I relize that I have one advantage over some of you when trying to remember who the worst president is or has been. Statistically, I'm probably older than 65% of you. Therefore, many of you don't know about because you didn't live through the worst US president, Lyndon Baynes Johnson, like I did. He cost us 50,000 lives and what would be today many trillions of dollars for a war we HAD NO BUSINESS IN. Vietnam never threatened us. Vietnam never produces any terrorists. Vietnam never attacked us.
Our active involvement over there was from 1963 to 1973. Yes, we were there before and after the above time period, but we were not actively fighting the war. So over a ten year period we lost 50,000 lives and MIAs. The war on terror started shortly after 9/11/2001 with our attack on Afganistan. With the Iraq war starting about a year later. That means the war on terror started about 6.5 years ago and has cost us 4.000 lives. Doing the math means the war on terror will have to continue for another 72 years to reach the same death toll as Vietnam.
Is George W and Jimmy C looking better? I've always like both of them. George W can't hold a candle when compared to Johnson reguarding their respective wars. While I didn't vote for him, Jimmy C did improve our image overseas by getting the CIA out of the government destablization business. Jimmy C was probably the most honest president we have had in the last 100 years. I don't like most of his meddeling today, but he wasn't a bad president, just an unlucky one. George W and Jimmy C have one thing in common. Their presidencies are overshadowed by domestic problems beyond their control. Carter had the Iran crisis which brought about high gas prices which brought about a recession. George W has gas shortages due mainly to higher demand, a real estate crises brought about by greedy mortgage brokers, which combined have brought on a recession.
Talk about spending money. Johnson was the first big liberal tax and spender. Before Johnson, Social Security was solvent with a REAL trust fund. No so when Johnson left office. He spent the money of Vietnam and the Beutify America program. He went to the House of Representatives as a school teacher. Worked his way into the Senate and became President when Kennedy was killed. He left office a multimillionaire. One trick Ladybird Johnson pulled off is she bought a bunch of Bell Helmet stock on the cheap. Lyndon pressured the states to pass mandatory helmet laws or lose highway funding. Part of the helmet law was that helmets had to me a certain specification. Bell Helmets was the major maker whose helmets met this standard.
The war on terror doesn't have a border like Vietnam or Afganistan. Terrorists exist any where there is some one preaching terror and another person stupid enough to believes this radical preacher. The war in Afganistan is fundamental. It was a rogue regime that permitted terrorists to operate out of Afganistan. The war in Iraq isn't so easy to see the benefits of, but it still has real value. First off, the Iraq government is getting stronger everyday. When they take over, and they will, Iraq will be a moderate democratic government in a region dominated by radicals. Given time, other coutries in the region will become more moderate. This is a given when women from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, etc., see women in Afganistan and Iraq voting, becoming educated, and having productive lives. The second great benefit I see is we are giving all of these radical terrorists a jihad to go get their 76 virgins. If we were not doing this war, I firmly belive we would have had more attacks on US soil. In the meantime America's finest will have at least the best weaponry in the world to shoot back with. Better than 3000 civilians stuck in a big burning tower.
You can love it our hate it, but we have a whole lot more business being at war in the mideast than we ever did in Vietnam. So when you talk about the worst president, think of the man that gaves us a troop buildup of 500,000 troop strength levels in a war that WE HAD NO BUSINESS IN. I like George W and Jimmy C a whole lot better than any of the three running today. BTW: I pulled draft lottery number 333 to go to Nam. They were only going to draft to approximately 244. Sometimes it is a good thing to be unlucky.