Andrew Johnson's speech on Washington's Birthday 1866. He compares himself to Christ and his Radical Republican political opponents in Congress to the recently defeated Confederates.
Jimmy Carter's "Crisis of Confidence" or "Malaise" speech. He lays out a laundry list of demoralizing American problems with no solutions and no real hope of success.
Barack Obama's stunning admission, after a summer full of golf and vacations that he has no strategy for ISIL revolutionaries.
Showing posts with label Andrew Johnson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Andrew Johnson. Show all posts
Friday, August 29, 2014
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Somewhere, Andrew Johnson Is Thankful That He Is No Longer the Worst
Until perhaps now, the worst president in the history of the United States has to have been President Andrew Johnson. No one else has managed to reach the same reverse Midas touch (everything he touches turns to name something foul and offensive) ineptness shown by Andrew Johnson . . . again, until perhaps now.
As a president, Johnson deserves his fate. As a man, he deserves some slack. The nation would have never elected Johnson to this office on his own merits. He was an aggressive, sometimes drunken, angry man bearing not chips, but full grown redwood trees on his shoulders. Johnson was useful as a Southern Democrat in the US Senate who hated secession and everyone associated with it.
Johnson tried to follow what he assumed Lincoln's policy would be. But he lacked Lincoln's disarming diplomatic style. His intellect paled in comparison, also. Most importantly, Lincoln earned more political capital than any president since Washington by winning the Civil War. He would have had to spend all of it and test his leadership abilities to their limit to implement his Reconstruction plan and make sure the South abided. Johnson had no such capital and no such abilities.
His suspicious and angry nature alienated moderate Republicans who had been eager to assist and even defend him against Radicals who sought full punishment for the costs of secession. The Democratic Party remained too tainted with the recent Rebellion to have given him substantial backing.
Johnson and Obama have many differences. One grew up in rural poverty, the other in urban comfort. But many similarities link them. They both saw themselves as the moral center of events. This created trouble for both because they could not understand that others may disagree for completely honest reasons.
Johnson, on Washington's Birthday no less, savaged his House Republican opponents. He accused Thaddeus Stevens, among others, for preventing the reconciliation of the country. "I do not intend to be bullied by my enemies!" he shouted. Obama, too has played the morally righteous victim, attacked by unreasonable opponents.
Both men relied on shrinking circles of trusted advisers. Obama has few, other than Valerie Jarrett, at this point after starting off with the capable Rahm Emmanuel and Robert Gibbs. Johnson lost most of his Cabinet outside of the increasingly moderate secretary of state William Seward. Seward had a relatively free hand and gave Johnson one of his few accomplishments, the purchase of Alaska.
Johnson's political influence did not hit its nadir in fall of 1866, even though he invested two weeks into speeches backing Democratic candidates. Those who allowed him to speak in their support found he was little help. Radical Republicans won big in the midterms that year and the nation repudiated Johnson. In 2014, most Democratic candidates avoid Obama. Allison Grimes of Kentucky hopes to build support for her Senate race against Republican Mitch McConnell by attacking the president.
And both men broke the law. Historians generally agree that the Tenure of Office Act was a trap laid out in the open by Republicans hoping to catch Johnson committing "high crimes and misdemeanors." they impeached, but failed to remove him. The odium of violating the law and facing a Senate trial ended whatever influence Johnson had left.
Obama last week violated a more important federal law. He turned five terrorist leaders and strategists back over to the enemy for a Marine who may have been at best a deserter, at worst a traitor. The law requires that any terrorists released from Guantanamo Bay come after consultation with Congress and 30 days for discussion. Obama failed to follow the law, then allowed his National Security Adviser to claim the enemy captured him on the battlefield, which was far from the case. The Taliban must know that if these men plan and execute an attack that harms Americans, that it will spark a Constitutional crisis and the likely impeachment of the president.
