Web Letters: The Worst President Ever

howl

By Nicholas von Hoffman

February 14, 2007

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  • Interesting topic and conjecture. But von Hoffman's treatment is somewhat scant. It goes through the administrations of John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, Benjamin Harrison, James Buchanan, Warren Harding, Herbert Hoover, James Madison and Richard Nixon, right up to the awaited obvious choice, George W. Bush. The expected conclusion was that we will have to wait and see how harshly history treats Mr. Bush.

    The criterion stated by von Hoffman was how much lasting damage the President did. That being the case, waiting out the current executive, there is one President who was omitted from the list: Harry S Truman (1945-52). His track record says it all, and I suggest would rank him number one.

    Mr Truman was an insistence by the Democratic big wigs who convinced Franklin Roosevelt that even he could not get a fourth term with liberal incumbent VP Henry Wallace on the ticket. I guess FDR just figured he would last a full term, and apparently foolishly yielded--one of his great, though rare, mistakes. It was his beloved Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, a most respected counsel, who could not reach him on the abandoning of Wallace.

    Truman's record is still with us. He allowed the Taft-Hartley bill, the most anti-labor enactment in our history to ride through the Hill without protest. And although he did refuse General George Patton's offer to continue the 1945 march on Berlin with one on Moscow and then General Douglas MacArthur's request to invade the Eastern powers after Korea, his staunch anti-Red hysteria was carried out in other ways. Truman sat by as Joseph McCarthy raged with more rabid clamor that created yet more hysteria that threatened every American freedom up to this very day. He squandered the chance to expose the viciousness and lies of the Rosenberg persecution that led to their state murders. Most glaring of all, it was then Senator Harry S. Truman who, on the day after the German invasion of the USSR on June 22, 1941, took to the floor of Congress and said that if we see the Germans are having too difficult a time in that campaign, we should help them out and supply them with weapons and war materiel. Yes, he openly advocated our aiding and abetting the Hitler forces against Russia. It is all in the Congressional Record. As President Truman, he carried out that policy as a Cold War architect.

    Moreover, it was on his watch that the war ended successfully and he had the opportunity to revive the New Deal of FDR that had brought America and the world to its greatest social accomplishments in history as we all recovered from the Great Depression. Instead of that, he prefered to shake hands with Winston Churchill and their declaration of the cold war that denied the world its peacetime greatness.

    But without question, the event that puts Harry S,. Truman in a worst class by himself is that he was the one who ordered the dropping of the twin atom bombs on the twin cities in Japan in 1945. He was therefore essentially responsible for the immediate nuclear deaths of almost a quarter-million Japanese civilians and perhaps that many more from the aftermath, these over targets without demonstrable military merit to allegedly end a war that was essentially over. This legacy fits von Hoffman's criterion if anything ever did.

    On the day Congress acquitted President Bill Clinton in the 1998 impeachment hearings, some reporters were at the home of author Gore Vidal in Italy and asked for his reaction. When he surprisingly said he would have voted for conviction, he explained that he was would have voted to impeach all f0rty- three Presidents as being unworthy. Maybe the Perkins appointment would have been enough to excuse FDR.

    So while I thank von Hoffman for his naïve thoughts, more homework would have added Harry Truman, who indeed met the author's criteria.

    Don Sloan
    Nobodyaskedmebut.net

    New York, NY

    01/24/2008 @ 5:13pm


  • I would have to say that while George W.'s legacy is still not set in stone, he will certainly be near the top of the stink pile of Presidents. Although I am surprised only one other person had the smarts to come up with the real stinker, Teflon Ron. His economic legacy of big military spending and tax cuts for the rich has led us into one of the longest lasting recessions of American history.

    His privatization of government services which George Sr., Clinton, and George W. so willingly followed along with has left us with the mess of hurricane Katrina and a crumbling infrastructure.

    And finally let us not forget the legacy of his foreign policy, which George W. has followed so obediently. He was the one who armed Iraq in the first place and he also poured all those arms into Afghanistan all in the name of fighting the cold war. And let us not forget his arms-for-hostage deal with the Iranians.

