I was born in 1948 so I have no memory of Truman who was president then. But, I remember my Grandfather buying his first television in 1952 to watch the first Republican convention when I was 4 years old. It was a black and white TV a big one for the times and I remember watching the convention with him and my parents then at age 4 even though most of the time I thought it was boring. Still, it was exciting to watch TV at all and to see so many people act in funny ways to me at 4.
So, I would say Eisenhower was a very important President. He built our superhighway system so people could get out of cities quickly if they go nuked. These were really heady times from thinking we all were going to get nuked (even the president thought this then) to an incredible standard of living increase after World War II.
Though I consider President Kennedy a Great President too, he and his wife were more like a young King and Queen to the citizens of the U.S. This was "Camelot" in many ways for people in the U.S.
So, when he died this was awful. Though when President Johnson his vice President took over he actually signed the Civil Rights Bill which has changed the U.S. more than anything in some ways since I was born. However, the Viet Nam war sort of killed Johnson in the end (literally).
Nixon was probably the best statesman president in 100 years and prevented a nuclear war with China by starting trade talks and going there. But, he was too paranoid so got caught lying about something important to the American people and so had to leave the Presidency. Though President Ford was a good president he didn't get re-elected because he pardoned Nixon.
Carter was a good president but the Iran situation and the American hostages kept him from re-election in 1980. President Reagan was a controversial president. However, what he did do was end the Cold War through Star Wars which helped bankrupt the Soviet Union along with Saudi Arabia dropping the price of oil so the the Soviet Union economically collapsed as a result.
I didn't think anyone head of the CIA should ever be president so I didn't think it was right for Bush I to be elected.
Bill Clinton despite his love of the ladies (Kennedy had this problem too) was a very good and intelligent President. In fact, I would have to say that Clinton and Obama are the two most intellectually brilliant presidents I have ever heard of elected to a U.S. Presidency. Bush II wasn't really elected as President at all in 2000 and was put in by the Electoral College.
However, the ever increasing menace of Terrorism logically was just going to get worse as it has out of the middle east throughout my lifetime. So, in some ways what happened on 9-11 was inevitable. Now France and Belgium and Great Britain and many other countries have all had their own 9-11s which was also predictable by the increase in population out of control in the Middle East compared to the water and the capacity for growing food there. When people cannot get jobs they become criminals. One type of Criminal is a terrorist.
Note: You have to add Jimmy Carter to the exceptionally brilliant group who all were very adaptable presidents because of their incredibly intelligence. And you likely should add Kennedy to this list of brilliant presidents too. Though I think Kennedy's ego with women was a problem like it was with Clinton.
Often times the most brilliant presidents tend to be ladies men too. However, I think President Obama is happy in his marriage and isn't interested in all that.
No comments:
Post a Comment