Vote for the worst President over the last 50 years.

I disagree. If Carter had just gone in and gotten the hostages instead of all the handwringing, whatever the cost, Iran would indeed be a different picture. The Shah was the pivot man back then and had made some grevious errors in judgment which in a large part contributed to the revolution and the Mullahs rise to prominence.

Ineptitude is at times is the worst and as far as politics go, Carter's are woefully lacking.

Carter can build houses with a little help, but run the US government is an area he wears the badge of fail.

Obama may well take possession of the baton before it's all said and done though.

That should probably be laid at Eisenhower's feet, honestly, with having the CIA overthrow Mossadeq and installing the shah. Yeah, Mossadeq may have been bad for British oil interests, but despite the fear-mongering of the British government, he wasn't about to ally Iran with the USSR; he knew it would have made Iran better off to do business with the USA instead.

I vote for Johnson.

It might have been a better picture. It might have been a worse one. No way to tell.

An earlier rescue attempt might have worked. It might have backfired like the actual one tried. It might have backfired worse than the actual one tried.

To a large extent, it's unfair to judge the wisdom of someone's decisionmaking by the consequences. A poorly made decision can end up working to one's advantage, and a reasonably made decision can end up proving to be a mistake.

I admittedly don't know tons about the Carter administration, but I don't think that there's anything to say from the prospective of Carter not going in early was an obvious mistake.

Nixon hands down.

And before people start saying "except for Watergate, he did a pretty good job"

I say the following:

You can't do that.

1) If you say "except for Watergate" in regards to Nixon, you should also say "except for the Iran hostage crisis" for Carter, or "except for budget deficits and Iran/Contra" for Reagan, or "except for the Iraqi Civil War" for Bush II.

2) I'm not at all convinced that Nixon was all that good or even average WITHOUT Watergate. After all he made some huge errors like gutting the space program and implementing wage and price controls. Not to mention mismanagement of the economy leading to severe recession in 1974.

3) Watergate had a horrendous effect on other key govt. policies. Because of Watergate, it was politically impossible for the Ford Admin. to provide any support to South Vietnam to prevent their fall to North Vietnam

So stop saying "except for Watergate".

It is bullshit and everyone knows it.

The Iran hostage crisis wasn't the only bad thing about Carter.

I will give credit to Carter over Obama: he didn't fuck things up irreparably. Obama has racked up more debt in 1 1/2 years than all the other presidents combined.

The Debt Clock is now over $13 trillion.

Directly comparing presidents is always pretty difficult.

Without going point for point - which I'm just not up for tonight - Reagan took over an economy that was a train wreck and left office with ever indicator on the books (except deficit spending) spiking. He took over a country that was in disarray not just in regards to radical Islam but also in their standing vis-a-vi the Soviets, when he left they were on the doorstep of collapse.

While there's an element of truth to the notion that sitting presidents often take credit or blame for that which they had nothing to do with, it takes a pretty twisted lens to not see the direct link between Reagan's policies and those results.

To the negative, there was Iran-Contra which, while regrettable, was a pretty measely scandal (in that the goals being advanced were, in fact, defensible foreign policy goals as opposed to personal gain as is usually the case with scandal and corruption) and the S&L fiasco (which is a failure of Congressional oversight if it reflects on the government at all)

there's also the deficit spending, which we could spend all night debating the extent to which he takes sole blame for that, but it's at least true that sometimes goals conflict and you can accomplish all of them in eight years.

It is. They all have their good points and bad points.

Most presidents have created new problems, but most have been fixable or at least a problem at a level we've been able to deal with up until now. FDR gets an ass whupping for Social Security.

I generally give Clinton good marks for his management of the budget, but I'd like to kick his ass over the AWB and for setting up the mortgage industry to blow wide open.

I give Johnson high marks for the Apollo program, but I hope he's burning in Hell for the Not So Great Society and Vietnam.

Carter and Obama? Carter generally screwed up everything, but at least he didn't leave the country a wrecked, burned out hulk. Obama is leaving it a wrecked, burned out hulk.

It is very hard for people today to realize just how bad things were in the U.S. when Reagan took over in 1981.

He followed not ONE

Not TWO

Not THREE

But FOUR consecutive presidents that a vast number of Americans saw as failures.

In fact, when Reagan took office in 1981, it is arguable that the U.S. had not had a president that much of anyone respected in fully TWENTY YEARS (Eisenhower).

JFK only became idolized later thanks to being murdered.

A broad consensus seemed to be developing in the U.S. that a president simply "could not govern" the U.S.

In fact in the Reagan inaugural issue, U.S. News & World Report (which generally supported Reagan) had an article entitled.

"Another disposable president" which kind of says it all regarding the lack of faith Americans had in the institution of the presidency.

Just to be fair, I hope Reagan is burning in Hell for being the original Neo-Con president.

I voted for Carter. Most of the reasons why have been posted here already in some detail by others, so I'll simply add that Carter's presidency brought the Misery Index into common usage. To this day Carter holds the dubious distinction of having the highest Misery Index score ever.

I lived and worked through his presidency and I can personally attest to the fact that the numbers don't lie in case.

