NationStates Jolt Archive

You would think, by glancing at the average list of presidential rankings (from best to worst), that Harding was at best a warmonger and a tyrant. He was neither. The man was no saint, but he certainly didn't do anything worse than what other Presidents have done. Presidents who have killed far more people and restricted far more liberties have gotten much better marks. If Harding had started a war or two, would he be remembered more favorably by historians?

Beats me. The economy did pretty darn well, we were basically at a state of total peace, and people were prospering across the country. The only real downside was Prohibition, and enterprising...businessmen...had already started to take care of that problem by the time he entered office.

In all honesty, I don't see what the big deal is. Surely Lyndon B. Johnson would rank lower given that his Administration's policies got us in to one of our most brutal, prolonged and costly military defeats.

lol how do i teapot dome scandaled

lol how do i teapot dome scandaled

A corrupt politician!? *gasp*

Seriously, though, other Presidents (Grant comes to mind) were infinitely more corrupt than Harding was. It's never even been proven that Harding himself, rather than some of his cabinet members, was corrupt.

lol how do i teapot dome scandaled

Apparently the only thing illegal was the bribes involved...$4 million worth of them, no less.

Beats me. The economy did pretty darn well, we were basically at a state of total peace, and people were prospering across the country. The only real downside was Prohibition, and enterprising...businessmen...had already started to take care of that problem by the time he entered office.

In all honesty, I don't see what the big deal is. Surely Lyndon B. Johnson would rank lower given that his Administration's policies got us in to one of our most brutal, prolonged and costly military defeats.

Exactly. Harding never killed anybody or took away anybody's freedom.

As for Prohibition...didn't that begin before Harding came into office?

Apparently the only thing illegal was the bribes involved...$4 million worth of them, no less.

Which is deplorable, but not as deplorable as what other Presidents have done.

Which is deplorable, but not as deplorable as what other Presidents have done.

The land was public, and Harding allowed the selling of oil on public land to a private company. He screwed the American populace, what have other presidents done to screw the Americans out of four million dollars?

Shouldn't have said that, knowing that Generalites will respond with "omg goerg bush nd his war n eyerack trillionz omg!!"

Didn't he have an affair? That should do it, given the reaction even in modern times to Bill Clinton's extra-marital shenanigans. Or am I confusing him with another President? They're all so corrupt its easy to get them confused.:D

Didn't he have an affair? That should do it, given the reaction even in modern times to Bill Clinton's extra-marital shenanigans. Or am I confusing him with another President? They're all so corrupt its easy to get them confused.:D

So did FDR, LBJ, JFK, and many others.

lol how do i teapot dome scandaled

I'm not really sure why, but I lol'd for a solid half-minute at this.

The land was public, and Harding allowed the selling of oil on public land to a private company. He screwed the American populace, what have other presidents done to screw the Americans out of four million dollars?

Shouldn't have said that, knowing that Generalites will respond with "omg goerg bush nd his war n eyerack trillionz omg!!"

Other Presidents have done far worse (killing off native Americans and stealing their land; lying us into war; stealing our liberties in the name of security; etc.).

Also, we need to emphasize the fact that Harding died in 1923, only two years in office.

I mean, imagine trying to judge Reagan or Clinton on the basis of their first two years in office; both are very popular and generally successful presidents, yet their first two years were not only the roughest of their time in office but also saw the lowest approval ratings of their terms. Harding's presidency wasn't around long enough for anything to happen anyways.

lol how do i teapot dome scandaled

It wuld appear that that involved only one of his cabinet members, not Harding himself. I could be wrong, though.

Warren G. Harding was a dick.

Warren G. Harding was a dick.

Why?

Yes, please post something to support that statement.

Why?

Because Stephen Colbert hath said so. A while ago. In a book. Called America: The Book. But really, it is quite enjoyable to call Harding a dick without any evidence whatsoever to support such a claim. Almost like I'm purposefully acting like an idiot. Or simply... a dick... Huh. That's ironic.

The amount of corruption really sets him apart.

Harding channeled money and favors to big business. They slashed income and corporate taxes and supports employer's campaigns to eliminate unions. Members of his administration received kickbacks and bribes from lobbyists and businessmen.

Even the Wall Street Journal wrote, "Never before, here or anywhere else, has a government been so completely fused with business."

But one thing in his favor is that he will move up the scale of bad Presidents as the shrub has even worse cronyism, corruption and pro-business bias.

You might ask yourself what exactly did he accomplish?

You might ask yourself what exactly did he accomplish?

Very little, which is a good thing. Meaning that he, for the most part, basically left people the hell alone.

Very little, which is a good thing. Meaning that he, for the most part, basically left people the hell alone.

