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The Most Destructive Presidencies In U.S. History: George W. Bush & Barack H. Obama
Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,
Powers once granted are almost impossible to take back.
After 13.5 years, there is more than enough evidence for reasonable people to conclude that the presidencies of George W. Bush and Barack H. Obama are easily the most destructive in U.S. history.
When historians speak of failed presidencies or weak presidencies, they are typically referring to presidencies characterized by uneven leadership, petty corruption by self-serving cronies or in extreme cases such as the Nixon presidency, abuses of executive power.
But weak or failed presidencies are not destructive to the rule of law and the foundations of the nation. The failed president leaves office and the basic structure of the nation continues: the rule of law, the balance of powers and a free-market economy.
A destructive president weakens or corrupts these core structures in favor of executive-branch powers, and passes these unconstitutional powers to the next executive for further expansion.
The Bush and Obama presidencies have effectively dismantled the rule of law and the Constitution by invoking essentially unlimited executive powers in the name of "national security:" we the citizens of the U.S. can now be accused of violating secret laws, be indicted in secret, tried in secret and sentenced to life in prison based on evidence fabricated in secret, i.e. declaring unclassified documents classified after the fact to incriminate and imprison whistleblowers.
How is this any different from totalitarian fascist regimes?
This is absolutely contrary to basic civil liberties defined by the Constitution. Who benefits from this destruction of fundamental civil liberties? (Always start by asking cui bono--to whose benefit?)
The Big Lie is that this destruction of the foundations of the rule of law and civil liberties is for our own good: if the President and the National Security State don't grab all these powers and deprive you of your constitutional rights, bad guys will destroy the nation.
This is of course the same old tired justification used by dictators and despots everywhere, and it is always a lie. The truth that must be hidden is that this wholesale expansion of executive powers at the expense of civil liberties, democracy, the rule of law and the balance of powers benefits the executive branch.
Every abuse of the law is now declared legal by executive order. Anyone questioning the legality of extra-legal abuses of power is told "this is legal because it was authorized by the President." In other words, executive power is now unquestioned and cannot be challenged.
For a variety of unsavory reasons, the Supreme Court has enabled this expansion of essentially unlimited executive power. Congress has also rubber-stamped it as part of The Global War on Terror (GWOT), the unlimited war that justifies unlimited executive powers, unlimited secrecy and unlimited expansion of the National Security State, the Deep State that is impervious to changes in electoral government.
Presidents Bush and Obama have directed this expansion of the National Security State because it greatly enhances the power of the Presidency. This is how we get a president who is delighted to discover that he's good at killing people remotely with drone strikes.
The expansion of secret programs and secret wars has engorged the Pentagon, the C.I.A. and the N.S.A., not just with funding but more importantly, with new powers granted by the executive branch and rubber-stamped by an impotent Congress and supine Supreme Court.
The president's power is greatly enhanced by this expansion of the National Security State, and the self-serving "patriots" empowered by the essentially unlimited secrecy are free to do whatever they please under the umbrella of executive privilege.
True patriots attempting to defend basic constitutional rights are labeled terrorists by the phony patriots busy destroying the foundations of the nation. The Orwellian doublespeak is as unlimited as executive power: a citizen who releases unclassified material about the secret abuse of power can be accused of treason on the Kafkaesque basis that unclassified material can be considered classified if it exposes the abuse of executive power.
All of this is well-documented and has been in the public realm for years. There is nothing mysterious about the destruction of basic rights or the abrogation of the balance or power or the rule of law. It's visible and painfully obvious to anyone who cares to read or watch a few interviews of whistleblowers who have been hounded and harassed by the Obama Administration.
For two examples of hundreds of articles and interviews, please read:
Senior NSA Executive: NSA Started Spying On Journalists in 2002... In Order to Make Sure They Didn’t Report On Mass Surveillance (washingtonsblog.com; I recommend the entire series of interviews)
"To me, there’s a psychology that’s not often written about: What happens when you have this much reach and power, and constraints of law and even policy simply fade into the woodwork."
PBS Frontline Interview - Thomas Drake.
This destruction of the fundamental building blocks of the nation has been rubber-stamped by gutless Republicans and Democrats alike. Cowed by the threat of appearing "soft on terrorism," left and right alike have scrambled to appear "tough on terrorism" by approving the wholesale transfer of power to the National Security State and the executive branch.
