C-SPAN recently asked sixty-five historians to rank the Presidents of the United States. At number one is Abraham Lincoln, The Great Emancipator.
Second place goes to George Washington, The Father of Our Country.
Coming in third is Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who did to government what Twinkies did to Marlon Brando. And he was an outstanding wartime leader.
Ronald Reagan ranked at number ten. According to lore, he cut taxes and government spending while balancing the budget. He also single-handedly ended the Cold War. He died on June 4, 2004, but on the Third Day he rose again, ascended into Heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father yada yada yada. I was talking about the Reagan legacy with some friends recently; they think he was a great president in the way that ketchup is a vegetable.
Coming in -- or rather coming on -- fifteen is Bill Clinton, who is more worthy than Reagan of the Great Communicator and Teflon President sobriquets. Unlike George Washington, he put the wood in someone else's mouth and lying about it under oath nearly got him booted out of office. He presided over eight years of peace and prosperity and left office with a high approval rating.
George W. Bush came in thirty-sixth on the survey, below Richard Nixon and Rutherford B. Hayes. Hmm.
It's too bad that sentences weren't the only things mangled by this twelve-short-of-a-dozen wannabe cowboy.
Man, Bush really fucked up this country.
President Obama has a lot of damage to rectify. In celebration of Presidents' Day, I've been re-watching his swearing-in and inaugural speech. I've also been watching clips of Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC's Hardball, talking about Obama. Matthews is seriously obsessed with the man. His praise for the President has become indistinguishable from Obama Girl's, haha.
Song of the Day is FDR's campaign song:
