Rank the Republican Presidents from best to worst

[Onlooker]

Here are the last 10 Republican Presidents. What a bunch of losers. How would you rank them from best to worst.

Taft
Harding
Coolidge
Hoover
Eisenhower
Nixon
Ford
Reagan
Bush I
Bush II

[Captain Hilts]

1. Hmmm...Good question!

Eisenhower - basically a decent guy
Taft - Brill administrator. Gave us the 7th inning stretch
GHWB - another good administrator. Last Republican prez to actually think government can solve problems
Nixon - innovative...EPA, etc.
Hoover - Good man whose reactions did not 'solve' the Depression, gave FDR an idea of what would not work.
Ford - Decent enough.





Coolidge - Guy that helped bring us the Depression
Harding
GWB
Reagan

[Sanity Claws]

2. Eisenhower was probably the only okay one in the bunch

So I'll put in the number one spot.
Bush Baby I'll put in the last spot.

[BeatleBoot]

5. Borrowed money from Social Security to fund Korean War

Boo!

[Captain Hilts]

15. No, not really. Ike ended the Korean War. Johnson pulled that stunt to fund Vietnam. nt

[sarge43]

19. Afraid not.

Eisenhower took office Jan 53.

Korean armistice signed Jul 53.

[Captain Hilts]

22. Folks here just don't know history. nt

[nosmokes]

3. #1 spot is a tie between Clinton and Obama... n/t

[denimgirly]

46. Was thinking the same thing

This country has gone soooo far right...and corporate owned. What's sad is that democrats have accepted anything they can get...even if it is continually right. Who would have thunk that democrats would praise Romneycare and shun the PO or Single Payer.

[BeatleBoot]

4. I'll start with Lincoln

Forget the rest of that lot.

Not worth ranking.

[GoCubsGo]

7. Except for Teddy Roosevelt.

Of course, he left the party...

[Captain Hilts]

17. Theodore said Eleanor was more like him than any of his own children.

ps. He HATED being called 'Teddy'.

[Mojambo]

6. I'd have Eisenhower higher and Hoover lower

I'd also have Reagan lower than Bush I

[GoCubsGo]

9. Yup, Nixon should be higher, too.

As reprehensible as he was, he was still better than most of them. Remember, he created the EPA and signed the Title IX, the Equal Opportunity Act, and the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species Acts. He comes off as a flaming liberal compared to what is in his party now. Too bad he was such a crook.

[Oregone]

11. He was to the left of many current Democrats

Although, maybe a tinge more corrupt

[Captain Hilts]

18. Very innovative. nt

[blm]

8. Eisenhower, Clinton, Taft, Nixon, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Ford, Reagan, Bush1, Bush2

.

[nsd]

24. Clinton?

[Captain Hilts]

26. Don't ask. nt

[IndianaGreen]

28. Don't tell! n/t

[Captain Hilts]

29. We can thank Obama's pal, Colin Powell for that one. nt

[blm]

35. Why was it Powell's fault that Clinton rolled over with DADT?

Was it Powell who forced Clinton to roll on healthcare, too?

Was it Powell who forced Clinton to deepsix BCCI matters, too?

Geez, Capt. Hilts, for ONCE.....think for a minute how different things would be the last 15 years if Clinton hadn't rolled so easily and TRULY acted as tough and honorably as the man YOU defend.

[IndianaGreen]

39. and while Bill couldn't keep his pants zipped, he prevented faithful gay couples from marrying

DOMA was Bill's doing!

[blm]

34. Michael Moore's famous quote - Clinton was the best Republican President.

I'm surprised this is the first time you heard.

[Zynx]

10. Eisenhower is the best

then:

2. Taft
3. Ford
4. Bush I
5. Nixon
6. Hoover
7. Reagan
8. Coolidge
9. Harding
10. Bush II

[harkadog]

12. Eisenhower was a loser?

A few hundred million Europeans would beg to differ with you.