Hell, Reagan almost got my vote, but the unneccessary preemptive war and taking a budget surplus I'd billions and turning it into a $10 TRILLION deficit takes the cake. Even Reagan knew to raise taxes (6 times, IIRC) when it was neccessary. So Bush II got my vote.

About Obama, yes he has increased the deficit, but the bulk of that was due to the stimulus and the second half of TARP, which passed under Bush 2.... and about 40% of the stimulus were the tax CUTS that everybody loves so much. That's right, 98% of us pay less taxes than we did under Bush and no one is paying more.

Bush2 would have gotten my vote had it not been for Obama. Bush2 ran up $3 trillion in debt in 8 years. Obama's tab is $9 trillion in 1 1/2 years.

My sources tell me the debt was $10T on the day of Obama's inauguration.

Lyndon Johnson. I didn't even have to think about the others. Johnson was the sickest and most crooked piece of trash we ever had in that office. And considering the 20th century presidents to present, DAMN THAT'S SAYING SOMETHING.

Um... no. Bush never had more than a $700 billion DEFICIT (IIRC), cumulatively $4 trillion in DEBT. $10 trillion was the total debt, but it started at $6 trillion, down from 6.1(?) trillion at the height of Clinton's presidency. Obama's at $3 trillion in a year and a half (that is, from 10 to 13), with no plans to have a yearly deficit less than Bush's worst at any time during his presidency. Obama will do what Bush did in 8 years in 4, and I don't even want to think of what he could do if reelected.

Of course, it goes without saying that Gore had spending programs planned greater than Bush's. Don't forget that.

What do you consider to be "Neo-Conservative" and just what is wrong with that anyway?

I'd like to see some proof that Reagan was "neo-con" in practice, even if he was in theory (a point I don't concede)

Neo-con, as I understand it, is very much a post-Cold War ideal since it's predicated on being the lone "big dog" with the ability and opportunity to mold geo-politics to our liking. we really couldn't study that sort of shit while we had the Soviets to worry about (unless you mean the whole "stamp out communism everywhere" business, which was certainly not something that originated with the Reagan presidency).

Don't forget the giving away of the Panama Canal. By far the worst President of the last 50 years. I cringe everytime some left wing pundit calls Carter a diplomat. Giving away the store does not make you a diplomat.

Eisenhower and Reagan were IMO great presidents. Kennedy wasn't in office very long, but he did a great job handling the cuban missile crises.

Johnson was just one sick bastard who deserves every bit of disdain that he has been given. He deserves sole responsibility for the Vietnam mess because it was him who ordered the mobilization of the reserves, yet refused to do what it took to win.

Nixon deserves credit for bringing the troops home,but gets low marks because of the creation of the EPA,taking the U.S off the gold standard, and of coarse the illegal wiretapping and other illegal activities that he did.

Ford wasn't in office very long because of his pardon of Nixon.

Bush 41 was actually a very good President who lost re-election because of his flip flop on no new taxes.

Clinton was average because he has taken a lot of undue credit thanks to decisions that were made by Bush 41 and a Republican Congress eg: the federal budget being in a surplus, welfare reform

Bush 43 was a great disappointment for many conservatives and his failures as president are IMO the reason for the tea party movement.

I don't like Obama, but he shouldn't be on any president rank list until his term is up.

Indeed, he could turn it around tomorrow.
Then again, we may have to learn to say "WordForge" in Chinese or Arabic by term's end.

People here don't seem to be spending much time offsetting the "good" deeds of presidents with their faults. I don't think it unreasonable that someone could either give Reagan little credit for these and other good deeds, or just consider his flaws in complete isolation from them (as long as they are also considering the flaws of the other presidents in isolation from their good deeds).

More or less a Conservative in name only. Or a faux Conservative. Reagan preached a good Conservative message, but proceeded to do the exact opposite. He gave us the highest deficits and debt in history at that point, more intrusion in our personal lives (WoD), promised smaller government but gave us a bigger one, Iran-Contra - the apparent deal with the Iranians over the hostages, etc.

I voted for Reagan in 1980, but by '82, I had fallen out with the Reps because of Reagan.

Your concerns have some validity but "fake conservative" isn't the same as "neo-conservative"

And, by the way, ever how far Reagan might have been from the conservative ideal (which is a debatable judgment) he was hell and gone more conservative than any president since Coolidge and if you are holding out for his better to come along (in terms of being a true blue conservative) you'd best get started finding that fountain of youth...

Neo Conservatives ARE fake Conservatives.

However, I pretty much agree with the 2nd paragraph.

No list of Carter "accomplishments" is complete without at least one mention of his epic naval battle with the Killer Rabbit. In the midst of all the other issues he was dealing with at the time, he was forced to personally defend himself aboard Canoe One from an aquatic suicidal hare obviously intent on the elimination of the Leader of the Free World.

Nothing quite causes an American heart to swell with pride as seeing their President flailing away with an oar at a small white bunny. It was a Harrison Ford (Air Force One) moment for sure.

The damn rabbit had a bigger pair than Carter.

For those of you who don't remember the Kamakaze Rabbit: