Lionel Nation - The Greatest/Worst President in America History
Aired: 2023-02-28
Duration: 15:28


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[00:01:31]  One of the most fun questions I ask, I love to ask people this, who your favorite question, or who your favorite president was?
[00:01:39]  And the internet is replete with more than one historian and academicians and academics and presidential scholars opining and weighing in as to who their president is, best and worst.
[00:01:54]  And when you ask civilians, they normally will give you the usual answers.
[00:01:58]  You know, FDR, Blinken, whatever.
[00:02:01]  It might be more contemporary JFK or Obama or Reagan or whatever.
[00:02:05]  And you can tell immediately, you can tell immediately whether somebody knows what they're talking about.

=== The Criteria for Best (03:49) ===

[00:02:12]  Whether they really understand the essence of this.
[00:02:14]  Whether they understand the gravamen, the actual trick to this question.
[00:02:21]  Because the first question you should be asking, of course, is what do you mean best?
[00:02:26]  What do you mean worst?
[00:02:27]  Worst how?
[00:02:28]  What are the criteria for what is and is not a good or a bad president?
[00:02:35]  You mean the most famous?
[00:02:37]  You mean the one who gets the most airtime?
[00:02:40]  The one who is referenced in media more?
[00:02:44]  Somebody who's famous?
[00:02:46]  Somebody who's loved?
[00:02:48]  Somebody who's part of the social scrum?
[00:02:52]  See, that's where it gets interesting.
[00:02:54]  Let me explain to you what that means, why that's critical, and give you a couple of hints as to what you should be looking at before you answer the question.
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[00:04:57]  Okay, best president, worst president.
[00:05:02]  What do you mean?
[00:05:05]  My criteria for best is, did you not do anything wrong?
[00:05:12]  Did you keep us out of war?
[00:05:15]  Did you maintain the economy?
[00:05:18]  Did you not exhibit or participate in anything that is considered egregious?
[00:05:24]  Did you do anything along those lines?
[00:05:26]  And that's critical.
[00:05:29]  That's critical.
[00:05:30]  That's the first issue.
[00:05:34]  Did you not do anything that was catastrophic?
[00:05:39]  Did you just leave well enough alone?

