Worst President Ever?

[Kinetic 0]

"Uh, Chamberlain? In '39? That was the year he scored 100 in a game, right?"

 

I was actually unfortunate enough to catch that "Hardball" segment as it aired. Skin-crawlingly awkward stuff. It was almost as if I had gotten caught not knowing what I was talking about.

[SuperJerk 0]

Holy shit, that was bad television. No advertisers should buy time on MSNBC.

So...someone confronting someone else on a news-themed talk show is bad television and should lead to the network's bankruptcy...and yet, Fox News continues to thrive.

 

Oh, wait, the difference between this and Fox News was that the host knew what he was talking about, and gave the guest multiple opportunities to answer the question while the guest chose to just repeat the same talking points over and over (the opposite of how things usually run at Fox).

[Guest Desensitized]

I didn't invoke Fox News. I'm not fond of them either. I actually watch MSNBC the most, but you can't tell me "whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say?" is quality programming. Can you?

[Danville_Wrestling 0]

I think Kevin James is the perfect poster child for why the GOP is in such shape its in. Coming in and yelling for no good reason and making absolutley no sense to boot. It's people like that which give conservatives a bad name. And yea, MSNBC is pretty lame.

 

I grew up as a fan of Fox News starting in 2001 but I consider it very unwatchable today. Their election coverage has gotten worse [CNN blows them out of the water with that big electronic board, I think that thing is very cool] and their late night hosts have gotten worse in interrupting/yelling at each other. I just prefer NPR these days because at least I can get some quality journalism out of that.

[SuperJerk 0]

I didn't invoke Fox News. I'm not fond of them either. I actually watch MSNBC the most, but you can't tell me "whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say? whaddid he say?" is quality programming. Can you?

I'm sorry, I didn't make the reason for my comparison clear. I was only trying to put MSNBC's popularity in the context of other news channels, not imply that you had a preference for them.

[SuperJerk 0]

Chuck Hagel weighs in on the Bush/Nazi Appeasement controversy, and says Bush "diminishes the office"...

 

“I’m not sure who he was talking about or what he meant,” said Hagel late Thursday. “I’m not aware of any officials who have ever talked about a policy of dealing with terrorists.”

 

“I don’t know if the president was confused and if he was referencing Iran, or if he was referencing terrorists,” Hagel said.

 

He added, “I agree with Sen. Obama and many of us who have talked about engaging Iran.”

 

Hagel praised Defense Secretary Robert Gates for a speech Wednesday in which he called for diplomacy with the Iranian government.

 

“Sen. Obama, Sen. Biden, Gen. (Brent) Scowcroft, a number of us, have been saying for many years that great powers engage (in diplomacy),” said the Nebraska Republican.

 

“The president probably would have been better off staying on the high ground and not interjecting himself in politics,” he said. “I think he diminishes the office when he allows himself to sink down into the underbrush of petty politics.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24658218/

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

The SCOTUS has moved us back into the 13th century (in a 5-4 decision):

 

By a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court has ruled unconstitutional the provision of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that suspended the use of habeas corpus by detainees in Bush's "war on terror." The MCA was pushed by Bush, and overwhelmingly approved by Congress, including both supposed anti-torture politician John McCain and many Democrats...

 

http://www.pubrecord.org/index.php?option=...view&id=125

[Jingus 0]

Fuck the heck are you talking about? The court struck down the provision which allowed them to deny habeas corpus. As in, your horse won the race. For christ's sake, the article is titled "SUPREME COURT SLAPS BUSH" in big red letters. What the hell were you reading?

 

And this isn't exactly an unbiased website. In a story about a SCOTUS decision, the "journalist" for no reason at all wanders down some completely unrelated tangent, like "The latest example of the failure of the Democratic Party leadership was the shameful suppression of Congressman Dennis Kucinich's resolution to impeach George W. Bush." What the fuck any of that has to do with this one court case, I dunno. Plus on their front page they rant about how Big Corporations oppress all the media in their endless search for the almighty dollar... and then literally right afterwards they beg for donations from their readers. L. O. L.

[randomguy 0]

Well the Magna Carta was originally signed in 1215 (1250?). I'd say this ruling moves us forward to that time again, from our 900 AD policies of the past few years.

[SuperJerk 0]

This never gets old...

 

(from 2007)

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

Well the Magna Carta was originally signed in 1215 (1250?). I'd say this ruling moves us forward to that time again, from our 900 AD policies of the past few years.

 

Thank you, randomguy.

 

Sorry, the website didn't meet your standards, Jingus, I was really just pointing to the fact that the Supreme Court made that ruling. If you would like a more objective article reporting on the court's ruling that doesn't so offend your sensibilities, I will be glad to help you find one!

 

[Jingus 0]

The SCOTUS has moved us back into the 13th century (in a 5-4 decision):

That makes it sound like they made a bad decision which set us back hundreds of years. You could've worded it a lot better.

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

I guess my thinking was that the Military Commissions Act moved us into the 12th century and then this decision moved us back into the 13th again.

 

I guess I could've said this decision has moved us forward into the 13th century, or said that the MCA had moved us back and now this had moved us forward, but I assumed that everyone would get it, like randomguy did. Sorry I got you so riled up, Jingus!

 

Also, I'll try to pick my random articles off google news more carefully in the future!