    George W.'s mess was already there, he has just made it worse because of his increasingly bad judgment.

    Joshua Henkin

    Baltimore, MD

    02/15/2007 @ 11:40am


  • "Misled the nation into a disastrous war, fumbled a horrific national disaster, authorized secret wiretaps on civilians, and pissed off the rest of the world."

    We have had Presidents who done all of these things before. America was misled into the Spanish-American War and we have invaded lots of countries that never threatened us, going back to our invasion of Mexico. Our little intervention in the Philippines at the beginning of the twentieth century certainly did not turn out quite as well as the country was led to believe it would. As bad as New Orleans was, can anyone really think to compare it to the Dust Bowl? And at least Bush eventually did something. Hoover completely ignored the Great Depression and hoped it would go away. Wilson was probably our worst President when it comes to ignoring the Bill of Rights. He practically declared martial law when the First World War started, and arrested anti-war advocates simply for stating their opinions. Wilson also used his power to control the press to keep the influenza epidemic of 1918 out of the press. This undoubtedly led to thousands of avoidable deaths.

    As bad as Bush is, the country has had his type before. Hoover prepared the country for the policies of FDR. Perhaps we can hope that Bush will prepare the country for a great leader with progressive policies.

    Thomas Paul

    Plainview, NY

    02/13/2007 @ 5:04pm


  • I guess no one on this thread attaches any import to the phrase "business as usual." That is exactly what Bush is. Certainly no better, but in general no worse than what the real power in this country expects from a Chief Executive.

    Come one, folks, this is The Nation here!! You'd think an evaluation of Bush's relative standing among US Presidents conducted at one of America's (putatively) most progressive weeklies would eschew the risible notion of American exceptionalism. Yet bletter after bletter proceeds with this notion in mind, at least implicitly. Of course, what can one expect from liberals but this. These are, after all, the sort that style themselves progressives because radical is for them as dirty a word as reactionary. Oh well, there's always Alexander Cockburn at Counterpunch.

    Douglas Presler

    Minneapolis, MN

    02/13/2007 @ 10:36am


  • I feel that this President will be remembered for attacking a country that never attacked us. In modern times, the case for using our military has been that of defense, and aid. Never have we used our military in such a mission as we have in Iraq. Our military have been being used as the pawns of big business. They were used to overthrow a legitimate government, for no apparent reason. Intelligence was cooked for this purpose. The deception that has been perpetrated upon the American people is staggering. Bush will be remembered for this, as well as all of the reasons mentioned above. He truly, will go down in history, or herstory, as the absolute worst American President in all time.

    Rocco Rizzo

    Rosendale, NY

    02/12/2007 @ 7:04pm


  • It may be a three-way tie for the worst President of the USA! But, this is a subject more appropriate for the twentieth century after our nation was more fully formed and the memory of three to four generations, most of whom are now living, can be involved.

    The candidates for this dubious honor should be Hoover, Carter and Clinton.

    Hoover methodically oppressed and generally ignored the suffering citizenry of the nation rather than responded to its dire distress after the 1929 stock market crash and bank closings.

    Carter stumbled, fumbled and functioned more like a low-level civil servant through the gas crisis, Iranian hostage taking, affront to the sovereignty of our embassy and nation, and every other challenge to his presidency. Giving away the Panama Canal--a creation of our American heritage--and his ignominious crediting himself for Middle East advances are just some.

    While Carter, Reagan and Clinton may all be faulted for ignoring the Islamic terror threat the more heinous cases of clear and present danger were under Clinton and his eight-year "party spirit" reign of terror against cherished American institutions, Christian religion, our military, and his politics of personal destruction unparalleled except by nineteenth-century scandals!

