The top 40 US presidents

[UnderseaLcpl]

FDR is #1!? Ain't that a bee with an itch Then again, I shouln't be surprised the Brits think he's great; they think Churchill's great too and he almost single-handedly destroyed the Empire.

Let's look at some things FDR did during his illustrious presidency:

1) Supported more pieces of unconstitutional (as found by the Supreme Court) legislation than any president in history.

2) Tried to pack the Supreme Court

3) Didn't manage to end the depression until he was dead.

4) Purposely tried to start a war with Japan by specifically instructing US diplomats to refuse any diplomatic offer the Japanese brought to the table.

5) Managed to be unprepared for said war.

6) Blatantly violated US neutrality for absolutely no reason other than Anglophilia, all without the consent of the people.

7) Went to war with Germany, at the expense of hundreds of thousands of American lives and untold sums of money, and yet failed to accomplish any of the war's supposed original aims.

8) In addition to not liberating Poland, a dozen more countries, almost all of which preferred the Germans to the Russians, ended up behind the Iron Curtain for half a century.

9) Sanctioned the internment and prosecution of tens of thousands of Americans on the basis of their ethnicity

10) As has been mentioned, signed social suck-urity, the bankrupt retirement program that pays stipends nobody could possibly live decently on, into law.

11) Allied with a monster who killed far more people via systematic methods of extermination than Hitler ever did.
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The really funny thing about all this is that most of the stuff people hate GW Bush for are things FDR did in extremis, and yet people adore him. It just goes to show how effectively the public consciousness can be whitewashed, just as was done with Wilson's presidency during WW1. Wilson accomplished absolutely nothing he set out to do; his own ideals were torn apart by his allies. The League of Nations and the idea of self-determination for all nations were dead before he ever set foot in Paris. He condoned and turned a blind eye to violence and inhumane treatment of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, Italian-Americans, and so on and so forth. He personally referred to what he called "hyphenates" as something resembling a blight upon society on many occassions, and yet nobody remembers that. Hardly a wonder, just look in a high-school textbook and see if you find any mention of such things. How wise we are to let the state ensure that we all receive a proper education.
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I hate to dog on our British cousins so much because I like them, even if their overriding ambition is to tax all of our tea and quarter their troops in our homes, but this ludicrousness that seems to govern their public mindset has to stop. If any nation in the world should know a thing or two about the dangers of the fallacies of idolizing great men for no other reason than "inspirational leadership", as the article puts it, and pursuing interventionist policies, it's Britain. What was easily the greatest empire the world has ever seen was reduced to a shadow of its former self in the span of less than a century, a process which began the moment that the aristocracy tried to "freeze" things as they were, so to speak, through military activity, restrictive trade policies, and later, a socialist outlook.

The US is doing the same thing right now, and it has been doing so for quite some time. It will take longer for us to fail because we have so many unbelievably unfair advantages in terms of geography and economy, but it will happen if our national attitude does not become more pragmatic in the near future. That doesn't mean elevating arrogant, incompetent powermongers (and especially those who are part of a political dynasty) to the status of sainthood simply because of their ideals or charisma.

I'd go on, but I think I'm sure I've gone on enough for those who cared to read all that. Thanks in advance to those who have something to add. I know I haven't responded to many posts in the past few months because I've been busy or out-of-state, but I've got some time off so I won't be inadvertently posting stuff and then seemingly ignoring the responses for a while yet.

[joea]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

4) Purposely tried to start a war with Japan by specifically instructing US diplomats to refuse any diplomatic offer the Japanese brought to the table.

5) Managed to be unprepared for said war.

6) Blatantly violated US neutrality for absolutely no reason other than Anglophilia, all without the consent of the people.

7) Went to war with Germany, at the expense of hundreds of thousands of American lives and untold sums of money, and yet failed to accomplish any of the war's supposed original aims.

8) In addition to not liberating Poland, a dozen more countries, almost all of which preferred the Germans to the Russians, ended up behind the Iron Curtain for half a century.

9) Sanctioned the internment and prosecution of tens of thousands of Americans on the basis of their ethnicity

11) Allied with a monster who killed far more people via systematic methods of extermination than Hitler ever did.
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Wow long post. Ok I won't comment on domestic stuff except point 9) which I agree with totally and am rather disgusted how the Canadian government of the time treated citizens of Japanese origin.

I disagree or question all the other points however.

4) There is still a long debate on this issue like here: http://www.armchairgeneral.com/forum...d.php?t=107123

Long thread but academic and primary sources are debated and cited. The poster BravoMike probably is closest to my view. I'll return later but suffice it to say the actions against Japan have to be seen in the context of the war in Europe, no war, no Axis alliance no war in the Pacific IMHO. I feel FDR either wanted to make Japan back down or goad them into action to make it easier to get into the war against Germany luckily Hitler made it easy by declaring war (he didn't have to - check the text of the Tripartite Pact) on the US.