[Zomby Woof]

13. It's like ranking favorite hemorrhoids

Or whether I would prefer a boil on my ass or inside my nostril.

Eisenhower is easy enough to rank as the least objectionable, if only for enforcing 'Brown vs. Board'. But really, this is like picking a favorite strain of the Plague.

Eisenhower (see above)
Taft (perhaps the most principled one on this list, I could rank him interchangably with Ike)
Nixon (It's a sad commentary on the last 10 Republican presidents that not even Watergate or bombing Cambodia ranks him lower, but China, Soviet detente, and the EPA make him look moderate by today's standards)
Coolidge (a rat smart enough to jump ship before the 1928 election, as if he knew the country was doomed)
Bush I (President Nero II - fiddled with Iraq while Rome burned, but the damage was halfway reparable under his successor. Still a criminal fuck though)
Hoover (President Nero I actually made some half-assed attempts to deal with the collapse, but couldn't overcome his ideological dogma sufficiently to do so)
Ford (demoted from a potentially higher slot because he employed Rumsfeld and Cheney in high-ranking positions before any other president)
Harding (only one valid contribution to the office: he was the first president to submit a budget to Congress, a precedent unbroken since his troubled tenure)
Reagan (in the same manner my first two choices are interchangable, likewise are my bottom two)
Bush II (deserves to lick the walls of a septic tank hooked up to the pneumonia ward of a neglected VA hospital)

[IndianaGreen]

14. I wouldn't lump Ike or even Jerry Ford in the same category as those idiots

Ford was a transitional President that was a welcomed relief after the horrors of Watergate.

Ike warned the nation about the threat to freedom and democracy posed by the military-industrial complex, and he was beloved by millions of Americans from both parties for his wartime role in defeating Nazi Germany.

[argonaut]

16. Here's my list, from Ike to Nixon.

1) Eisenhower - probably the closet thing to an 'independent' President we've had. Overall, a good guy.
2) Bush I - not bad as Republican Presidents go. Smarter and more centrist than Reagan, a better diplomat than his son.
3) Taft - had actual principles. Looked pretty funny.
4) Ford - decent guy, fairly moderate. Disliked Reagan intensely.
5) Hoover - not great by any means, but was basically handed a shit hand by Coolidge et al, and his post-Presidency was admirable in the vein of Jimmy Carter's.
6) Coolidge - personally a decent man, but his economic policies were awful. Did, however, bring some resepect back to the office after Harding's corruption.
7) Reagan - probably genuinely thought he was doing the right thing for the country, but his polices were disasters. Oh, and Iran-Contra.
8) Harding - the pre-Nixon
9) Bush II - Incompetent as hell. Pretty much the only good thing he did was increase aid to Africa.
10) Nixon - singlehandedly created the cynical, hateful atmosphere of politics that plagues us to this day. Evil asshole.

[Captain Hilts]

21. LBJ also contributed a great deal to the "cynical, hateful atmosphere of politics

that plagues us to this day."

A lot of folks went from being draft-dodging, govt.-hating hippies to right wing govt. hating cranks.

[IndianaGreen]

23. LBJ had the Army spying on Americans

And Hoover was still running the FBI.

[IndianaGreen]

27. Hoover and Carter were better in the post Presidency

I can't say enough good things for what Carter has done to improve the human condition since he left office.

Herbert Hoover was tapped by President Truman to feed the millions of dislocated people in postwar Europe.

[Captain Hilts]

30. FDR asked Hoover in '40 to run a committee on refugees with Eleanor. He said 'no'. nt

[Donald Ian Rankin]

45. I believe Hoover also did a great deal before he became president?

It's just a shame his presidency itself was so catastrophic...

[treestar]

20. ...