Democrats seem to have found their breaking point. Senator Diane Feinstein was livid in her denunciation. This comes on top of the Veterans' Affairs scandal and the War on Coal regulations that provoked open rebellion from Senator Joe Manchin and Congressman Nick Rahall. Obamacare's many failures and burdens on working Americans already define his presidency. Clinton will try to separate herself from the president and his policy, but will not have much success.
Johnson with his flawed personality and good intentions sank his own presidency. He failed in everything that he tried, but Andrew Johnson did not make the country substantially worse off than when he took office. Obama's values and beliefs have underlain every policy decision that he has made, foreign and domestic. The utter wrongness of those ideas has put the nation and the world in a much worse position
As a president, Johnson deserves his fate. As a man, he deserves some slack. The nation would have never elected Johnson to this office on his own merits. He was an aggressive, sometimes drunken, angry man bearing not chips, but full grown redwood trees on his shoulders. Johnson was useful as a Southern Democrat in the US Senate who hated secession and everyone associated with it.
Johnson tried to follow what he assumed Lincoln's policy would be. But he lacked Lincoln's disarming diplomatic style. His intellect paled in comparison, also. Most importantly, Lincoln earned more political capital than any president since Washington by winning the Civil War. He would have had to spend all of it and test his leadership abilities to their limit to implement his Reconstruction plan and make sure the South abided. Johnson had no such capital and no such abilities.
His suspicious and angry nature alienated moderate Republicans who had been eager to assist and even defend him against Radicals who sought full punishment for the costs of secession. The Democratic Party remained too tainted with the recent Rebellion to have given him substantial backing.
Johnson and Obama have many differences. One grew up in rural poverty, the other in urban comfort. But many similarities link them. They both saw themselves as the moral center of events. This created trouble for both because they could not understand that others may disagree for completely honest reasons.
Johnson, on Washington's Birthday no less, savaged his House Republican opponents. He accused Thaddeus Stevens, among others, for preventing the reconciliation of the country. "I do not intend to be bullied by my enemies!" he shouted. Obama, too has played the morally righteous victim, attacked by unreasonable opponents.
Both men relied on shrinking circles of trusted advisers. Obama has few, other than Valerie Jarrett, at this point after starting off with the capable Rahm Emmanuel and Robert Gibbs. Johnson lost most of his Cabinet outside of the increasingly moderate secretary of state William Seward. Seward had a relatively free hand and gave Johnson one of his few accomplishments, the purchase of Alaska.
Johnson's political influence did not hit its nadir in fall of 1866, even though he invested two weeks into speeches backing Democratic candidates. Those who allowed him to speak in their support found he was little help. Radical Republicans won big in the midterms that year and the nation repudiated Johnson. In 2014, most Democratic candidates avoid Obama. Allison Grimes of Kentucky hopes to build support for her Senate race against Republican Mitch McConnell by attacking the president.
And both men broke the law. Historians generally agree that the Tenure of Office Act was a trap laid out in the open by Republicans hoping to catch Johnson committing "high crimes and misdemeanors." they impeached, but failed to remove him. The odium of violating the law and facing a Senate trial ended whatever influence Johnson had left.
Obama last week violated a more important federal law. He turned five terrorist leaders and strategists back over to the enemy for a Marine who may have been at best a deserter, at worst a traitor. The law requires that any terrorists released from Guantanamo Bay come after consultation with Congress and 30 days for discussion. Obama failed to follow the law, then allowed his National Security Adviser to claim the enemy captured him on the battlefield, which was far from the case. The Taliban must know that if these men plan and execute an attack that harms Americans, that it will spark a Constitutional crisis and the likely impeachment of the president.
Democrats seem to have found their breaking point. Senator Diane Feinstein was livid in her denunciation. This comes on top of the Veterans' Affairs scandal and the War on Coal regulations that provoked open rebellion from Senator Joe Manchin and Congressman Nick Rahall. Obamacare's many failures and burdens on working Americans already define his presidency. Clinton will try to separate herself from the president and his policy, but will not have much success.