[Jingus 0]

Riled up? You appeared to have made a thoroughly 100% wrong reading of said article. It seemed to be an error which required either egregious stupidity or not having read the article at all, so naturally I reacted with exhasperated disbelief. Yet it was merely a mistake of semantics and incomplete sentence construction. You explained the convoluted message you were trying to communicate. We all understand now. And my bitching about the website was bitching about the website, not about you. The matter is settled.

[Guest Vitamin X]

Bush Justice Department broke the law by hiring only loyal Bushies

 

Ah, crud. Wow. Apparently if they were going to try to build an impeachment case, this would be good evidence. Awful shit.

[At Home 0]

No one better impeach Bush, what will we hate then?

[SuperJerk 0]

I miss the days when I was proud of a president.

 

I think I was 10 at the time.

[EricMM 0]

No one better impeach Bush, what will we hate then?

President Cheney (shudder)

[SuperJerk 0]

Somebody really wanted to be part of this thread (why else bring it up, given that the average American isn't old enough to remember the Carter years and knows him only from his post-presidency humanitarian work)...

 

McCain calls Carter a 'lousy president'

 

(CNN) — John McCain directed his trademark straight talk toward a former president, flatly calling Jimmy Carter a "lousy" commander in chief.

 

The Arizona senator has long attempted to portray Barack Obama's policies as in the mold of Carter's, though the Republican has previously held back criticizing Carter so directly.

 

But in an interview with the Las Vegas Sun published Friday, McCain was decidedly more blunt than he has been in the past. McCain, who is a proponent of nuclear reprocessing, was asked why he thought Carter was against the process when he was president.

 

"Yes, because Carter was a lousy president," McCain quipped. "This is the same guy who kissed Brezhnev."

 

McCain's comments are in reference to the now famous moment when Carter and then Soviet Union leader Leonid Brezhnev kissed after signing the SALT II treaty in 1979. Both the agreement and the kiss were widely panned by Republicans.

 

Carter himself largely stayed on the sidelines during the prolonged Democratic primary race, refusing to publicly back a candidate. Though he had long dropped several hints that he was a supporter of Barack Obama and he formally endorsed the Illinois senator shortly after he tied up the nomination.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/...ousy-president/

 

Say what you want about his economic policies, but how many American soldiers died in combat under President Carter?

Zero.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

I think some technically died in Iran (helicopter crash) under him, but I get your point.

[spiny norman 0]

He was certainly the worst Democrat president of the past century.

[SuperJerk 0]

He was certainly the worst Democrat president of the past century.

 

[At Home 0]

He was certainly the worst Democrat president of the past century.

 

 

Eh, I don't know about that. Sucks that Johnson kinda got the whole Vietnam thing pinned on him when most of the blame belongs on Kennedy and the assassination of Diem. And that his secretary of state continually advised him in the wrong direction.

[RepoMan 0]

Carter was probably pretty naive thinking you could have an effective foreign policy just based on embracing human rights, but he at least has the Camp David accords to his credit. But, good Lord, talking to your adversaries isn’t appeasement. We wouldn’t be hear to talk if Kennedy refuses to talk to Khrushchev. I’m a Kent State grad and hate having to give Nixon any credit, but he was fucking brilliant to embrace diplomacy with China.

[spiny norman 0]

He was certainly the worst Democrat president of the past century.

 

 

Eh, I don't know about that. Sucks that Johnson kinda got the whole Vietnam thing pinned on him when most of the blame belongs on Kennedy and the assassination of Diem. And that his secretary of state continually advised him in the wrong direction.

 

And when you consider the War on Poverty, Medicare and Civil Rights, I think you come to the conclusion that the claim truly is baseless.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Yeah...LBJ accomplished a lot for civil rights and other social issues. A lot of it was carried out from Kenned's policies, but he still accomplished it.

 

I think Carter could have been a pretty good president at almost any other time in US history. He was just ill equipped to deal with the changing reality of the world, it seemed like.

[SuperJerk 0]

Let me see if I understand this argument...

 

• Bad things that happened while LBJ was in office = JFK's responsible because it was his supposedly idea.
• Good things that happened while LBJ was in office = JFK's not responsible even if it was his idea.

Does that about sum it up?

[At Home 0]

Well let's hear your argument, meng.

[SuperJerk 0]

While President Kennedy did send troops to Vietnam, there were only 16,000 there when he died. Johnson escalated the war after the fake Gulf of Tonkin incident and before they lefty office there were over half a million. At its peak, a thousand Americans were dying in the war every month. His war strategy was based on containment of the communists without truly doing anything to help the South Vietnamese people. His budget priorities, also known as "guns and butter" was a combination of increased spending on military and social programs coupled with tax breaks, led to greater inflation (starting a tide which was not turned until the 1980s). Though poverty dropped dramatically at first, eventually his anti-poverty programs were defunded to help pay for the Vietnam War. Though he was instrumental in getting the Civil Rights Act passed, it was originally proposed a year before by John F. Kennedy.

[At Home 0]

I think the CIA's assassination of Diem really was the decisive event that solidified our presence there, and that was under Kennedy's hand.

 

It's noteworthy to look at the roles of the secretary of state and George Ball had in the decision making process. I can't believe I'm blanking on the sec'ys name, but his opinion was the polar opposite of Ball's, which stated, correctly, that increased military action would only make shit worse.

 

Johnson kept trying to convince people that the blame of Vietnam really belongs on Kennedy, even to his death.

 

Also, consider that it would've been a political nightmare for Johnson had he just pulled out and Vietnam went to the north. It was either that blatant reality, or the gamble of putting more forces in to try and save it.