Thursday, November 30, 2017

Who Is the Worst US President So Far?

I can hardly think of anything for which we can be grateful to Donald Trump; however, he has resolved the debate about who has been the worst US president in his own favor. I am not a historian, though I do know a lot about the histories of the Middle East, Africa, and other places. So, I tend to be better able to evaluate presidents I have seen in action while I have been alive. To be sure there were villainous 19th century presidents. Consider, for example, Andrew Jackson who led the genocide against Native Americans and set the stage for later US war crimes throughout the world. In the 20th century, consider the devout racism of Woodrow Wilson. Still, in looking for the lowest points, prior to Trump I saw Ronald Reagan as the worst president ever. He led a major downhill change in direction by the US government aided by his confusion of cinema with reality. Bill Clinton did awful things, but he should be viewed as an implementer of Reagan's terrible ideas. In the same way, Barack Obama continued many of the worst policies of George W. Bush, who was pretty awful but not nearly so awful as Reagan. Still, we have to thank Trump because the debate now is about who is the second worst president in US history.