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Who is the best modern day American president?

IvaBigWun

The Arnie thread got me thinking, of the past 10 American presidents; who was the best?

I'll go with Clinton, he looked the part, spoke the part and his surname wasnt Bush. Job done.

Poll to follow

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Comments

wazky

Morgan Freeman in Deep Impact.

coolhull

I think your man in 'The West Wing' was an excellent leader of the Free World

IvaBigWun

Poll options up

Sir Osis of Liver.

Harrison Ford hanging off Airforce 1 by a chain.
Fcukin ace.

greedygoblin

President Palmer in 24.

Cody Pomeray

Clinton.

When I was growing up he was the symbol of an America that still represented the mottos of which Obama has only managed to make a blunder - hope, and equality and justice.

The fact that clinton had pretty impressive economic and political successes (despite his own personal failures) is almost not even that relevant. It was his ability to convince people that hard work, and hope and justice were worthy ideals in themselves, even if you emerge the worse from their pursuit.

I know he took a lot of inspiration from Kennedy, and many people will say he was often times just a fortune to circumstance. Both are true to an extent. Nevertheless, Clinton was a powerful image of the last great American heroism of my generation, I was lucky enough to hear him speak in UCD last week, which is something I'll never forget.

There's something hugely awe-inspiring and captivating about him and his vision for the world, in spite of - or because of - his human frailties.

Amirani

Clinton I reckon. All have fairly noticeable flaws, but he probably has least.

IvaBigWun

I really want to add TV and film presidents now.

Are there any mods online feeling helpful?

theblaqueguy

Barack Obama

Karl Stein

None of them.

greedygoblin

In that pie chart, Nixon and Clinton are the same colour. For a second I thought everybody was voting for tricky dicky!

IvaBigWun

Clinton is running away with this already

wretcheddomain

IvaBigWun wrote: »

I'll go with Clinton, he looked the part, spoke the part and his surname wasnt Bush. Job done.

Cody Pomeray wrote: »

Clinton.

NiallSparky wrote: »

Clinton I reckon. All have fairly noticeable flaws, but he probably has least.

IvaBigWun wrote: »

Clinton is running away with this already

For reasons unknown to me.

Has nobody ever heard of the Al Shifa Pharmaceutical Plant bombing?

It was directly under Clinton's orders to act as a distraction for his own infamous personal challenges at the time; based on insufficient evidence. Thousands of people in Sudan died as a direct consequence from very treatable ailments had the medication been made available.

If that's the best US President in modern times, I quake at the thought of who the worst would be. What a standard.

Amirani

wretcheddomain wrote: »

For reasons unknown to me.

Has nobody ever heard of the Al Shifa Pharmaceutical Plant bombing?

It was directly under Clinton's orders to act as a distraction for his own infamous personal challenges at the time; based on insufficient evidence. Thousands of people in Sudan died as a direct consequence from very treatable ailments had the medication been made available.

If that's the best US President in modern times, I quake at the thought of who the worst would be. What a standard.

As I said, all have very notable flaws. Which presidents on the list don't have significant amounts of blood on their hands? And of them, which ones weren't lame ducks at best in every other aspect of their presidency?

castletownman

JFK.

Stuck to his guns during the Bay of Pigs/Cuban Missile crisis (in terms of ignoring instructions from Cabinet). Oversaw an economic boom and set in motion a chain of events that eventually saw LBJ sign into law the Equality Act. The first globally adored POTUS. Charmer.

And Irish of course too

wretcheddomain

NiallSparky wrote: »

As I said, all have very notable flaws. Which presidents on the list don't have significant amounts of blood on their hands? And of them, which ones weren't lame ducks at best in every other aspect of their presidency?

I completely agree; but there generally seems to be a whitewashed version of Clinton around many people who see some external persona or '90's President' rather than any damage he inflicted on the world. For instance, the vast majority of sensible people would rightly condemn George Bush but this stinging condemnation never appears to ring true for Clinton, it appears his crimes are not worth noting.

mattjack

Clinton ? the monster who was president alongside the spineless UK prime minister between the two wars in Iraq who's sanctions are believed to be responsible for the deaths of about 100,000 civilians.

Mint Sauce

Your one from Independence Day. He was a Fighter Pilot!

mike65

They are all terrible as they are so powerful, its the lot of being a USA president.

Gerald Ford probably did the least damage all round but it doesn't mean he was any god.

mike65

mattjack wrote: »

Clinton ? the monster who was president alongside the spineless UK prime minister between the two wars in Iraq who's sanctions are believed to be responsible for the deaths of about 100,000 civilians.

Er Clinton left office in 2002 so why mention them?

Manic Moran

I have to say, looking at the list there, none of them struck me as being particularly 'great'. Maybe I just have a very tight definition of it. I suspect that a lot of the reasons people may think a certain President is the best is partially related to "how closely his philosophies married with their own", and partially also simply due to exposure. Face it, outside of his being attacked by a rabbit, what do people in Ireland know about the presidency of Jimmy Carter?

Of course, such polls have been done before. After a little hunting around, it seems that the consensus of historians has been that the best president of the list above is Lyndon Johnson, who at the time of my writing of this post, has received 0 votes at all from this august group, who probably can't get past the word 'Vietnam' and don't know of his other policies and successes.

NTM

Bullseye

I'd like to vote but I don't know much about most of those presidents.

mattjack

mike65 wrote: »

Er Clinton left office in 2002 so why mention them?

January 2001 was when his term ended .While he was in office between the two wars , sanctions were in existence , they started in 1990 and ended in 2003 .Even though originally started by the UN security council , the USA wanted no relaxation of sanctions arguing that strict harsh sanctions should force Iraqi citizens to remove Saddam Hussein from power.
Clintons term were through most of the 13 years of sanctions , 100000 dead is argued as being the lower figure of dead.

coolhull

William Harrison served as president from March 3rd 1841 to April 4th 1841 and died of pneumonia after 31 days in office. So he didn't get a chance to do much damage

mattjack

Manic Moran wrote: »

I have to say, looking at the list there, none of them struck me as being particularly 'great'. Maybe I just have a very tight definition of it. I suspect that a lot of the reasons people may think a certain President is the best is partially related to "how closely his philosophies married with their own", and partially also simply due to exposure. Face it, outside of his being attacked by a rabbit, what do people in Ireland know about the presidency of Jimmy Carter?

Of course, such polls have been done before. After a little hunting around, it seems that the consensus of historians has been that the best president of the list above is Lyndon Johnson, who at the time of my writing of this post, has received 0 votes at all from this august group, who probably can't get past the word 'Vietnam' and don't know of his other policies and successes.

NTM

He was a peanut farmer , peanuts are good.

Rascasse

Only Clinton could win this poll, mostly due to two reasons.

1. Democrat
2. Oirish

The Dagda

Josiah Bartlett.

JupiterKid

George W Bush. He had the intelligence and charisma of a chicken with severely limited mental faculties...

dark crystal

Rascasse wrote: »

Only Clinton could win this poll, mostly due to two reasons.

1. Democrat
2. Oirish

JFK was both those things too....

cerastes

NiallSparky wrote: »

As I said, all have very notable flaws. Which presidents on the list don't have significant amounts of blood on their hands? And of them, which ones weren't lame ducks at best in every other aspect of their presidency?

If thats the case

Charlie Rock wrote: »

None of them.

then this guys answer is the right one

From that list, Id go with JFK, helped avert a nuclear war

Id go with FDR though,