Well? That's not really a good measurement. For example, William Henry Harrison could be considered the best President by that standard.

It can be argued Harding giving business whatever it wanted messed with people a great deal.

Well? That's not really a good measurement. For example, William Henry Harrison could be considered the best President by that standard.

I actually agree.

It can be argued Harding giving business whatever it wanted messed with people a great deal.

Correct, but at least he kept the country at peace and did a few good things (namely, pardoning and releasing political prisoners like Debs and speaking out against lynching).

The land was public, and Harding allowed the selling of oil on public land to a private company. He screwed the American populace, what have other presidents done to screw the Americans out of four million dollars?

Shouldn't have said that, knowing that Generalites will respond with "omg goerg bush nd his war n eyerack trillionz omg!!"

Exactly. It wasn't the dollar value of the crime (though 4 million was a massive sum back then) but the intent. Harding tops many lists of bad leaders because he was actively corrupt, rather than misinformed or stupid.

As for "no one got killed," you can only push that (weak) standard so far. Notice that no one ever applies "no one got killed" to Watergate, for example. Corruption counts, is the point.

harding seems to have been really bad at the job of being president. he wasn't evil, just crappy.

Harding tops many lists of bad leaders because he was actively corrupt, rather than misinformed or stupid.

A politician...actively corrupt!? [shock][horror][gasp] :eek:

As for "no one got killed," you can only push that (weak) standard so far. Notice that no one ever applies "no one got killed" to Watergate, for example. Corruption counts, is the point.

How is it a weak standard?

A politician...actively corrupt!? [shock][horror][gasp] :eek:

I wasn't suggesting that he was the first. Did it sound like I was? :p Anyway, I meant actively, as opposed to passively or arising from neglect or indifference (as in, e.g., Grant's cabinet).

How is it a weak standard?

The way most people use it disregards basic considerations such as intent, cause and context. Again, no one was killed because of Watergate, or any of the Clinton scandals, or Teapot Dome, etc., but those sorts of things speak to the character of those leaders, in a way that the relative amount of "peace" doesn't.

The amount of corruption really sets him apart.

Harding channeled money and favors to big business. They slashed income and corporate taxes and supports employer's campaigns to eliminate unions. Members of his administration received kickbacks and bribes from lobbyists and businessmen.

Even the Wall Street Journal wrote, "Never before, here or anywhere else, has a government been so completely fused with business."

But one thing in his favor is that he will move up the scale of bad Presidents as the shrub has even worse cronyism, corruption and pro-business bias.

You might ask yourself what exactly did he accomplish?

Harding was also an isolationist, thus he didn't pull off the asstacular feat of alienating every possible ally of the U.S. on some boner-stroking disregard for international consensus or invasion of another country. All he happened to be was just a patsy who let his corrupt business friends turn America into the original Corporate Bordello.

If he could have won a few wars he probably would have been better remembered.

Very little, which is a good thing. Meaning that he, for the most part, basically left people the hell alone.

Well, see, there's your problem. You're proceeding from a different assumption than most historians, and a false one to boot.

Based on the context of your quotes, I would assume the following quote rings as essentially true for you:

"But in old times this contest was between subjects, or some classes of subjects, and the Government. By liberty, was meant protection against the tyranny of the political rulers. The rulers were conceived (except in some of the popular governments of Greece) as in a necessarily antagonistic position to the people whom they ruled."
--John Stuart Mill, On Liberty

As such, you're not particularly surprised or offended by rulers acting for their own interest rather than yours; that's to be expected of all rulers.

The problem of course is that this us-and-them dichotomy doesn't really work in our society, Magdha. Who are the "them" in your analysis? Government officials, presumably. How do they gain their status as government officials? They get elected. Who elects them? The people do . . . So how do you reconcile the apparent assumption, in your earlier account, that elected officials are rational and capable of manipulation for their own gain, while the people who continually elect them are not?

And here is where your analysis falls apart, because apparently, you have to admit that either there is no us and them when we are the ones who give their jobs legitemacy, in which case we have a legitemate greivance with government officials who do nothing or are corrupt, or you have to admit that government officials are more rational and more capable of manipulation than normal people are, in which case you would in some sense have to ask whether or not they deserved to be in government given their superior mental acuity.

A corrupt politician!? *gasp*

Seriously, though, other Presidents (Grant comes to mind) were infinitely more corrupt than Harding was. It's never even been proven that Harding himself, rather than some of his cabinet members, was corrupt.

If memory serves, Grant didn't actually cause any of the scandals, he just happened to have really bad timing.

If memory serves, Grant didn't actually cause any of the scandals, he just happened to have really bad timing.

Grant and Harding themselves were fairly clean. It was that their friends just happened to be corrupt fucks who exploited the friendship to clean house.

