Cross posted at Left Coast Rebel
#4 Ronald Reagan – Ronaldus Magnus is without a doubt my personal favorite president and it is with great difficulty I do not put him closer to #1 in this list. He defeated what was arguably our mightiest foe in our short history and he did so without firing a shot while encouraging many of the wonderful technological advances we enjoy today through his push for space supremacy. Reviled by the press, he nonetheless spoke directly to the hearts of the American people. That ability and his wit and charm lead to the biggest electoral landslide in history. He understood the fight we would be in for the hearts and minds of our children’s children. He is the father of modern conservatism. Despite the smear jobs of liberal historians and the press will say, he was extremely well read and supremely knowledgeable of the issues and history. One of his main advantages was that he was nearly always underestimated because of his looks, age, or because of his sense of humor. In my mind, when I picture the President of the United States he is who I suspect I will always see. There is simply no comparison to any president who has come since, and many who came before. I would support cloning if it meant bringing him back. I would like to dynamite Roosevelt’s face right off of Rushmore and put Reagan there.
#3 Abraham Lincoln - warned the South in his inaugural address “in your hands my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of Civil War. The government will not assail you…you have not an oath registered in heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect, and defend it.” After defeating the Confederacy the enemy combatants were for the most part pardoned, the President encouraged southerners to lay down their arms and join speedily in re-union. Reconstruction would likely have been vastly different had Lincoln not been assassinated, in his second inaugural address he said: “With malice toward none, with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nations wounds…” His assassination turned reconstruction into the military occupation and subjugation of the South…creating more wounds instead of healing them…the assassination…not his presidency. I learn and adjust my positions when I am wrong. I have learned much in the last year regarding the civil war, Lincoln helped fulfill the promise of the founding. That being said, I am still not sure it is illegal for states to secede.
#2 Thomas Jefferson - “I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man” Jefferson took that oath literally. After the wars and crisis in France passed he reduced the armed forces, cut the budget, eliminated the onerous whiskey tax, and reduced the debt by third. He sent the marines to whip up on the Barbary Pirates harassing shipping in the Med , Responsible for the Louisiana purchase. Sent Louis And Clark on the Voyage of Discovery to map our territory, an endeavor very literally equal to the Moonshot in its audacity for the time.
#1 George Washington – The indispensible man. The only man that the founders all agreed on to lead them. Led the continental army through to victory in what should have been an unwinnable war, then became our first president. Saw early on the flaws in the Articles of Confederation and became a prime mover for the Constitutional Convention. Accurately foresaw what the two parties would do to politics in this nation, and in his Farewell Address urged his countrymen to limit excessive party spirit, and geographical distinctions and warned against long term alliances with foreign powers (advice we obviously have not kept). He was actually asked by many to become King…a title he vehemently refused. To be begged to be King and to refuse it, that is Character. There was never any doubt, or should not be, who is our greatest president ever.
For the rest of the countdowns:
Worst Presidents of All Time: 20-11; 10-1
Best Presidents of All Time: 10-8; 7-5
-KOOK
Logging you in...
Trestin · 767 weeks ago
KOOK 91p · 767 weeks ago
Andrew33 103p · 767 weeks ago
Andrew33 103p · 767 weeks ago
I strongly suggest reading all of the still existing correspondence between Lincoln and Karl Marx. I had never heard about Lincoln being so chummy with Marx before a year ago. Since reading that in an old book, I have spent much time digging into this topic. Marx worked at and printed his communist propaganda through Lincoln's newspaper to send back to Germany.
1st question: Was Lincoln smart enough to know what his newspaper was printing? I tend to think so.
So, for the last year I have read the letters that pen pals Abe Lincoln and Karl Marx. Keep in mind Lincoln was a very private man and rarely if ever wrote anyone as much as Marx. As it turns out, the early "Republican" party was well funded by Marx and his "workers party" pals. Those letters are full of concepts we hear as code words today. redistribution, social justice, etc. The very last letter Marx wrote to Lincoln (after his death) expressed joy by the marxist political party over "their" victory in Lincoln's reelection. The war was all but over and Lincoln could get to the business of transforming America.
So, we have the original communist funding the birth of the "republican party", which held total power from the end of the Civil War to the turn of the century right at the time that the seeds of "progressivism" took root in America. Interestingly, there was a group within the early Republican Party who held all the power and defined their agenda. They were known as "radical Republicans". Back to Lincoln, he never led during peacetime. The only things Lincoln accomplished were successfully prosecuting a war and the "Emancipation Proclamation, which was good, but it did nothing more than told Southernors to give up slavery. Apparently, how freedmen were treated after being free didn't matter. Or is it possible that a marxist element in our government decided poor free ex slaves were the perfect foundation for a welfare state. By the time TR was elected as a "progressive" Republican, progressivism was an established concept with clear goals. Those are the same goals Marx and Lincoln chat about in those letters. Ever find it odd that the "south" did not wait to see what newly elected Lincoln's policies would be before going into open revolt? It sounds like they thought Lincoln was quite an extremist. I have a mounting pile of evidence that supports that notion.
*note* I see today's Republican party as having been reborn under Reagan, but many in the "Republican establishment" don't see it that way, which explains the Repub's leftward lurch after Reagan and Newt Gingrich were out of the picture.
So, did I just say that Abe Lincoln was a marxist? Read the letters between Lincoln and Marx available online and decide for your self. If we are going to judge BHO by his associations (which proved to be very accurate) shouldn't we do the same for Lincoln? Could this be what BHO really meant when he said he idolized Lincoln so while campaigning in 07-08? Now, everyone who reads this will probably cut my head off for this, but those letters prove that Lincoln at bear minimum sympathized with Marxist politics. I say to any detractor, forget Lincoln's name and monument and look at the facts instead of believing everything you think you know about historical figures like Lincoln. Lincoln did usher in to power the party that set the foundation for Marxism in the US during the reconstruction era. It's at least worth a look. Personally I am unsure about Lincoln's ideology. So far, as I dig into this topic more, it looks far more like the Lincoln we know from history is a far cry from the real Lincoln.
conservative girl · 767 weeks ago
I also think that it is very easy to say what would be different had he not been killed. We will never know. I also have read in some history books that he had no intention of integrating blacks into this country, he ideal was to round them up and return them to Africa. I don't think that is something to be heralding either.
Andrew33 103p · 767 weeks ago
KOOK 91p · 767 weeks ago
Andrew33 103p · 767 weeks ago
Andrew33 103p · 767 weeks ago
KOOK 91p · 767 weeks ago
KOOK 91p · 767 weeks ago
Andrew33 103p · 767 weeks ago
KOOK 91p · 767 weeks ago
Andrew33 103p · 766 weeks ago
Sent from my iPhone