From the NY Daily News:
Indeed, one of the worst-kept secrets in Bush World is the dismay, in some cases disdain, harbored by many senior aides of the former President toward the administration of his son - 41 and 43, as many call them, political shorthand that refers to their numerical places in American presidential history.
For five years, the 41s have bit their collective tongues as, they complain, the 43s ignored their counsel. But as the war in Iraq has worsened and public support for the current administration has tanked, loyalists of the elder Bush have found it impossible to suppress their disillusionment - particularly their belief that many of 43's policies are a stick in the eye of his father.
"Forty-three has now repudiated everything 41 stands for, and still he won't say a word," a key member of the elder Bush alumni said. "Personally, I think he's dying inside."
4 comments:
I wouldn't rank Poppa Bush in the top ten but I wouldn't put him in the bottom ten either.
Polk (Mexican American War), Harding, Nixon, Fillmore, Buchanan, Grant, Baby Bush, Pierce, Tyler, Andrew Johnson, Benjamin Harrison, Coolidge, and Van Buren were all considerably worse than he was (William Henry Harrison and Garfield excluded for kicking off too soon).
I'd argue that you could rank Reagan under Bush41 as well.
How about Andrew Jackson?
I'm torn on Jackson. You can't get around the Trail of Tears and the rest of his war on Indians (note to trolls: Jackson's actions were ruled illegal by the Supreme Court--I'm not hating America).
On the other hand, historians tend to rank Jackson well (although they rank Polk pretty well too and I hate his guts).
Jackson did open the government at least to poor whites which was probably the most anyone could realistically do at the time. He fought the banking industry which might have been misguided but you'd never see a president do that today.
Also his efforts in the Battle of New Orleans turned the War of 1812 from a humiliating defeat to a half-way respectable defeat.
Also in the fighting, Charles Darwin's grandfather (not Erasamus) was shot in the buttocks, causing him to drop the military life and retire to build a scientific library at home. Without Jackson, Gramps might have stayed in the army and Charlie would never have got interested in science. We'd all be fundamentalists, believing the world is only 6,000 years old.
Okay, maybe that's a stretch but all in all, I'm still soft on Jackson.
Interesting... I'm easier on Polk and more antagonistic towards Jackson. To me, Jackson is just an 1820s version of Yosemite Sam.
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