Johnson with his flawed personality and good intentions sank his own presidency. He failed in everything that he tried, but Andrew Johnson did not make the country substantially worse off than when he took office. Obama's values and beliefs have underlain every policy decision that he has made, foreign and domestic. The utter wrongness of those ideas has put the nation and the world in a much worse position
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Obama, Dick, and Andy: "I Wanna Talk About Me"
About a year ago, Barack Obama caused a personal pronoun stir when CNSNews.com reported that he used the first person pronouns "I" and "me" a combined total of 117 times in a single speech. But, however, Obama is far from alone in "wanting to talk about me."
About a year and six weeks before the oft reported July 2012 speech, blogger Marc Cenedella reported an analysis of Obama speeches given at CIA headquarters compared with several of his predecessors. Since 1968, Presidents Carter, Reagan, and George W. Bush referred to themselves the least often. George H. W. Bush gets a pass for a slightly higher level because he once was CIA chief, which would lead to more first person mentions.
By far, the three highest levels of use came from Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama. Clinton's high use shrinks when Cenedella factors in the length of the addresses. The famously loquacious Clinton drops down to Bushian levels of first person pronoun use while Obama and Nixon remain higher than the rest.
In his 1960 work Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction, famed American historian Eric McKitrick examined another president persistent in his employment of first person pronouns.
About Johnson, he wrote :
For a public man, he was obsessed with himself to a degree that exceeded the normal, and most of his speeches, no matter what else they dealt with, may be read as demands for personal vindication and personal approval.
McKitrick also concluded that Johnson preferred general rules to concrete thinking "in order that (his mind) might once more close itself and be at rest."
Johnson, at his worst, often evoked images of crucifixion and Judah Iscariot-like betrayal in reference to himself and his enemies. This worked in the East Tennessee hills where the poor felt just as nailed to a cross by their betters as he did. But it fell short of the expectations that the national public had for the demeanor of their president.
McKitrick compared the inferiority complex of Johnson to the confidence of Lincoln. About the 16th president, he said his "'humility' was sustained by the odd arrogance of a superior man's self-knowledge." Interestingly, this also describes President Reagan and both chief executives of the Bush family.
Nixon's public speaking patterns mimicked McKitrick's evaluation of Johnson, especially early. Journalist Theodore White remembered almost a decade later that in 1960, Nixon's "common utterances all too frequently a mixture of pathetic self-pity and petulant distemper." Aide Robert Finch told White in 1968 that Nixon" doesn't want to be loved. He's not looking for adulation the way he used to." But that campaign evaluation looks more like Nixon covering than transforming his nature.
The three presidents all share in common some attributes. All three worked to expand the authority of the executive branch. None of them could work and play well with anyone except their closest trusted associates. All three had fatal flaws that kept them from functioning comfortably in the role chosen for them by the public. Nixon enjoyed the most success, but of course unraveled his legacy by covering criminal activities. Obama and Nixon both preferred layers of secrecy to public examination of their administration's doings. Conversely, Johnson was perhaps too open about his exact feelings for proposals and personalities.
Of the three, Johnson was far and away the best speaker. He could address a crowd extemporaneously for hours. Sure, the crowds sometimes despised him after his efforts, but Johnson could never leave an audience cold. Obama reads well from a teleprompter, but may be one of the worst presidential speakers if the ability to speak and respond without notes is factored.
Will Obama's presidency end in scandal and/or disgrace as Johnson and Nixon's did? It certainly has achieved no success that has been of any value to the people. And history's remembrance of Johnson certainly has found echoes in Obama.
History will illuminate more of Obama as years and decades pass, but he has shown enough over the past several years that some conclusions are inescapable.
The most important of these is that Obama has been consistently a much smaller man than the American presidency demands.
About a year and six weeks before the oft reported July 2012 speech, blogger Marc Cenedella reported an analysis of Obama speeches given at CIA headquarters compared with several of his predecessors. Since 1968, Presidents Carter, Reagan, and George W. Bush referred to themselves the least often. George H. W. Bush gets a pass for a slightly higher level because he once was CIA chief, which would lead to more first person mentions.
