HNN Poll: 61% of Historians Rate the Bush Presidency Worst

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

“As far as history goes and all of these quotes about people trying to guess what the history of the Bush administration is going to be, you know, I take great comfort in knowing that they don’t know what they are talking about, because history takes a long time for us to reach.”— George W. Bush, Fox News Sunday, Feb 10, 2008

A Pew Research Center poll released last week found that the share of the American public that approves of President George W. Bush has dropped to a new low of 28 percent.

An unscientific poll of professional historians completed the same week produced results far worse for a president clinging to the hope that history will someday take a kinder view of his presidency than does contemporary public opinion.



In an informal survey of 109 professional historians conducted over a three-week period through the History News Network, 98.2 percent assessed the presidency of Mr. Bush to be a failure while 1.8 percent classified it as a success.



Asked to rank the presidency of George W. Bush in comparison to those of the other 41 American presidents, more than 61 percent of the historians concluded that the current presidency is the worst in the nation’s history. Another 35 percent of the historians surveyed rated the Bush presidency in the 31st to 41st category, while only four of the 109 respondents ranked the current presidency as even among the top two-thirds of American administrations.



At least two of those who ranked the current president in the 31-41 ranking made it clear that they placed him next-to-last, with only James Buchanan, in their view, being worse. “He is easily one of the 10-worst of all time and—if the magnitude of the challenges and opportunities matter—then probably in the bottom five, alongside Buchanan, Johnson, Fillmore, and Pierce,” wrote another historian.

The reason for the hesitancy some historians had in categorizing the Bush presidency as the worst ever, which led them to place it instead in the “nearly the worst” group, was well expressed by another historian who said, “It is a bit too early to judge whether Bush's presidency is the worst ever, though it certainly has a shot to take the title. Without a doubt, it is among the worst.”

In a similar survey of historians I conducted for HNN four years ago, Mr. Bush had fared somewhat better, with 19 percent rating his presidency a success and 81 percent classifying it as a failure. More striking is the dramatic increase in the percentage of historians who rate the Bush presidency the worst ever. In 2004, only 11.6 percent of the respondents rated Bush’s presidency last. That conclusion is now reached by nearly six times as large a fraction of historians.

There are at least two obvious criticisms of such a survey. It is in no sense a scientific sample of historians. The participants are self-selected, although participation was open to all historians. Among those who responded are several of the nation’s most respected historians, including Pulitzer and Bancroft Prize winners.

The second criticism that is often raised of historians making such assessments of a current president is that it is far too early. We do not yet know how the things that Mr. Bush has done will work out in the future. As the only respondent who classified the current presidency among the ten best noted, “Any judgment of his ‘success’ or lack thereof is premature in that the ultimate effects of his policies are not yet known.” True enough. But this historian went on to make his current evaluation, giving Bush “high marks for courage in his willingness to attack intractable problems in the Near East and to touch the Social Security ‘Third Rail.’ ”

Historians are in a better position than others to make judgments about how a current president’s policies and actions compare with those of his predecessors. Those judgments are always subject to change in light of future developments. But that is no reason not to make them now.

The comments that many of the respondents included with their evaluations provide a clear sense of the reasons behind the overwhelming consensus that George W. Bush’s presidency is among the worst in American history.

“No individual president can compare to the second Bush,” wrote one. “Glib, contemptuous, ignorant, incurious, a dupe of anyone who humors his deluded belief in his heroic self, he has bankrupted the country with his disastrous war and his tax breaks for the rich, trampled on the Bill of Rights, appointed foxes in every henhouse, compounded the terrorist threat, turned a blind eye to torture and corruption and a looming ecological disaster, and squandered the rest of the world’s goodwill. In short, no other president’s faults have had so deleterious an effect on not only the country but the world at large.”

“With his unprovoked and disastrous war of aggression in Iraq and his monstrous deficits, Bush has set this country on a course that will take decades to correct,” said another historian. “When future historians look back to identify the moment at which the United States began to lose its position of world leadership, they will point—rightly—to the Bush presidency. Thanks to his policies, it is now easy to see America losing out to its competitors in any number of area: China is rapidly becoming the manufacturing powerhouse of the next century, India the high tech and services leader, and Europe the region with the best quality of life.”

