Opinion of Harry S. Truman

[ElectionsGuy]

George Washington: 77.6% Approval
John Adams: 87.0% Approval
Thomas Jefferson: 70.4% Approval
James Madison: 81.0% Approval
James Monroe: 66.7% Approval
John Quincy Adams: 79.6% Approval
Andrew Jackson: 23.7% Approval
Martin Van Buren: 77.8% Approval
William Henry Harrison: 50.0% Approval
John Tyler: 23.3% Approval
James K. Polk: 64.3% Approval
Zachary Taylor: 80.0% Approval
Millard Fillmore: 12.5% Approval
Franklin Pierce: 16.1% Approval
James Buchanan: 6.3% Approval
Abraham Lincoln: 89.1% Approval
Andrew Johnson: 19.2% Approval
Ulysses S. Grant: 76.2% Approval
Rutherford B. Hayes: 35.3% Approval
James A. Garfield: 83.7% Approval
Chester A. Arthur: 80.8% Approval
Grover Cleveland: 54.8% Approval
Benjamin Harrison: 31.1% Approval
William McKinley: 44.7% Approval
Theodore Roosevelt: 67.7% Approval
William Howard Taft: 68.3% Approval
Woodrow Wilson: 38.9% Approval
Warren G. Harding: 31.1% Approval
Calvin Coolidge: 45.2% Approval
Herbert Hoover: 35.8% Approval
Franklin D. Roosevelt: 78.7% Approval

33rd President of the United States: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_S._Truman

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Exceptional.

[SWE]

Major FF!

[windjammer]

Exceptional.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

Exceptional.

[Goldwater]

FF.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Awful.

[Sopranos Republican]

I mean I support ending the war, but come on. Bombing Japan goes TOO FAR.

[Hifly]

Horrible bloodthirsty man.

[RogueBeaver]

Major FF!

[I Will Not Be Wrong]

FF during his first term, HP during his second.

[Sopranos Republican]

FF during his first term, HP during his second.

In is first term he was more fiscally conservative, while in his second term more socially conservative.

[7,052,770]

Major FF. It really took guts to drop the atomic bomb.

[Hifly]

Major FF. It really took guts to drop the atomic bomb.

This is a joke, right?

[ElectionsGuy]

HP

[TNF]

A tremendous failure in terms of achieving anything of substance. The Truman administration egged on the red-baiting that the Republicans began, tearing the labor movement (and society at-large) to pieces in the process and exiling most of the most effective organizers to the blacklist. It engaged in hapless administration of the economy, turning over most war production plants to private companies in spite of the government having built and financed them, shuttling any hope of production for public, rather than private purposes, after the war. The Fair Deal was largely a failure, with little or nothing to show for it.

Desegregating the armed forces and preventing the 1940s version of Mitt Romney from winning the White House in 1948 are literally the only good things I can say about Mr. Truman's administration, beyond the fact that I generally admire him as a person and appreciate his life story: this is a guy who literally made it to the White House without graduating from some snooty Ivy League university (or any university at all) and that's something I think we should celebrate and push for more of.

The atomic bombing of Japan can be debated until the end of time, and I'd rather not weigh in on it here. The push to alienate the Soviet Union and embark upon an alliance with imperialist powers abroad was not a good decision, and in retrospect we know that the Cold War was largely a gigantic waste of resources that could have been better spent at creating an economy that didn't rely on mass amounts of military spending. The Korean War was a waste of 50,000+ American and untold numbers of Korean, Chinese, Soviet, and other lives. We're still living in it's shadow, too. I voted HP for the purposes of this poll, but only in the sense that his Presidency was what anyone should objectively consider a failure.

[LeBron]

FF. He fired MacArthur, integrated the military, and was a great, liberal successor to FDR with attempting to get his Fair Deal passed in expanding public work programs, expanding employment, and raising the minimum wage.

[TNF]

FF. He fired MacArthur, integrated the military, and was a great, liberal successor to FDR with attempting to get his Fair Deal passed in expanding public work programs, expanding employment, and raising the minimum wage.

