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Comment on: who do you think is the most overrated president in history?

Bigthink — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 04:01:57 +0100

i agree with marktags that jfk is very overrated i just think that the whole progressive movement was idiodic.

you priv1 on the other hand sound like a misinformed libral ronald reagan was a great man in general not just a great republican in fact he wasnt conservative enough for me on many issues early on but whether you believe so or not Reagan is easily in the top 5 all time greatest president and is definatly the greatest president in the second half of the 20th century

Comment on: who do you think is the most overrated president in history?

Bigthink — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 06:37:01 +0100

The question, as posed, asks who is the most overrated President in US history. Inherent is the notion that one's legacy, in some sense, outweighs one's record. This being the criteria, I would consider JFK to be an "overrated" president.

JFK might well have become a fantastic president; however, the reality is that he only served in office for two years, prior to his assassination. He simply did not have the time to implement or execute the policy measures necessary to be considered amongst the elite presidents.

Granted, he mediated the Cuban Missile Crisis effectively and he was a supporter of civil rights -- intervening in the University of Alabama incident in the summer of '63. However, his rampant internationalism had both positive and negative aspects. His alterations to Eisenhower's plans for Cuba led to the much maligned "Bay of Pigs" fiasco. And finally, he was unable to implement any of his domestic ("New Frontier") program, promised funding for all sorts of areas of US life.

Perhaps he would have been able to implement his economic policy, perhaps he would have brought civil rights to fruition; these points, however, are moot. His assassination disallowed his ability to implement policy or make tangible changes.

His inability to do so, of course, was not his fault. Yet people regard JFK as one of the "greatest presidents." His popularity rivals Lincoln's and Washington's. His list of accomplishments - though no fault of his own -- is actually quite barren.

Thus, given the fact that his iconic legacy and popularity as "one of the great" massively outweighs any tangible contribution to the presidency that he was able to make, I would argue that JFK is one of the more overrated presidents.

Comment on: who do you think is the most overrated president in history?

Bigthink — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 03:25:02 +0100

Ronald Reagan - The Republican Party has created a whole iconography idolizing a president who was not that popular when he left office and who had lost control of his administration - see Iran/Contra - if he ever had control of it. A "sunny personality" and "great humility" hardly compensate for a wisdom epitomized by the 3 x 5 card.