Most Liberal 2-Term Republican President

[RINO Tom]

Lincoln. Opposed both slavery and Know-Nothingism.

Only the second has anything to do with being liberal.

This seems like a double standard to me. What makes the second more important than the first?

Immigration and what to do about it translates relatively well across time periods, ideologically.  Opposition to slavery, especially when its opponents included the likes of the most conservative Northern Christian denominations and conservative business interests looking to even the playing field with the Slave Power, gets a bit more dicey.  Let's not forget that some in the pro-life movement, right after Wade, often considered themselves the ideological heirs to the abolitionists (this time fighting for the unborn).  I just think it's more complicated.

[Fuzzy Says: "Abolish NPR!"]

Grant easily.

Lincoln's a Henry Clay fanboy, that's a disqualification from any sense of left-wing as we know it.

And TR's colonial tracts don't sit well with post-'Nam/post-Iraq dovery. He might be a Democrat today just because of the Religious Right taking over and Trump sounding too uncouth in manners, but he certainly wouldn't be anywhere close to the liberal end.

TR was the model for Scoop Jackson.

ike was a moderate.

Lincoln defies classification.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Grant easily.

Lincoln's a Henry Clay fanboy, that's a disqualification from any sense of left-wing as we know it.

And TR's colonial tracts don't sit well with post-'Nam/post-Iraq dovery. He might be a Democrat today just because of the Religious Right taking over and Trump sounding too uncouth in manners, but he certainly wouldn't be anywhere close to the liberal end.

TR was the model for Scoop Jackson.

ike was a moderate.

Lincoln defies classification.

They all probably would be independents today

[President Johnson]

Teddy. Followed by Tricky Dick.


Who voted for the Gipper

[Landslide Lyndon]

Teddy. Followed by Tricky Dick.


Who voted for the Gipper

Probably some Trumptard because Reagan didn't hate immigrants enough.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I’m actually far more likely to believe Lincoln would be a Democrat today than Roosevelt, and that isn’t a run against either of them. Regardless of the rather flimsy “Lincoln was a Marxist” talking points, I don’t see it. Lincoln’s economic views, while calling for increased state involvement in the economy, were to the effect that they were intended to help men of merit. Common men of merit, perhaps, but still, men who sought to rise above. Bringing infrastructure and available capital to thrbackwards corners of the country ran afoul of both anti-state “Jacksonian” egalitarianism and the more radical labor Democrats in the Northeast (I am assuming the latter). The primary reason I see Lincoln as a Democrat today is that, with education and finance now generally available, I am not sure what his next “goal” would be, and that it seems he might try to preserve access to opportunity through policies we currently call liberal. As for Roosevelt, I see him following a similar path as real life—an initially conservative, if unorthodox, Republican who turns populist relatively late in his career and after already reaching the heights of his power. “My party’s establishment doesn’t want me to tell you this...” Roosevelt might be the most radical Republican, but not necessarily the most liberal. I can see him playing a Nixonesque role—that of conservative who often bowed to public pressure on domestic issues and use largely plebeian rhetoric. If when we discuss Grant we are referring to the law and order hawk who didn’t intervene in the Panic of 1873, I think that’s an obvious conservative.