The Trump library will have no need of book shelves or bins for papers. A simple glass case will be sufficient to display his cell phone, the source of so many historic tweets.
And, oh, maybe a menu from the Mar-a-Lago restaurant.
(The property extends west one-quarter mile from the ocean to the Intracoastal on the island of Palm Beach, hence the name: Sea-to-Lake, get it?)
2
I think that McDonald's should launch a commemorative trump burger, they could call it the Trump Fake Burger or perhaps The Twitter Burger. It could consist of a pure lard patty on a stale bun and come with a trump action figure in a golf cart chasing Hillary Clinton.
27
I just took a blow to my ribs playing basketball. It is uncomfortable to breathe, let alone laugh. Shoulda known better than to read Gail's column... Now I'm really laughing my head off in shire agony!
11
Wonder if Dubya moved up in the rankings.
6
Build the Trump library out of his stupid wall prototypes.
And don't bother with a door.
18
Priceless, Gail.
8
A bankrupt Presidential Casino.....
11
President Harding pardoned Eugene Debs, the Socialist labor leader given 10 years for opposing World War One, though many conservatives objected.
"I want the man to go home & have Christmas dinner with his family," he said.
10
If Trump's Russian deal goes through while he is still in office, or shortly afterwards, then his library should, of course, go in Moscow.
17
Undoubtedly, all staff and docents at the Trump Museum/Library will have spray-on tans and be armed with AK-47s.
14
Don't put it in Queens! Like you said, New York City's suffered enough.
10
Watch him win another term.
4
Given the criteria and standards of this poll, I'm guessing that BHO made the Top 5 Best Presidents With The Shortest List of Accomplishments
1
New Jersey says NO.
12
A good laugh is the very best medicine for this cancer. I must point out, however, that Queens is in NYC, Would Safire consider this a "gotcha"?
2
The fact that AGW will innundate Mar a Lago is a definite plus.
3
Perhaps Ms. Collins has forgotten that Queens is indeed part of New York City.
However, I agree that Trump's standing as worst President seems assured for some time, perhaps for all time. (I would certainly hate to think that a President could come along who would outdo Trump in faux pas, selfishness and lack of political knowledge.)
As another reader noted, Moscow might be an appropriate spot for the Trump quasi-library. Do tweets become part of an Archives somewhere? Of course such an establishment might readily include all the articles about Trump's unwillingness to rent to African Americans, his ads accusing black teenagers of assaulting a jogger in Central Park when they had already been exonerated, and his frequently voiced opinions about President Obama's place of birth. Perhaps it could be called The Trump Race to the Base Archives.
11
After Trump has left office his papers will go to the Dr. Alfred Kinsey Institute at Indiana University.
5
Can you imagine Trump's tweets after he leaves/gets kicked out of Office? We must start work on Bi-partisan legislation to ban Trump from all forms of electronic communication, especially Twitter, for the rest of his unnatural life.
7
C'mon. Trump's library could contain all of Mueller's indictments. I expect that alone will turn into a bigly set of documents.
9
Trump library would need no book shelves.
15
I am reading Ron Chernow’s excellent biography of Ulysses Grant and am struck by how much Trump reminds me of Andrew Johnson. Both Trump and Johnson were preceded in office by much more significant leaders. Furthermore, Trump and Johnson claimed to be looking out for the interests of the common man, but once in office both did a 180: Trump with his tax bill that favors the wealthy and corporations, Johnson with his opposition to Reconstruction and deference to the Southern plantation-owning class. Both Trump and Johnson tried to extract loyalty pledges from those serving in the government (Trump from Comey, et. al; Johnson from Grant). Furthermore, Johnson was more racist than Trump, but the latter has not exactly distinguished himself with past statements regarding non-Europeans.
13
John Updike's Memories of the Ford Administration helps fill that need for reminiscences of Ford, and it includes a wonderful flashback to Buchanan. By the way, another positive thing about Buchanan was that he owned a multi-seat outhouse.
9
How did we get here? A clueless, heartless and shameless man who really thinks money is ALL! Extra pay for educators who are willing to kill?
Sadly, another low but surely more to come!
One is only comforted by the thought that there is an end to his presidency and if only time would go faster!
8
You all are missing an important strategic point about the business opportunity of the Trump library. Obviously what will happen is that the size of the library will be huge and in it will be a zillion copies of The Art of the Deal, each copy paid for by the U.S. citizens. Paid at full price, not the Amazon discount.
This is a lot of money.
11
Gail, your optimism is irrepressible! My vision of the future might be a little more (-hopefully!) dystopian.
I am thinking that we needn't worry about any future
"Trump Presidential Lie-berry".
