It shocks me how little love Bill gets from liberals. So, here is a story by Nate from FiveThirtyEight Dot Com. It has a graph showing that Bill Clinton had the highest approval rating minus disapproval rating of any US president on the graph. No mention of it. In the comments, there is some republican bashing of Clinton, and someone comparing Clinton to HW as both leaving office under a cloud. Clinton left office on a chariot of fire having defeated his enemies, with a through the roof approval rating and the right to tell Gore, "See, dumbass, you should have let me campaign."
The truth is, I don't like Clinton as much as I did in 2000. He squandered a lot of opportunity, and a lot of that for a BJ. But it is just interesting how Republican universally support the greatness of Reagan, while Clinton has never enjoyed the love.
4 comments:
Approval ratings are a measure of the moment, not a measure of consequence in history.
Reagan was well approved of, while also being a president of enormous consequence. He certainly changed the demographics of Republicans for a generation, an economic philosophy is named for him as he saw it to fruition, he was an international icon, and many (including me) think he was the single most important person in bringing down the United States' one and only rival.
Clinton was well approved of, but his presidency was of little consequence, historically. Academically the biggest news is his impeachment. Popularly his relations with Lewinsky will be remembered. His initiatives were effective but unremarkable. And he didn't serve during a time of war or great economic stress.
George W. Bush is going to be a president of enormous consequence.
Jim,
Clinton doesn't get as much love because while he was popular, he was effective largely in playing defense, which is important but not too exciting in the historic context. Even his accomplishments were, unfortunately, short-lived -- the budget was only balanced for a very short time. FDR would have been less consequential if Dewey had won and ended the Social Security program, as he promised.
Also, there is the fact that his policies were either half-measures (DADT) or conter-intuitive for a democrat (NAFTA, Welfare reform), and it's hardly the stuff of which a liberal icon is made. Reagan threw a ton of red meat to his base and provided the set-up for the 1994-2008 republican era. I hate him, but I can understand why they lionize him.
Matt,
First off, I agree with you entirely about the approval-rating/history thing. But I am genuinely curious about something:
You and I often wind up looking at the same data set and coming to vastly different conclusions, and this is one which has had me wondering for a while. You write, "many (including me) think [Reagan] was the single most important person in bringing down the United States' one and only rival." I'm interested in this because this belief is essentially an article of faith in conservative circles, but I know you, and you tend not to take strong opinions unless you have looked closely at the facts, so I know it's not a matter of blind faith.
So, I would be interested to hear your answer to this question: in what way, specifically, was Ronald Reagan responsible for the collapse of the USSR? I'm looking for a clear causal relationship, BTW, between acts and policies that RR executed and the implosion of the Soviet state.
This is interesting (to me) and possibly complex/detailed, so feel free to promote it to a new post if you like...
So you guys don't think this has anything to do with conservatives being generally more loyal and obedient to their leaders? I was listening to the football game on Sunday, and it was on one of the hate radio station. They advertised a show that would be comparing George W. Bush's legacy to Lincoln's.
Ronald Reagan cut taxes and grew the military. He also had a lot of one liners. Bill Clinton balanced the budget and started happy lefty programs like teach america and americorps. He also made a lot of empathetic speaches.
Reagan's reckless tax cut policy has become the Republican model, but didn't Clinton's pragmatism become the Democratic model? Isn't Obama suggesting a return to Clinton style government budgets?
I will be interested to read the discussion on how Ronald Reagan had anything to do with the fall of the Soviet Union.
Post a Comment