Ranking of U.S. Presidents by historians

[Sailor Steve]

The Civil War was the beginning of the end of another conception as well - that forts were unassailable by ships. The use of ironclad batteries by the British and French against Sevastapol in 1855 was the first time that floating weapons had been even possible against fortified positions, and by the 1860s there were finally floating weapons powerful enough to be effective against mortar and stone, and at ranges long enough that the fort's guns had difficulty hitting the ships.

It was the beginning of the end for coastal forts.

Very good point, Mr Steve.

[August]

Originally Posted by antikristuseke

I don't think 3-1 worked too well against interlocked machine gun fire.

Machine guns are indeed force multipliers that would change whatever attacker/defender ratio there was beforehand, but so would any new weapon or tactic.

For example, interlocking machine gun fire was not effective at all against poison gas and MG fire was not as effective if aircraft are strafing and bombing their position keeping the crews heads down while the attacking troops advance across the kill zone.

Even changes in doctrine for existing weapons change the ratio. For another example: Pickets charge might have achieved it's objective if the rebels had been able to keep their artillery barrage going right up until the leading ranks reached the stone wall.

[Raptor1]

Originally Posted by Snestorm

Your point is well taken in modern warfare, but USA's civil war was the beginning of the end of linear tactics, and restrictions.

Let's luck at muzzleloaders (Springfield / Enfield).
Defender: Fire, reload, fire, at capacity.
Attacker: Fix bayonette. Advance. Usualy 1 shot, if one lives to fire it.

Artillary.
Attacker: Pre-advance barage.
Defender: Fire, reload, fire, at capacity. Final round = grapeshot.

That's where that 3 to 1 pretext came from. However, in the end, you are correct. Nothing is even close to being written in stone, and there are infinate possabilities that can have a minor, or major effect.

An often overlooked handicap of the attacker is logistics. It's a whole discussion in itself.
And a very complex one at that.

Or it could go like this:

Defender: Fire. Reload as fast as possible under heavy rifled artillery barrage. Fire again, but you're blinded by your own smoke so you can't aim well.

Attacker: Close range, fire massed volley. Fix bayonets and charge the disoriented and shocked enemy, breaking and dispersing them while taking negligable casualties.

As I said, it all depends on a huge number of factors regardless of the era the battle takes place in.

I can even think of cases in WWI, where defensive technology far outpaced offensive doctrine, in which outnumbered but properly led and handled troops could attack strong defensive positions while taking far fewer casualties than the defenders.

And logistics can effect the defender just as much as the attacker.

[Stealth Hunter]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

That's not what your source says,

I cited more than one source...

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

and that's not what conventional economic wisdom says, either.

As a matter of opinion, you mean.

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

Your source (economic library) cites many of the failures of the New Deal and supports the claim that it exacerbated the Depression, rather than rectifying it.

Though it proves my point: that doubling the fixed exchange rate for the dollar relative to gold helped to stabilize and indeed benefit the economy by acting as a monetary stimulus thusly leading to large amounts of gold flowing into the United States. Twice as many dollars could therein be purchased. That supported bank deposits and increased bank willingness to lend, encouraging investments to be made. This lending led to a huge increase in the currency supply, which pushed against price deflation and increased consumption, thus helping to end the Great Depression.

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

It also casts doubt on your figures for GDP and employment. This is all in the last half of the document.

Mr. Smiley is accurate on some things, not so much on others, with my particular reason for using this viewpoint article being its excellent summary of the standard, which can be substantiated from the following source:

http://www.federalreserve.gov/boardd...22/default.htm

Moreover, you've switched that up: my figures for GDP and employment cast doubt on his article, which does not cite any sources. My figures, on the otherhand, DO have sources. This can (and does) furthermore serve to confirm my point that, he is accurate on some things, in conjunction with the Federal Reserve citation above, not so much on others (which stresses why it's so important to look around ).

