this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2023
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And if it wasn't Reagan, you have pretty good odds it was Nixon.
And if it wasn't Nixon just choose literally any other (former) Republican president.
* Former in parentheses for future reference
Any post-Nixon one, anyway. The list before him is fairly non-objectionable. Lincoln. Grant. Roosevelt. Hoover. Eisenhower. I guess Taft through Coolidge were fairly forgettable, by today's standards.
I don't know about that. Woodrow Wilson was a major factor in the regression after reconstruction. It's important to remember that democrats before the 1930s were the conservative party.
While it wasn't popular at the time, Wilson's decision to enter WW1 was actually the best thing for American interests in particular and worldwide democratic reform in general.
People really don't understand exactly how fucked in the head Kaiser Wilhelm and his allies were. Absolute monarchies could very well still be the world wide norm without the decisive, undeniable loss of the Central Powers to the liberal nations.
Does that decision undo all the harm he did? Who knows?
I'm not talking about Wilson entering the war. I'm talking about how he had the showing of Birth of a Nation, giving legitimacy to the Klu Klux Klan leading to their resurgence. He was also president during the Palmer Raids, and refused to join the League of Nations
Wilson was literally the architect of the League of Nations, and by far its greatest champion in America. He, however, was only President in the first place because the Republicans had split their party on the national stage despite having a strong Congressional majority and his hope of drumming up public support for the League was dashed when his failing health lead to a series of strokes he suffered campaigning for its acceptance.
I don't think you can blame him entirely for the resurgence of the KKK, especially since at its heart it was, and still is, a pyramid scheme first and a terrorist organization second (I'd suggest listening to the Behind the Bastards episode on them for details), but he's such a weird figure in American history precisely because he combined such disastrous internal policy with an objectively good global legacy, a mirror of his democratic idealism tarnished by personal bigotry.
btwn the two of them (correct me if I'm wrong, just going from memory): raised housing costs, stopped social benefits, criminalized drugs, were against worker's rights & minimum wage, against universal healthcare, overall made life harder for everyone except the upper class
Casual reminder that Nixon set his federal minimum wage at something he considered unreasonably, insultingly low, and that was $12 per hour adjusted for inflation.