u/BudgetLaw2352

Source for the quote:

Just a little reminder that Reagan’s political shift conveniently came around the time that Democrats started supporting more intense Civil Rights measures, and Republicans like Barry Goldwater were courting Southern voters through raising attacks against the Civil Rights Act.

Reagan opposed the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act when they passed, so whatever distorted impression he gave later is inaccurate.

There’s a reason that MLK Jr’s family were outspoken critics of the Reagan admin.

Also, before anyone says anything, the ONLY reason why Reagan signed the bill for a day dedicated to Dr. King was because of the overwhelming Congressional support for such a measure. He had initially opposed it.

This may be a stupid question, but here goes.

One of Nixon’s most admired US presidents was Woodrow Wilson; Nixon greatly respected Wilson’s approach to foreign affairs, particularly praising Wilson’s advocacy for American intervention worldwide to stabilize American interests abroad. Additionally, while Nixon wasn’t ideologically a progressive on the economic front, I always got the impression that he leaned towards progressive policies when it came to aid for the poor, the elderly, the disabled, etc. He wasn’t personally, deeply interested in these policies, but he was willing to support them if it meant that he could garner votes.

All of that being said, if Nixon was so economically progressive in his policy platform (particularly when compared to later Republicans), and if he liked Wilson so much, why did he run for his first Congressional race in 1946 as a Republican?

Was California so red at the time that it would have been unthinkable to run as a Democrat anywhere in the state?

Whenever I read about Nixon, he doesn’t seem like a fiscal hawk in the way that Ike and many other Republicans were. Thus, it seems odd that Nixon would have identified as a Republican.

Marching orders came in for the Republicans. Apparently, if you support blank checks for Americans (checks that will surely spur inflation), you DON’T support socialism, but you DO support socialism if you support that money going to “illegal aliens”.

Also, you DON’T support communism if you support the executive branch controlling all elections and the postal service, but you DO support socialism if you don’t want ICE shooting unarmed people in the streets.

It must have been a terrifying experience to have Johnson giving you “the treatment” while you were just minding your business as you walked to your office on Capitol Hill.

Man was a menace.

At least his domestic legislation was great.

I have some candidates above, as I think that all of the above presidents demonstrated a pretty impressive proficiency for understanding and interacting with the leaders of other countries in the pursuit of American geopolitical interests. For the purposes of this question, while the Secretary of State can be cited in defense of a particular choice, I am more concerned with how the President himself engaged with other heads of state or heads of government.

Obviously, this question is difficult to quantify into a firm hierarchy, so multiple answers for the most effective president on the foreign stage are certainly possible.

Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, and even George HW Bush (before he joined Reagan’s ticket) tried to warn the country about trickle down economics. Reagan found a way to successfully sell income inequality and austerity.

Interestingly enough, Eisenhower felt that Nixon shouldn’t have participated in the 1960 debates, as he told Nixon that this would only serve to elevate Kennedy’s national profile and standing with the electorate. Nixon had already built a profile in his famous case in the House committee on un-American activities, where he was able to get Alger Hiss convicted on perjury charges. Additionally, he had served as the attack dog of Eisenhower’s administration as his vice president.

Nixon, who had famously saved his career through the medium of television in his famous “Checkers speech” to dispel allegations of improper campaign fund use, ignored the advice.

He went on to be viewed by the television viewers of the debate as having lost the debate, (while the smaller quantity of radio listeners said that he won the debate). Nixon appeared haggard (having suffered a knee injury before the debate) and sickly, while JFK appeared extremely poised and handsome.

Given that the election was one of the closest in presidential history (just a 0.17% difference in the popular vote), was Nixon’s choice ultimately what did him in? Would Ike’s advice have changed the outcome?

This comes across as a bit of a rant, and it might be, but there seems to be this weird phenomenon where Republicans (really since the 1980s) tried to co-opt Truman’s legacy as part of their own.

Over the years that I’ve had political discussions, I’ve heard Truman brought up by Republicans as “one of the good Democrats” who wasn’t a “big government liberal” like LBJ, Carter (ironically, Carter was far more conservative than Truman), or Obama.

I’m here to correct that record. Truman was not a conservative. He was a liberal Democrat.

Here are a few quotes from him to illustrate this point:

1. Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home--but not for housing. They are strong for labor--but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor minimum wage--the smaller the minimum wage the better. They endorse educational opportunity for all--but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools. They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine--for people who can afford them. They consider electrical power a great blessing--but only when the private power companies get their rake-off. They think American standard of living is a fine thing--so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire of Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.

2. Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a Republican. I repeat myself.

