History Network survey of historians: 98% say Bush presidency is failed

[Phokus]

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Hey look, another worthless poll from people who should know better...

http://hnn.us/articles/48941.html

Somehow, i doubt the loss of civil rights, Katrina, growth of executive power at the expense of the other 2 branches of gov't, Cronyism in the justice dept/Fema/all levels of gov't, the lies for the justification to go into Iraq, the enormous defecits, the tanking economy, torture, Terry Schiavo, etc. etc. etc. will somehow reverse itself down the road (the scary thing is, i'm probably forgetting a lot of things that Bush has f*cked up). Those things tend to be kinda permanent after they happen.

What, are we waiting a decade to see that Katrina wasn't that bad after all? :roll:

Bush is holding out hope that Iraq will somehow be a success. Which is hilarious, because so far it's been bungled and we've lost so much blood and treasure that even if we do somehow 'win', it won't vindicate the damage he's caused both in Iraq and at home.

 

[CADsortaGUY]

Originally posted by: Phokus

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Hey look, another worthless poll from people who should know better...

http://hnn.us/articles/48941.html

Somehow, i doubt the loss of civil rights, Katrina, growth of executive power at the expense of the other 2 branches of gov't, Cronyism in the justice dept/Fema/all levels of gov't, the lies for the justification to go into Iraq, the enormous defecits, the tanking economy, torture, Terry Schiavo, etc. etc. etc. will somehow reverse itself down the road (the scary thing is, i'm probably forgetting a lot of things that Bush has f*cked up). Those things tend to be kinda permanent after they happen.

What, are we waiting a decade to see that Katrina wasn't that bad after all? :roll:

Bush is holding out hope that Iraq will somehow be a success. Which is hilarious, because so far it's been bungled and we've lost so much blood and treasure that even if we do somehow 'win', it won't vindicate the damage he's caused both in Iraq and at home.

Somehow I don't think you read the link i posted.

 

[Vic]

First, I can't believe it wasn't 100%. It should have been IMO.

Second, when is "the left" going to figure out that this is a democracy and divisive partisan hackery doesn't win elections? In other words, as long as the Republican leadership can convince "the right" to fear "the left" more than the party's own corrupt politics, and as long as "the left" continue to reinforce that with their own immature attitudes and hackery, as the OP does here as he always does, then it will continue to be difficult to get this corruption out of power.

This is the beauty of Obama's campaign. The idea of dumping the partisan hackery and uniting the country to improve conditions for everyone. That is change. Contrast that against Hillary's message that "it takes a Clinton to clean up after a Bush," and that is just code for they fscked us so we'll fsck them, a continuation of way things have been in this country for decades.

 

[JS80]

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Hey look, another worthless poll from people who should know better...

http://hnn.us/articles/48941.html

How do these same people rate the Reagan years?

 

[Atreus21]

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: Atreus21

Sigh.

You've made the point I made in my response to the OP. I'm being called an apologist just as hastily and excessively as right-wingers are calling you a BDSer.

For crying out loud, no historian on earth makes far-reaching judgements based on recent events, because the effects of recent events on future events are not yet apparent. Recent events will be judged by their ramifications, not by the popularity of the method upon which they were engaged. Furthermore, ramifications take time to play out, sometimes years, decades, or centuries, and any decent historian knows this. Historians have spent years trying to find out if the Battle of Gettysburg decided the fate of the Confederacy, or what caused the Great Depression, or if the New Deal did anything to alleviate it.

That's why these historians, in this poll, were acting not as historians, but as any other person quick to make a political opinion.

Please qualify your "logically indefensible" accusation.

Sorry, you're wrong. Just because judgments may change in the future to be more favorable then they are now doesn't mean that you can't make a judgment on what you now know.

Um, okay. So just because Hitler turned out in the end to be an evil bastard doesn't make wrong the assertions that he was originally a decent guy. Give me a break.

The article even said this. In fact, this is a very Bush administration type argument. "We can't know for sure, so don't even bother."

If anything, that's typically the line of liberals with regard to Iraq. Because we couldn't know for sure that they were out to nuke the US, we had no right to justify an invasion.

"We can't know for sure, so don't even bother" is not quite what I expect from history. If a good historian can't know for sure, then he should say he doesn't know for sure.
Otherwise, he's just another knee-jerk political commentator with a bottomless vault of predictions of death, destruction, and hell-on-earth.

