Wonkette
PLUS THAT GIANT STONE PHALLUS: “Was this man, George Washington, truly our greatest president? No, not at all! Most historians put him in the ‘Top 50,’ at best. But he was the first president, of America, and for that we honor his service to our country.” [AOL Political Machine]
For one thing, Washington was very tall.
6′20″ FUCKIN’ KILLIN’ FOR FUN!!!1!
From the list, you’ll note that G.W. Shrub didn’t make Worst President Evah… beaten out by Millard Fillmore. Something *else* he couldn’t do right!
However, I am reliably informed that Fillmore was the end of his line, a Whig, after whom the Whig Party died and was never resuscitated. So there’s something to hope for with that…
Voted off after a woeful performance in the ABBA round.
Don’t forget that he also had teeth made of used piano keys. His dentist would have used Alan Keyes, but he and his hot lesbian daughter were busy at the time.
Sometimes a giant stone phallus is just a GIANT STONE PHALLUS, and sometimes it’s a revered monument to a hero of Democracy that can be seen from space and just happens to be shaped like a GIANT STONE PHALLUS…..
George Washington had wooden teeth and wore a wig. You lose points for that. However, it has recently been established that Martha Washington was something of a hottie — plus points for that.
So… truly our greatest president? Hard to say.
Goerge W gets points unfairly awarded for being the FIRST this and the FIRST that. If this was applied fairly to everyone else then the list might be somewhat different. W might get extra points for being the FIRST functional illiterate moron to be President or the FIRST president who took a pretty good situation and in 8 years turned it into complete shit. Unfortunately, W isn’t that tall, which apparently one must be to even crack the Top 5 (think Abe, FDR - both tall - standing up that is or not cheating by using a stovepipe hat).
“Most historians put him in the ‘Top 50,’ at best”
They’re joking, right? What would you have to do to be rated outside of the top *50* American presidents? Even Bush is in the top 50.
atheotes: No joke. And Bush isn’t even in the top 50. Most historians put him around #75. So there’s your answer. You have to be as bad as W to be rated outside the top 50. Pick up a history book once in a while, you dolt.
hobospacejungle: I guess I was referring to the fact that Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States and therefore the set of presidents who are in the “top 50″ includes every president to have served by default. I’m not sure consulting a history book will help on this matter… Maybe a future book?
OK, point taken. GW 1 is safely in the top hundred of presidents. Two hundred? Almost as good as Indiana basketball ‘09?
trondant: Win.
I was an officer in my college’s history honor society, which is like being a DnD Dungeon Master except you have a faculty sponsor and get honor cords at graduation, and about 10 of the members acutally had an impromptu debate about the worst president of all time. We all agreed to exclude G-Dub, on the grounds that he blew the curve. The strongest contenders were Buchannan and Harding, which essentially comes down to whether you think its worse to be incompetant or corrupt, a distinction again made meaningless by W, which is why we excluded him.
Ken Layne: There is a moran among us. Help!
atheotes: Close your web browser. Now. Go back to watching “Everybody Loves Raymond” reruns. It’s easier there. The laugh track tells you when there are funnies.
Ah, the laugh-filled days of the Fred Thompson campaign…
Draft Fred!
Chester A. Arthur had the best facial hair. George Buchanan was a closeted gay who wasn’t Republican (thereby risking a distortion in the space/time continuum). Reagan was brain dead, and Coolidge asleep. Taft and Cleveland were morbidly obese.
Let’s face it, it’s a strange collection of individuals. Still Dubya is clearly worse than the worst.
Advocatus_Diaboli: Are you familiar with what an American joke is? The Japanese use it to refer to a joke that is either 1) confusing, 2) not funny, or a combination of 1 and 2. In my book, pointing out some random typo or brain fart on the internet isn’t that funny. Oh wait, I get it now!! Some non-important person I’ve never heard of made a fool of himself on the internets, har har har…
Gallowglass: atheotes: I was going to try some lame Welcome Back, Kotter joke (the Sweathogs attended James Buchanan High) until I checked Google and learned that there actually are about a dozen James Buchanan High Schools in this country.
Gallowglass: Buchanan gets points for trying to get his boyfriend named VP. Truly this ‘bachelor president’ was a progenitor of the closet case Republican Party of today.
Um, the Murray-Blessing survey of 800 some-odd historians ranked George the First up there in the top 10 (Murray, Blessing, The Journal of American History, vol. 71, No 3, Dec. 1983). He makes one of the 8th or 7th top presidents in respected (one would presume) surveys by several historians.
George is responsible for the United States remaining a Republic, and not drifting into a monarchy (until much later under another George).
See here. And here
Ol’ Wooden Choppers gets my vote. He was also the first to put down a rebellion, and folks in Western Pennsylvania are apparently still bitter about it.
But Lincoln was president during the Civil War (which rather overshadows such accomplishments as building the Transcontinental Railroad and purchasing Alaska) and events over the last 50 years or so have left me with the impression that those of us who come from the rational thinking part of the country might have been a lot better off if Lincoln had continued Buchanan’s policies.
gurukalehuru: Ditto. What I love about G.Dub the First is that he is so often pictured with a pursed, flatline grimace and a stern look in his eyes. Hence he was likely one surly dude, pragmatic in the extreme. Tall and quiet yes, not as profound as he appears, probably, but my suspicion is his teeth were not the only thing made of wood.
So,can we expect an even bigger SALE on TRUCKNUTZ, today?
Also out there this week is yet another dumb, misinformed political “list,” this time from C-SPAN. Everyone by now knows that, in reality, there was no real Republican resurgence, revolution, power or anything. Nothing. Zilch. The cold, hard, reality is—and magazines such as “CQ” should know better, for God’s sake–that the Republican administrations of Reagan, Bush I and Bush II were three of the worst presidencies in the history of the United States, these fiefdoms pushed our progress back by 50 years in every way at every level, they were completely out of touch with the U.S. zeitgeist and the international zeitgeist. So any high ranking of the Reagan, Bush I or Bush II presidencies are just the wayward ramblings of delusional psychos.
not everyone knows this, but if you wipe away some of the snow, the giant stone phallus has a single word engraved on its side and that word is: MOTHER
Washington may have been our first president, but Bush was our
FIRST! president.
Numbat Dundee: President Grant gets the nod for ‘best facial hair’ amongst the Bears… some hold on to $50s just for the portrait…
Take a look: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Series2004NoteFront_50.jpg