3. The Republicans believe in the minimum wage-the more the minimum, the better.

4. Socialism is a scare word they have hurled at every advance the people have made in the last 20 years.
Socialism is what they called public power. Socialism is what they called social security. Socialism is what they called farm price supports. Socialism is what they called bank deposit insurance. Socialism is what they called the growth of free and independent labor organizations. Socialism is their name for almost anything that helps all the people. When the Republican candidate inscribes the slogan "Down With Socialism" on the banner of his "great crusade," that is really not what he means at all. What he really means is "Down with Progress--down with Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal," and "down with Harry Truman's fair Deal." That's all he means.

While I could provide many more quotes, I’ll move onto policies.

Truman was a fundamental champion of the New Deal and progressive legislation to fix the problems that everyday Americans were facing. He wasn’t merely a foreign policy hawk who took action against the USSR (although this action was extremely important).

1. The Wagner-Murray-Dingell Bill of 1945:

This bill was the first of its kind. Truman wanted a universal healthcare program that would be paid for by federal taxes. This was one of the first attempts to make healthcare universal in the country’s history, and although it failed, it demonstrated Truman’s commitment to fulfilling the promises of his Fair Deal program of legislation.

2. The Housing Act of 1949:

Truman passed a bill in 1949 to federally subsidize the creation of public housing across the country. This was an extremely impactful piece of legislation, leading to a surge of home construction in the 1950s.

3. Minimum wage increase of 1949:

Truman nearly doubled the national minimum wage from 40 cents/hour to 75 cents an hour as part of his Fair Deal.

These are just a few of the policies that Truman passed to enact his legislative agenda. Much of it would be stymied by Republicans (who took the Congress from ‘47-‘49, with conservative, southern Democrats often halting Truman’s agenda as well).

As such, Truman shouldn’t be claimed by conservatives as one of theirs, because he wasn’t. Truman was a liberal Democrat til his dying day (hence why he loved LBJ’s administration), and any attempt to claim him as a conservative or as an outlier amongst FDR or LBJ is wrong. He would NOT “be a Republican if he were alive today” as so many claim.

This article from CBS goes over some similar points.

There’s been a lot of discussion about the legislative obstruction that Obama faced in the latter 6 years of his presidency (with Republicans gaining the House in 2010 and the Senate in 2014), and this inevitably led to what many would consider to be an unproductive 6 years in the domestic side of things.

That being said, I wanted to get more specific on the question of Obama’s legislative record. Clearly, his first two years were quite productive, with the ACA and financial recovery legislation serving as defining moments of his presidency. However, as stated previously, his latter 6 years were largely unproductive on the domestic side, and I am curious about whether or not Republicans’ obstruction of Obama’s agenda was solely to blame for the lack of legislative progress, or if Obama could have done more to overcome the impasse.

Despite being extremely intelligent and academically gifted, from my reading on President Obama, he didn’t seem to be a great interpersonal communicator in the same way as Reagan or Clinton. Ergo, while Reagan or Clinton would be schmoozing Congressional leaders and fence sitters to vote on their legislation, President Obama didn’t really want to get on that often unsavory level. He often left Senator Reid and Speaker Pelosi to do the relationship management between the Congress and White House, according to a Politico article.

A New York Times article corroborates this with some pretty interesting insights:

Mr. Reid seethed quietly for the rest of the meeting, according to four separate accounts provided by people who spoke with him about it. After his return to the Capitol that afternoon, Mr. Reid told other senators and his staff members that he was astonished by how disengaged the president seemed. After all, these were Mr. Obama’s own ambassadors who were being blocked by Mr. McConnell, and Secretary of State John Kerry had been arguing for months that getting them installed was an urgent necessity for the administration.

But the impression the president left with Mr. Reid was clear: Capitol Hill is not my problem.
To Democrats in Congress who have worked with Mr. Obama, the indifference conveyed to Mr. Reid, one of the president’s most indispensable supporters, was frustratingly familiar. In one sense, Mr. Obama’s response was a reminder of what made him such an appealing figure in the first place: his almost innate aversion to the partisan squabbles that have left Americans so jaded and disgruntled with their political system. But nearly six years into his term, with his popularity at the lowest of his presidency, Mr. Obama appears remarkably distant from his own party on Capitol Hill, with his long neglect of would-be allies catching up to him.
In interviews, nearly two dozen Democratic lawmakers and senior congressional aides suggested that Mr. Obama’s approach has left him with few loyalists to effectively manage the issues erupting abroad and at home and could imperil his efforts to leave a legacy in his final stretch in office.

This excerpt is pretty telling. However, I don’t want to take away the fault that Republicans bear. They were often operating in bad faith, and they cast the ultimate blow by not letting Obama even have his final SCOTUS nominee taken up for a vote by the Senate.