By far, the three highest levels of use came from Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama. Clinton's high use shrinks when Cenedella factors in the length of the addresses. The famously loquacious Clinton drops down to Bushian levels of first person pronoun use while Obama and Nixon remain higher than the rest.
In his 1960 work Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction, famed American historian Eric McKitrick examined another president persistent in his employment of first person pronouns.
About Johnson, he wrote :
For a public man, he was obsessed with himself to a degree that exceeded the normal, and most of his speeches, no matter what else they dealt with, may be read as demands for personal vindication and personal approval.
McKitrick also concluded that Johnson preferred general rules to concrete thinking "in order that (his mind) might once more close itself and be at rest."
Johnson, at his worst, often evoked images of crucifixion and Judah Iscariot-like betrayal in reference to himself and his enemies. This worked in the East Tennessee hills where the poor felt just as nailed to a cross by their betters as he did. But it fell short of the expectations that the national public had for the demeanor of their president.
McKitrick compared the inferiority complex of Johnson to the confidence of Lincoln. About the 16th president, he said his "'humility' was sustained by the odd arrogance of a superior man's self-knowledge." Interestingly, this also describes President Reagan and both chief executives of the Bush family.
Nixon's public speaking patterns mimicked McKitrick's evaluation of Johnson, especially early. Journalist Theodore White remembered almost a decade later that in 1960, Nixon's "common utterances all too frequently a mixture of pathetic self-pity and petulant distemper." Aide Robert Finch told White in 1968 that Nixon" doesn't want to be loved. He's not looking for adulation the way he used to." But that campaign evaluation looks more like Nixon covering than transforming his nature.
The three presidents all share in common some attributes. All three worked to expand the authority of the executive branch. None of them could work and play well with anyone except their closest trusted associates. All three had fatal flaws that kept them from functioning comfortably in the role chosen for them by the public. Nixon enjoyed the most success, but of course unraveled his legacy by covering criminal activities. Obama and Nixon both preferred layers of secrecy to public examination of their administration's doings. Conversely, Johnson was perhaps too open about his exact feelings for proposals and personalities.
Of the three, Johnson was far and away the best speaker. He could address a crowd extemporaneously for hours. Sure, the crowds sometimes despised him after his efforts, but Johnson could never leave an audience cold. Obama reads well from a teleprompter, but may be one of the worst presidential speakers if the ability to speak and respond without notes is factored.
Will Obama's presidency end in scandal and/or disgrace as Johnson and Nixon's did? It certainly has achieved no success that has been of any value to the people. And history's remembrance of Johnson certainly has found echoes in Obama.
History will illuminate more of Obama as years and decades pass, but he has shown enough over the past several years that some conclusions are inescapable.
The most important of these is that Obama has been consistently a much smaller man than the American presidency demands.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Obama's "Swing 'Round the Circle"
On the Magical Misery Tour, the debt man walking continued his Andrew Johnson impersonation, traveling around the Midwest, giving speeches that even further bury his presidency. (In 1866, Johnson conducted his "Swing 'Round the Circle" tour where he took on Congress in a series of speeches. By the end of the tour, train officials routinely feared for the life of the president because the crowds grew so violent.) In his most recent speech, Obama compared criticism of himself to that of Lincoln. This implied that opposition to Obama is quasi-treasonous, a note he has sounded in the past. None other than Eric Foner, quasi left wing historian of the Civil War and Reconstruction era, slammed Obama's recent self-comparison to the 16th president.
Obama's series of speeches, like Johnson's, have laid bare the nature of the president. He is self-absorbed without enduring self-reflection. His speeches emphasize his trials, his suffering, his political enemies' machinations. Audiences in 1866 found these themes unnerving in their chief executive. In 2011, the president is trying to toss everyone under his bus, but so far has only thrown his own reputation beneath the wheels.
Obama criticism has not even reached the depths of the fecal matter slung at his predecessor, much less the unfortunate Lincoln, who endured commentary on every aspect of his presidency and life. Few people, really outside of me, have questioned Obama's intelligence and all will admit that he can read a teleprompter with style. People have issues with how the president has performed so far. He has made glaring errors on every level and has no shortage of other people to blame. Most recently, he blamed politics itself as the main obstacle to his leading us to a glorious promised land.
