New survey of experts ranks US presidents

A new C-Span poll of presidential historians has ranked US presidents. As usual for expert rankings so far, the ex-president is ranked in the bottom four. He is tied with Franklin Pierce for third worst. The results are shown in comparison to rankings from 2017, 2009 and 2000.

This survey was informal, with respondents selected by C-SPAN, not by scientific polling. This year, more historians were invited to complete the survey compared to the past. C-SPAN said this was to better reflect diversity in race, gender, age and philosophy. That makes it harder to directly compare it to previous surveys. All of the respondents are distinguished presidential historians covering a broad range of perspectives.

The experts rated presidents from 1 to 10 on ten different leadership categories. The averages of all of ratings were then ranked. The ten categories are public persuasion, crisis leadership, economic management, moral authority, international relations, administrative skills, relations with Congress, vision/setting an agenda, pursuit of equal justice for all and performance within the context of the times. The ex-president's best average rating was for public persuasion, where he came in 32nd. On moral authority and administrative skills, however, he came in dead last, i.e., he was first in being last on morals and competence. That assessment seems quite reasonable.  

Obviously, this ranking by experts is way out of synch with how most rank and file republicans view the ex-president. Some of them believe he was sent by God and was a great president. Some Republicans believe he is far and away the best US president ever.

One can reasonably expect silence from radical fascist Republican media sources and leaders. Most of the rank and file will probably remain ignorant of how history is starting to assess the fascist president's God-awful time in office, his incompetence and his lack of morality.

Ignorance really is bliss when reality isn't.