However, this is a question directed outward for those who are more familiar with the dynamics. Can we say with any certainty whether or not, had Obama taken a different course with his relationship with Congress, if his latter 6 years would have been unproductive as they were?

The man was smitten with her from the very beginning. He even drove her to dates with other men for months before asking her out himself.

Perhaps the only sweet spot to Nixon’s hardened and weary soul was his wife. When she died in June of 1993, Nixon essentially lost all will to live. He would pass away roughly 10 months later in April of 1994.

Edit: As some have pointed out, all that glitters is not gold. Dick, despite this affection, frequently acted in a frankly disgusting way to Pat. Such a shame.

I am generally less aware about Presidents before the 1900s, so feel free to speak on one of those, but in my opinion, the presidents featured above seemed to be the most concerned with their personal legacy, revealed through their policies, their demeanor while in office, and their private thoughts or correspondence with others.

I find it fascinating to think of what would go through a president’s mind, particularly after the First World War, when America truly became a world power.

I often shiver at the awesome burden of occupying the most powerful office in the most powerful country in human history, and I know for myself, I’d at least be somewhat curious about how I’d be remembered after I die.

Interested to hear your thoughts (feel free to talk about a president not featured above)!!

Edit: sorry about the image resolution. The images appeared better in my camera roll before uploading them.

Reagan was a bad President (particularly on his domestic policy), but god was he witty with his humor. He had actually rehearsed his answer to that question (which was inevitably going to come up during one of the debates given that Reagan was the oldest man to run for the Presidency at that point).

The day after the ‘84 election, Walter Mondale said that Reagan’s joke (“I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I will not use my opponent’s youth and inexperience against him in this campaign”) was when he was 100% sure that he was going to lose.

I feel bad for Mondale, man. I think he would have been a good President for what it’s worth.

I highly encourage you all to watch the first and second 1984 debates just to see the contrast. Reagan bombed the first debate (sounding tired, confused, and old). Mondale had good momentum and was making really cogent criticisms of the Reagan admin.

In the second debate, Reagan focused much less on data and numbers (which were causing him to pause awkwardly to remember) and he relied on his insane levels of affability, and it worked like a charm.

I thought I’d make this post to inquire about what people thought regarding not merely the candidates’ personalities, but what policy platform that you all felt would best serve the American public.

While I have a few contenders present, I’d have to say that my top three policy platforms post-1960 were:

1. Lyndon Banes Johnson

2. Al Gore

3. Michael Dukakis

For LBJ, the results speak for themselves. SNAP, Medicare, Medicaid, funding for affordable housing, funding for education, the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act, and so, so much more. LBJ was a policy master and genuinely transformed America into a much better place.

For Al Gore and Michael Dukakis, I simply respected their plain speaking, no nonsense, by the book platform to maintain fiscal responsibility while investing in the things I care about: education, healthcare, paying down the deficit (or in Gore’s case, just the debt), and smart tax policies that only cut taxes for the small businesses that will stimulate economic growth and job creation.

I’m excited to see other perspectives.

In Terminator 2, while the t800 repairs the truck at Enrique’s hideout, John says to the t800 regarding his father, Kyle Reese: I wish I could have met my real dad.

The t800 simply replies: You will. This is referring to John meeting Kyle to give him the photograph of Sarah and assign him on the mission to go back in time and protect her.

What made me sad is, while John, Sarah, and the t800 defeated Skynet once and for all by destroying Cyberdyne and the remnants of the first t800 sent back in time, John won’t ever get to meet his father in this timeline.

Yes, Sarah will always be able to tell John about her and Kyle’s single night together, but ironically enough, this comes from a Kyle who knew a John Connor who will never exist, with Kyle Reese (who was born after Judgement Day) never existing.

There’s an indescribable sadness in knowing that John is all that remains of a timeline that would never be and a man who gave his life for the woman he loved. Kyle would never know that in giving his life, he had ensured that humanity would prevail.

John would never meet that man, with his very existence being the only thing remaining of Kyle’s in the universe.

While he’s largely forgotten in modern political discourse, Senator Bob Dole of Kansas, who’s 27-year tenure went from 1969-1996, was a household name for Americans throughout the 70s, 80s, and especially the 90s.

Dole was a war hero of WWII, taking machine gun fire to his back while leading a charge against German forces in Castel d’Aiano. This resulted in his permanent and near-total loss of function in his right arm and hand, hence why Dole always featured a pen in his right hand.

Dole had a very quick rise to prominence, as only 8 years after his election to the Senate, he was already selected by Gerald Ford to serve as his running mate in the very close 1976 election.