Basically in 7 years of a Bush presidency we have gone from a huge budget surplus to a massive deficit, income inequality has skyrocketed, we have become mired in a disasterous war that he CHOSE to engage us in, his administration has been rife with cronyism and has repeatedly been found engaged the subordination of science to ideology.

As several historians in the article mentioned, things could change if his policies somehow work out better then most people think they will. This is not an eternal judgment. In order for Bush to not be among history's worst presidents however, most of the above would have to change. This is exceedingly unlikely. I think it is very safe to place him among history's worst.

For the third time, I'm not arguing that Bush either is or is not History's Worst President. I'm saying the historians are seizing upon an opportunity to make a political point while passing it off as the professional opinion of an historian, and that's not what good historians do.

 

[Atreus21]

Double Post.

 

[Phokus]

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY

Originally posted by: Phokus

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Hey look, another worthless poll from people who should know better...

http://hnn.us/articles/48941.html

Somehow, i doubt the loss of civil rights, Katrina, growth of executive power at the expense of the other 2 branches of gov't, Cronyism in the justice dept/Fema/all levels of gov't, the lies for the justification to go into Iraq, the enormous defecits, the tanking economy, torture, Terry Schiavo, etc. etc. etc. will somehow reverse itself down the road (the scary thing is, i'm probably forgetting a lot of things that Bush has f*cked up). Those things tend to be kinda permanent after they happen.

What, are we waiting a decade to see that Katrina wasn't that bad after all? :roll:

Bush is holding out hope that Iraq will somehow be a success. Which is hilarious, because so far it's been bungled and we've lost so much blood and treasure that even if we do somehow 'win', it won't vindicate the damage he's caused both in Iraq and at home.

Somehow I don't think you read the link i posted.

No i did, the main claim is basically this:

Bush has famously claimed that the verdict of history will be in his favor and that future historians will vindicate him, even if contemporary historians view his presidency as a failure.

That really only applies to Iraq. However, he's caused so much damage and death, he lied to get us into Iraq, and he also bungled the invasion that at BEST it can turn into a wash (and that's only you view it through the lens of a deranged bush loving retard).

We pretty much know that he ****ed up Katrina by hiring an inexperienced hack buddy of his to FEMA and that he condones torture and loss of civil liberties. We don't need decades to figure this out. And decades will not change these facts. No matter how much bush tries to spin it down the road.

 

[Atreus21]

I've never seen people so arrogant. What some of you are essentially saying is that, no matter what happens in the future, we know better than they do.

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Atreus21

Originally posted by: eskimospy


Sorry, you're wrong. Just because judgments may change in the future to be more favorable then they are now doesn't mean that you can't make a judgment on what you now know.

Um, okay. So just because Hitler turned out in the end to be an evil bastard doesn't make wrong the assertions that he was originally a decent guy. Give me a break.

The article even said this. In fact, this is a very Bush administration type argument. "We can't know for sure, so don't even bother."

If anything, that's typically the line of liberals with regard to Iraq. Because we couldn't know for sure that they were out to nuke the US, we had no right to justify an invasion.

"We can't know for sure, so don't even bother" is not quite what I expect from history. If a good historian can't know for sure, then he should say he doesn't know for sure.
Otherwise, he's just another knee-jerk political commentator with a bottomless vault of predictions of death, destruction, and hell-on-earth.

Basically in 7 years of a Bush presidency we have gone from a huge budget surplus to a massive deficit, income inequality has skyrocketed, we have become mired in a disasterous war that he CHOSE to engage us in, his administration has been rife with cronyism and has repeatedly been found engaged the subordination of science to ideology.

As several historians in the article mentioned, things could change if his policies somehow work out better then most people think they will. This is not an eternal judgment. In order for Bush to not be among history's worst presidents however, most of the above would have to change. This is exceedingly unlikely. I think it is very safe to place him among history's worst.

For the third time, I'm not arguing that Bush either is or is not History's Worst President. I'm saying the historians are seizing upon an opportunity to make a political point while passing it off as the professional opinion of an historian, and that's not what good historians do.

What are you talking about? There were lots of people in the 30's who very much despised Hitler and spoke out against him. This includes a lot of historians. Just because some people liked him before they found out he was a genocidal maniac does not in any way discount the large numbers of people who already saw the writing on the wall.