Unless the cockroach's far-flung future progeny decide to build one, as a shrine to their god, "The Dear Irradiator".
Once Trump realizes the inevitability of dying in prison? All bets are off...He will manufacture an excuse to press his
"Bigger button".
You know, the one "that works".
2
"William Henry Harrison came in third from the bottom even though all he did was die a month into his administration. Give the man a break."
Since his principal distinction is least time in office before dropping dead, isn't it just as insulting to up-vote Harrison as to down-vote him? We don't want to encourage such behavior in our presidents. Or do we?
5
Trump's Presidential Library should certainly include all the books that Trump paid to have ghostwritten in his name. The actual authors should not just be given full credit, they should give their impressions (as some of them already have) of what a barbarian Trump really is.
3
Yes, the Trump Library & Casino (to which his base can pilgrimage to be conned still of their hard-earned dollars), placed at the (current) high-tide line of Atlantic City. Let them gamble on whether global warming is "a hoax."
12
The library will be populated solely by picture and coloring books. Any future population that digs up the Trump library will conclude that his civilization was illiterate .
4
This Trump reality show has stayed too long. Please cancel it. It's on every channel. I'm going mad.
8
President Buchanan, in response to a nation wide movement, granted US Federal workers a ten hour day. It was a break through for American labor.
Of course the President' s action was denounced in editorials and sermons across the nation. The Establishment declared that the workers would only spend their new free time in brothels or saloons . . . .
6
Maybe his library could be built into the wall...
5
Yes, but Trump is the GREATEST worst president. Just ask him.
12
I found the rankings of presidents very interesting. I think Reagan should be in the bottom third. He did perform impeachable offenses via Iran-Contra, but the Democrats took pity on his aged dementia. I was encouraged that even Republicans scholars looked upon Trump with disdain. I was pleased that Bush the elder was elevated. He was rational with great experience in many areas. The list made me want to learn more about the more obscure presidents.
In some ways, the parliamentarian form of government seems better. They can conveniently remove a prime minister with a simple vote of no confidence. Our problems involve firearm and religious fanaticism, the overwhelming power of money, and the fact that so many people don’t even bother to vote. It is still an open question whether government of, for and by the people can succeed. I was in kindergarten when Pearl Harbor was attacked. That was, for me, America’s finest hour when the entire country was on the same page. Most everyone served in some form of defense, sports and movie stars, and the wealthy. I loved that feeling of togetherness.
7
I can't stand Trump. I believe he's a disgrace. Yet so far I must demure. He didn't kill a million people, as LBJ did in Vietnam. And he didn't start a war against Iraq, that has led to Iran's preeminence in the region, gave rise to ISIS, and killed and maimed so many in the region, including our soldiers and marines. So I say, unless Trump starts a war, he is still better than LBJ and W.
2
No more libraries and museums for US presidents! Beginning with the incumbent. Congress should specifically prohibit funding for a Trump memorial complex, and for naming anything for him ever. Of course, he will not sign that bill, but Congress can, and should, withhold funding for Trump memorials until the next president signs the prohibition into law.
4
If Mueller implicates Trump in any of his findings, then Trump will be completely disgraced. Then we can add a small wing to President Obama's library to house the Trump stuff.
2
As a retired librarian, I can't wait for the Trump Presidential Library. May be Lilliputian in scope.
7
My last comment. When teachers hand in their lesson plans for the week, do they also hand in their gun plans for the week?
Teaching is an art and people who go into teaching become teachers not for the money but for the love of teaching. There are some who shouldn't be teachers but the vast majority are in it for the love of working with children and imparting knowledge to children. God Bless Teachers.
I was a teacher and proudly say that with love in my heart and for the beautiful children I taught for over 40 years. I loved every minute of it.
I am crying for all the children and teachers who have lost their lives to mass school shooting in our country. God Bless them too. It is not too late to save the children going to school right now every day. Gun control not more weapons.
14
Thank you for the levity. Having survived Buchanan and now discover he maybe wasn't as bad as he might have been gives me hope. Sort of, in a perverse way. Maybe 100 years from now others will trade places. Who knows? It was gratifying to see that the top ten remain people we can still admire and respect, whose libraries we would gladly visit to see books and records of actual accomplishments. We need to focus in that direction. And hope.
3
This is something that no present day Republican would ever say: With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan — to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.
Lincoln's final words in his second inaugural address to the nation still apply. But the party of Lincoln no longer exists and that's the real tragedy here. No one today in the party of Lincoln would ever speak these words. I doubt that they would give any serious thought to what those words meant or could mean today. And then, alas, Lincoln was assassinated and the man who succeeded him didn't try as hard as he should have to reconstruct the nation.