Of course, from there, Dole would go on to have a distinguished career as a longstanding leader of the Republican Senate Caucus (be they in the minority or majority), and he would eventually go on to become his party’s nominee in ‘96, albeit losing in a landslide.

However, my question is about 1973.

Now, Dole would have been a hard sell for the Democratic House and Senate (which had to vote for the nominee by majority vote in both chambers). Dole was much more partisan and nationally focused than Ford was, and while Dole had a good relationship with his Democratic colleagues, Democrats weren’t going to shoot themselves in the foot by voting for a man who could potentially beat them in a future Presidential election.

That being said, let’s say Dole magically is able to secure the vote and is successfully appointed Nixon’s VP, assuming office in ‘74. How does history potentially change?

Does Dole stand a better chance in ‘76 against Carter? Does he fend off Reagan’s challenge for party leadership and direction?

In keeping to the same spirit of my expression of thoughts regarding the ‘92 election, I thought I’d do a little write-up on my thoughts on the Clinton years, Bill’s efficacy as A) a politician B) as a leader of the Democratic Party (to which I belong) and C) his legislative and policy record as a whole. 

In order to avoid any undue suspense as to whether or not I consider Clinton a “good” President, I will assuage any curiosity of my estimation of Clinton on net; Clinton was no doubt a good President with unrivaled competence, and very reputable as an ally to our friends and international partners. That said, I must submit that I find his presidency to be one that is disappointing in spite of his legacy as a truly “good” President, for he wasn’t “great” in the sense that I would consider Lyndon Johnson or Harry Truman to be “great”, but I’ll speak on that further into this write up. 

Clinton’s election in ‘92 was an utter volcanic eruption of optimism and passion for the future. At the time, Clinton had by far the largest inaugural crowd in American history, with people genuinely excited about the “Man from Hope” (Bill had been born close to a town called Hope, Arkansas). 

In line with the enthusiastic tenor of the historical moment that Bill was elected on, he stated during his first inaugural address: 

And so today, we pledge an end to the era of deadlock and drift; a new season of American renewal has begun. To renew America, we must be bold. We must do what no generation has had to do before. We must invest more in our own people, in their jobs, in their future, and at the same time cut our massive debt. And we must do so in a world in which we must compete for every opportunity. It will not be easy; it will require sacrifice. But it can be done, and done fairly, not choosing sacrifice for its own sake, but for our own sake. We must provide for our nation the way a family provides for its children.

As such, the Clinton Presidency began, and Clinton embarked on a political project of American revival with undercurrents of the 1960s and 1970s Democratic tradition of progressive policies. In this tradition, during Bill’s first two years, he passed some legitimately progressive (and in many cases, hotly demanded) pieces of legislation in keeping with his mandate: the Family and Medical Leave Act (allowing families to have federally protected time off of work for sick loved ones), the Voter Motor Act (allowing ppl to register to vote at DMVs), the 1993 Budget Reconciliation Act, which raised taxes moderately on the wealthy and less so on the middle class to control the deficit. 

Additionally, even if not necessarily progressive, the 1994 Crime Bill was universally lauded for addressing a legitimately shocking crime rate in the 1980s. 

However, despite these legislative wins, a broad resurgence in the American economy as a result of the dot com boom, and in spite of Clinton’s extremely effective style of communication and collaboration with Congress, all that glittered was not gold. 

For one thing, the nature of media was fundamentally changing, and this change would springboard a political change that would largely take shape during Clinton’s tenure. 

If you were holding your breath for the one of the dour parts of the Clinton saga, this is one of the low points: division and slander, thy name is Rush Limbaugh. 

Limbaugh, who started his radio show in 1984 (becoming nationally syndicated by 1988 and nationally relevant by the time of the 1992 election, having as many as 20 million weekly listeners) would forever change the nature of political commentary and “news” forever. 

Many people of voting age during the ‘92 election had at least a peripheral familiarity with the likes of Tom Brokaw, Bernard Shaw, and perhaps most famous, Walter Cronkite. These were media figures who were household names in America, and they were household names because, while they occasionally offered their own insights onto the current events of the time, they were trusted pundits who offered a levelheaded, even-tempered analysis of the issues to an electorate that didn’t have information at their fingertips as we do now. 

Limbaugh was something entirely different. Rather than report on news in a factual manner befitting a respectable news outfit, rather than distinguish himself based on his cadence, his seriousness, his constancy, Limbaugh himself became the main attraction. He would pound his hand on the desk in exasperation at even the slightest of perceived slights (such as a reporter stating that the Clinton economy was improving). 

