The Worst President in American History?

Spencer Blog Archives 1-03: The Worst President in American History? 01-23-03

"Okay, as I'm sure you're well aware, I'm not at all in the habit of defending W about anything but, as a historian, this story and the Helen Thomas quotation that W is 'the worst president in all of American history' is beginning to become quite grating to me.

Don't get me wrong. W does have the genuine potential to make that short list of real presidential losers that includes folks like Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, U.S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, Benjamin Harrison, and Warren Harding, but he's not there yet. He hasn't been president long enough and done enough damage yet to qualify.
(Yes, I know there were more bad presidents, of course, but these are the ones that damned near every historian will agree were the bottom of the barrel.)

Now, if W's administration continues its assault on civil liberties, if his administration engages us in an unnecessary and morally bankrupt war that will kill tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis, destabilize a region and increase the threat of terrorism worldwide, if his administration follows through on its plan to re-implement Nixonian secrecy and the imperial presidency, and if he and his surrogates continue to drag American political discourse into the gutter by questioning the patriotism of political opponents a la Joseph McCarthy in political campaigns, then he very well may get to make the presidential shit list but it's awfully premature to put him in this category.

Now, of the nine presidents Helen Thomas has covered, he probably is the worst one IMHO. His daddy was downright impressive in comparison folks. But it's awfully early to be making such pronouncements and, I would argue, pretty damned irresponsible. While I might enjoy thinking about W this way, the historian in me thinks this is taking things too far after just two years of W's presidency.

Now that I've finished defending W, I'm going to go take a shower.

I think I'm going to be sick."

- Tom Spencer