    John W. Kerr

    Jones, Oklahoma

    02/12/2007 @ 02:15am


  • Nicholas von Hoffman is a fine writer when it comes to putting nouns and verbs together. But as a student of history, not so much. Grant was the last President until Lyndon to go to bat for blacks? What about Harry S integrating the military and Ike and JFK sending troops into the south to make sure schools were integrated? These were executive actions and they were sort of optional.

    Maybe Nick should be a little more specific about what he means by "go to bat for."

    Ron Adami

    Flossmoor, Il

    02/11/2007 @ 8:43pm


  • Labeling George W. Bush the worst President the United States has ever seen is an understatement. He is probably the worst democratically elected leader the world has ever seen, period.

    Norm Bell

    Vancouver, BC, Canada

    02/11/2007 @ 7:48pm


  • You missed the most obvious candidate, at least for worst President of the twentieth century: Jimmy Carter. If he had had the courage to confront Islamic fasciscm in its earliest stages, perhaps GWB wouldn't have had to go in and clean up the messes left by JC's aversion to confronting this insidious evil with which we are now plagued.

    Juan Delacruz

    Simpsonville, SC, US

    02/11/2007 @ 7:04pm


  • If G.W. Bush were heading a conservative government we would all be merrily getting on with business as usual. However, this is not really a conservative Administration.

    Privatization is the key word with this Administration. Remember it was Benito Mussolini that said, "Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." With the old Nixon Administration back in power within the Bush Administration we have become a fascist state without even recognizing it. How? Privatization = Corporatism = Fascism.

    The United States can survive and prosper with a conservative government. The United States can survive and prosper with a liberal government. The United States cannot survive with a fascist government, at least not as we knew it. All fascist states need wars to survive (war is very profitable for corporations connected to governments), and we are already getting the propaganda now to set us up to invade another country. So my vote for worst President has to be G.W. Bush.

    We need to talk about our new fascism, not liberals vs. conservatives, etc.

    David Andrews

    West Palm Beach, Florida

    02/11/2007 @ 6:57pm


  • "On the plus side, he [Grant] was the last President until Lyndon Johnson who would go to bat for black people"

    Let us not neglect Harry S Truman, who vocally supported equality at grave risk to his political career.

    Back on track: Bush is worst. Fiscal/corruption, destruction of the Bill of Rights, foreign policy blunders that are unbelievable (with Iran pending!)--he covers all the bases. Oh, I forgot Katrina, global warming and forcing incompetent flunkies throughout government.

    David Clapp

    Borrego Springs, California

    02/11/2007 @ 5:59pm


  • I agree that we can't yet evaluate the Bush presidency, historically.

    That said, these discussions often seem to omit, what in my mind, is a truly critical historical point: Bush's blunders immediately follow a historical moment (September 11) in which he could have used his position to improve America's standing in the world, strengthen the UN, create a new wave of internationalism, or really, accomplish just about anything he wanted. The fallout from those attacks offered a rare opportunity to enact a huge amount of positive change. It's genuinely hard to think of a US President who enjoyed so much international support as Bush did in late 2001 and early 2002, and in my mind, Bush's failure is not simply that he messed up internationally, but that he did so when he enjoyed such goodwill.

    In Von Hoffman's article, he argues that "one of the criteria for being worst is how much lasting damage the President did."

    I think that's half right. But a better question is to look at how much lasting damage the President caused compared with the opportunity for creating lasting, positive change.

    Bradley Kreit

    San Diego, CA, US

    02/11/2007 @ 5:51pm


  • Surely GW is the worst President ever, should we measure this in whatever measurement we decide upon. However, on the flip side, GW has shown society through his leadership or lack of how perilously dangerous and fragile the very Constitution he has sworn to protect is. GW has shown us by example how a bad government can produce mean and bad people--consequently, broken people and even dead people. GW has articulated how bad his education is with his lackluster inability to communicate. GW tells us how well we are all doing, and in reality more people are on the ropes with an economy that is nonrecoverable and a government that professes great skill but in actuality is mired in mediocrity.

    Now, what we do with the knowledge that GW has given us is for starters restoring accountability and credibility with our politicians by bringing this leader to justice. Impeachment is not enough, but allowing him to remain in jail for the rest of his life might help.