Did the factual rigor of such tirades matter? Not at all. The attraction was that Limbaugh had found a way to completely circumvent the traditional media paradigm of capturing American audiences based on a respected and trusted record of factual reporting, instead making news about the volume of your voice when you bloviate in opposition to the “establishment”, and the props and gimmicks in your studio (Limbaugh often employed dumbed-down visual aids to make simplistic, dogmatic attacks even more simple to understand). 

The consequences for the Clinton administration were dire. Despite a growing economy, shrinking deficit, falling crime rates, and growing jobs, the Limbaugh method of baseless attacks and tabloid-esque slander was working. 

Despite having one of the slimmest, most efficient governments in modern history, and despite actually going beyond where many Democrats wanted to go in budget cuts to bring down the deficit, Limbaugh still was defining the popular perception of Clinton as a “big government”, bureaucratic, Carter-esque liberal.

Then, came the healthcare proposal. 

Affordable healthcare isn’t just a contemporary issue for voters. As far back as FDR and Truman, there have been impassioned discussions about the need for universal healthcare and how we ought to go about implementing such a policy. In fact, Nixon had himself been open to the prospect of passing a universal healthcare plan, and while Carter also expressed interest, he couldn’t agree with the Congress on how to do it.

Then came Clinton. In his ‘92 campaign, while Clinton didn’t really mention healthcare extensively (it was a part of his platform, but not overwhelmingly so), it was clear (especially from his primary debates) that Clinton had become deeply concerned with the skyrocketing healthcare costs that were saddling individual healthcare recipients and small businesses with medical debt and untenable insurance costs. The issue got so bad that George HW Bush was forced to offer a skeleton of a plan during the ‘92 campaign, although this wasn’t taken with extreme seriousness. 

Upon Clinton’s inauguration, he immediately set out to take advantage of his Democratic trifecta to pass what was coined the “Clinton Healthcare Initiative”. 

Clinton would soon make one of the greatest political miscalculations of his life: making his partner, his trusted advisor, and his beloved wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, in charge of the initiative. 

Mind you, Hillary was (and still is) an extremely tenacious, adept, passionate woman who had always been unapologetic in her opinions and her convictions. Bill would often jokingly refer to his relationship to Hillary in context of the Presidency as “two for the price of one”, as he saw her as a legitimately brilliant and trusted advisor.

However, this move was politically shortsighted for multiple reasons. 

A: Clinton had effectively announced the healthcare campaign with very little coordination with the Democratic National Committee or with their campaign staff to cogently message the healthcare plan

B: He had effectively kept Democrats in Congress out of the loop on the actual drafting of the proposal for the healthcare initiative, choosing to present it as a massive omnibus bill, rather than in manageable, piecemeal chunks to be considered and argued for.

C: He put Hillary in charge of the effort.

Now, I need to focus on that last part, because it is the most importantly to understanding where things go forward. As I said above, Hillary Clinton was about as intelligent and driven as any politician on the Hill, and she had the record of working for children’s interests as a lawyer in Chicago and Arkansas. That being said, she just simply wasn’t liked. No matter what Hillary did or said, she was always portrayed or perceived as a domineering, stubborn, uncompromising battle axe who supplanted the traditional role of the First Lady as a somewhat politically neutral hostess of the White House. What Bill and Hillary failed to realize was that the country was still deeply distrustful of a woman with that much power, and her assertiveness and persistence made her intimidate a lot of people. 

Rush Limbaugh ran with this in SPADES. His broadcasts were chalked full of wild, panicky addresses about how “Hillarycare” was going to make our healthcare “communist” and how there would be death panels for seniors, rationing of medications, no more elective surgeries, etc, etc. 

Bill and Hillary either were unwilling to respond to the right wing attacks against the healthcare plan (with many in their own party growing nervous about it), or unable. The result was politically disastrous, as in September of ‘94, the one of Bill’s most desired aims for his first term, universal healthcare, was defeated resoundingly. 

Additionally, a new threat to Clinton’s legislative record was on the horizon, a Georgia man who would prove to define Clinton’s presidency for the next 6 years. While you might think I am referring to Jimmy Carter, I am in fact referring to Newt Gingrich, Republican member of the House since 1979. 

Gingrich had been on the back foot of government for quite a while, and by the 1990s, was wholly accustomed to political minority. Democrats had controlled the House since 1954, after all, so Gingrich was no stranger to political hardship. 

That said, Gingrich would define a key political battle 4 years before his historic victory against the Clinton agenda in ‘94. In 1990, President Bush had consistently governed as a moderate Republican, passing legislation that was often either dead in the center of the national sentiment, or somehow even left of center. The Reagan coalition of conservative Republicans was not happy. 