Eisenhower
Taft
Ford
Coolidge
Harding
Hoover
Nixon
Bush I
Reagan
Bush II

[Arkana]

25. Hmmm...

Eisenhower
Taft
Harding
Nixon
Ford
Coolidge
Hoover
Bush I
Reagan
Bush II

[SemiCharmedQuark]

31. Blah. Eisenhower.........

Taft

Nixon

Ford

BushI

Coolidge

Harding

Hoover (His program of repatriation puts him here--he deported my family to Mexico although they were citizens)

Reagan

Bush

[saltpoint]

32. Working with just those ten... geez, most of them suck outright.

I'll rank Eisenhower he best by virtue of his "Cross of Iron" speech.

After that, though, there's a sharp drop off for the other nine, with Harding, NIxon, Reagan, and both Bushes being the worst of the worst.

[Captain Hilts]

33. Eisenhower did the 'military industrial complex' speech too. nt

[ChairmanAgnostic]

36. toughie

Ike, Hoover, Nixon, are the top three.

Bush II, Reagan, Coolidge, are my bottom three.


I don't know enough about Taft or Harding.

[Meshuga]

37. I think Reagan was the worst. n/t

[Scruffy1]

38. This will surprise everyone

But Gerald Ford was a good man in a situation that was untenable. He's the one that appointed John Paul Stevens to the court and his later Amicus brief for affirmative action is a masterpiece.
Ike was Ike and he was mostly oblivious to civil rights having spent his whole life in an all white male dominated culture and I feel he let Alan Dulles lead him around by the nose too long.
Even though I could count his family as friends in some ways he certainly was not one to stand up or stand out.
Nixon was the smartest of the bunch and I would say the last progressive president we had. The EPA and Postal reorganization were huge accomplishments.
TR is vastly overrated IMHO. I particularly despise his active and illegal anti-labor dealings.
The real question is have our beloved Dems been much better?

[Jennicut]

40. Ike would not be let into the Rethug party today.

A moderate Repub.
Hoover was not a bad man, he just did not try intervention of the economy on a big enough scale.
Ford was also probably a decent enough man but he really messed up on the Nixon pardon.

The rest were all pretty bad.
The last 3 would be Bush I, Reagan, and Bush II for me. Nixon was a paranoid jerk but even his ideas would not be considered conservative enough for the conservative nutsos of today's Rethug Party.

[Grand Taurean]

41. Eisenhower, Ford, Nixon, ,Taft, Bush I, Harding, Hoover, Coolidge, Reagan, Bush II

[Bobbie Jo]

42. I won't quibble over the first 9, but....

Bush II: Worst. President. Ever.

Edit: typo

[BlueIdaho]

43. Eisenhower, and then a nine way tie for tenth place.

[craigmatic]

44. Lincoln, TR, Grant, Ford, Taft, Bush I, Ike, Nixon, Coolidge, Harding, Reagan, Bush, Hoover

Arthur, Garfield, Harrison, Mckinley, and Hayes all sucked too but not as bad as bush 2

[brentspeak]

47. TR and Eisenhower were the only good 20th century Republican presidents

However, as much a disaster as Nixon's presidency was as a whole, his domestic agenda was more progressive than either Clinton's or Obama's.

[road2000]

48. I'd use a specific scale for ranking:

Which would be least likely to be admitted to what passes for today's Republican party?

Eisenhower and Nixon would never get into the elephant tent -- probably, neither would want to. Based sheerly on their ideology and accomplishments (remember the tax rates under Ike), I'd give them a tie for first.

Taft, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Ford and Bush1 would hold little appeal for today's regressives (although Harding might get a small boost for his closet trysts, which fit today's Republican values).

Bush2 and Reagan... I can't decide which is worse. Reagan was an evil bastard even before his kickoff speech in Philadelphia, Mississippi. His eight years in office led us straight to where we are today. Bush2 just carried out the delayed Reagan agenda, albeit with more megalomania than perhaps even we Dems expected at the time.

Reagan was the setup man; Bush2 the closer.

[amb123]

49. Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt and Eisenhower are the only good GOP Presidents EVER!

The rest are pure dreck.