AMERICA'S WORST PRESIDENTS: A MATTER OF OPINION

AMERICA'S WORST PRESIDENTS: A MATTER OF OPINION - Continued

By Tim Siggia

Carter first put himself on the wrong side of the American majority with his giveaway of the Panama Canal. There was no excuse whatsoever for this ill-advised action. Americans had lawfully purchased the strip of land in Panama called the Canal Zone. Americans had built the canal, many of them paying with their lives in its construction. The canal was in every respect an American enterprise. With a stroke of the pen, Carter magnanimously gave all rights and ownership of the American-built canal to the Republic of Panama, an act which in later years would enable the People's Republic of China to acquire interests in this strategic part of the world. It was a momentous blunder that cost the United States not only in terms of money, but in influence as well.

This, however, was only the beginning of the national nightmare that was the Carter presidency. Trouble was brewing in Iran, where political opposition to Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran, was mounting, and an exiled Muslim leader, Ayatollah Rohalla Khomeini, waited in Paris for a return to his homeland where he envisioned the formation of an Islamic republic. In Iran, the Shah headed up an oppressive regime which, through its secret police, Savak, allegedly committed crimes against humanity on a routine basis. The Shah was also, however, a strong ally of the United States. The United States should have either stayed out of Iran's internal affairs, or, if intervention was unavoidable, intervened on the side of the Shah. Carter did neither, siding instead with the forces seeking to depose the Shah and bring Khomeini to power. The Shah was ousted in 1979, and Ayatollah Khomeini, now back in Iran, instituted a theocracy that not only turned into a reign of terror that set Iran back centuries in time, but also turned against Iran's ally, the United States, whose president ironically had made Khomeini's rise to power possible. The taking of first 63, then an additional three for a total of 66, American hostages at the American consulate in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, came as a shock to America -- especially its president, who was totally unprepared for such a turn of events. Eleven of those hostages were later released for health and humanitarian reasons, but 52 of them remained as the once-exiled Muslim cleric now brought America to its knees, its president haplessly trying to negotiate the release of the 52 remaining American hostages. A botched rescue attempt on April 24-25, 1980, to free the hostages, served only to underscore the ineptness of America's commander-in-chief.

Carter was equally ineffective at home, where inflation had risen to double-digit figures, as had unemployment, and the president helplessly rambled on television about a "national malaise," and the need to wear sweaters and more clothing in the face of skyrocketing fuel prices. His disdain for the military, of which he had once been part, resulted in plummeting morale among armed forces personnel. An example of this presidential disdain was especially noticeable in the Washington, D.C. area, where soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines were directed to wear their uniforms only once a week, and civilian clothing on all other days, in order to "keep a low profile in Washington." Such orders could have come only from the commander-in-chief. Carter's leadership, or rather, lack of it, had so appalled his electorate that in 1980 a challenge for the Democratic nomination came from Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), who carried a number of states in that year's primary. Carter survived the primary challenge, only to lose the presidency to Ronald Reagan in an historic landslide. Since then, he has reappeared to criticize the performance of our current president both at home and overseas, and in 2002 won the Nobel Peace Prize, confirming long-held suspicions that this prize has little if anything to do with peace and everything to do with politics.

Carter's motives in all his improbable goofs were no doubt altruistic. He simply wanted the rest of the world to love America. In his attempts to put idealism into practice, however, he not only failed to win the world's love, but forfeited the world's respect, leaving it all for his successor to restore.

2. William Jefferson Clinton, Democrat, 42nd president, 1993-2001: If Jimmy Carter was motivated by a desire for love from the rest of the world, Bill Clinton had no such idealistic desires, his only real love being for himself. Clinton came to the presidency with all the external trappings of electability. Tall and photogenic, the former Arkansas governor had been both a Fulbright Scholar and a Rhodes Scholar, and, at 32, the youngest governor in Arkansas history. He was the prototypical fast-talking snake-oil salesman, and it was said by some -- approvingly, of course -- that he could talk his way into or out of just about anything. A fellow Democrat and competing candidate for the 1992 presidential nomination, Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, put it more succinctly, calling Clinton, "an unusually good liar." The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette had its own nickname for Clinton, which gained widespread usage and seemed to sum up his general character and style: "Slick Willie."

What set Clinton apart from all other presidents before him was that the others, whether good or bad, were motivated by ideals over and above themselves. Clinton had no such impractical idealism. He wanted the presidency strictly for his own personal gain, both in money and public esteem. His was a presidency characterized by narcissism, hedonism, and the total absence of any kind of moral standard. A notorious womanizer, Clinton was accused by several woman of sexual harassment, and by at least one of rape. Clinton's amorality went beyond sexual misadventures, however. Under his stewardship, it became clear to all who had eyes to see that America was now for sale to the highest bidder. Nothing was sacred to Clinton. For a substantial campaign contribution, one could buy access to the president himself, buy a night's stay in the Lincoln Bedroom, even buy a plot in Arlington National Cemetery. There is additionally much evidence to suggest that Clinton knowingly took illegal contributions from foreign sources, including the People's Republic of China -- an avowed enemy of the United States. In one particularly odious example, Clinton, over the objections of both military and civilian advisors, approved the sale of satellite technology that could be used for military purposes to the People's Republic of China by the Loral Company -- which, of course, constitutes treason, for which Clinton, of course, was never prosecuted. All this from the president who, with a straight face, had promised the American people that his would be the most ethical administration in history.