    We need to hold people accountable who choose to take the oath of office, otherwise why bother giving anyone up there any oath? Why bother having any office at all?

    Pat Croft

    Portland, Oregon

    02/11/2007 @ 4:14pm


  • I think it is too early to tell if Bush II is the worse President ever. It will take at least a hundred years for us to fully digest all the damage he has done. One thing I know for sure. I am 40 years old, and without a doubt, Bush II is the worst President in my life time.

    Samuel Collins

    Chattanooga, Tennessee

    02/11/2007 @ 2:12pm


  • I believe that all on von Hoffman's list of Worst Presidents have, at one time or another, done something worthwhile. The same cannot be said of George W Bush.

    If he has indeed done anything as President that is any good, I wish someone would point it out.

    Furthermore, he was not even elected--he was appointed.

    Rowland Scherman

    Orleans, MA

    02/11/2007 @ 1:39pm


  • He's not even on your ballot, but you've got to include Andrew Johnson on the "Worst Ever" list. If you measure "worst" by how long it took to undo the damage a President did, Johnson's legacy is exceeded by no one's. I'd rank him as #1.

    Though it is too early to know, Bush II is the only Presidnt with the potential to dislodge Johnson from his "worst ever" perch. My fear, however, is that the reasons Bush is so bad and his legacy so critical may not matter to many Americans in the end. I'm afraid he will go down in history not as an exceptionally bad President, but as a bridge, i.e., as our Augustus. Everything he is doing might come to be seen as the moment when America finally readjusted its republican traditions, flawed as they were, to make them more compatible with emerging imperial necessities both abroad and at home. In that case, Bush II would be the "worst ever" only for those who mourned what was lost (like checks and balances), as opposed to those who learned to live with what was gained.

    That's the nightmare, worst-case scenario. The fact that Bush II can even invoke it in people who love and worry about this country shows just how horrific and dangerous he and his cohorts really are.

    Erskine White

    Nashville, TN

    02/11/2007 @ 12:39pm


  • GWB seems to be garnering the qualifications in order to be eligible to receive the "World's Worst President" award based on the one most important feat that no other President could have been able to accomplish: taking the entire planet into "Armageddon" by nuking Iran, setting off a world war with nuclear weapons. No other President has been in that position, and it looks like it could happen. His political actions/decisions have been primarily based on right-wing fundamentalist "Rapturist" ideology, à la Pat Robertson. The Rapture Right is salivating at the prospect of nuking Iran, one of the "signs" to them that Armageddon is upon us, heralding the "second coming of Jesus Christ" to earth. They are looking forward to being "lifted up" until the tribulations are over. We should not be overlooking or underestimating the belief system of these fanatics and their influence on GWB. This brainwashed cult of the Rapture Right, blended with the Machiavellian ideology of the neocons makes for a MAD (mutually assured destruction) conclusion which may make historical perspective obsolete.

    Pamala Thomas

    Santa Monica, CA

    02/10/2007 @ 11:01pm


  • I chose not to cast a vote because even though I can agree that G.W. Bush is the worst President of the past 100 years, there was no option for a write-in.

    My write-in would have been Andrew Johnson, who became President after Abraham Lincoln's death and blocked every effort to bring the former slaves full citizenship, even scotching the "fory acres and amule" idea proposed by some to help the freed people become economically self-sufficient.

    Even though President Grant moved to fight the KKK's terror campaign, his successor, Rutherford Haves, withdrew federal troops from the South as part of a political deal abandoning African-Americans to another century of oppression.

    Even though Bush has done massive damage to this nation, the long-term effects are yet to be determined by history. But the US is still hobbled by the effects of the decisions of Johnson and Hayes more than 130 years ago.

    Jerome Nicholson

    Richmond, VA

    02/10/2007 @ 02:55am


  • I don't think Dubya will stack up so poorly at all. Too much depends on how the Jihadist threat develops over the next few decades. He could wind up looking like a visionary.

