RANK THE LAST 10 US PRESIDENTS

[Mickey]

Anders is the worst person on the entire board.

[BurtReynolds]

I meant it in a friendly way.

[4/5]

So far, Barry O. has ranked outside the top 2 only once (Burt).

I know with my own rankings it had more to do with the field than his own warring & pharmaceutical loving 8 years. He did get Bin Laden, he did lead us out of the financial collapse, and he did get the Affordable Care Act also known as Socialist Death Squad Plan passed.

What happened next?

A decade of peace, stability, and prosperity!

[Mickey]

So far, Barry O. has ranked outside the top 2 only once (Burt).

I know with my own rankings it had more to do with the field than his own warring & pharmaceutical loving 8 years. He did get Bin Laden, he did lead us out of the financial collapse, and he did get the Affordable Care Act also known as Socialist Death Squad Plan passed.

What happened next?

A decade of peace, stability, and prosperity!

[4/5]

So far, Barry O. has ranked outside the top 2 only once (Burt).

I know with my own rankings it had more to do with the field than his own warring & pharmaceutical loving 8 years. He did get Bin Laden, he did lead us out of the financial collapse, and he did get the Affordable Care Act also known as Socialist Death Squad Plan passed.

What happened next?

A decade of peace, stability, and prosperity!

Or the rise of right and left wing populism in response to bailouts. Could be either one.

[Mickey]

Exactly why I find doing such a ranking impossible, outside of the big guns (Reagan and W for me). Most of their choices are completely overdetermined by the details of their historical conjectures: Carter gets stagflation and can't solve it, Obama gets 2008 and "solves it" but look what happens next. Nixon starts the EPA, is that a credit to him? How do you balance withdrawing from Vietnam against intervention in Latin America? And so on, I made a rough list but found myself tempted to overvalue presidents who oversaw periods of relative stability (like Clinton or Bush Sr.) and undervalue folks like Carter or Ford. The bodycount on W. and the ushering in of metropole neoliberalism for Reagan puts them in the bottom tier but then you can argue that we only get Reagan because of Nixon and Carter, etc. etc. They're all ghouls, in the end.

[Rob]

These are presidents of a pretty free country, where power is very much decentralized. I don’t want to downplay their importance, but they aren’t responsible for everything that happens. W Bush & Iraq is one example of a decision that really was his, and was awful. It was Trump’s decision to spend his time stoking resentment (as a “leader”), but the overall flaws/mistakes of the country aren’t all their fault. None of these people always did the right thing, that’s the given.

[VinylGuy]

whats a pretty free country?

[Mickey]

"Free"

[B]

whats a pretty free country?

Iceland?

[Rob]

A pretty free country is one where crazies are constantly worried that we’re one step away from tyranny, but the rest of us are living life.

[elliseamos]

"The departure of five out of 66 "A-Team" officials puts Biden's departure rate as the third lowest since Ronald Reagan's presidency, above only George H.W. Bush and son George W. Bush, the report found." -Axios

Must be worth something in the rankings!

[B]

"The departure of five out of 66 "A-Team" officials puts Biden's departure rate as the third lowest since Ronald Reagan's presidency, above only George H.W. Bush and son George W. Bush, the report found." -Axios

Must be worth something in the rankings!

Is that even worth mentioning? Two presidents had less departures, and only 3 had more. He's the exact middle of 6 Presidents.

[BurtReynolds]

The fact that high ranking bureaucrats are satisfied with Biden is hardly a point in his favor.

[Mickey]

Alternately: the problem with Trump was not the turnover or the lack of so-called "adults" in the room.

[elliseamos]

Soooo, not worth anything in the rankings. Got it.

[Mickey]

I mean my overall sense is that this (admittedly self-consciously silly) thread is quite silly, since what a president has the capacity to do is hugely overdetermined by their historical conjecture. Biden is a middling, forgettable president, but I don't know that it's possible for a Democrat to be otherwise right now.

[elliseamos]

Now that's silly!

[Rob]

I agree that this should improve his rankings (always helps if everyone likes working for the boss), but also agree that Biden probably will end up a “middling, forgettable President”.

There is only so much a President can do. I mean, Trump had 4 years and there’s no real wall out there. Obamacare still exists. Was he incompetent? Yes, but everyone else who wanted that stuff, collectively, weren’t. I feel like the problem isn’t that the crazies will win, it’s that they will muck up the system forever, because… politics/voters allow it. I dunno. The sky is falling all the time, but other than Covid related changes , nothing happens.

[Bammer]

No real opinion on 1-8.

Trump & Biden come in at 9 & 10 in no particular order.