Of the dozens of books published on the abuses of executive power and the uncontrolled expansion of the National Security State, here are two worthy starting points:
The Family Jewels: The CIA, Secrecy, and Presidential Power
The Way of the Knife: The CIA, a Secret Army, and a War at the Ends of the Earth
This destruction of the fundamental building blocks of the nation has been rubber-stamped by gutless Republicans and Democrats alike. Cowed by the threat of appearing "soft on terrorism," left and right alike have scrambled to appear "tough on terrorism" by approving the wholesale transfer of power to the National Security State and the executive branch.
It is laughable to see so-called liberals and conservatives alike in Congress kow-tow to the National Security State while claiming they have effective oversight, even as the revelations of whistleblowers reveals them as clueless toadies with no real grasp of what is being done in the name of the American people they claim to represent.
Those abusing executive power in the Nixon administration knew they were breaking the law. Those abusing power in the Bush and Obama administrations simply declare their actions legal. In effect, any action taken by the president or the National Security State is legal in name if not in principle.
Powers once granted are almost impossible to take back. What president will give away essentially unlimited executive powers established as "law" by previous presidents? We don't elect saints as presidents, we elect infinitely ambitious people desiring power. We should not be surprised that such people not only consolidate the power they inherit but actively seek more.
We should also not be surprised that all these power grabs by the executive branch and the National Security State are cloaked in secrecy, and that anyone who dares to reveal the power grabs and abuses of power to the public is declared a traitor and crucified.
A traitor to what? It's a question every citizen should ask and answer for themselves.
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Apparently there are a lot of levels above Top Secret and the president is not the highest level!
Seems to me we should start looking at who those folks are and determining what their agenda is.
Presidents and banksters are just the face of the sociopths running the show
Why do we continue to be surprised by their acts?
The "real" owners aren't in the spotlight. Is a matter of following the money - which is hard to do. WTC7 comes to mind.
Yup. Both, together, have ended the great experiment known as the United States. And yet they cannot totally be blamed, as neither one was (or is) truly in charge - even as Presidents they are only being told selected information on which to base their decisions. And much of the damage is happening outside of any laws or regulations.
I saw a list of top secret clearence catagories. The President only gets to peek at up to #11 in the list. The 10 above that he is not allowed
The fault is with the majority of the sheeple who crave a king, a dictator, a president or of that ilk to think for them, protect them, fight winning wars and be responsible, so they don't have to be. This is as old as time. Three thousand years ago, the prophet Samuel advised the Israelis about the stupidity of wanting a king, but they persisted.
"Absolute power corrupts absolutely" was said about the Pope by a true believing Catholic, Lord Acton. Not even in God's Pope can a man trust. The more power you give or allow to be taken from you, the greater the corruption. Man lives in the Natural World's jungle. Freedom of the least trusting is one rule. Serfdom or slavery for the most trusting and obedient is another.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/15/james-mcdonald-dead-rocke_n_287...
Aonother Rockerfeller connection dies this week......
Well, I think Bush's move against Iraq and Afghanistan was correct and even heroic, because he knew it would take a huge toll on him even if it went well. But it did not go well - we get a win on points, but it cost too much and took too long and was inconclusive. But at least half of that was because Bush tried to play nice with Democrats, Euros, and his friends the Sauds. Obama on the other hand is just a fool and a jerk all on his own and for no reason at all. Neither is responsble for the mess handed them, but they are responsible for the messes they leave, and so far it's looking like Obama's is going to be one big mutha of a mess.
OTOH the US has had some tough times before and some morons in the White House, but Obama takes the soy-iced quinoa and kale cake hands-down, with several mulligans and 9-foot gimmes.
'Bush' and 'heroic' should never, ever, EVER, be used in the same sentence. for shame.
By my reckoning they are the third and fourth most treasonous presidents.
"My guillotine is sad that it can't reach the first and second."
Just curious, last first two were Lincoln and..............Clinton?
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November 22, 1963, the Company disposes of the last good president.
Under the orders of Who is open to debate.
Bushman in Black face, I described BHO in 2008.
The people who put him in office are the same who whacked Jack.
Even my grandfather, a staunch conservative Republican observed "Bullshit! Oswald didnt didnt kill Kennedy-it was the power elite"
"Those abusing executive power in the Nixon administration knew they were breaking the law. Those abusing power in the Bush and Obama administrations simply declare their actions legal."...
