Was Bill Clinton the best President since Ike?

[Dazey]

Would you say Clinton was the best President since Eisenhower?

JFK was killed before he could accomplish anything of note.
LBJ was great on domestic policy, but his domestic work is overshadowed by Vietnam
Nixon has a very muddled record, all of it is overshadowed by Watergate
Ford never truly had his own Presidency.
Carter was a miserable failure
Reagan was a 'success' but accomplished little of note in terms of policies.
GHW Bush was mediocre
GW Bush was a horrible President
Obama has been the most controversial President since Nixon and while he got Obamacare passed, he's done little of note otherwise.

While I'm not the biggest fan of the Third Way style of politics I'd have to say that Clinton was probably the best President since Eisenhower overall.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

No, and even if he were that would be more of a gigantic and shameful indictment of the others than praise of the malevolent, incompetent and altogether horrendous Clinton administration. Cowardly attacks on welfare claimants, constant sleaze, the politicising of the federal death penalty etc.

My personal ranking of postwar presidents goes as thus: (it changes all the time though, although the bottom three remain the same, and Obama always wins)

Obama
Truman
Eisenhower
Ford
JFK
Johnson
Carter
Clinton
Bush Sr.
Reagan
Bush Jr.
He Who Must Not Be Named

[Sumner 1868]

Waco, NAFTA, WTO, gun control, welfare "reform" (i.e., cuts), telecommunications deregulation, repeal of Glass-Stegall, thoroughly unconstitutional "Anti-Terrorism Act," "Commodity Futures Modernization Act." Caved on gays in the military, caved on a federal jobs program, watered down an already weak promise on health care. Cost his party Congress after almost sixty years of dominance with little interruption.

Then we get to the worst of Clinton; bombed Somalia, bombed Iraq, bombed Sudan, bombed Afghanistan, and bombed Yugoslavia. None of these "interventions" were needed, and all ruined the chance of peace after the Cold War.

[Mr. Smith]

Hell no, Clinton signed Welfare Reform, got through NAFTA, bombed a medicine factory unnecessarily, sat his on hands when Rwanda was facing a genocide [one of the few cases where an intervention was necessary], put the nation through a bunch of absurd skirmishes that weren't our business and for all intents and purposes was just an effective Republican.


LBJ, JFK, Carter, even Jerry Ford were all better Presidents than he was.

I'd call JFK the best personally.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Yes I have him tied with Reagan

[Oakvale]

Kennedy, Obama and Reagan were/are all far better than Clinton's miserable Presidency. It's not clear to me what substantial difference there is between Carter's disastrous term in office and Clinton's other than Clinton managing to be re-elected. More scandals?

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

The President of welfare reform, three strikes, and executing a mentally disabled man to score political points, better than the "dime-store New Dealer" and the man who championed Civil Rights and tried to truly destroy poverty in America?

Yeah, no.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Kennedy, Obama and Reagan were/are all far better than Clinton's miserable Presidency. It's not clear to me what substantial difference there is between Carter's disastrous term in office and Clinton's other than Clinton managing to be re-elected. More scandals?

Carter got laid less

[Mr. Smith]

Kennedy, Obama and Reagan were/are all far better than Clinton's miserable Presidency. It's not clear to me what substantial difference there is between Carter's disastrous term in office and Clinton's other than Clinton managing to be re-elected. More scandals?

Carter got laid less

And Camp David, and finishing up what Nixon did with China, and creating he Department of Education, and serious environmental effort, and significant mental health legislation, and not dumping us into every l'il skirmish and generally looking at the world through a lens beyond the Cold War morality.

Sans Johnson, no President has done more in just one term than him (JFK comes close though).

To try to compare Carter to Clinton is an exercise in absurdity

[OSR stands with Israel]

Kennedy, Obama and Reagan were/are all far better than Clinton's miserable Presidency. It's not clear to me what substantial difference there is between Carter's disastrous term in office and Clinton's other than Clinton managing to be re-elected. More scandals?

how was Clinton presidency miserbale

[Oakvale]

Kennedy, Obama and Reagan were/are all far better than Clinton's miserable Presidency. It's not clear to me what substantial difference there is between Carter's disastrous term in office and Clinton's other than Clinton managing to be re-elected. More scandals?

how was Clinton presidency miserbale

Yeah.

[/]

Uhh actually it was Jimmy Carter, by any reasonable standard...

[Mr. Smith]

Kennedy, Obama and Reagan were/are all far better than Clinton's miserable Presidency. It's not clear to me what substantial difference there is between Carter's disastrous term in office and Clinton's other than Clinton managing to be re-elected. More scandals?

how was Clinton presidency miserbale

Welfare Reform is how.

[Oakvale]

Carter revisionism is embarrassing ftr ^^^^

[H. Ross Peron]

No LBJ was much better than either of them.

[NeverAgain]

Uhh actually it was Jimmy Carter, by any reasonable standard...

^^Truth.

[RINO Tom]

I'm of the opinion that it matters not who the best since Ike was, as I think Ike was pretty easily the best since FDR (including FDR).  However, I suppose Clinton wasn't one of the worst?

[Mercenary]

I'm not sure why welfare reform is considered bad by anyone. Having it more as a temporary aid program and encouraging people to get a job is better than just an endless program. Not that it was ideal, but still I think an improvement.

I don't think any president was "good", but some were less bad. So being the best of less bads doesn't mean a lot. I think Clinton was the best Democrat and Reagan the best Republican since then though. I am not sure which one I rate higher. It'd be interesting to see how their presidencies would have turned out if congress had been of the same party.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Gut welfare, throw away the few regulations on banksters, murder civilians in Sudan/Iraq/Yugoslavia/Somalia, utterly botch health care reform, turn the White House into a goddamn Whore House, and go down as a great because of the Internet boom. Finally, use your harpy wife you haven't slept with in 30 years to get back into the White House.

[RFayette]

It was definitely one of the best presidencies recently.  I especially admire Clinton's welfare reform proposal as well as the spending cuts that took place during this time.  The GOP Congress + Clinton was a good duo IMO.

[OSR stands with Israel]

It was definitely one of the best presidencies recently.  I especially admire Clinton's welfare reform proposal as well as the spending cuts that took place during this time.  The GOP Congress + Clinton was a good duo IMO.

Agreed with everything you said. If Clinton was president today he would make Mcconal and Boehner look like nothing as he would take advantage of the GOP civil war which Obama cant do. His welfare reform and spending cuts were great.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Eisenhower was not a good President FTR.

[Ebowed]

No lol

[Redalgo]

And really, please, I cannot stress how much of a deal it was that he actively went out of his way to avoid calling the ethnic cleansing of 800,000 people in Rwanda genocide so that he wouldn't need to risk getting a repeat of the politically-toxic experience he had with Somalia in '94. I realize he didn't how much worse it was going to get afterwards, for what little that's worth, but the purges eventually spiraled out of control into a nine-country conflict that went down as the deadliest war in all of African history - the deaths being something like four times the military fatalities suffered by the U.S. in the entirety of its history?

Just some food for thought.

[Rockefeller GOP]

Eisenhower was not a good President FTR.

THERE WE HAVE IT, folks!!

And now it's on record, even.