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| quote: | Originally posted by jerZ07002
from 80-90 the US experienced a 22M increase in population. His presidency also began in a severe recession in which the unemployment rate was >10%. Business naturally goes through cycles. He was fortunate enough to be on the upswing. Job creation during his presidency was less a result of reagan policies and more a result of population growth and the natural business cycle. |
Ah.. so, lowering the tax rate from 70% to 28% definitely didn't have a positive affect on the business climate. It was just the typical ebb and flow. Jimmy Carter was all about bad timing, and Regan good timing.
| quote: | | who cares. i hate when republicans cite this. social forces bigger than reagan were at play. |
Plenty of Poles, Ukranians, Czechs, Germans, Slovakians, Bulgarians, Romanians, etc. care... I would guess. Sure there were plenty of other social forces at play, but it's not just a coincidence that Regan was president when it happened... he in effect put things in play that caused their economy to crumble within itself.
| quote: | | 1) he was also the first president since the end of WW2 that increased the national debt over his presidency. |
Yes... which he lamented after leaving office was his biggest regret and failure as a president. At least the man didn't try to pass the buck.
| quote: | | that was the independent actions of Paul volker, the fed chairman during the 1980s, appointed by Jimmy Carter in 1979. (NJ native!!!) Reagan had nothing to do with ending the stagflation problem. |
I'm not an economist, but I find it hard to believe that Regan's policies seriously had nothing to do with the economy getting back on track. That's a crazy statement.
But my point is really that there's no reason to villfiy him like Krypton did, as if he is evil incarnate. That list put out by C-SPAN is a joke! Washington's presidency, and his voluntary retirement after two terms, saved America from the establishment of a new royalty. FDR, comes in at number 3 while being the only American President to refuse to follow Washington's precedent, and Congress eventually had to place explicit term limits on the office after FDR's president-for-life ambitions.
Andrew Malcom sums up the rest nicely:
| quote: | Kennedy doesn't belong on the top ten, either. Kennedy was definitely an inspirational figure in American politics, but his presidency was a mess. He fumbled the Cold War badly enough to prompt the USSR to build the Berlin Wall, and nearly started a nuclear war over Cuba with his fecklessness. He jumped into the Vietnam War when France withdrew, and meddled significantly with Vietnam's government to exacerbate the crisis. His successor LBJ comes in at #11 despite making the situation even worse. Reagan ended the Cold War in victory and restored American economic health, and yet trails JFK by four positions.
I find it terribly ironic that Harry Truman gets ranked as #5 now. I don't have a big issue with that ranking, but when he left office, he was less popular than George W Bush, who comes in at #36 in this survey. But was Truman more important than Thomas Jefferson, who doubled the size of the nation with the Louisiana Purchase and set the stage for Manifest Destiny? I know JFK wasn't a better President than Jefferson, which alone makes this survey deeply suspect. |
Basically, this list is top heavy with media favorites rather than a serious look at the accomplishments of each President.
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