    John D. Froelich
    none

    Upper Darby, Pennsylvania

    02/10/2007 @ 01:46am


  • Don't forget Andrew Johnson and his sell-out of reconstruction.

    Rod Hay

    Kitchener, Ontario

    02/09/2007 @ 11:56pm


  • George W. Bush gluts himself on military porn, neglecting the needs of ordinary Americans. He fondles photographic images, capturing women displayed in explicit death.

    The President salivates while viewing children sprawled amid rubble of Middle Eastern cities, savoring the thoughts of snuffing the faiths of Islam. Military porn occupies the Commander-in-Chief of the American Armed Forces to the degree of addiction.

    He traces the outlines of long and large guns mounting enormous army vehicles, ready to spew shot after shot of ammunition across a broken land. With morbid passion, George W. Bush spreads rumours to create illicit, sadistic paranoia among his fellow Americans. "Terrorists, terrorists, terrorists!"

    He foams and trembles while begging for more military porn to satiate his indecency. The dysfunctional nature of George W. Bush is leading the American home to economic disaster.

    Jerie K. Leep

    Vian, Oklahoma

    02/09/2007 @ 6:01pm


  • I think that the worst President ought to be judged by the harm that he did to the Constitution and to our democratic institutions.

    For example, carrying out a secret foreign policy in defiance of the expressed will of the Congress, as Nixon and Reagan each did, should rank them near the top of anybody's worst list.

    Bush's threats to our republic are so numerous and far-reaching that we may never recover from them. I don't know of any other Administration that did so much harm to democracy and individual liberty--the two things Bush claims to love most.

    Brad Lumb

    Springfield, Illinois

    02/09/2007 @ 5:23pm


  • I don't think "worst" is the corrrect word for a numbskull like Bush 2.

    "Worst" implies that with a little "insight," Bush could/would "do something" about the "mess'o'potamia," as Jon Stewart so appropriately calls it! Dante had the "worst" sinners in Hell ("Opportunists") located at Hell's front door, lest the sinners in the "Juddeccai" might somehow exalt themselves. Bush is an opportunist, but he is also, in this retired paramedic preceptor's opinion, the most obviously "Ted Bundy-like," except for his choice of targets ("everyone," if there's a nuclear escalation to the current oil and war profits situation, instead of Mr. Bundy's taste for--female variety--human flesh).

    No shame, always a "reason" for his activities, (though the reasons may change faster then a prisoner"s stained shorts when they're about to ride Florida's "ole sparky," (Bundy was executed electrically...).

    And...Guiliani / McCain vs. Clinton/Obama? Reminds me of a time when Saturday Night Live was always funny!

    Robert G. Frano

    Jersey City, New Jersey

    02/09/2007 @ 4:19pm


  • I'm responding to Nicholas von Hoffman's piece on whether or not one can call Bush II the worst President ever. Of course this is always an amusing and pleasant topic for speculation. Still, I was disappointed by Hoffman's light-hearted approach. It seems to me that there is a very real possibility that Bush II really is the worst and that the consequences of his actions--particularly the militarization of international conflicts--could be very grave indeed, not just for this country but for the millions who could be caught up and killed in those conflicts.

    Too many political reporters treat the Bush Administration as business-as-usual, as nothing worse than a particularly bad moment in the ongoing process of American democracy. It isn't. We are living through a political disaster and not just in Iraq. We need to agree that something has gone very badly wrong, figure out what it is, and then try to fix it. That Bush remains just another figure in the rogues' gallery, someone we love to hate, demonstrates that in the end we are just as frivolous and irresponsible as he is.

    Alexander Price

    Seattle, WA

    02/09/2007 @ 11:41am


  • In assessing some of our worst presidents, Nicholas von Hoffman offers some curious breaks.

    He is able to somehow absolve Grant and Harding of any responsibility for putting crooks in their cabinets. He also doesn't mention that Grant's administration was one long booze binge and Harding lacked the intellect to be chief executive.