Your argument about Iraq is insane. I'm not exactly sure where to start. First of all you are trying to compare two things with drastically different consequences. The judgment of historians affects debate, maybe a general policy disposition here and there at best. The invasion of Iraq has cost at a MINIMUM hundreds of thousands of lives. The standard of proof required for one is much different then for the other. Secondly, your assertion that it wasn't "for sure" is a highly misleading one. There was a large amount of dissent from the US' position on Iraq's weapon programs, coming from no less then the man in charge of the UN inspections into those programs. That's some pretty well qualified dissent.

In addition, saying that historians should say he doesn't know for sure instead of giving his opinion pretty much means that no historian can give his opinion on any historical matter of any depth... ever. History is almost never clear enough to say things with certainty when you're talking about cause and effect.

Every time someone trashes Bush for the absolutely awful things that he's done... it's always about politics according to the Bush apologists. It never ever seems to actually be about the absolutely awful things that he's done (that nearly everyone agrees on). To say concretely that he's the absolute worst in history can't be confirmed for now, but to say he's one of the worst of all time is pretty easy. To give such an opinion is never wrong so long as the uncertainty is noted... which the article did.

Just so we know when we can call him this, at what date will it be acceptable to call Bush the worst and have it count?

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Atreus21
I've never seen people so arrogant. What some of you are essentially saying is that, no matter what happens in the future, we know better than they do.

Maybe they are saying "we've spent our lives studying presidential history so we feel qualified to give an opinion on the current president in light of this".

 

[CADsortaGUY]

Originally posted by: Phokus

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY

Originally posted by: Phokus

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Hey look, another worthless poll from people who should know better...

http://hnn.us/articles/48941.html

Somehow, i doubt the loss of civil rights, Katrina, growth of executive power at the expense of the other 2 branches of gov't, Cronyism in the justice dept/Fema/all levels of gov't, the lies for the justification to go into Iraq, the enormous defecits, the tanking economy, torture, Terry Schiavo, etc. etc. etc. will somehow reverse itself down the road (the scary thing is, i'm probably forgetting a lot of things that Bush has f*cked up). Those things tend to be kinda permanent after they happen.

What, are we waiting a decade to see that Katrina wasn't that bad after all? :roll:

Bush is holding out hope that Iraq will somehow be a success. Which is hilarious, because so far it's been bungled and we've lost so much blood and treasure that even if we do somehow 'win', it won't vindicate the damage he's caused both in Iraq and at home.

Somehow I don't think you read the link i posted.

No i did, the main claim is basically this:

Bush has famously claimed that the verdict of history will be in his favor and that future historians will vindicate him, even if contemporary historians view his presidency as a failure.

That really only applies to Iraq. However, he's caused so much damage and death, he lied to get us into Iraq, and he also bungled the invasion that at BEST it can turn into a wash (and that's only you view it through the lens of a deranged bush loving retard).

We pretty much know that he ****ed up Katrina by hiring an inexperienced hack buddy of his to FEMA and that he condones torture and loss of civil liberties. We don't need decades to figure this out. And decades will not change these facts. No matter how much bush tries to spin it down the road.

You obviously didn't read the link if you think that was it's main claim. Try reading it - then get back to me.

 

[Atreus21]

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: Atreus21

Originally posted by: eskimospy


Sorry, you're wrong. Just because judgments may change in the future to be more favorable then they are now doesn't mean that you can't make a judgment on what you now know.

Um, okay. So just because Hitler turned out in the end to be an evil bastard doesn't make wrong the assertions that he was originally a decent guy. Give me a break.

The article even said this. In fact, this is a very Bush administration type argument. "We can't know for sure, so don't even bother."

If anything, that's typically the line of liberals with regard to Iraq. Because we couldn't know for sure that they were out to nuke the US, we had no right to justify an invasion.

"We can't know for sure, so don't even bother" is not quite what I expect from history. If a good historian can't know for sure, then he should say he doesn't know for sure.
Otherwise, he's just another knee-jerk political commentator with a bottomless vault of predictions of death, destruction, and hell-on-earth.