What made them even MORE unhappy, however, was that Bush was pressing the Congress to pass a tax increase on the wealthy to bring down the deficit. For quite a while, Gingrich took a radical step: he opposed the Bush budget agreement as Republican minority leader. This was in effect the beginning of his career in the national spotlight. Gingrich saw Bush as a betrayal of the supply side economics revolution that Reagan had built. 

This revolution would only morph and grow with time, as Gingrich, after 1992, found himself as the ideological forebearer of the right wing in America. He was an unlikely leader (short, nasally voice, not a gifted orator, and held at arms’ length by colleagues, including Dole). 

That said, Gingrich was nothing if not unfathomably tenacious and politically adept. He immediately co-opted the Limbaugh language of division and scorn of Clinton, framing himself as the arbiter of the “Contract with America”, a seemingly “common sense” document to bring about sanity and “family values” back to the country. Again, it didn’t matter that the economy was growing faster than in the previous 12 years or that the deficit was cut in half, Gingrich framed Clinton as yet another government bureaucrat who wanted to “socialize” healthcare and tax people into poverty. 

This, combined with many of the Reagan era coming of voting age, resulted in a political avalanche that shattered 40 years of Democratic House control. 

Gingrich swept the House, having a comfortable majority of 230 Republicans, and the Senate was won comfortably as well, with Dole leading with a majority of 53-47. 

It cannot be overstated how much this devastated an already bereft Clinton, who would also lose his mother to breast cancer in ‘94. In the span of three months, Clinton had lost not only one of his seminal political causes, but was the first Democrat since Harry Truman to have a Republican House. This loss was seen by Clinton as a fundamental rejection of his ‘92 mandate, and for roughly 6 months or so, many thought that Clinton could very well be yet another President doomed to one term. A Guardian article from after the midterm shellacking states:

Losing the mid-term elections The Comeback Kid has been shot off his horse, and a Democratic era in Congress has bitten the dust with Bill Clinton 's humiliation. A crucial part of the presidential myth has been gunned down. He had come back after defeat in Arkansas, come back again after defeat in the first New Hampshire primary in the 1992 election, and recovered from third place in the polls to win the White House with a shrunken, 43 per cent mandate.
But Clinton could not come back this time. This election was a deeply personal verdict against a President who had campaigned himself hoarse, who had clawed back some much-needed foreign policy successes, and whose achievements in cutting the deficit and delivering economic growth could not mollify an angry electorate.

The message was clearer than crystal: Clitnon’s approach had to change, and fast. 

Here is where my analysis reaches its climactic peak, as while Clinton was evidently electorally successful (‘96 being a damned good testament to this), as I said in my title, Clinton was ideologically ungrounded, or perhaps more accurately put, uprooted. 

For Clinton didn’t just sit on his hands and steam at his midterm election loss. He had an ace up his sleeve: Dick Morris.

Now, since this essay is becoming a book, I don’t want to get into the weeds on Dick’s background, but suffice it to say, he was to Bill Clinton what jelly is to peanut butter on a PB&J. Rather than take the Carter route of framing himself as oppositional to the Congress, and rather than taking the purely Reagan route of placing ideology above political efficacy, Morris told Clinton to take on the Republicans in Congress as partners in a new campaign of “triangulation”, and effectively, a new presidency: the New Way. 

Clinton was no longer the Democrat of FMLA or defending lesbian and gay service members in the US Armed Forces. From now on, Clinton would be the “results” President who balked at any label of “liberal” or “progressive”, framing himself as the compromising agent between two political extremes, despite Clinton himself benefitting greatly from the votes of the left. 

In Clinton’s latter 6 years, you would see an unbelievable adoption of what would now be considered Republican policies: defining marriage as solely between a man and a woman, gutting welfare programs, slashing capital gains taxes, deregulating the tech industry, unlimited free trade abroad, and hawkish foreign policy against Iraq and Iran. Clinton was in effect a far better Republican President than his immediate predecessor had ever been. Sure, Clinton would vocally decry measures by Gingrich to cut specific programs, but by and large, the two men had formed an incredibly strange and unique political alliance. 

By 1996, the writing on the wall was clear. Clinton was going to completely outflank the right by touting their own perceived victories as his own. The economy was booming, jobs were exploding, and crime was plummeting. Dole was essentially run as a sacrificial lamb, and no serious political pundit or polling organization had any doubt that Clinton was essentially going to be gifted another 4 years.

While I could talk about Lewinsky or the 2000 election, I’ll leave that for someone else and give my own personal opinion on the, at least to me, more interesting factors of Clinton’s tenure.

Clinton was a politician of limitless potential, unending drive, boundless optimism, and the charisma to sell ice to a penguin. The heavens were his limit. To his credit, Clinton did many good things (many of which I’ve listed above, like 23 million new jobs, record low inflation, an end to the Serbian ethnic cleansing, more funding for college grants, etc). 

