Fox News reported on some new presidential rankings, which purportedly show Barack Obama as the #6 president in U.S. history and Donald Trump dead last, and MAGA was not happy.
Fox News on Sunday posted an article about the new rankings by the Presidential Greatness Project, which Fox describes as “a group of self-styled experts.” It states that Abraham “Lincoln topped the list of presidents in the 2024 Presidential Greatness Project expert survey for the third time, following his top spot in the rankings in the 2015 and 2018 versions of the survey.”
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“Rounding out the top five in the rankings were Franklin Delano Roosevelt at number two, George Washington at three, Theodore Roosevelt at four, and Thomas Jefferson at five,” according to the report. “Trump was ranked in last place in the survey, being ranked worse than James Buchanan at 44, Andrew Johnson at 43, Franklin Pierce at 42, and William Henry Harrison at 41.”
The report states that Obama and Joe Biden “ranked an average of 6th and 13th, respectively, among Democrat respondents, and 15th and 30th by Republicans.”
So who do you think is the worst President ever?
I mean, it’s gotta be Reagan, right?
Caused permanent economic fuckery people are still being victimized by today. Lied about every one of his campaign promises. Actively supported overseas terrorism. Hugely expanded the oil and gas industry at a time where it was still possible to control it and we already knew about how devastating climate change (then global warming) may end up being. Broke the back of organized labor in a way that it still hasn’t and may never fully recover from. His views on civil rights were so regressive and heinous he actually had vetos overridden by congress on the subject – he even wanted to continue supporting apartheid south africa. Double and tripled-down on the war on drugs and is probably more responsible for its expansion than any other president.
And I’m not even getting into his responses to GRIND/AIDS. Or the Iran/Contra affair.
Fuck I am so glad he’s dead in the ground. Wish his assassination attempt hadn’t been an attempt.
One of the problems with lists that rate “greatness” is indeed recency bias. It takes a generation or two before a President’s legacy is understood. Reagan’s legacy is still volatile. Will Iran-Contra, voodoo economics, and the War on Drugs be considered significant in 50 or 100 years? Hard to know.
If Trump loses the next election and MAGA burns out, Trump will be remembered as a buffoon who lamely and unsuccessfully tried to stop the peaceful transfer of power. If his actions eventually lead to the overthrow of the US constitutional order, then he’ll either be considered the Second Coming or worse than Hitler, depending on your perspective. I think/hope the US constitutional order will survive Trump and that he will be largely forgotten by history, like other lesser known Presidents.
Buchanan was the last pro-slavery president, who made Kansas a slave state and helped cause the Civil War(Jan 6th but way worse), exacerbated the Panic of 1857 by not providing any stimulus (Covid recession recieved quite a bit of stimulus during the Trump admin), he was also apparently really corrupt and didn’t do anything to help normal people (maybe the same in relation to their day but corruption was way easier and more widespread in Buchanan’s time). Pretty common choice for worst president. Inarguably worse than Trump I’d say.