Yeah Harding did great...In the booming 20's. Seriously, I doubt he would have done so well during the depression or any other crisis. Instead put one of the other "bad" presidents in his position and they don't look so bad anymore. As has been mentioned he was also inactively corrupt.

Warren Harding's most fundamental flaw was incompetence.

He did a bad job of being President. Now, he's not alone in that - Grant, for instance, also did a bad job - but in most cases, you can also point to something they did right, or at least completed.

Warren Harding did nothing, or at least, little that hadn't already had the building blocks prepared by either the previous administration or the Republican Party leadership (such as the establishment of the Veteran's Affairs Bureau).

He also brought to Washington the whole "Ohio Gang" as his cabinet. Now, Harding himself was almost certainly clean - there was never any evidence against him - but the various scandals attached to his Presidency, including Teapot Dome and the Veteran's Administration Kickbacks Scandal tainted his Presidency irrevocably.

At that, I don'y consider Warren Harding to be the worst President we've had, or even the worst of the 20th century. His immediate predecessor, Woodrow Wilson, brought the US into a major war for no good reason, after campaigning on a platform of exactly the opposite, and then signed off on the single most egregiously poorly considered peace treaty in the 20thC - thank goodness Congress refused to ratify it.

Well? That's not really a good measurement. For example, William Henry Harrison could be considered the best President by that standard.

I have always argued exactly this. :p

O.K, I feel that somebody should set the record straight.

First, we must look at the absolute wisdom that I have so wisely enshrined in my sig:

"Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."
-Hanlon's Razor

There are more elaborate versions, which I think should be covered in a separate thread, but the point is this: Harding's incompetence in choosing cabinet members that would effectively run the government without advancing their personal goals, as well as his inability to see the precarious position that Germany was forced into after WWI, meant that his two years in office mark some of the worst presidential years in history. Quite simply, he was a shitty judge of others.

Yes, he did have affairs. Yes, he and his boys did gather for poker games where they smoked and drank (this last one being illegal at the time of Prohibition), and while I love backroom poker games with a glass of Jack Daniels, they didn't reflect well and Harding. Granted, I don't think it was this, as much as it was that the people he played with, namely, the Cabinet (Coolidge was always absent, likely fishing), were the same type of lowlifes that should never have been allowed into the government. But they were, and we got Teapot Dome. I can say similar stuff about Ulysses S. Grant, but that's for another thread. Point is, Harding was an idiot. Given where he was, it was probably a miracle that he didn't serve out a full term.

Warren Harding's most fundamental flaw was incompetence.

He did a bad job of being President. Now, he's not alone in that - Grant, for instance, also did a bad job - but in most cases, you can also point to something they did right, or at least completed.

Warren Harding did nothing, or at least, little that hadn't already had the building blocks prepared by either the previous administration or the Republican Party leadership (such as the establishment of the Veteran's Affairs Bureau).

He also brought to Washington the whole "Ohio Gang" as his cabinet. Now, Harding himself was almost certainly clean - there was never any evidence against him - but the various scandals attached to his Presidency, including Teapot Dome and the Veteran's Administration Kickbacks Scandal tainted his Presidency irrevocably.

At that, I don'y consider Warren Harding to be the worst President we've had, or even the worst of the 20th century. His immediate predecessor, Woodrow Wilson, brought the US into a major war for no good reason, after campaigning on a platform of exactly the opposite, and then signed off on the single most egregiously poorly considered peace treaty in the 20thC - thank goodness Congress refused to ratify it.

Not for lack of trying. Wilson aimed a bit more idealistically, and the involvement of the US in the League may have kept it from failing. Of course the attitude of Europe probably played an equal part in its failure as well.

Not for lack of trying. Wilson aimed a bit more idealistically, and the involvement of the US in the League may have kept it from failing. Of course the attitude of Europe probably played an equal part in its failure as well.

Entirely true. But if Wilson had stuck to his guns, and refused to sign Versailles, I would have far more respect for the man.

Entirely true. But if Wilson had stuck to his guns, and refused to sign Versailles, I would have far more respect for the man.

Agreed. Also had he not been a racist asshole, too.

Entirely true. But if Wilson had stuck to his guns, and refused to sign Versailles, I would have far more respect for the man.

It was all about the League for him. He gladly compromised the other 13 points just for that.

Harding's isolationist policies doomed Europe to a gigantic post-WWI depression that contributed significantly to America's Great Depression. THerefore, Warren G. Harding is a dick.

Harding's isolationist policies doomed Europe to a gigantic post-WWI depression that contributed significantly to America's Great Depression. THerefore, Warren G. Harding is a dick.

No no no... "dick" implies Harding did it on purpose well knowing what the effects would be. I'd classify him as a "boob."