5) Hardly Roosevelt's fault-given the Depression and isolationism meant delayed start to rearmament.

6) and 7) Nonsense IMO, I think FDR honestly felt in the medium to long term a Europe under the control of the Third Reich would be a threat to US security. We can debate that now but it must have seemed like that then. The US did not go to war to guarantee Poland, that was Britain and France's war aims in 39 at least. The aims obviously changed as the war went on and at no time was the Holocaust a reason - any more than Stalin's crimes a reason not to ally with the USSR - Realpolitik.

8) If we do want to discuss morality though consider that many of the countries that preferred the Germans to the Soviets were allied with Germany ! Yes some like Finland and Romania had lost territory to the USSR before the war and wanted to recover it - but many went to far. Not to pcik on Romania but their war aims went far beyond recovering Bessarabia and their government took part fully in the Holocaust. Heck many Western European occupied countries took part fully and btw I am sure French and Italian communist partisans were as upset to be liberated by the Western Allies as the Poles were by the Soviets.

One more thing about Poland, the nation that probably suffered more than Russia or China proportion wise, yes the Soviets committed crimes there (and the Russian government has apologised for Katyn) but if you look at just this link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_W...endnote_Poland

In August 2009 the Polish Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) put the figure of Poland's dead at between 5,620,000 and 5,820,000; including an estimated 150,000 Polish citizens who died due to Soviet repression. The IPN's figures include 3 million Polish Jews who died in the Holocaust, as well as ethnic Poles and other ethnic groups (Ukrainians and Belarussians). The Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) classifies the various ethnic groups by language spoken. Jews, Ukrainians and Belarussians who spoke Polish were considered Poles.
The Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) figure for deaths of Poles due the German occupation is 2,770,000. This figure includes "Direct War Losses" -543,000; "Murdered in Camps and in Pacification" -506,000; "Deaths in prisons and Camps" 1,146,000; "Deaths outside of prisons and Camps" 473,000; "Murdered in Eastern Regions" 100,000; "Deaths in other countries" 2,000. These figures include about 200,000 Polish speaking Jews who are considered Poles in Polish sources.[251]

In August 2009 the Polish Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) researchers estimated 150,000 Polish citizens were killed due to Soviet repression. Since the collapse of the USSR, Polish scholars have been able to do research in the Soviet archives on Polish losses during the Soviet occupation.[257]

So the Nazis killed far more Poles than the Soviets-even if you exclude Jews-the Soviets can claim they saved the country from extermination- not that it justifies the forced imposition of communism of course.


11) Well the enemy of my enemy is my friend, and the US has been good at finding unsavoury friends to fight other unsavoury enemies. Not that they're alone of course Stalin must not have been happy allying with capitalists and imperialists. Also while he killed many people I think the numbers are in dispute in a way they are not with the Nazis (who lost and whose records were captured etc.) . While the Russian archives are still difficult to access we do know more than before and yea I have to dig around to find the sources, but seriously, if the numbers bandied about for the victims of Stalinism were correct then counting the 25 million casualties of WWII the USSR would have ceased to exist and would not have bounced back to defeat the Nazis. Look up the Generalplan Ost sometime to know what the Nazis intended to do-consider also 5 million NON-Jews were also killed in the extermination camps.

Final point, if the USSR was seen as a threat to the US (whether they were, or the Nazis for that matter, or not is for another discussion), why wouldn't Germany - in control of Europe- not be? After all it was scientifically and industrially far more advanced than the USSR.

Anyway this is my 20 bucks worth. Take it or leave it and I'm sure you'll leave it.

See below just the date darn spammers.

[Betonov]

Teddy Roosevelt

The guy would make my backwater country a superpower

[Oberon]

FDR at number one is subjective, but yeah, it's probably got a lot to do with the support he gave to the UK even though many did not want him to. There's a lot of deep gratitude to FDR in that, throughout those in the UK who actually know who he is (despairs at younger population).
Te-ahem...sorry...Theodore Roosevelt should be a bit higher than five imho, mayhap he be put at three and FDR brought down under Jefferson...or perhaps the two Roosevelts should be four and five Theodore at 4 and FDR at 5. Hard to say really, but anyone who can continue a speech for an hour and a half after being shot in the chest, well, he gets my vote.

Interesting that Lyndon Johnson is higher than JFK, also interesting to see Truman so high up the list. If Europe is as socialist as many think it, I'd have thought he'd have been ranked lower.

[TarJak]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

FDR is #1!? Ain't that a bee with an itch Then again, I shouln't be surprised the Brits think he's great; they think Churchill's great too and he almost single-handedly destroyed the Empire.

The Empire was well and truly stuffed long before Churchill got his hands on the reins. A long chain of mismanagement and the ruinous costs of defending the far flung dominions, was, as it is for all empires, too much to bear.