Basically in 7 years of a Bush presidency we have gone from a huge budget surplus to a massive deficit, income inequality has skyrocketed, we have become mired in a disasterous war that he CHOSE to engage us in, his administration has been rife with cronyism and has repeatedly been found engaged the subordination of science to ideology.

As several historians in the article mentioned, things could change if his policies somehow work out better then most people think they will. This is not an eternal judgment. In order for Bush to not be among history's worst presidents however, most of the above would have to change. This is exceedingly unlikely. I think it is very safe to place him among history's worst.

For the third time, I'm not arguing that Bush either is or is not History's Worst President. I'm saying the historians are seizing upon an opportunity to make a political point while passing it off as the professional opinion of an historian, and that's not what good historians do.

What are you talking about? There were lots of people in the 30's who very much despised Hitler and spoke out against him. This includes a lot of historians. Just because some people liked him before they found out he was a genocidal maniac does not in any way discount the large numbers of people who already saw the writing on the wall.

Your argument about Iraq is insane. I'm not exactly sure where to start. First of all you are trying to compare two things with drastically different consequences. The judgment of historians affects debate, maybe a general policy disposition here and there at best. The invasion of Iraq has cost at a MINIMUM hundreds of thousands of lives. The standard of proof required for one is much different then for the other. Secondly, your assertion that it wasn't "for sure" is a highly misleading one. There was a large amount of dissent from the US' position on Iraq's weapon programs, coming from no less then the man in charge of the UN inspections into those programs. That's some pretty well qualified dissent.

In addition, saying that historians should say he doesn't know for sure instead of giving his opinion pretty much means that no historian can give his opinion on any historical matter of any depth... ever. History is almost never clear enough to say things with certainty when you're talking about cause and effect.

Every time someone trashes Bush for the absolutely awful things that he's done... it's always about politics according to the Bush apologists. It never ever seems to actually be about the absolutely awful things that he's done (that nearly everyone agrees on). To say concretely that he's the absolute worst in history can't be confirmed for now, but to say he's one of the worst of all time is pretty easy. To give such an opinion is never wrong so long as the uncertainty is noted... which the article did.

Just so we know when we can call him this, at what date will it be acceptable to call Bush the worst and have it count?

History is the study of the past leading up to the present. A good presidential historian knows that a president's policy's are judged by their results, and those results take time to come to fruition. Therefore, a judgement takes time, certainly longer than the normal term of a presidency, to formulate.

For this reason, these historians are not acting as historians. They decided instead to jump to a conclusion they wanted to believe, true or not, and then said, "This is our professional historical opinion, so Bush, according to History, is the Worst President Ever."

That's childish.

I don't know when it will be acceptable to assign any comprehensive judgement of the Bush presidency. I simply ask of whoever makes such a judgement to offer a convincing argument based in part on facts gathered in the wake of his administration, which is something these historians cannot help but lack.

 

[cwjerome]

Any "historian" who says the Bush presidency is failed is a worthless historian. Any real historian would never base a historical analysis on something so recent, let alone not ever over with yet.

It could be their personal opinion that Bush's presidency is a failure, whatever. Hell, they could speculate that it will be viewed as a failure. But from a historical perspective, it's beyond stupid for them to make any conclusion. Dumbasses.

 

[m1ldslide1]

Originally posted by: Vic

This is the beauty of Obama's campaign. The idea of dumping the partisan hackery and uniting the country to improve conditions for everyone. That is change. Contrast that against Hillary's message that "it takes a Clinton to clean up after a Bush," and that is just code for they fscked us so we'll fsck them, a continuation of way things have been in this country for decades.

Yeah but, can't we fsck them just a little? Just a little bit? Is that too much to ask?

 

[Arkaign]

Originally posted by: m1ldslide1

Originally posted by: Vic

This is the beauty of Obama's campaign. The idea of dumping the partisan hackery and uniting the country to improve conditions for everyone. That is change. Contrast that against Hillary's message that "it takes a Clinton to clean up after a Bush," and that is just code for they fscked us so we'll fsck them, a continuation of way things have been in this country for decades.

Yeah but, can't we fsck them just a little? Just a little bit? Is that too much to ask?

lol

Fuck them both, we need no more Clintons and Bushes, now or ever.