One historian indicated that his reason for rating Bush as worst is that the current president combines traits of some of his failed predecessors: “the paranoia of Nixon, the ethics of Harding and the good sense of Herbert Hoover. . . . . God willing, this will go down as the nadir of American politics.” Another classified Bush as “an ideologue who got the nation into a totally unnecessary war, and has broken the Constitution more often than even Nixon. He is not a conservative, nor a Christian, just an immoral man . . . .” Still another remarked that Bush’s “denial of any personal responsibility can only be described as silly.”

“It would be difficult to identify a President who, facing major international and domestic crises, has failed in both as clearly as President Bush,” concluded one respondent. “His domestic policies,” another noted, “have had the cumulative effect of shoring up a semi-permanent aristocracy of capital that dwarfs the aristocracy of land against which the founding fathers rebelled; of encouraging a mindless retreat from science and rationalism; and of crippling the nation’s economic base.”

“George Bush has combined mediocrity with malevolent policies and has thus seriously damaged the welfare and standing of the United States,” wrote one of the historians, echoing the assessments of many of his professional colleagues. “Bush does only two things well,” said one of the most distinguished historians. “He knows how to make the very rich very much richer, and he has an amazing talent for ****ing up everything else he even approaches. His administration has been the most reckless, dangerous, irresponsible, mendacious, arrogant, self-righteous, incompetent, and deeply corrupt one in all of American history.”

Four years ago I rated George W. Bush’s presidency as the second worst, a bit above that of James Buchanan. Now, however, like so many other professional historians, I see the administration of the second Bush as clearly the worst in our history. My reasons are similar to those cited by other historians: In the wake of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the United States enjoyed enormous support around the world. President Bush squandered that goodwill by taking the country into an unnecessary war of choice and misleading the American people to gain support for that war. And he failed utterly to have a plan to deal with Iraq after the invasion. He further undermined the international reputation of the United States by justifying torture.

Mr. Bush inherited a sizable budget surplus and a thriving economy. By pushing through huge tax cuts for the rich while increasing federal spending at a rapid rate, Bush transformed the surplus into a massive deficit. The tax cuts and other policies accelerated the concentration of wealth and income among the very richest Americans. These policies combined with unwavering opposition to necessary government regulations have produced the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Then there is the incredible shrinking dollar, the appointment of incompetent cronies, the totally inexcusable failure to react properly to the disaster of Hurricane Katrina, the blatant disregard for the Constitution—and on and on.

Like a majority of other historians who participated in this poll, my conclusion is that the preponderance of the evidence now indicates that, while this nation has had at least its share of failed presidencies, no previous presidency was as large a failure in so many areas as the current one.

http://hnn.us/articles/48916.html

[Breaker]

1. It is an admitted unscientific poll which means there is no way to tell how the responders where selected. They could all be Liberals or Dems for all we know.

2. It is way to early to even begin to say if he was a failure or not as a President. It might be true, and it might not be. Remember at the time the first GB was derided as one of the worst ever and now in retrospect he is middle of the road.

3. The author put Buchanon as one of the worst, are you kidding me. Generally speaking Grant has been considered to be the worst President in history. His administration was easily the most corrupt ... yes even more so than Bush. In addition Grant didnt do anything worthwhile as the President.

[Bronco_Beerslug]

Originally Posted by Breaker

3. The author put Buchanon as one of the worst, are you kidding me. Generally speaking Grant has been considered to be the worst President in history. His administration was easily the most corrupt ... yes even more so than Bush. In addition Grant didnt do anything worthwhile as the President.

Bush in a nutshell.

[baja]

The fact anyone can defend Bush at this point is a lesson in the human ability to see what they want to see. Reality is completely subjective.

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by baja

The fact anyone can defend Bush at this point is a lesson in the human ability to see what they want to see. Reality is completely subjective.

QFT.

There are really only four basic types of people who are still defending the disaster monkey at this stage of the game:

1) Sociopaths.
2) People who are in a profound state of denial.
3) People who don't have the courage or the integrity to admit they were wrong.
4) People who have benefitted from Bush's frauds and felonies.

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by Bronco_Beerslug

Bush in a nutshell.

Yep.