HOWEVER, Clinton was still, in my opinion, someone who sacrificed principles for personal ambition, a bargain with dire consequences for the future of my party (if my flair is any indication). Democratic policies of the LBJ and FDR eras helped form what America is today, and by ignoring and so disrespecting and disregarding this heritage, Clinton, perhaps inadvertently, weakened the Democratic Party indelibly and didn’t do anything to help future Democrats build on his record in a more progressive approach. 

As such, rather than being called the “Man from Hope”, Clinton ought to have been called the “Man hoping to win”. 

I can only see President Roosevelt utterly dismayed at how his party had been gutted of its progressive, worker-led tradition.

Edit: Apologies. Gingrich is in fact not short, but 6 ft tall.

I typically ask questions on this sub via posts, but this time, I wanted to write a little essay on my thoughts on the ‘92 election, the dynamics of said election, and the psychology of both candidates (I’ll be excluding Perot, since he took equally from Bush and Clinton’s vote tallies).

1992 was a fundamental crossroads not only between an entrenched Republican succession of administrations and a Democratic challenger, but older, more traditional styles of governance and campaigning, as opposed to a young, fresh, dynamic approach at national governance and leadership.

In many ways, ‘92 mirrored the election of 1960, as Clinton, like JFK, represented a new form of accountability and leadership style that went beyond the dogmatism of Eisenhower.

Before I continue, I’d like to preface this analysis by saying that ‘92 was essentially unwinnable by Bush, unless he was willing to adopt methods even more slanderous and accusatory than his ‘88 campaign, something I feel that Bush was unwilling to do at that point in his life.

To cut to the chase, I suppose that the conclusion of my argument (raised before I offer background to my rationale for holding this to be true), is that George HW Bush had fundamentally “lost his steam” for running a presidential election, and left the outcome up to fate, satisfied with victory or defeat.

To begin, just by a plain view, Bush looked tired. Throughout ‘92, it was almost as if all of the vigor and excitement that Bush had felt in ‘88 had been completely drained from him as a result of the strenuous duties of the office.

This is not exactly a surprise, as Bush had been in a high stakes, high demand job for 12 years as VP and President without any period of rest or recovery.

Additionally, by ‘92, Bush was 68 years old. While Reagan had roughly been this age when running for the presidency in 1980, this was without the strain of serving as President for 4 years prior to that point. Any man at the age of 68 would be utterly exhausted in a national campaign, especially when coming off the back of 12 years of intense, demanding public service.

With regard to his policy record, it was undoubtedly strong (ADA, clean air protections, a responsible tax increase, Dessert Storm, civil rights protections, chaperoning the end of the Soviet domination of Eastern Europe, helping to end Apartheid, etc), but it was also politically unfocused.

The Reagan coalition had gotten used to tax cuts, strong arm politics with foreign adversaries, and culture war issues. While HW Bush touted a legacy as the ideological successor to Reagan in his ‘88 campaign, it was clear that he was not the loyal Reagan conservative many in the Republican Party anticipated that he would be, and this cost him.

By ‘92, as a result, it seemed as if Bush had almost surrendered to the winds of change. He wasn’t going to sell himself out to the evangelical right by disparaging his own legislative record and his moderate approach, and he also wasn’t willing to go as hard on Clinton as Lee Atwater (pictured in the 2nd pic above) had gone against Dukakis in ‘88. After all, it was Atwater who fundamentally changed the nature of presidential campaigns by making them purely about slander and aspersions against one’s opponent’s character rather than the issues. Atwater had successfully painted Dukakis as a weak, out of touch, permissive “liberal” (practically an invective in the 80s and 90s), and Dukakis could never beat the framing.

However, Atwater died in March of ‘91 of a brain tumor, and Bush was either unable, or in my opinion, unwilling to go after yet another opponent in the same way.

Sure, Bush impugned Clinton on the issue of protesting the Vietnam War in another country, but this was never a main focus of Bush’s campaign ads in the way that “Willie Horton” or the tank ad had been.

Moving on to Clinton, it is clear to see how he had some red flags with regard to electability. The Whitewater allegations and rumors of extramarital affairs certainly made Clinton appear less spotless than he had hoped. However, unlike Dukakis before him, Clinton utterly ignored any and all allegations or smears, making the election one of the “new way” against “Washington”.

Clinton framed himself as diametrically outside of the traditional left vs right division, choosing to impugn both federal Republicans and Democrats for failures to mange the economy and domestic affairs properly from 1980-1992. The strategy was a massive success, and Clinton won areas that Reagan had comfortably won in both of his election campaigns.