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

Furthermore, while I have no doubt that FDR was little better than Lincoln when it came to civil liberties, you make no mention of his attempt to pack the Supreme Court.

On the concernancy of civil liberties, we are arguing on what presidents did do, not what they tried to do. His Judiciary Reorganization Bill did not pass and did not come anywhere close to passing in Congress. Not that this was going to do anything terrible to the Supreme Court anyway. For those who aren't aware, the only real thing the integration of it into a law would have done would have been to limit the ages of the justices. Roosevelt felt there were too many elderly justices and that they could not perform their duties adequately (funnily enough, this is exactly what we have been seeing these past few years). For each justice who did not retire and stayed active to 70 and 1/2 years of age, a new justice(s) would be added (preferably, of a younger age), until the respective justice(s) died. Naturally, the justices, and indeed many of the politicians who had gained connections as lawyers from working with the justices opposed the plan, but eventually it evened itself out when two of the Supreme Court's members died, and Roosevelt was able to replace them with younger substitutes, who luckily agreed with many of his policies.

http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/679281

But again, fact is the bill never passed. So it's really pointless to bring it into this discussion.

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

That, in conjunction with his political control of Congress,

What is that even supposed to mean? "Political control of Congress"? You mean as in having a Democratic majority to support him on his policies (which they did not, for the record, support him on the Judiciary Reorganization Bill) or as in being a skilled politician who knew how to use Congress to actually get it to do something? (The latter, of which, was true, before, during, and shortly after the Hoover Administration- particularly towards the subject of the Great Depression as Hoover's Conservative leanings led him to favor a Trickle-Down Economy to fix the horrid status the country was in; this is precisely why he gets my vote as being one of the worst presidents in the United States' history).

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

and his adamant refusal to leave office,

Presidents LONG before Roosevelt were allowed to remain in office for as long as they wished. The two-full terms thing was only done with a few presidents prior to him: Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Grant, and Wilson (2,922 days for each man)- not counting Cleveland as he ran three times and served nonconsecutively (though it did amount to 2,922 days for him, in the end of it all). It wasn't until after he died that Truman approved the 22nd Amendment.

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

makes him the closest thing to a dictator this nation has ever had.

Not really, as he never did act unconstitutionally nor did he assume total control of the country during the Second World War. He was no better and no worse than Lincoln was, even considering the times and circumstances.

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

Sorry, but he's staying on my "Worst Presidents" list.

Well he's been ranked as the best president since 1982 in each statistical research session the Siena Research Institute has launched.

http://www.siena.edu/uploadedfiles/h...2010_final.pdf

And consistently as one of the better presidents in history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histori..._United_States

Think we can all agree on who's one of the worst...

http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=iV4lJr6AhJA&feature=related

[gimpy117]

no surprise with W and his abysmal ranking

[UnderseaLcpl]

Excellent post, SH, but I think youre overlooking some things. Prepare yourself for a veritable barrage of classical and post-modern economic theory, replete with empyrical evidence. There's a reason that the Keynesian economic theory prevalent in the New Deal has been overturned and I intend to show you what that reason is.

For the time being, however, I'm just messing around on the GT forums. I'll get on the case tommorrow afternoon or something. Sorry for the wait, I'm just too tired to do any serious research or dig out the boxes that my books are packed in. That's a real yawn, not a sarcastic one.

[Torvald Von Mansee]

Well, this this thread has strayed from its original topic a tad.

[tater]

Originally Posted by Torvald Von Mansee

Well, this this thread has strayed from its original topic a tad.

It was certainly bound to do so. As I said way up there, any "ranking" is absurd. It's no different than the idiotic shows on the History ( Military?) Channel that rank the "Ten best Submarines." It's not like they pick some simple, objective standard like, "total tonnage sunk by the class," or better, the tonnage sunk per submarine in class lost. No, they add stuff like "fear factor" (whatever the hell that is), then rank submarines that are without question deadly, but have NEVER proven themselves in combat.

Meaningless.