People are fed up. Even his own supporters, such as those in the Congressional Black Caucus, imply that he has been less of a savior and more of a carnival barker. Obama is reminiscent of Harry Truman's description of another failed president, James Buchanan in that he spent a long period of time trying to become president, then once he got there, he had no sense of how to do the job.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Watching the Andrew Johnsonization of the President
In 1865, Andrew Johnson entered the White House after the assassination of President Lincoln. High hopes surrounded the presidency even without Lincoln. Some wanted punishment for the South, others wanted leniency. Some called for treating blacks fairly and getting them a new start, others were not as concerned.
Lincoln wanted lenient treatment for Southerners, but also did not impede the progress of his military's seizures of Confederate military and government officials' property for redistribution to blacks. It seemed like a fair punishment for taking arms against the Union, although it was not yet clear whether or not Confederates would face trial.
Johnson followed the leniency policy and forget about the blacks, taking control of Reconstruction. Northerners grew increasingly angry that the South seemed to face no punitive measures for starting the war. Those concerned about the fate of blacks saw legal proscription and impoverishment approaching for them.
Republicans stepped in by 1866 and started blocking Johnson. He reacted wildly, ranting about individuals such as Charles Sumner. Johnson actually made a national figure of the radical Thaddeus Stevens, representative of Pennsylvania, by condemning him so often. Moderates who might have compromised with Johnson recoiled at his bitterness and lack of decorum in speechmaking. The summer and fall of 1866 found Johnson speaking through hecklers and physical threats to support Democratic candidates. Republicans increased their majorities substantially. From 1867 until the end, Congress put Johnson in a box, but overplayed their hand in trying to impeach and remove him from office.
Are there enough angry Democratic moderates in both houses to join with the GOP and put Obama in his place? That remains to be seen, but a repudiation of Harry Reid by a coalition of Democrats and Republicans would be a great start.
Something to watch for. Wait and see if Hillary Clinton doesn't leave office within six months.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Obama Has Lost His D@&^ed Mind, Much Like Andrew Johnson
You can understand why he did it. A month or so ago, Barack Obama made a trip to Georgia to support Democratic candidates. The Peach State's ticket topper, former governor and Democratic candidate for governor again, Roy Barnes, high tailed it for the southern part of the state. he did not want to be seen with Barack Obama.
When Joe Manchin wanted presidential punch, he opted for Bill Clinton rather than Obama.
It's clear that an agitated Obama in recent days has simply lost his mind. Like Joe Biden, you don;t know what crazy thing he is going to say. Unlike Biden, whose shenanigans are cheeky and fun, Obama's are tragic.
Obama told Latinos on Univision that they needed to "go out and punish their enemies."
He told Republicans, after being told himself by the Democratic candidate for governor of that state that he could do something anatomically impossible with his endorsement, that they "had to sit in the back of the bus."
Say what? Were he American, he would understand the Rosa Parks, second class citizen connotations in that remark. But we can't cut him slack. He is the president and should know better. The only conclusion that one can reach is that the strain of the presidency and his failures have left him mentally unbalanced.
The best comparison in U. S. History is Andrew Johnson. Johnson sported a strong inferiority complex and a severe drinking problem and allowed both to sink his presidency. He compared his political opponents to Judas Iscariot, compared himself to Christ on the Cross and generally made himself obnoxious. His attempts to build a Democratic majority in 1866 resulted in higher than expected GOP gains as he was ignored and ridiculed on stops across the nation. Republicans took Congress and put the president into a box where he could do only limited damage. They went too far in trying to remove him from office and created enough sympathy for him that he eventually made his way back to Congress.
Both Obama and Johnson showed two years into their term definite signs of a breakdown. Let's hope that we can avoid too much damage to our nation and its image between now and his loss in the primaries in 2012. Johnson was not renominated, neither will Obama.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)