Why is it that all the greatest American presidents were liberals (under the definition that "change is good", as opposed to conservatives, who believe that "change is bad")? Washington was a liberal--republican government was a novel institution. Jackson was a liberal--he worked for the benefit of the common man. Lincoln was a liberal--he wanted to eventually abolish slavery. FDR was a liberal--he created Social Security. Under this theory, shouldn't all conservative politicians take a lesson and embrace change?

Ronald Reagan.

Washington didn't invent the notion of republican government. Jackson's "working for the benefit of the common man" can be said for any president; that's their job. Lincoln's wanting to abolish slavery is near irrelevant, as he only initially abolished slavery in the part of the Union that he didn't control as part of a war strategy. His situation was unique, and it's likely that almost any president in his position would have done so, and once you do something like that, it's hard to renege.

Reagan's widely considered the best modern president, yet he was conservative. Also, what do you mean by liberal? You mean democratic/progressive, or freedom-loving?

Your definition of liberal seems to be whatever you want it to be. Washington is a liberal because he supports a novel form of government. Jackson is a liberal because he is described by a substanceless platitude (do conservatives work for the hindrance of the comman man?). FDR was a liberal, and he ranks high on my worst presidents list.

Everyone knows Calvin Coolidge was the greatest president ever.

Its funny because you're assuming that social liberal = liberal in all other cases. Clinton was a fiscal conservative.

Damn right he was. I look at the national debt chart under Clinton and I smile, smile, smile. Reagan and Bush, yech.

This.

Zero good conservative presidents, but one good Republican president: Theodore Roosevelt.

I dunno, I heard Nixon did some great things overseas. We tend to label him as bad because of Watergate, though.

I wanna say two things:

First

There is no such thing as true "liberals" or "conservatives." There are times where liberal policies are needed, and there are also times where conservative policies are needed. If you study these presidents punctiliously, you'll see that their views on many issues deviate from what you'd think a typical "liberal" or "conservative" would hold.

Great presidents are ones who:
- Know how to adapt depending on the situation of the country.
- Have staff/administration who know what they're doing.
- Are open minded.
- Knows the important of addressing his or her people.


Second and more importantly

Presidents themselves don't know everything; they have staff or administration who do all the work. If you look at the education of most our presidents, they have degrees in business, political science, government, economics, law, etc etc. I wonder how many of them have erudite backgrounds in degrees in science, engineering, health, technology, etc.

As an engineering student I may be a bit biased about this but there is a severe lack of experienced engineers running our country. We've got politicians, businessmen, economists, lawyers running our country who know nothing but money money money. For years our nations infrastructure needed a severe makeover but nobody listened. And guess what happened because of that?

Hurricane Katrina

One can point fingers at Bush, others can point at the Louisiana/New Oreans leaders, hell some can even blame God for bringing this natural disaster upon everyone. But these are all secondary. This entire catastrophe could have been severely mitigated if the voices of the engineers responsible for the levees and infrastructure of the Louisiana coast could have been heard years and years ago.

For those of you who don't know, levees are man made walls/dams designed to hold back water that rises above the surface. Since the entire city was founded below sea level, these structures are needed in order to prevent water from flooding the city. The designs for these walls are made to hold back around 16-19 feet of flood and storm waters. However, as many of us know, the land which New Orleans was founded on has been sinking over the years, thus the benchmark (the elevation where designs are made and calculated from) lowers. Thus, the levees, build decades ago, which were designed to hold 16-19 feet of water now can only hold 12-14 feet of water. Those few feet spell the difference between typical hurricane damage and thousands of denizens forced to vacate the land forever.

The engineers saw this coming. They told the government about this but what responses do they get? "Oh it's too expensive to add 3 more feet of height to 350+ miles of retaining walls." "The risk is too low, it's not worth our time." All they see is money, they don't understand the ramifications of leaving outdated engineering designs untouched.

Not just engineering either, the health guys too. I have a really good friend who is a medical student and he talks about the arduous work they tackle everyday. The human body is complex, any slight change or modification will make us cease to live. Time is needed for doctors and health professionals to provide adequate service to people. However, when we've got lunatics in D.C. who go on and on about how health care this health care that, 90% of them have no idea what this will do to the doctors and health people who work and study hard to keep our nation alive and healthy.


This is why I never really liked pure business, law, political science, or economic majors. They only know how to run the country (which of course is critical to our nation's continued existence) but they hardly know the consequences of their business or political decisions in regards to the ethics of science, technology, engineering, health, etc. If you look at the people currently running our government, only one or two have engineering backgrounds and I doubt any of them have had any real professional engineering experience.


So to sum it up, Presidents are judged by the people they choose/oversee to run things. More engineers, health professionals, and technology driven people need to get more involved in politics and business so that all of our voices can be heard.

So what you're saying, MA, is that a President basically needs to have really great managerial skills. They need to be able to delegate effectively and be good judges of character, and retain the loyalty of those they appoint.

Of course they also need to look good in front of the media, which is another matter but unfortunately important.

http://www.economist.com/node/13496638

Perhaps it's because in a democracy a leader needs to be charismatic and a very effective public speaker, especially in this era of mass media.

President Hu didn't have to fight for the vote of China's billions.

^ This.

I'm all for a technocracy in the United States, but it ain't happenin'. Most voters can't connect with technocrats. In China, it might be different, had they democracy; they probably have a better work ethic and more respect for mathematics. I could see a technocrat winning the hearts and minds of Chinese or Russian voters.

I take it you didn't actually follow the link?

India, Brazil and South Korea are all democracies, and they have vastly different political makeups compared to the US.

How does that contradict anything I said?

People that do things are remembered in textbooks, and usually if they do it successfully, its a good thing. (Or the repercussions are not seen for a while.)
Conservative, in a general sense, is status quo. Not doing things.

My point is that there are many great conservative presidents that are simply boring to write about because everything went well and nothing happened.

But when everything goes better than expected, my, now that is something to write about! But no, seriously, you won't find many times where the status quo is preferred, thus any type of "progress" is generally going to be better than none. IMO, American government needs to get back to the "worker (usually farmers) first, politician second" type of government it was. Career politicians are useless slime that only serve to leech off of the rest of the populace, and contribute little to the good of the populace. That is, when they aren't harming one or more groups for the advancement of personal agendas.

But I digress. Rantent stated it perfectly when he said Conservatives will rarely be called great simply because they took little to no risk during incumbency.

1. Wouldn't you rather have someone specialized/highly educated(Career Politician) working in the HOR or Senate rather than a random citizen who knows little about law?
2. Personal agendas can be eliminated through term limits, but term limits eliminate the continuance of an experienced politician's career.


Unless you can actually find a president who is purely "liberal" or "conservative" then you can't say all liberal presidents are great.

Quote from name:Vortex-

Quote from poison_us

Career politicians are useless slime that only serve to leech off of the rest of the populace, and contribute little to the good of the populace. That is, when they aren't harming one or more groups for the advancement of personal agendas.
But I digress. Rantent stated it perfectly when he said Conservatives will rarely be called great simply because they took little to no risk during incumbency.

1. Wouldn't you rather have someone specialized/highly educated(Career Politician) working in the HOR or Senate rather than a random citizen who knows little about law?
2. Personal agendas can be eliminated through term limits, but term limits eliminate the continuance of an experienced politician's career.

1. I'd rather have someone with common sense making laws that protect us from other people, rather than our current political system that serves their own agenda.
2. What does that have to do with anything?