Ronald Reagan did more damage to this country than any president before or after him.
I'm continually shocked by how often I learn of some structural systemic issue, pull the thread to see where it started and- oh, surprise, it was once again Reagan.
While W. sucked in many ways, there is no way he is the worst. Off the top of my head I can easily think of four better contenders: Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan (both guilty of pro-slavery fuckery before the Civil War), Andrew Johnson (fought to let the Confederates off the hook after the war and opposed the 14th amendment), and Donald Trump (first president to be impeached twice, first to be convicted of a felony, and may be remembered by future historians as the spark that ignites the next Civil War).
donvict ain't done yet, either. i think the damage and legacy he leaves behind, leaking out that giant diaper, will be the worst of the bunch.
Btw. question from Germany regarding Trumps Felony: I read that people convicted of a felony may not vote yet I also read that Trump cast his in Florida. Hoe does it actually work?
He was convicted in New York so Florida doesn't care.
It is complicated because the rules are different in each state. Also, Trump was convicted in New York state but he resides and votes in Florida.
For out-of-state convictions, Florida defers to the other state's rules. New York would allow Trump to vote if he resided there because he is not currently in prison, so Trump can vote in Florida legally.
https://apnews.com/article/trump-felony-conviction-can-he-vote-b95e7b4c9158d999e8bc89b00fbda911
It's tempting to pick someone recent, but the real answer is probably Andrew Jackson. He successfully engineered a genocide, trampled the Constitution and human rights, and was actively hostile to limits on Presidential power.
We'll see if 47 surpasses him. He's set up to do so. It's going to be wild to see what happens when Trump order troops to fire into crowds of American citizens.
I'd probably say someone like Andrew Jackson before even thinking about Trump being the worst. Jackson did a literal genocide with the Indian Removal Act
Andrew Jackson and it's not even close. Not to downplay the horrible crimes committed by many of our other presidents but I don't think anything rises to the level of the Trail of Tears.
Remove Jackson from the running and it's a more interesting conversation, however thinking about it reveals just how interconnected all of this stuff is. While the current genocide is occurring under Biden, we can't forget that the conditions that lead to Oct 7 were created under Trump. For that matter so were the conditions that lead to the escalation of the war in Ukraine.
I think the worst in my lifetime by a mile is Dubya, but while his wars were massive and consequential we can't forget that George Senior also killed scores of people in Iraq, and Clinton carried out the sanctions regime that killed scores more. Clinton was also the one who broke Labor's influence within the Democratic Party - but it was Obama who was swept into power on the promise of a working class revolution only to smother it in its crib.
But yeah my top two are Jackson and Dubya but beyond that I'm not sure there are a lot of crimes in the history of America's presidency.
Woodrow Wilson was so racist that he was quoted in an epigraph for "The Birth of a Nation." You know, the 1915 movie about how awesome the KKK was, which became the first true "blockbuster" film and which led to a huge resurgence in KKK activity. Not only that, but Woodrow Wilson also personally invited the filmmakers to screen the movie in the White House - the first movie ever screened in the White House, by the way. Honorable mention!
lol trump is bad but not like Andrew Jackaon bad.
Probably
- Andrew Jackson - Crimes against native people
- Andrew Johnson - Fucked up reconstruction
- Ronald Reagan - Trickle down economics
- 45/47 🤮 - We all know why...
- Richard Nixon - The Infamous Crook
Might have some memory gaps, but these are what I can remember from the top of my head.
If you think Trump is worse than you're telling everybody that you think norms are more important than a million dead brown people
Reagan definitely deserves a top 5 spot.
I dunno, Nixon's fuckery is downright provincial these days.
Don't forget that the SCOTUS appointed by 47 ended the American experiment since Presidents are now effectively kings. Thanks to Presidential immunity, we no longer get to say nobody is above the law.
George W Bush Jr.
Yes I am handing him the worst president title, even over Trump.
Because, it was his mishandled War on Terror, that plunged the country into massive national debt. He crashed the housing market. He literally had waged a war on obese people, minorities and other things as distractions from his failure to capture Osama. He allowed American Surveillance with Patriot Act I and II. His cabinet were all crooks and he was just a dumb puppet.
He is essentially the ripple effect of everything we're dealing with today and Trump is merely the symptom of that.
He allowed American Surveillance with Patriot Act I and II.
People at the time were begging for that. There were a very, very few civil libertarians that realized just how dangerous those acts would be, but the people, as a whole, were really behind them. Just like the people went in gung-ho for the start of GWoT.
He is essentially the ripple effect of everything we’re dealing with today and Trump is merely the symptom of that.
I'd put that at the feet of Reagan first. Reagan was the one that cozied up to the 'moral majority', which was based in racism and misogyny, what with Bob Jones University being forced to desegregate. That's where the birth of the alt-right (which I guess is now just mainstream Republicans) happened.
andrew jackson (or johnson can never remember which) for the trail of tears. absolutely awful
This question is too difficult, there are too many candidates...
How is it even close between Dubya and Trump like honestly Bush started the war on terror, killing and displacing millions.
I think I have Trump derangement syndrome but for Bush Jr. instead cause very few people make my blood boil just by seeing their face like that scum.
I would hire nucular George every day for the next 4 years to get rid of the orange dipshit.
Reagan
Asklemmy
A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions
If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!
- Open-ended question
- Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
- Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
- Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
- An actual topic of discussion
Looking for support?
Looking for a community?
- Lemmyverse: community search
- sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
- !lemmy411@lemmy.ca: a community for finding communities
~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~