Ah but were the crimes that uprooted Nixon from his Presidency really the ones that should have ended his Presidency?... War crimes his administration committed in Vietnam, Cambodia and Chile are what should have not only gotten him impeached but sent him to jail or worse for all that he, Kissinger and yes Congress committed in our names all those years ago.
Same goes for Bill Mena Arkansas Clinton with Iraq (oil for food), Bosnia and Serbia and of course Rwanda...
The American people have been myopic and asleep for a very long time and this read only brings that point home, making it painfully clear that the 'Nanny State' has been alive and well since we allegedly conquered fascism bringing peace and prosperity through an arms race that has lasted 69 years and that will no doubt with the psychopaths we've allowed since the Truman's, the Johnson's, the Nixon's, and the Bush(s)... to run our government unfettered and free from justice will see that destiny fulfilled here very shortly.
As Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard who I'm certain is also losing money in the markets because of what both he and lawmakers in Washington have done and keep doing to our perceived prosperity when he says rather anxiously -What good are nuclear weapons if you already paid for them but don't use them?...
Good question Bill. When the first cruise missile gets launched to "destinations unknown" we will anoint those words of yours by strapping you on the end of one like Commander Kong!
Gutless Republicans?
Hey man sticking your mug in the trough and looting America in collusion with Obama to burn/wreck loot your own fellow citizens, friends and family takes guts.
Neither of them got shot at in a war.
The last good President did, but rode in a Lincoln convertible.
Oh we are so fucked
edwyn,jacob and david and nathaniel rothschild love obarme and the queer satanic child rapin bush clan.
forward zion
Why debate who was the worst president? Show me a good one. The US has been sold out incrementally for over 100 years. We are a hollow shell. There is nothing left to sell. We have all been beaten down into apathetic slavery.
Calvin Coolidge
Let's be honest, okay? Let's agree people like Thomas Jefferson were (or sure seem like they were) vastly better than the current crop of overt predators, which I suppose extends back to at least Lincoln (slaughter "your own" people at banksters request).
But actually, everyone who sanctioned, advocated or formed ANY sort of "government" on the American continents is a statist, a predator, and totally evil in fact, even if not entirely so in intent (thinking of Jefferson). So this atrocity goes back 520 years, plus or minus a few.
Do I exaggerate? Before you decide, consider.
What IS the perfect form of society (pseudo-government if you wish)?
The short answer is... liberty, freedom, individualism, benevolence.
Okay. So let's assume we start with empty American continents, completely devoid of human beings. Somehow we transport a few million people to those continents. So far, no government, no organization, pure liberty, freedom, individualism.
Or is that so?
Well, not entirely.
To be sure, families will tend to live together, and the parents are likely to set down some "rules of behavior" for their kids. In addition, often multiple generations of a family will live in small cluster of dwellings, a tiny settlement of sorts. The adults in this tiny settlement might set "rules of behavior" for the area they farm, so kids don't destroy their crops, for example. And each dwelling will have its own set of rules for inside their home.
Since any of the kids required to comply with the "family rules" can say "screw these rules" and leave at any time... this setup (pseudo-government) still constitutes pure liberty.
The next stage of development, which is also natural, organic and inevitable is for extended family (aunts, uncles, cousins and such) to cluster together with their "second-order families" into slightly larger settlements, which would function the same as first-order family settlements.
Anyone can leave, so everyone is free. Furthermore, everyone can leave, move just outside the boundary of their extended family settlement, establish their own little private kingdom, and set whatever rules they want for whoever chooses to visit. And they can accept others who wish to live in their little settlement for some reason.
Of course, people have friends as well as families, so some families will naturally allow other families to move into their tiny settlements, as long as they agree to follow the settlement rules like everyone else.
This is pure liberty, pure freedom. One might argue this is NOT liberty, because people are expected to adhere to settlement rules. But that is not a correct viewpoint, because then you would be saying people do not have the liberty to limit the behavior of others on their own property.
The truth is, pure liberty allows people the liberty to move to settlements that require certain behavior and/or certain behavior limitations. This is similar to the model of most modern "gated communities".
This is pure liberty, because everyone can enjoy the environment they want. If you don't like their environment, go find one that suits you, or create your own.
This is exactly the same as "if you're in our house, you don't do xxx (put your feet on the table)". If you're in our settlement, you don't do xxx (play loud music).
This is pure liberty.
This is also EXACTLY what existed before the invaders came to the American continents in the late 1400s and since. The only difference is, the people who lived on the American continents [apparently] called these settlements "tribes".