 

[JD50]

Originally posted by: Jaskalas

Originally posted by: Craig234
I worried for years now that the right would draw the wrong lessons from the Bush disaster - not to examine the errors in their ideology and policy, but rather to do things like say Bush is an aberration, or to simply reject our political system for a while, but somehow not to consider the issues and perhaps move to the left because the left is correct, compared to the current radical right in power. That seems to be happening as well.

Only a partisan authoritarian could view Bush as "far right wing" with the solution being more neocons to betray our values. Bush has betrayed the party?s principals in EVERY mistake he has made and you go off about how the continuation of that must be upheld by all others.

You want this party to have McCain who is the same breed of neocon? You?re either a liar or you do yourself a great disservice. The world isn?t left/right right/wrong black/white Craig. Neither is anyone you despise fit to be labeled ?radical right?. The same hallmarks between Bush and McCain are a ?moderate? declaration of being companionate conservatives who are pro-government and big on ?security?. Much of that is in direct opposition with ?radical right? and many of us on the right view all of it as a betrayal already.

Yet go ahead and feel free to champion the continuation of the Bush mantra within the Republican Party. I?m sure our destruction suits your purposes very well indeed. Especially when pro government measures like the Patriot Act will be more enjoyable when both sides support it without opposition from my sort of Republican whom I feel you?ve branded as ?radical right? your mortal nemesis.

:thumbsup:

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Atreus21

History is the study of the past leading up to the present. A good presidential historian knows that a president's policy's are judged by their results, and those results take time to come to fruition. Therefore, a judgement takes time, certainly longer than the normal term of a presidency, to formulate.

For this reason, these historians are not acting as historians. They decided instead to jump to a conclusion they wanted to believe, true or not, and then said, "This is our professional historical opinion, so Bush, according to History, is the Worst President Ever."

That's childish.

I don't know when it will be acceptable to assign any comprehensive judgement of the Bush presidency. I simply ask of whoever makes such a judgement to offer a convincing argument based in part on facts gathered in the wake of his administration, which is something these historians cannot help but lack.

Did you read the article?

It specifically mentioned that future events could change this judgment. Their judgment was based on things as they are right now. This is completely reasonable as it is explicitly described as such.

In addition, some things do not take any time to judge as being bad. His appointment of cronies to prominent positions is bad. (Brown, Gonzales anyone?) His attacks on habeas corpus and due process are bad. The odds of us waking up one day 20 years from now and saying "man I'm sure glad he attacked the bill of rights and appointed incompetent officials to oversee natural disasters" is exceedingly unlikely.

You're taking a page right from the Bush playbook right now man, they always say "nobody can tell right now, so stop criticizing me". It's a load of crap.

 

[ProfJohn]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

We won't have a true understand of the long term effects of Iraq for years.

Not, true, complete; you won't have a complete understanding. Those in the making of history can still have a sense of where it's going as they make it.

Tell that to Chamberlain after the wonderful agreement he made with Hitler.

You can't get a proper historical perspective of something while that thing is still on going.

During Bill Clinton's Bosnia and Kosovo bombings a lot of people thought he was making a mistake and that he would never achieve anything long term. But 10 years later we can look back and see how much better off that area is today.

 

[Fern]

We all know the current unpopularity of the Bush Admin. And it's way too early for serious historians to start making this call.

It's gonna take decades to judge the full effect any President has had. The fact that this bunch is ready to forcast such a negative already calls into question their professional objectivity, or lack thereof.

H3ll. there are two potentially HUGE developments that could occur between now and the expiration of his term: (1) The SCOTUS ruling on the 2nd Amendment, and (2) The begining of a substantial withdrawal from Iraq (depending on Maliki, the Iraq parliment and the UN).

Civil rights issue in general, and torture in specific are two issues that need a "cooling off" period and more info before we can adequately judge.

The whole FISA thing etc seems so fraught with hysteria and inaccuracies. I keep hearing people scream of "wiretapping" yet so far we have no evidence of such. We're likely gonna need info declassified to see what's really going on. Is it wiretapping US citizens, or is it an "innocent" structural change in the law to account for the modern routing of (foreign) communication as many others claim?

Similarly with "torture" Has the CIA under GWB just continued practices used in all previous administrations, or did something new develop? We'll likely need more info declassified to adequately judge.

Oh, and GWB ain't no radical righty. He's a war hawk who happens to also be a spendthrift.