This historian summed Bush up most accurately:

“No individual president can compare to the second Bush,” wrote one. “Glib, contemptuous, ignorant, incurious, a dupe of anyone who humors his deluded belief in his heroic self, he has bankrupted the country with his disastrous war and his tax breaks for the rich, trampled on the Bill of Rights, appointed foxes in every henhouse, compounded the terrorist threat, turned a blind eye to torture and corruption and a looming ecological disaster, and squandered the rest of the world’s goodwill. In short, no other president’s faults have had so deleterious an effect on not only the country but the world at large.”

“With his unprovoked and disastrous war of aggression in Iraq and his monstrous deficits, Bush has set this country on a course that will take decades to correct,” said another historian. “When future historians look back to identify the moment at which the United States began to lose its position of world leadership, they will point—rightly—to the Bush presidency. Thanks to his policies, it is now easy to see America losing out to its competitors in any number of area: China is rapidly becoming the manufacturing powerhouse of the next century, India the high tech and services leader, and Europe the region with the best quality of life.”

[loborugger]

While I am not going to defend Bush and I think even 50 years from now he will be rated as our worst 2 term prez, but as a student of history its a little early to be judging the success or failure of this administration. I would give it 5 - 10 years. Facts come out, things become clearer, & people become less emotional about the situation.


Actually, Buchanan is usually rated pretty low cuz he sat and watched the country tear itself apart over the slave/state's right issue. He was the last of the casual, layed back prez that dominated the middle 19th cent.

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by Breaker

It is an admitted unscientific poll which means there is no way to tell how the responders where selected. They could all be Liberals or Dems for all we know.

But the poll was open to all historians.

If there was some meaningful number of prominent historians who felt Bush deserved higher marks, then why didn't they speak up?

[TailgateNut]

Originally Posted by Breaker

1. They could all be Liberals or Dems for all we know.

.

As if, at this point it should matter. Regardless of affiliation, he has been nothing less than a total disaster. To deny that, is akin to admitting that one has not paid any attention to what this president and his administration has done to our country, our economy, our foreign relations and how they have divided us.

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by TailgateNut

As if, at this point it should matter. Regardless of affiliation, he has been nothing less than a total disaster. To deny that, is akin to admitting that one has not paid any attention to what this president and his administration has done to our country, our economy, our foreign relations and how they have divided us.

Breaker is really grasping at straws in his efforts to cover the disaster monkey's flank (nothing new on that account.)

[Rohirrim]

Here's the problem. Somewhere in the U.S., in some classroom, some poor kids are sitting there listening to the blatherings of the above 2%.

[Rohirrim]

“It would be difficult to identify a President who, facing major international and domestic crises, has failed in both as clearly as President Bush,” concluded one respondent. “His domestic policies,” another noted, “have had the cumulative effect of shoring up a semi-permanent aristocracy of capital that dwarfs the aristocracy of land against which the founding fathers rebelled; of encouraging a mindless retreat from science and rationalism; and of crippling the nation’s economic base.”

“George Bush has combined mediocrity with malevolent policies and has thus seriously damaged the welfare and standing of the United States,” wrote one of the historians, echoing the assessments of many of his professional colleagues. “Bush does only two things well,” said one of the most distinguished historians. “He knows how to make the very rich very much richer, and he has an amazing talent for ****ing up everything else he even approaches. His administration has been the most reckless, dangerous, irresponsible, mendacious, arrogant, self-righteous, incompetent, and deeply corrupt one in all of American history.”

People don't give Bush any credit for the fact that, while he was doing all that, he still kept his sense of humor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKX6luiMINQ

[baja]

Originally Posted by TailgateNut

As if, at this point it should matter. Regardless of affiliation, he has been nothing less than a total disaster. To deny that, is akin to admitting that one has not paid any attention to what this president and his administration has done to our country, our economy, our foreign relations and how they have divided us.

Actually Bush's administration has been so horrific he has become the great uniter he always wanted to be except we are uniting against him and his insane policies.

[TailgateNut]

Originally Posted by baja

Actually Bush's administration has been so horrific he has become the great uniter he always wanted to be except we are uniting against him and his insane policies.

Is that why there are actually people who at this point are considering a vote for McCain, who is just as clueless and owned as Bush.

[W*GS]

I won't argue that the Bush administration has been a near-complete mess. However, a factual error:

Originally Posted by L.A. BRONCOS FAN

Mr. Bush inherited a sizable budget surplus and a thriving economy.