As is any ranking of Presidents, it is in fact a popularity contest that measures not the Presidents, but the historians. The relative rankings show the overall bias of the academic historians polled, and tell us virtually nothing about the Presidents in question.

[Bilge_Rat]

well, it made me finally begin to read "Lincoln: the War Years" by Carl sandburg which my dad gave me years ago and was just sitting on my book shelf gathering dust, so an excellent thread as far as I am concerned.

[tater]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

well, it made me finally begin to read "Lincoln: the War Years" by Carl sandburg which my dad gave me years ago and was just sitting on my book shelf gathering dust, so an excellent thread as far as I am concerned.

A friend (history grad student) recommended Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution (McPherson), which I also found to be quite good.

[Torvald Von Mansee]

Originally Posted by tater

It was certainly bound to do so. As I said way up there, any "ranking" is absurd. It's no different than the idiotic shows on the History ( Military?) Channel that rank the "Ten best Submarines." It's not like they pick some simple, objective standard like, "total tonnage sunk by the class," or better, the tonnage sunk per submarine in class lost. No, they add stuff like "fear factor" (whatever the hell that is), then rank submarines that are without question deadly, but have NEVER proven themselves in combat.

Meaningless.

As is any ranking of Presidents, it is in fact a popularity contest that measures not the Presidents, but the historians. The relative rankings show the overall bias of the academic historians polled, and tell us virtually nothing about the Presidents in question.

Could it be Presidents you philosophically agree with are ranked lower than you'd want?

I thought these kinds of surveys polled historians from all kinds of philosophical backgrounds.

[tater]

Originally Posted by Torvald Von Mansee

Could it be Presidents you philosophically agree with are ranked lower than you'd want?

No, it's that ranking people 1 to whatever is absurd, and subjective—which is what I said.

Again, exactly how much better is President #1 from President #2? 1.378658765% better? What does that mean, did he tie his shoes 1.378658765% faster?

The analogy to those shows on the history channel is spot-on.

So while I think you could possibly put Presidents into some zoological piles like "effective," "ineffective," etc, saying that one is better than another based on having one more vote by some historian is absurd.

I would say such a ranking was absurd regardless of who was on top, or what the % of philosophical backgrounds is. It's SILLY.

I thought these kinds of surveys polled historians from all kinds of philosophical backgrounds.

Really? Where is the methodology section of the poll? I checked out the Sienna Poll, and in none of their materials does it list each historian polled, along with his party affiliation. That's what it would take for you to demonstrate that the poll had no political bias, you'd need equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats polled. Since ~80% of university profs are registered Democrats (have seen numbers in that area in a few different polls before)—and the remaining 20% is not Republicans, it's split along with parties LEFT of the democrats—it would be hard to get a 50/50 split without some proof of party affiliation.

So what we have is a silly idea—ranking Presidents—executed in an almost certainly biased way.

[Sailor Steve]

Well said, tater.

Originally Posted by tater

So while I think you could possibly put Presidents into some zoological piles like "effective," "ineffective," etc...

Even then effectiveness is affected by congressional agreement and opposition. One president may accomplish all his goals because congress is on his side, while another may be blocked at every turn. One may also be a strong leader and get a lot of wrong things done, and another may try to do the right things but not be very good at them.

[tater]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Well said, tater.


Even then effectiveness is affected by congressional agreement and opposition. One president may accomplish all his goals because congress is on his side, while another may be blocked at every turn. One may also be a strong leader and get a lot of wrong things done, and another may try to do the right things but not be very good at them.

True enough, I was at first thinking that was objective—policy goals stated vs achieved, but I suppose that it could also be weighted based on the relatie weight of that president's party in Congress. You'd be more effective if you got your bill through a more hostile congress than a rubber stamp.

Dunno. Even that falls into subjectivity.

It's like ranking restaurants. My fave might be a thai place, and you might love food, but hate thai food (you could be one of those folks who taste cilantro as soapy, in which case it's hard-wired for you to dislike it).