They had pure liberty.
This is not to say that some tribes weren't a bit crazy and violent. Some apparently were (not that I'm a great historian). But obviously many tribes were quite helpful and benevolent.
But the point is... no matter where you lived (in a tribe or settlement or otherwise), if you didn't want to comply with the "settlement rules", you could leave, find some other tribe or settlement more to your liking, or move into "no mans land"... which is just my name for "everywhere outside any existing settlement".
This setup or system was in fact, pure liberty, and the only perfect and healthy organization for human beings. All accepted interaction is voluntary. Any exception is [hopefully, nominally, theoretically] met with forceful self-defense.
In other words, benevolent, productive human beings treated other benevolent, productive human beings as such (no force). But not all humans had risen from behaving as "malevolent predators" to behaving as "benevolent producers". And so, the appropriate and customary way to deal with predators of all species was... to kill them --- in self-defense.
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Just look around the world. Observe how almost everyone buys into the notion that their "nation" is special, that whatever exists today is somehow legit, right and "a-okay". Pretty much everywhere adopts some form of "we are exceptional-ism".
What a bunch of nonsense and BS.
I don't know much about world history, but I do know the social setup in the americas was perfect... before the invaders decided to destroy the natives and their "natural system" and impose various deity-king-authoritiarian-universal nonsense structures onto everyone.
Note the biggest problem, which remains the biggest problem today. The old system had a place OUTSIDE control of rulers, which we call "no mans land". So anyone who cannot find ANY tribe or settlement (or other voluntary pseudo-government) can live unmolested, and not enslaved.
Today, ALL systems leave no "no mans land". And thus, they are ALL utterly and completely invalid and illegitimate. There is, and cannot be, any basis to say "if you don't like the rules of our planet, then leave". But that is precisely what the current situation is.
The reason that assertion is invalid, illegitimate, unacceptable and absurd is... individual humans cannot leave planet earth... yet. If we could, then that assertion would be perhaps closer to defensible. And if the population ever gets to the point where no "open space" outside tribes and settlements exists, and the ability to travel to other planets or moons or alternatives exist, then okay, maybe that can be justified.
But not today.
My main point is this. The endless sheeple on this planet are perfectly welcome to live as obedient abused slaves all you want. They have a perfect right to live that way if they wish, and that is consistent with "pure liberty"... IF and ONLY IF... everywhere outside populated tribes and settlements is "no mans land" and thus free of rules.
The one... well... not exactly rule, but fact of reality... that applies even in "no mans land" is to distinguish "malevolent predators" (including humans) from "benvolent producers", and act accordingly. You don't harm or steal from producers, and you absolutely do defend yourself from predators... of all species. Otherwise... no rules. Pure liberty.
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To discuss "which predatory human was worst" may be a fun game, but misses the crucial point, and the reason mankind is totally screwed, and nearing their end game. Which is... the overthrow of the native american "system" (the existence of "pure liberty" by means of "no mans lands"), and the substitution of "universal slavery".
If you want to blame something... blame that, because THAT is the problem.
If you want to do something about it... you just learned the solution.
How to implement the solution? Well, that's the difficult part, huh?
There is no solution H ones tan. We are in overshoot.
Oh, solutions are easy.
Getting humans to adopt them? Impossible.
The points about leaving your group and starting somewhere new....
Ain't no place new...
You occupied the entire universe already?
!!!!!!!! Wow !!!!!!!!
I'm impressed.
They could be half brothers and we'd never know!
See Recency Bias
I won't bother to debate Lincoln-Grant, Roosevelt-Truman, Johnson-Nixon. I will say after Johnson-Nixon the die was cast.
Details and timing could have been different but the trajectory was set. This is easier to see if you grasp the stealthy gangsterization beneath the surface during Bush I-Clinton.
in that pic is george wiping his had on B's back or checking out the junk in his trunk?
My picks for the worst presidents are Abraham Lincoln and Woodrow Wilson. They have done the most to destroy the Constitution and liberty.