    Then, while praising Hoover for being "brilliant" and "decent," von Hoffman blames bad luck for the horror that blossomed while Hoover stood by. Sure, he didn't cause the Depression, but he did his best to do nothing to stop it--and that's probably why Hoover revisionism never really caught on.

    And why neglect William McKinley? His and his advisors' approach to foreign policy reeked of the same arrogance and aggression we are seeing today.

    Marco Bissaccia

    Holliston, MA

    02/09/2007 @ 11:38am


  • In the poll your site posed the question "Who was the worst president ever" I don't see the correct choice in our options.

    I would prefer to leave the question open-ended as opposed to stacking the deck. Most people now don't know anything except what you printed about Harding and others, but they do know Bush.

    They also know Clinton, Reagan, Bush Sr. so why limit the choices.

    If you print this, I would be really surprised, just like I would if you actually printed a fair or balanced view of politics. I have heard it said that Pelosi has illegal immigrants working for some of her businesses.

    David Krimminger

    Kannapolis, NC

    02/09/2007 @ 11:23am


  • Because I have a Presidential name I have a shot at speaking my peace even though I know peace is not part of the current equation.

    I can only say that never in one's lifetime should one have to encounter so much wrong, so many lies, so much distortion and all under the slick guise of decency.

    The question is a no-brainer in my held opinion. Mr. Bush (notice I can not even call him President) is by far the worst, hands-down, without any doubt, yet I don't claim to be perfect, nor an expert, just a simple Christian.

    William Harrison

    Friendship , Maine

    02/09/2007 @ 11:17am


  • Interesting list, however you forgot to mention the two Johnsons.

    Andrew Johnson set about undoing in peace the victory that the Union had won in the Civil War. The result of his racial policies is still being felt today. He should have been removed.

    LBJ took us into a war that he did not believe in for reasons of domestic politics. The Great Society was a well intentioned policy that deepened economic misery for millions of Americans. We are still suffering the consequences of those actions. He gets lots of credit for the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act, but let’s not forget that the real catalyst for racial justice was television. When the good natured people of this country saw the reaction to the Brown decision in Arkansas and Mississippi, change was inevitable.

    It may be too early to tell, but my worst three would be A. Johnson, with LBJ and Nixon tied for second. They left problems that will last for generations.

    Steven Heath

    Woodbridge, VA

    02/09/2007 @ 11:12am


  • There is no question in my mind or on my mind. George W. Bush is the worst man in the White House, ever.

    He and Chaney have been the most incompetent, the most arrogant, the most corrupt and the most deceptive pair at the top.

    If we do not change our Constitution into a Parliamentary type, we will lose our democracy and ere long we may have a Christian Ayatollah in our White House.

    C.M. Ramakrishna

    Cherry Hill, NJ

    02/09/2007 @ 11:11am


  • Surely to the list of worst Presidents--with another big "wait and see” asterisk --one must add Ronald Reagan. Yes, beloved as he is, "end the Cold War" though many claim he did, the list of offenses he and his administration committed is long, worrisome, and generally goes unacknowledged.

    Iran-Contra? Impeachable. His drug policy? Hopeless and shortsighted. Bad choices? The list of criminals and incompetents appointed by him and his administration is long and impressive. AIDS? Never heard of it. Creating, in essence, the ever- growing divide between rich and poor (and, coincidently, white and black) in the US? Would it have become so huge a problem without his Trickle Down Voodoo? The Cold War? Reagan simply bent the US economy as far as possible, and the Soviets decided they could not bend theirs so far.

    The "Wait and See" is in how Russia resolves its issues in the decades to come, and whether the US can ever hope to avoid complete economic collapse. And let's not forget what he helped to do to Latin America and the Middle East. If there was a dictator to support, Ronnie was there. If there was a justly-elected Left- leaning leader to be found, Ronnie was there to arm fascists in opposition.