The Fair Deal didn't revive or expand work programs created under the New Deal, and it didn't really expand employment (Truman was satisfied allowing the market to work in that regard, rather than sapping up unemployment by direct job creation, a pattern we still follow today). Firing MacArthur was definitely a good move and I wish I'd noted that above.

[7,052,770]

Major FF. It really took guts to drop the atomic bomb.

This is a joke, right?

... No?

The vast majority of historians agree that dropping the bombs saved many more lives than it costs. I can understand the argument that dropping the bombs was immoral because killing civilians always is, but saving more lives in the longrun, both military and civilian, both American and Japanese, was definitely the more ethical decision.



Also, I can't wrap my head around anyone calling the Korean War a big waste. Without that war, South Korea would have never transformed from third-world backwater to highly developed U.S. ally and trading partner.  The Korean War is in no way comparable to Vietnam or any of the other pointless entanglements we've gotten involved in since then.

[H. Ross Peron]

Huge FF. We need another man like him in the White House to-day.

[7,052,770]

Yeah! Without us, those Koreans would still be farming rice and wearing sandals!

USA USA USA

I mean, it wasn't just us. We led an entire U.N. coalition. But yes, without that coalition, Kim Il-sung would have taken the entire peninsula and run it into the ground, rather than just doing that to the Northern half.

[H. Ross Peron]

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Wasn't the USSR also imperialistic (albeit in Eastern Europe rather than Africa or Asia)? I agree though the US ought to have co-opted decolonization movements before the USSR could, which Truman did in some cases (such as opposing a coup against Mossadegh in Iran). In addition you've correctly criticized the US being cozy with authoritarian regimes, so shouldn't it be the same with the USSR?

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Won't get into that whole debate....

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The Korean War was probably one of the more justified wars in American history considering it was a response to a blatant invasion of the ROK by the North.

[TDAS04]

FF.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

FDR's low approval, in the words of many a troll, makes me a sad panda. But at least most of the people above him are the types who didn't do much worth noting like Taylor and Arthur.

I'm getting excited for the presidents of the last 50 years' threads.

[TNF]

Major FF. It really took guts to drop the atomic bomb.

This is a joke, right?

... No?

The vast majority of historians agree that dropping the bombs saved many more lives than it costs. I can understand the argument that dropping the bombs was immoral because killing civilians always is, but saving more lives in the longrun, both military and civilian, both American and Japanese, was definitely the more ethical decision.



Also, I can't wrap my head around anyone calling the Korean War a big waste. Without that war, South Korea would have never transformed from third-world backwater to highly developed U.S. ally and trading partner.  The Korean War is in no way comparable to Vietnam or any of the other pointless entanglements we've gotten involved in since then.

South Korea was an authoritarian backwater. The Korean War is literally only justifiable in retrospect, if it's justifiable at all. I don't think the United States should be in the business of intervening when we aren't attacked directly.

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Wasn't the USSR also imperialistic (albeit in Eastern Europe rather than Africa or Asia)? I agree though the US ought to have co-opted decolonization movements before the USSR could, which Truman did in some cases (such as opposing a coup against Mossadegh in Iran). In addition you've correctly criticized the US being cozy with authoritarian regimes, so shouldn't it be the same with the USSR?

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Won't get into that whole debate....

You must be logged in to read this quote.

The Korean War was probably one of the more justified wars in American history considering it was a response to a blatant invasion of the ROK by the North.

The USSR was acting in an imperialist manner in Eastern Europe, yes. And we should have harshly condemned it doing so without going full retard in the region and pissing them off to the point that we'd end up shelling out trillions on weapons systems we'd never use and engage in pointless conflicts around the globe to 'stop the spread of communism.' We could have condemned what the USSR was doing without actively creating a climate of distrust and mutual contempt that ultimately blossomed into the Cold War. As for your second point, there was no way the U.S. could do that so long as we were joined at the hip with the UK and France, the world's largest imperial powers.

Again, the United States should not be in the business of intervening when we are not directly attacked. Every time we do, we end up worse off for it.