Your least favorite president post-Nixon

[brucejoel99]

From Worst to Best:

Trump: A National Security Advisor who was out like Flynn, a fast-spreading Russia scandal, an inept & inhumane executive order on immigration, a White House that can't find recruits for sub-Cabinet jobs, & a crap presidential approval rating to top it all off

W.: His legacy will be forever haunted by a series of public speaking gaffes & costly wars in Iraq & Afghanistan

Reagan: His poor policies, such as bloating the nat'l defense, drastically cutting social services, & making illegal arms-for-hostages deals, led the country into record deficits & global embarrassment

Carter: The Carter legacy is one of workaday reforms that made significant improvements in American life: cheaper travel & cheaper goods for the middle class. Ironically enough, the president you'd never want to have a beer w/ brought you better beer... & much else besides; he's the President who actually did the thankless job of restraining & reforming gov't.

Ford: He faced extraordinary challenges, especially involving the nation's economic woes, which he struggled to solve. He had difficulty navigating a demanding political environment in which Democrats (from across the ideological spectrum) & conservative Republicans found fault w/ his leadership & his foreign & domestic policies. However, Ford was an innately decent & good man who brought honor to the White House.

HW: In my opinion, Bush 41 is underrated. He handled the end of the Cold War w/ dignity & broadly had very good foreign policy (w/ the Gulf War being the most shining example of this). He was stabbed in the back by Gingrich in the budget negotiations & then mercilessly hammered on his broken promise to not raise taxes by conservatives like Pat Buchanan, which is the biggest thing that led to his defeat (& the fact there'd been 12 years of Republicans in the White House). He was also very moderate in comparison to Reagan. I think, by & large, he was one of the best post-World War II Presidents.

Clinton: Under his presidency, the U.S. enjoyed the lowest unemployment & inflation rates in recent history, high home ownership, low crime rates, & a budget surplus. He eliminated the fed. deficit & reformed welfare, despite being forced to deal w/ a GOP-controlled Congress

Obama: In my judgment, there's little doubt that future historians will rank him high in the historical rankings of presidents. First: the passage of the Affordable Care Act. Whether you like the legislation or not, whether the GOP repeals it or not (they won't), that won't change the fact that for the first time in U.S. history, an American president was able to lead the enactment of guaranteed access to health care for all Americans as a fundamental right of citizenship. Second: his leadership in digging the country out of an economic Great Recession comparable to the Great Depression faced by FDR. Obama must share credit not only w/ the Democratic-controlled Congress for enacting the $700+ billion stimulus bill, but also, w/ Republicans & W. for maintaining liquidity for avg. Americans (i.e., access to their bank accounts & restoration of credit) through unpopular subsidies to banks to avoid massive bankruptcies in the banking industry. 3rd & certainly the one fact that all future historians will note is the fact that he helped mitigate America's moral stain of slavery & Jim Crow by his historic election as the nation's 1st African American president.