I would vote Ronald the clown as the worst president.. he started all these deficit doesn't matter
Really? GW and Barry? Those fucks along with most of our presidents accomplished nothing. Their only presidential quality was to understand that you need money to win. The only worthwhile, generally honest, and brave President in the last 100 years was Dwight D. Eisenhower. Hell, I'll even go to say he's a top 3 in the last 200 years. By the way, Lincoln was a terrible president. I'm 27 so I'm not resorting to some nostalgia of days gone by, but name the last truly qualifed president who led a sprawling bureacracy to any legitimate success (not success in spin) besides DDE. My only fault with Ike is that he caved to not calling out in his farewell speech what the true evil was: the Congressional Military Industrial Complex. Which is now the Congresional Welfare Industrial Complex. Which is now the Congressional War on Drugs Industrial Complex. Which is now...
Ike!?!?
The author sounds like a turrerrist. Lots of people here sound like turrerrists.I guess I probably sound like a turrerrist, too.
Oh, crap.
Bush and Obama are just puppets to international, radical leftist Jewry, which is the true reason why the US is transitioning away from a free country towards one that is tyrannical and despotic.
Time may have passed, but the radical, leftist Jews M.O. hasn't changed; anytime they come into power, like in the old Soviet Union, freedom erodes, and rights begin going out the window.
This is precisely what's happening in the United States, and people need to wake up to this reality.
yes, there have been so many Jewish dictators throughout history...
Actually, the most destructive administration in US history was that of Dishonest Abe Lincoln.
And history made him a hero. Interesting how by holding this country together at the cost os so much blood he has been placed os high in the minds on many Americans.
The most destructive president is still to come.
As unpopular as this reads, the Tea Party (now a global movement) came out a two party system, which is really just a one party system.
It can easily get worse. The Roman empire had such an escalation. You think you had the worse of the worse with Caligula then you get Nero who torches Rome as some kind of 9/11.
Empires always self destruct because they are based on irrationality and traumatised people. The Armada always sinks spectacularly.
Oh gee, they don't have a plan..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkp7tkeu22I
Too narrow a perspective.
The destruction of American power heritage; thanks to great generation sacrifice and FDR's BW/UN benign matrix; that led to thirty years of world reconstruction; began when US power went sour in its desire to rule as SOLE imperator.
It started with Ronnie and Maggie, the catholic kings of deregulated American/Western hubris.
"Give the power to the elites and ramp up WS. Tuff shit on the welfare state as the salaried cannot be supported when we import all our oil and create these deficits."
It followed on in the financial and economic field to the warmongering LBJ/Nixon/Kissinger morph of US hegemonical power in the aftermath of Cuban Crisis super-power stalemate and the decision by US elites to deem NECESSARY a planned global strategy to feed the MIC BEAST; whose initiation occurred when a Rubicon was crossed in Dallas on Aldous Huxley day. The <Supreme became accomplice to crime of state now about to unfurl as crime of global power play.
The world entered the age of recurrent asymmetric wars in NAM and deficit spending in USA.
It went viral under the Reaganomics mantra.
It exploded in terms of warmongering strategy on 9/11 and in terms of financialization in the Lehman 2008 debacle now out of control.
Obammy is left holding the baby and the soiled bath water on all fronts.
As stooge surrogate of Oligarchy he is damned either way.
Whoever the worst or most destructive and treasonsous Presidents were (Lincoln, Wilson, FDR, HWB, W and Obama), the one that finished off the Republic was Husein Obama.
The NWO put him in office SPECIFICALLY because he is not an eligible natural born Citizen. GET A CLUE, the United States does not exist when the executor of the laws is an illegal entity. ALL of the criminals in government and crony corporations know that. It is about power. The law is now only what they say it is.
If it is important to them, then why is it unimportant to you? Criz, Jindal, and Rubio are not eligible natural born Citizens either--- all born of foreign parents, and thus with multiple allegiance.
In 2008 the citizens allowed 2 ineligible POTUS candidates to choose from. McCain was born in the PCZ, and Obama was a British subject, born of a British subject father. And you think that was an accident?
I contend that many of the problems we are seeing are the result of the massive growth in crony capitalism and corruption. Much of this can be attributed to the ability of those in control "changing the rules" and positioning themselves to benefit at every corner. In our busy and complex world we have found it impossible to watch all the moving parts. More on this subject in the article below.
http://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2014/05/how-empires-collapse.html
"Every abuse of the law is now declared legal by executive order. Anyone questioning the legality of extra-legal abuses of power is told "this is legal because it was authorized by the President." In other words, executive power is now unquestioned and cannot be challenged."
= Richard Nixon's 'executive privilege' = King George III's 'divine right of kings'.
Yes, Bush is a moron, psyco, skull & bones pos..............but don't 'talk bad bout bama', or you are a RACIST!