1830)

Muon.

George McGovern

A long list, with the best of the best bolded

Henry Clay
Daniel Webster
William Jennings Bryan
Charles Hughes
Eugene Debs
Robert LaFollette Sr.
Richard B. Russell
Adlai Stevenson
Hubert Humphrey
Scoop Jackson
George McGovern
Frank Church
Al Gore
Joe Lieberman

Theodore Roosevelt (third term). Mike Dukakis. Colin Powell. Al Gore.

Progressive Teddy, Bryan, and Debs.

Mike Gravel and George McGovern. Gene McCarthy also would've got out of Vietnam ASAP.

Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, Charles E Hughes, Thomas Dewey

Hughes is a good one. It's also something of a truism that in 1904 both major candidates were unusually top-notch, so perhaps Parker too from that era, though I'm not terribly familiar with him.

Frank Harris
Jerry Brown

John Jay
Alexander Hamilton
Henry Clay
Daniel Webster
Samuel J. Tilden
Alton B. Parker
Henry Cabot Lodge
Charles Evan Hughes
Robert Taft
Arthur Vandenberg
Barry Goldwater

All I got for now. The list gets more partisan as it goes on, obviously.

Lordy, never.  McCarthy was a schmuck compared to Humphrey.

Thomas Hendricks :), Robert Taft, Barry Goldwater, Pat Buchanan, and Ron Paul.

Oy. Why?

Abraham Lincoln's second term.

He's a Paleo-Libertarian Britain.

Barry Goldwater or Ron Paul.

Robert "Fighting Bob" La Follette
Mo Udall
Jerry Brown
Russ Feingold (we could still possibly have him as president, but it's rather unlikely)
Huey Long (because to be honest, everybody fearing a dictatoral Long is forgetting that he wouldn't be able to wield an iron fist against the entire national Congress)
Edmund Muskie seemed like a decent fellow
Al Gore, I guess. He wouldn't have done the Bush Tax Cuts or Iraq.

What about HHH? Or Mondale?

The world would be much better off if Al Gore had won in 2000, I think that's nearly an objective truth.

Lieberman? He should get his face eaten off. You think he would make a great President? Oh my.

Ron Paul, Barry Goldwater, and more Calvin Coolidge.

George McGovern and (lolwhynot) Gary Hart, as alternatives to awful presidents.

Imagine - we might not now be in a depression.

On the list, Clay and Hughes. Not on the list: Alan Simpson of course!

We would have been very depressed had Gore been elected, friend :)

What's with everyone thinking things would be better if Gore was elected? There probably wouldn't have been a democratic congress at any time in his term in office and I can't really think of much he would have done different. We'd still probably be in Afghanistan, and if Clinton was willing to fight in Serbia and bomb Iraq I don't see why Gore would be different.

Anyway, on topic I think that while he might not have been a good president Alexander Hamilton would have been a great one.

Perhaps, in your ignorance, but you would have had a lot more money. ;)

The fact that he's including McGovern (and Church) along with Scoop Jackson and Lieberman just adds to the amusement and the absurdity.

I don't think Ralph Nadar is among them, but I'm a bit surprised he hasn't been mentioned.  I'd also put Bernie Sanders there since it's clear he'll never run.  I would also be tempted to put Kucinich as one were it not for his recently-revealed contacts with the Gaddafi regime. 

We'd probably have gone into Afghanistan, but debt would be a lot lower because of no tax cuts and we surely would NEVER have invaded Iraq.

Things would have been a lot better with Gore as president: yes, 9/11 probably still happens, but
Also, there are no Bush tax cuts and no Iraq War, the deficit is much lower, and in fact the government might even have been in surplus throughout the 00s.

This is the key.  A simple, pointless, foolish, frivolous, and utterly useless move, and it has doomed us.

Sometimes I wonder if we'll ever stop cleaning up Bush's messes.

I would say Teddy Roosevelt is my favorite POTUS. Had we been allowed multiple terms, the USA would encompass all of North America right now. Had Douglas MacArthur or General Patton been elected POTUS, the USA would encompass the entire world!

A: How?

B: Is that a good thing?

Charles Evans Hughes, Alf Landon, Wendell Willkie, Thomas E. Dewey, Nelson Rockefeller, Harold Stassen, George Romney, Barry Goldwater, John Anderson, Bob Dole, Mike Huckabee, and Sam Brownback, and John McCain.

A: Through nukular missuls.

B: Course it is! Murica's greatest nation evah!

Oh...we never had? Hmmmm......

Alexander Hamilton (But since he wasn't born in the USA, he was inelligible
General Douglas MacArthur
General George S. Patton
Ross Perot
John McCain
Mike Huckabee
Henry Clay

Well if the US encompassed the world, that would solve the illegal immigration problem now wouldn't it?  Think of the upside.  Don't be a gloomy Gus.

Hamilton, while born on Nevis, was a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution and thus was eligible to be President.

Howard Dean is the first that comes to mind, though I'm sure there are far better options.

I think you grossly overestimate the power of the presidency and the power of our armed forces.

George Clinton, Jack Kemp, Chuck Hagel, Garfield's full term

Of people who did or would have a serious shot, and relative to their IRL counterparts:

Martin Van Buren's second term
Thomas Hart Benton (following Van Buren's second term, natch)
Stephen Douglas
Horatio Seymour
Grover Cleveland's third term
Champ Clark
Calvin Coolidge's second term
Al Smith (1932 would say 28 as well but he didn't have a shot)
John Nance Garner
Robert Taft Sr. (any of 40-52)
Douglas MacArthur
Jack Kemp
Pat Buchanan

Ah yes it's often the Neo-Cons who look at Teddy's foreign policy as amazing.