    This man may have done more damage to the entire globe than anyone since Hitler -- who had help from Tojo and Il Duce. Poor Ron only had Maggie firmly on his side. Will his adoring public ever realize how bad he was? Will all his crimes and atrocities ever fully come to light? Will the damage he did ever heal? Wait and See. Meanwhile, there are still millions of Americans who truly believe Bush II is a great man. Wait and see.

    Adam Arnold

    Berlin, Germany

    02/09/2007 @ 11:09am


  • Pierce and Buchanan led to the Civil War. Nearly a million casualties on both side. Shrub isn't in that league.

    What about his treatment of the Constitution and freedom? Wilson was far worse in his attempts to prevent decent against US involvement in WWI.

    So the Shrub hasn't reach the level of the elite but he still has time.

    Thomas Paul

    Plainview, NY

    02/09/2007 @ 11:05am


  • As your Feb. 5 cover indicates, there are few earthly beings whom W pays attention to.

    Unless God's reputation for omniscience is wildly exaggerated, even more than fraudulent claims of WMD, while W may talk with his heavenly father, God must sure be getting ignored as well.

    Edward J. Allan

    Silver Spring, MD

    02/09/2007 @ 11:03am


  • Nick Hoffman's article about whether Bush is our worst president treated only half of that subject, the comparative predecessors. While he touched on the war, he did not explore the outrageous arrogance that created dozens of major lies, rejected competence as unnecessary, and failed to accept responsibility or deal in any way with the mess he created.

    But that is only the Iraq war. There is also:

    * The throwing away of advantage in Afghanistan, a place we had a right to be and from which we could have had a long-term presence no one could have argued with, if that presence were really necessary.

    * Undermining the nation's economy by refusing to tax sufficiently to pay for his wars, leading to gigantic deficits.

    * Generally alienating the rest of the world by arrogantly pursuing Pax Americana rather than a Good Neighbor Policy.

    * Making a direct, significant contribution to the possibility of the end of life on the planet by rejection of the Kyoto treaty and a general refusal to cooperate on environmental protection.

    * Disguising business giveaways as progressive social policy, such as the Medicare drug program and the proposal to privatize Social Security (which would produce hundreds of millions of stockbrocker commissions paid by old folks).

    * Taking significant steps toward an authoritarian presidency by exaggerating and extending his Constitutional powers and rewriting acts of Congress.

    These are just the biggies. Hoffman is right that our perspective of Bush is too short for us to be entirely confident in our judgment of him, but surely the list of this man's crimes and failures is substantially longer than any of his predecessors'rap sheets.

    I mean, what's it going to take? Nuking Iran? Forget I said that.

    Douglas Wilson

    Naples, FL

    02/09/2007 @ 11:01am


  • I don't know about "all-time," but he makes Nixon look like a piker. I still can't believe that anyone believed the initial State of the Union address "justifying" going to war. I know his body language and tone a mile away, and when he lies it's painfully obvious. I was stunned. Saddam was a clown at that time. Who didn't know that?! What I really want an answer to is why did they suddenly stop chasing Bin Laden and his sidekick, and not send the back-up that was requested by the men on the chase. Tough conditions in the mountains?! Sure. That was when Rumsfeld said he wasn't important anymore. That means that George W. Bush lied to all New Yorkers, and the world, through the bullhorn from downtown, when he said, in no uncertain terms, that he would get whoever was responsible. I see. So going into Iraq was easier than going after two guys in the mountains?! They all have a lot of blood on their hands and cannot escape the destiny of action-and-reaction. I think all of them should be exiled to Iraq. The Hague still exists, doesn't it. Why wasn't Saddam sent there? Well, send them there anyway! They are probably clinically compulsive liers, at the very least. Maybe downright insane. How could everyone let this peabrain roll over them like he did? Pathetic. Webb is the man. I had a feeling about him twenty-five years ago when he worked for the Navy under Reagan. I was feeling a little hopeless until I saw that he was running against Warner, and then...."Macaca!" All Hail Macaca!

    William Boltwin

    New York City, NY

    02/08/2007 @ 7:09pm


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