Clinton was young, brilliant, charismatic, and in possession of the politically priceless commodities of confidence, energy, charisma, and optimism. He tapped into the American sentiment of the economy and state of the union as effectively as Reagan did 12 years prior, and JFK 20 years before that. While Perot took 19% of the vote, I have no doubt that Clinton would have easily cleared 53-54% of the vote in ‘92 if it was just him vs Bush.

Clinton didn’t simply want to win; he needed that victory. The presidency had been something he’d been aiming for quite a while, and Clinton was nothing if not ambitious. The Democratic Primaries preceding the ‘92 general election were contentious and brutal, but Clinton was unable to be deterred or denied his ultimate aim. Through ever handshake to a steelworker or farmer, every hug to a mother who lost a son to gun violence, and every piercing gaze to someone drowning in medical bills, Clinton used his undeniable strength in knowing and understanding people to shift the consciousness of the country from the Cold War era to one facing entirely inward. Whenever you get the chance, I highly encourage anyone reading this to watch his town hall in Detroit shortly after his first inauguration. Clinton was a dynamo. As many people I’ve known who’ve met Clinton have told me, he made each person he talked to feel like the only person he cared about.

In Bush’s diaries, he indicated a feeling of shock and honest dismay at the election outcome, but in truth, I don’t think Bush wanted it enough.

During the debates, Bush appeared utterly tired and uninterested in the debate at hand, gazing at Clinton with exasperation and fatigue, repeatedly checking his watch. When the famous debate question of “how has the economy personally affected you?” Came up, Bush utterly waffled on it, and Clinton utterly nailed it by talking about his conversations with constituents in Arkansas who lost jobs in the ‘92 recession.

Bush would leave office after an incredibly distinguished career of public service, and I think this was why ‘92 didn’t particularly concern him as much. Bush Sr. was a man of honor who risked his life in WWII, and while he would have liked a crack at another 4 years in office, he also had accomplished what he set out to do all the way back in 1980. He became President and governed in a way that comported with his values.

While the timeframe of my question is oddly specific, this is because the common answers always presented for Presidents most fed up with the job are John Quincy Adams, George Washington, and Calvin Coolidge (there may be others that I’m missing).

As such, I was curious which President post-1945 was the most sick of the job/most ready to retire.

I personally got the impression that Truman, W Bush, and Obama were the most relieved to leave office and embark on their long awaited retirement from public life, but I’m interested in hearing other perspectives/insights.

The question is pretty self-explanatory, but I’ll elaborate a bit on the 4 I personally felt had the largest chasm between their private and public spaces.

1. Eisenhower: In public, Ike purposefully gave off the image of the removed, somewhat aloof grandpa who was above the political squabbles of the time. However, in private, Ike was anything but aloof. He was known to be a chronic micromanager who was intimately familiar with the goings on of his administration, keenly involved in policy formation. While Nixon was the “attack dog” of his administration, this was largely a way to keep Congress’ good graces, and it largely worked.
2. Reagan: While Reagan was publicly a very humorous and witty individual, in private, while still personable and charming, he was much different. Many who met Reagan said that he was surprisingly reserved and closed-off, not having many true confidants or friends other than Nancy. He kept to himself, and while he was able to entertain and host guests, he never delved too deeply into personal beliefs.
3. George W Bush: While George W Bush gave off the public persona of the somewhat clumsy, stuttering country boy who wasn’t too concerned with data, many who met George W Bush were actually shocked at how well-read and educated he is. W Bush is a voracious reader who cared intimately about the little details found in policies, even if his public persona and behavior made him appear less intelligent and thoughtful than he actually is.
4. Barack Obama: somewhat similar to Reagan, Obama is known for his charisma, oratory, and his poise, but in private, Obama is shockingly introverted and private. He sometimes had trouble connecting even with Democrats in Congress as a result of this, and VP Biden would often serve a crucial role in maintaining strong relationships between the White House and Democrats in Congress.

Interested to hear others y’all thought of!

Edit: forgot to mention Jimmy Carter. Jimmy Carter: While Carter came off as a very warm, affectionate, compassionate person, while there is no doubt that he was personally very scrupulous and disciplined, he was not exactly an affable person.

Many who knew Carter said that he could often be unreasonably demanding, critical, and cold, expecting others to hold themselves to an unattainably high standard.

The Republican opposition was firmly in place, and as a result, Obama was not only denied the ability to pass any domestic legislation, but he had a Supreme Court nominee deprived of him due to the political machinations of the Republican leadership.

I cannot fathom the level of frustration and dejection that Obama felt having an opposition that was utterly uncompromising and partisan.