Clinton's foreign policy was equally abysmal. Again and again he ignored warnings from military advisors about threats from Islamic radicals. Clinton couldn't be bothered. He was too busy either watching or playing golf, grubbing for money, building monuments to himself, and turning the White House into a brothel. When the first attack was attempted on the World Trade Center in New York on Feb. 26, 1993, Clinton did nothing. When the guided missile frigate USS Cole (DDG-67 was attacked on Oct. 12, 2000, Clinton offered $5 million for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the bombers, but beyond that did nothing. His indifference to national security undoubtedly enabled Muslim fanatic Osama bin Laden to execute his attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.

Under Clinton's stewardship, scandal after scandal erupted from Washington, culminating in the revelation in late 1998 that Clinton had lied to the American people about an affair with a then-22-year-old intern named Monica Lewinsky, for which the House of Representatives impeached him on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice, making Clinton the second president to be so impeached, and the first elected president to face impeachment. In the Senate vote that came on Feb. 12, 1999, Clinton was acquitted along party lines, with Democratic senators unanimously closing ranks to defend their president, and all but eight Republicans voting to remove him from office.

Yet in spite of all this, the Clinton years carry an aura of unreality that persists to this day. Though he in fact accomplished little in his two terms as president, he routinely took credit for the accomplishments of others, and his sycophantic partisans eagerly gave him that credit -- which included credit for a balanced budget he himself did nothing to balance, a good economy based primarily on a dot-com boom that had nothing to do with him or his presidency (though when that boom went bust, on his watch, he took none of the blame), and every other good thing that just happened to happen on his watch. It all led comic Jay Leno to remark, "Clinton taking credit for the economy is like the rooster taking credit for the sunrise." Wherever he goes these days, Clinton gets rock-star treatment by adoring 50-plus-aged groupies, and fawning from the news media who were always in his corner. He is the darling of Hollywood, and is acclaimed by some -- most noticeably his former vice-president, Al Gore -- as the greatest American president who ever lived. To have lived through the '90s was much like attending a non-stop professional wrestling exhibition -- only for some reason, they were all cheering the Bad Guy. The more Clinton pulled and got away with, the further he pushed the envelope. In fitting fashion, Clinton ended his presidency with a flurry of pardons with obvious political motivation. Then, upon vacating the White House, he attempted to lift furnishings belonging to the American people to use as his own property. Only when caught did he and his wife return the merchandise. Add attempted burglary to the list of crimes by the second-worst, and most disgraceful, president in American history.

3. Lyndon Baines Johnson, 36th president, 1963-1969: "I do not seek, and will not accept, another term as your president." With these words, President Lyndon Baines Johnson probably performed the most valuable service of his more than six years in office. A president by succession after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, Johnson, who ironically had made his reputation as a conservative Democratic legislator from Texas, inherited a sound economy from his predecessor -- and promptly squandered it. Swerving sharply to the left, Johnson delighted Washington liberals by growing the federal government to proportions unseen since the days of the New Deal. Declaring a "War On Poverty" Johnson threw money in all directions with a new model program he entitled, "The Great Society." Most of the Great Society programs are gone today, though we are still paying for them some 40 years later, but two yet remain: Medicare and Medicaid, both of which, along with Social Security, eat up a sizeable portion of the wage earner's paycheck. Alternatives to these costly programs have been proposed, only to die in debate meeting stiff resistance from Democrats. Since Johnson first announced his War On Poverty, we have more poverty today than we ever did before. You might say Poverty won. What Johnson did was to create the Welfare State, which ended up eroding the traditional nuclear family and replacing fathers and mothers with government bureaucrats.

Though Johnson cannot be blamed for starting the Vietnam War per se -- our involvement in Vietnam actually began under Dwight Eisenhower in the role of military advisors -- it sharply escalated under Johnson's administration. This in itself was not a bad thing. What made it bad was that men were routinely sent into combat with no overall strategy for winning, no clearly-defined objective, and with rules of engagement that made that conflict unwinnable. Much of the blame for this lies with Johnson's secretary of defense, Robert S. McNamara, who was first appointed by John F. Kennedy. With federal programs at home and the war in Vietnam both out of control, Johnson bowed out and left it to his successor, Richard Nixon, to solve those problems he had created.

Unlike Bill Clinton of later years, Johnson had no swarms of goggle-eyed admirers who would swoon in his presence, forgive his every transgression, and defend him right or wrong. Johnson was hardly a beloved president. He was a man of crude personal habits, including such things as urinating outdoors and calling in aides for talks while sitting on the toilet. A much-publicized photo of Johnson holding a beagle up by the ears drew outrage from pet lovers throughout the nation. His wheeler-dealer image earned him general distrust, and when he finally made the announcement that he would not seek a second term as president, few if any were disappointed.

A common thread runs throughout each of these presidents, none of whom made the U. S. News & World Report list of worst presidents: the general absence of leadership. Whether it be as commander-in-chief of the armed forces, or as head-of-state, the first requirement for one who would be president is leadership. The president, by definition, is a leader. He cannot escape this, nor can he delegate it. When Harry Truman left the White House, so too, unfortunately, did his famed desk plate with the inscription, "The Buck Stops Here." It should have stayed. Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Lyndon Johnson each had not just one, but multiple opportunities to exhibit leadership. In every case they failed. They are, according to Yours Truly if no one else, the three worst presidents in American history.

Return to Radiofree West Hartford's Home Page