=== Great Accidental Presidents (09:47) ===

[00:05:42]  Did you just not break anything?
[00:05:44]  You know, at first, don't kill the patient.
[00:05:46]  Do no harm.
[00:05:47]  Okay.
[00:05:49]  We can get into then, did you do scandals?
[00:05:53]  Were you involved in scandals?
[00:05:54]  Did you do scandals?
[00:05:57]  Were they of your choosing?
[00:06:00]  Are you an accidental president?
[00:06:02]  How about some great accidental presidents?
[00:06:04]  Harry Truman?
[00:06:05]  Teddy Roosevelt?
[00:06:08]  John Tyler?
[00:06:09]  You know, John Tyler was terrific.
[00:06:12]  McKinley?
[00:06:13]  Garfield was great.
[00:06:15]  Grover Cleveland had his moment.
[00:06:17]  Yeah!
[00:06:18]  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:06:19]  John Quincy Adams loved him.
[00:06:22]  The worst?
[00:06:24]  What do you mean the worst?
[00:06:25]  The worst?
[00:06:26]  Franklin Pierce, a drunk.
[00:06:30]  Buchanan, Andrew Johnson.
[00:06:32]  Oh my God.
[00:06:33]  I mean, it just depends.
[00:06:36]  And then you get into this notion of, well, what about Lincoln?
[00:06:38]  Was Lincoln that great?
[00:06:39]  Well, Steven Spielberg loved him.
[00:06:43]  Lincoln suspended habeas corpus.
[00:06:47]  Lincoln is not what people think in terms, historically, of what he was as to slavery and the like.
[00:06:54]  His goal was the notion of maintaining the union.
[00:07:00]  Now, there's another group of people who have suggested, why is it anybody's fault to maintain the union?
[00:07:09]  It is within the rules to secede, right or wrong or what have you.
[00:07:16]  Nobody ever speaks about it from that point of view.
[00:07:20]  Well, isn't secession bad?
[00:07:22]  Not everybody thought so.
[00:07:24]  I must admit, I think a contiguous, intact country is a lot better.
[00:07:30]  But understand, again, the reference.
[00:07:33]  Who were these people?
[00:07:35]  What was the, and I'm going to say it, what was the zeitgeist?
[00:07:41]  Who were these people?
[00:07:44]  And forget personalities.
[00:07:46]  People always love to go into, well, who was weird?
[00:07:48]  Who was weird?
[00:07:49]  Did you know that Grover Cleveland on the weekends was like the only person in the White House?
[00:07:58]  It was reported that if you were one of the few people who had a phone, and the joke goes, if you call the White House, and whoever answered, if you said, President Cleveland, please, you would most probably hear, speaking!
[00:08:11]  It was a different world then.
[00:08:14]  It was this...
[00:08:14]  James Garfield didn't want to be nominated.
[00:08:18]  He said, no, no, no.
[00:08:21]  Harding?
[00:08:22]  Was Harding poisoned?
[00:08:24]  I mean, all these great stories.
[00:08:26]  Warren Gamaliel Harding?
[00:08:28]  Teapot Dome?
[00:08:29]  The greatest writer?
[00:08:32]  Who was the greatest writer?
[00:08:33]  Believe it or not, U.S. Grant.
[00:08:35]  Many, many people believe he was.
[00:08:38]  Washington?
[00:08:39]  Very odd.
[00:08:40]  Didn't know how to...
[00:08:41]  Mule deal with people.
[00:08:43]  He had things to put his hand on, and he didn't really...
[00:08:48]  I think I told you this.
[00:08:50]  Jefferson never made a speech.
[00:08:52]  Adams was a far different type, far saltier.
[00:08:56]  I mean, before you get into the personality types of these folks, then you get into Miller Fillmore and Rutherford B. Hayes, and then you get into...
[00:09:05]  And I mentioned Cleveland.
[00:09:07]  What was great about Cleveland was the only...
[00:09:09]  The only two-term, the only two-term, non-consecutive two-termers ever.
[00:09:19]  And a real stand-up guy, a real stand-up guy who lost, I think his re-election, his first re-election, I think it was an electoral vote.
[00:09:28]  He says, well, those are the rules.
[00:09:29]  That's the way it goes.
[00:09:31]  We knew what we were getting into.
[00:09:32]  A far different cry.
[00:09:34]  And then there are people that, and this is what I want you to listen to.
[00:09:37]  Because you can hear me ramble about these little moments of, you know, historical, you know, that's cute.
[00:09:43]  It's fascinating stuff.
[00:09:44]  It is truly fascinating.
[00:09:45]  But the one thing I want you to understand, no matter what you think about any president, you've got to wait.
[00:09:51]  Remember, history would be a wonderful thing if only it were true.
[00:09:54]  When it comes to presidents, you have to wait a significant period of time before anybody really, really recognizes, really settles down into who they were and are.
[00:10:05]  That's the most important.
[00:10:07]  We don't know.
[00:10:10]  Truman left with one of the worst, one of the worst ratings maybe ever in how he's loved.
[00:10:24]  History is a very weird thing.
[00:10:26]  It's a strange, it's...
[00:10:30]  And you know, say what you want about Ken Burns, God bless him for at least making it seem remotely interesting, but there is no truth to this.
[00:10:39]  Do you think Kennedy, a thousand days, do you think Kennedy was as great as he was, or is the tragedy of his death this young, handsome couple that Camelot in the 60s and every, I mean, that day killed everybody.
[00:11:00]  It was the harbinger of the 60s and Vietnam and the terrible five-year period from 63 to 68 with JFK, RFK, MLK, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X. It just went on.
[00:11:20]  It was awful.
[00:11:24]  That day.
[00:11:26]  I was five years old.
[00:11:27]  I remember my mother was crying.
[00:11:29]  I didn't understand.
[00:11:30]  I said, what's going on here?
[00:11:33]  And there's a tendency to be, to wax hagiographic, to romanticize about people, to not necessarily be as critical.
[00:11:48]  But wait till you see what history does regarding Trump and Clinton and Obama and Biden.
[00:11:55]  You have to wait because we're too close.
[00:12:00]  The notion of history presupposes a significant lapse of time before there's any kind of reflection.
[00:12:09]  You have to have that.
[00:12:11]  Without that, it's not history.
[00:12:14]  It was the other day.
[00:12:16]  There has to be this notion of comparison.
[00:12:19]  And who gets to write it?
[00:12:20]  Is ChatGPT going to write history?
[00:12:24]  Who is going to write history?
[00:12:28]  What will be the prevailing thought?
[00:12:35]  Regarding the personalities and the efficacy and the lunacy of this.
[00:12:40]  I mean, let me just warn you.
[00:12:42]  Whatever you think is going to be the case in the future, do not necessarily believe so.
[00:12:51]  Because, again, history has to be read in terms of the context.
[00:12:55]  But if I have to pick the worst, Franklin Pierce.
[00:12:58]  Franklin Pierce, hands down.
[00:13:00]  But my favorite, The favorite president, the person who really was the guy who did the right thing, who actually, you know, despite, and the worst is what FDR did.
[00:13:20]  Oh my God!
[00:13:22]  I can go through.
[00:13:25]  From the St. Louis to basically wanting to pack the cord and he was In many respects, despised by people.
[00:13:36]  But to go through a depression and World War II, and while being physically, I don't know if I admire him or the fact that he didn't just quit.
[00:13:56]  So he is there.
[00:13:58]  Lincoln for the pros, but U.S. Grant, his writing is even better.
[00:14:03]  His writing is even better.
[00:14:05]  And Washington is heraldic.
[00:14:11]  It's almost like you can't speak of him normally.
[00:14:15]  So, I haven't been very good as far as who my favorite was.
[00:14:19]  Because, like I told you, I like Grover Cleaver.
[00:14:22]  I despised Wilson.
[00:14:25]  Wilson was awful.
[00:14:26]  Read what Wilson writes.
[00:14:28]  Dear God.
[00:14:30]  Oh, my God.
[00:14:33]  Income tax and post-League of Nations.
[00:14:37]  Oh, my God.
[00:14:39]  Plus, he had a stroke.
[00:14:40]  His wife, Edith, ran the show.
[00:14:43]  Favorite is tough.
[00:14:46]  Favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite is tough.
[00:14:50]  Because there's favorite because of what they did, and then there's kind of the personal thing.
[00:14:54]  I'm kind of, believe it or not, I'm kind of like a Cleveland fan.
[00:14:57]  Plus, he was born in In Bloomfield, and excuse me, Caldwell, New Jersey, and his home is right there on Bloomfield Avenue.
[00:15:05]  We drive by it all the time.
[00:15:07]  I haven't been much help regarding that, but Franklin Pierce, not good.
[00:15:12]  All right, my friends, have a great and a glorious day.
[00:15:14]  Thank you so much for watching.
[00:15:15]  Please put your thoughts and comments down.
[00:15:17]  Who were your favorites?
[00:15:18]  Who were your, whom did you despise or loathe or detest?
[00:15:23]  And please like the video, subscribe to the channel.
[00:15:25]  And make sure you hit that little bell so you're notified of new videos and the like.