What policies would Pat Buchanan have pursued and gotten passed through Congress that would have been good?

On the world stage, he'd have been a combination of Awigdor Lieberman and Silvio Berlusconi. An offensive buffoon who couldn't get anything done.

At this stage it's more of a not getting bad policies through thing.  Pitchfork Pat would at least be in a perpetual standoff with congress, and we might even get some real spending or tax cuts out of it (also, having a strict constructionist in charge of all the federal departments, judicial nominations, and monetary policy is a huge improvement in and of itself).


The main attraction is that he wouldn't "get anything done."  However, I probably should've kept him off the list, as he never really had any chance (maybe 1992 if Perot wouldn't run and one of the non-Clintons got the nomination, or 2000 if he'd stayed in the GOP and Bill Bradley were the D nominee).

Well then

Bryan, La'Follote, Weaver, Folsom, Bobby Kennedy, Kefauver, Sinclair,

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Teddy Kennedy and Mario Cuomo

John McCain (2000)

Barry Goldwater, Jack Kemp, John McCain...

Obama's third term. :'(

Henry Clay
Robert F. Kennedy
Frank Church
Walter Mondale
Al Gore

Either LaFollette or Bob Kennedy.

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James Cox, William Jennings Bryan, Adlai Stevenson I., or Hubert Humphrey.

George McGovern
Robert Kennedy
Howard Dean
Robert LaFollette
William Jennings Bryan

Henry Clay, James Weaver, Robert La Follette, Henry Wallace, Adlai Stevenson, Robert Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Ted Kennedy, Walter Mondale

I got worried on the first two pages when Bobby wasn't mentioned.

His 1968 campaign was honestly one of the most inspiring political campaigns that's ever been ran-even back then can can you think of any other white politicians who could stop a race riot with a speech? Bobby felt the pain of the nation in 1968-any of his speeches from the 60's like the South African day of affirmation, or the mindless menace of violence show his political wisdom. The fact that these's speeches still inspire people today shows how influential he was

George McGovern, RFK, HHH, Robert La Follette, Walter Mondale, Frank Church.

James A. Garfield was the greatest president we barely had. 

Huey Long, Bobby Kennedy, Al Gore, John Kerry...eh, I guess Howard Dean too.

Also, JFK's second term, and Carter's second term.

Barry Goldwater, Pat Buchannan, John Schmitz, Robert Taft, Michelle Bachmann and Ron Paul

Henry Clay, Dale Bumpers, George McGovern, Nixon in 1960

Ron Paul

George Romney, Mitt Romney

THIS

You do realiz that McCarthy and McGovern are as far removed from Goldwater as conceivable ? don 't buy t6he whole "neocons " label bs.

- Howard Dean
- Guy Vander Jagt
- John B. Anderson
- Paul Tsongas
- Thomas Dewey
- Charles Percy
- Mark Hatfield
- Ross Perot
- Lowell Weicker
- Andrew Cuomo
- Mo Udall
- Jerry Brown
- Joe Biden
- Edmund Muskie

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Franklin Roosevelt's Fourth Term

In my defense, I want him to quash De Blasio.

Alexander Hamilton
Thaddeus Stevens
Benjamin Wade
Robert LaFollette
Huey Long
Hubert Humphrey
Henry "Scoop" Jackson
Frank Church

She didn't even deserve to get into congress

Aaron Burr
DeWitt Clinton
James Birney
John Fremont
John P. Hale
Peter Cooper
Benjamin Butler
Eugene V. Debs
William Z. Foster
Farrel Dobbs
Clifton DeBerry
Peter Camejo

Jack Kemp, John McCain (Only the 2000, no Palin version!), 1960 Richard Nixon, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Dewey (though his ties with J. Edgar Hoover give me minor doubts), are all I can think of.

Robert Taft is an honorable mention, since I doubt isolationism during the Cold War would have been wise at all.

Mike Dukakis deserves some love.

Right off the bat: Al Gore. He won the 2000 election, but never had the opportunity to actually serve. If John Kerry had won in 2004, Iraq would have turned out much differently and we may have had progressive health care reform; Ross Perot in 1992 (no NAFTA), George McGovern (immediate withdrawal from Vietnam) in 1972, George Wallace in 1968 (withdrawal from Vietnam, and the only candidate in 1968 to oppose intervention in Vietnam).

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Ron Paul

That's not a defense. Say what you will about De Blasio, he isn't a corrupt hunk of garbage.

Also, this:

Other than the obvious choice, Jack Kemp.

My answer: Uncle Pat!

Aaron Burr is the obvious choice, that crazy bastard

This too.

Lincoln's second term.

The greatest man our country ever produced was replaced by one of the worst Presidents.

Was just coming here to post this

Alexander Hamilton
Henry Clay
Daniel Webster
Ross Perot

Mark Hatfield

George McGovern
Al Gore
Mike Dukakis
Ted Kennedy

The Romneys and Jack Kemp come to mind.

TR (1912)
Henry Wallace (1945)
Tom Dewey (1948)
Adlai Stevenson (1952)
Hubert Humphrey (1968)
Mario Cuomo (1992)
Al Gore (2000)

Eugene V. Debs
Robert M. La Follette Sr.
Robert F. Kennedy
George McGovern
Mario Cuomo
Al Gore

I have to go back to the election I would have changed above no other: 1968. I think a President Hubert Humphrey would have led to a much greater expansion to the Great Society, which we would no doubt enjoy today.

Al Gore in 2000 because of what we got.

Bobby Kennedy would have made an incredible President.

McGovern is on the list.

Also both Teddy Kennedy and a second Carter term.