Actually, GDP growth slowed to under 1% p.a. in 2001 - the economy was hardly "thriving" when Bush took office.

[baja]

Originally Posted by TailgateNut

Is that why there are actually people who at this point are considering a vote for McCain, who is just as clueless and owned as Bush.

Unfortunately you can't fix stupid. Amazingly many people do not make the connection McCain = Bush

[Spider]

Originally Posted by Breaker

2. It is way to early to even begin to say if he was a failure or not as a President. It might be true, and it might not be. Remember at the time the first GB was derided as one of the worst ever and now in retrospect he is middle of the road.

what ****ing world are you living in ?

[Smiling Assassin27]

One of the requirements of making such stupid statements (those made by the historians, not those made by Spider) is that you must have a PhD.

[Spider]

Originally Posted by Smiling Assassin27

One of the requirements of making such stupid statements (those made by the historians, not those made by Spider) is that you must have a PhD.

I supported Bush in 2000, didnt vote for him , but he was my president , so I supported alot of his actions , told every one that Bin Ladin will get an ass kicking of biblical proportions ...... as time passed I saw Bush was nothing but a lying back stabbing little **** nut , now I have no use for the piece of trash ...... so in a poll like this , I would have somewhat of a bias view

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by Smiling Assassin27

One of the requirements of making such stupid statements (those made by the historians, not those made by Spider) is that you must have a PhD.

This has to take the blue ribbon for most idiotic/willfully ignorant post of the month.

(And it serves as a paradigm example of why Bush got votes to begin with.)

[Florida_Bronco]

Originally Posted by Spider

I supported Bush in 2000, didnt vote for him , but he was my president , so I supported alot of his actions , told every one that Bin Ladin will get an ass kicking of biblical proportions ...... as time passed I saw Bush was nothing but a lying back stabbing little **** nut , now I have no use for the piece of trash ...... so in a poll like this , I would have somewhat of a bias view

That's pretty much how I felt. IMO it wasn't long into 2002 that he really started to screw up and I stopped supporting him.

[Stormontheplains]

Jimmy Carter was the worst. Does anybody remember that idiot Here I will remind you, annualized inflation peaked at 18.6 percent in January 1980, during Jimmy Carter’s final year as president.

[gunns]

Originally Posted by Breaker

1. It is an admitted unscientific poll which means there is no way to tell how the responders where selected. They could all be Liberals or Dems for all we know.

2. It is way to early to even begin to say if he was a failure or not as a President. It might be true, and it might not be. Remember at the time the first GB was derided as one of the worst ever and now in retrospect he is middle of the road.

3. The author put Buchanon as one of the worst, are you kidding me. Generally speaking Grant has been considered to be the worst President in history. His administration was easily the most corrupt ... yes even more so than Bush. In addition Grant didnt do anything worthwhile as the President.

1.

A Pew Research Center poll released last week found that the share of the American public that approves of President George W. Bush has dropped to a new low of 28 percent.

Either the country has now become 72 percent liberal or Dem or they aren't the only ones that view Bush as pretty damn bad.

2. I don't believe it's too early, in fact it's a little too late to say he's the worst. And I don't remember his father ever being derided as the worst, bad, but not the worst. I think it's way too early to even consider another admin being worse.

3. Buchanon was one of the worst and so was Grant. Grant's admin was corrupt but Bush's takes the cake.....and our constitution.

I think the ramifications of this administration will still be felt years down the road.

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by Stormontheplains

Jimmy Carter was the worst. Does anybody remember that idiot Here I will remind you, annualized inflation peaked at 18.6 percent in January 1980, during Jimmy Carter’s final year as president.

Maybe I awarded that blue ribbon too soon.

[footstepsfrom#27]

Originally Posted by L.A. BRONCOS FAN

QFT.

There are really only four basic types of people who are still defending the disaster monkey at this stage of the game:

1) Sociopaths.
2) People who are in a profound state of denial.
3) People who don't have the courage or the integrity to admit they were wrong.
4) People who have benefitted from Bush's frauds and felonies.

You left one out; single issue voters who measure abortion as the only issue of concern. They're still holding out. Other than that, you have to be comatose to not understand how bad this guy is.