Fern

 

[ProfJohn]

Originally posted by: Fern
We all know the current unpopularity of the Bush Admin. And it's way too early for serious historians to start making this call.

It's gonna take decades to judge the full effect any President has had. The fact that this bunch is ready to forcast such a negative already calls into question their professional objectivity, or lack thereof.

H3ll. there are two potentially HUGE developments that could occur between now and the expiration of his term: (1) The SCOTUS ruling on the 2nd Amendment, and (2) The begining of a substantial withdrawal from Iraq (depending on Maliki, the Iraq parliment and the UN).

Civil rights issue in general, and torture in specific are two issues that need a "cooling off" period and more info before we can adequately judge.

The whole FISA thing etc seems so fraught with hysteria and inaccuracies. I keep hearing people scream of "wiretapping" yet so far we have no evidence of such. We're likely gonna need info declassified to see what's really going on. Is it wiretapping US citizens, or is it an "innocent" structural change in the law to account for the modern routing of (foreign) communication as many others claim?

Similarly with "torture" Has the CIA under GWB just continued practices used in all previous administrations, or did something new develop? We'll likely need more info declassified to adequately judge.

Oh, and GWB ain't no radical righty. He's a war hawk who happens to also be a spendthrift.

Fern

About the only thing new under Bush is that we stopped handing people over to Egypt.

The people who are freaking out over the three people we waterboarded should read about what happened to the people we handed over to Egypt in the 90s.

 

[SlickSnake]

Originally posted by: cwjerome
Any "historian" who says the Bush presidency is failed is a worthless historian. Any real historian would never base a historical analysis on something so recent, let alone not ever over with yet.

It could be their personal opinion that Bush's presidency is a failure, whatever. Hell, they could speculate that it will be viewed as a failure. But from a historical perspective, it's beyond stupid for them to make any conclusion. Dumbasses.

But the fact remains he has sat there for nearly 2 terms now. Is it too soon to tell if his first term was a success or failure? How long is the window for history to accurately judge a success or failure? And isn't history usually written by the victors? So then success or failure would be a laughable arguement over long term history, at best.

Most people I know, even normally diehard religitard Republican'ts think it was a failure, and are going to vote Democrat. That being the case, the quality of life before or after his terms will be a larger indicator of his faliure than some History Network poll will. But I think the quality and validity of the poll is still a useable yardstick for determining the degree of this abject failure.

The dollar is shrinking and inflation and joblessness are at all time highs. Obviously, letting 10s of millions of jobs go to other countries have hurt the US economy immeasurably. The administration and congress holds NAFTA and the other job stealing bloody daggers high overhead and claims a resounding success! Success for whom? The corporate masters or the people they are supposed to be representing? Now we just need to build the Trans Texas Corridor to finish the bloody deed of slicing up the country and jobs and get those foreign made goods to the US even faster! Hoorah! Just wave the flag in front of the camera at all available photo ops and your good to go! And we also have a never ending war on terror instead of spending the squandered tax dollars on nationalized healthcare! But at least the congress and their immediate families can see a doctor for free for life! That's all that REALLY matters, right? Screw the voters who gave congress the power to dump countless perks on congress in the first place.

Do we really need long term history in order to judge this administration an abject failure? Are you seriously implying you don't think it is a failure?

 

[bamacre]

Turning away for a bit from his adventures in Iraq and his lack of respect for the rights and liberties of Americans, we aught to look at the fact that we have had a Republican president for 8 years who has grossly and irresponsibly increased spending. And at a time when the head of the GAO is almost on his knees, begging for someone to listen to him when he talks about the "fiscal cancer" that is growing inside of us.

Doubling the Department of Education for one. But the Medicare prescription drug bill he signed was completely and totally irresponsible when you look at the already coming SS and Medicare entitlement numbers.

Oh, and the $3 trillion war in Iraq doesn't exactly help.

If we can't find fiscal responsibility in terms of cutting spending with the Republicans, we have nothing left to look forward to with a Democrat in office but higher taxes. We'll be going from ridding the country of one big asshole in DC to each and every taxpayer getting their very own afterwards.

 

[eleison]

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: eleison

Originally posted by: Atreus21


It seems to me nothing more than a personal opinion. Educated opinions should be prudent opinions. And this judgement they make is anything but prudent.

Opinions are like assh*les. Everyone has one. If I remember correctly, during the zeitgeist of the 30's, Time named Adolf Hiter man of the year. Also, during the time, Ghandi said of Hitler, "I do not consider Hitler to be as bad as he is depicted. He is showing an ability that is amazing and seems to be gaining his victories without much bloodshed"...

It wasn't until years later that History really able to judge the german leader correctly. This was also true of Abe Lincoln.. Hated by a lot of people in his own time, but revered by many only after years later.

You are mixing things up. First of all Time's man of the year is not an award given to the best person in the year, but the person that had the most influence on the world that year. It's the same reason why they named Stalin man of the year, and seriously considered naming Osama it for 2001. It did not take history long at all to judge Hitler differently. He was in fact roundly criticized during the 1930's by a large amount of people, and it took no time at all after the war for people to be generally aware of just how bad Hitler was.

You are also incorrect about Abraham Lincoln. He was deeply unpopular at certain points in his presidency, but his unpopularity was never anywhere as long as Bush's. Unless you want to count his unpopularity in the south, but counting how much some people like a president who just conquered them would be obviously unfair. In fact, Lincoln was re-elected in a colossal landslide in 1864. I think he only lost 2 or 3 states.

The definition of "Man of the year" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person_of_the_Year):

Despite the magazine's frequent statements to the contrary, the designation is often regarded as an honor, and spoken of as an award or prize, simply based on many previous selections of admirable people. Thus, journalists frequently describe latest choice as having joined the ranks of past winners such as Martin Luther King. However, those such as Adolf Hitler in 1938, and Joseph Stalin in 1939 and again in 1942 have also been granted the title.



When Lincoln was voted in as president, he was so unpopular, several states left the union. Ultimately causing the civil war. I don't understand why you are dismissing the southern population? It like saying Bush is popular if you leave out the east and west coast. In all respect, Lincoln was not popular. In the 1864 election, he may have won in a landside, but then I don't think the southern folks were able to vote (a lot of the southern states already left the union). And if some were, I don't think they were wanting to vote for any US president considering, as you noted, they were just conquered.

In Lincoln times, he was unpopular.. so much so he was shot and killed. Only recently, have history given Lincoln his dues..

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: SlickSnake
But the fact remains he has sat there for nearly 2 terms now. Is it too soon to tell if his first term was a success or failure? How long is the window for history to accurately judge a success or failure?
-snip-

I have no objection to people drawing their own conclusions. I object to slaping the "historian" label on it so soon. Hindsight is 20-20, I suggest that they make use of it. It is afterall the best professional tool any historian has as regards judging a President.

Sometimes, often really, what a President does creates a backlash and history may hold them responsible for that. Jeesh, the guy's still in office, the backlash hasn't even occurred yet. So we don't what may yet develop long those lines, or their long term consequences.

Fern

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Fern
We all know the current unpopularity of the Bush Admin. And it's way too early for serious historians to start making this call.

It's gonna take decades to judge the full effect any President has had. The fact that this bunch is ready to forcast such a negative already calls into question their professional objectivity, or lack thereof.

H3ll. there are two potentially HUGE developments that could occur between now and the expiration of his term: (1) The SCOTUS ruling on the 2nd Amendment, and (2) The begining of a substantial withdrawal from Iraq (depending on Maliki, the Iraq parliment and the UN).

Civil rights issue in general, and torture in specific are two issues that need a "cooling off" period and more info before we can adequately judge.

The whole FISA thing etc seems so fraught with hysteria and inaccuracies. I keep hearing people scream of "wiretapping" yet so far we have no evidence of such. We're likely gonna need info declassified to see what's really going on. Is it wiretapping US citizens, or is it an "innocent" structural change in the law to account for the modern routing of (foreign) communication as many others claim?

Similarly with "torture" Has the CIA under GWB just continued practices used in all previous administrations, or did something new develop? We'll likely need more info declassified to adequately judge.

Oh, and GWB ain't no radical righty. He's a war hawk who happens to also be a spendthrift.

Fern

No evidence of wiretapping!?! You mean other then Bush's explicit admission that he repeatedly ordered it? The fact that they freely admit in involves US citizens? Come ON man.

Same thing with the torture thing. We'll never know with a certainty what other administrations have done, but we DO know with a certainty what this one has done, and the sort of legal defenses it has raised to allow it to keep doing exactly that.