Ironic that the man who preserved the union was a Republican and the man that is attempting to destroy it is the same.
26
@zegowitz
To paraphrase CNN: It may start as a joke, until someone gets hurt.
Facts first.
The NYT has now run at least TWO above the fold articles in "the paper of record" touting "political science experts" who do not know who is on Mt. Rushmore. Dubious.
Worse yet the expert survey is deeply flawed research. And these are purportedly academicians.
The point I make: The research can be flawed, the source can be biased, Truthiness is paramount; as long as the outcome--45 is worst--serves the narrative, Ms. Collins & the NYT do not care about the details.
Wouldn't you expect Collins to do a column on the so-called political experts who do not know who is already on Mt. Rushmore?
2
I don’t understand your Mt Rushmore comment. Was this mentioned in the article? Or the linked article that explains the methodology? Or is this just a word salad that seems to sound good to your ears?
7
I have a suggestion for the presidential museum. There's a little spot in Leavenworth, Kansas...
30
"Where do you think they'd put [his Presidential Museum]? Queens? Mar-a-Lago? Please God, not at Trump Tower. New York City's already suffered enough." Gail, you do know that Queens is part of New York City, right??
1
Yes the Trump Museum/Library?........There will be free entry with your declaration of Loyalty with the catch coming when you have to pay dearly to get out.
13
Isn't 'Trump Presidential Library' an oxymoron?
23
What about Andrew Johnson, the first president to be impeached?
He was ranked fifth worst. It is in the linked article
2
No matter what is contained (or not contained) in the Trump Library, it will be YUGE!. "The biggest one that has ever been built!"
3
And the greatest ever!
If he would just die, do you think that it might boost his ratings? He is old enough and that diet should do it. We would all be so grateful. I don't care that Pence would be next. It is so good to have people that think like this as the objects of our attention.
5
The only appropriate place for a D.T. museum in New York would be in Wollman ice skating rink in Central Park, where his sole great accomplishment took place in 1986 on the long time broken rink, he made ice.
3
He also fixed up the rink just below 110th St. And gave us the summertime Victorian Gardens amusement park in Wollman in summer. My daughter learned to skate on a Trump-refurbished rink and we spent many a day at Victorian Gardens. I used to think it was funny that even the water they sold at those venues was called "Trump Ice". Back in those golden days I was grateful to Trump and just considered him another NYC character. I am saddened that I now utterly abhor him.
2
Trump's Presidential Library will have bars & orange jumpsuits...
Not the "open-bar" kind, the vertical "window treatment" kind.
I dont think they will let everyone have AR's though....
Not on HIS side of the bars, at least.
5
Warren G. Harding is often ranked as one of the worst Presidents, but he had a great deal more compassion and self-knowledge than trump. He once said: "I am a man of limited talents from a small town; I don't seem to grasp that I am president."
11
This ranking is seriously flawed. William Henry Harrison, the one-month marvel, should by definition be ranked at the median of the list. He didn't do anything great, but he didn't mess anything up either. He's just a null entry on the list. He should be the benchmark, the sea-level mark, for future presidents. Beat WHH! should be the goal of every new administration.
7
Perhaps Vladimir Putin will find a place in a tiny corner of his St. Petersburg Presidential library to contain Trump's "library".
15
I do wonder what a Trump historical site will look like. Maybe a big field with a pile of perpetually burning books at the center, topped off by a burning cross flanked by a circle of AR 15s.
20
You imply in your editorial that Queens is not in New York City. As a reminder, Queens is one of the 5 boroughs that make up the city- Brooklyn, Queens, Bronx, Manhattan, and Staten Island. I agree that any memorial to Trump should stay in New Jersey- maybe one of his failed casinos?
6
We all know he’ll be judged as the worst, but logic dictates that we wait a reasonable amount of time before passing that judgement. Give it a about five years to let the true nastiness that is the Trump presidency sink in. It’s a presidency, he has four years, we can’t be definitive after just one year.
Who knows, we could see that in a few months he starts being the great leader.....HEY...STOP THROWING STUFF AT ME. I’m just kidding.. sssshhhh
10
Trump has done wonders for Bush/Cheney as well.
20
It might be better to compare Trump to a different president, Jefferson Davis —vain, venal, indecisive, and elected by supporters who want to destroy the United States of America.
26
When you think about it, it's kind of amazing that our poor country has survived so many lousy presidents as well as it has.
16
We may need a Trump presidential library for his "papers": "The US president was pictured holding a briefing note that appeared to be a reminder for him to show empathy to school shooting survivors visiting the White House." (The Guardian, 22Feb2018) In a photo of the sheet, Item 5 was "I hear you". Obviously his handlers know that compassion is not his long suit, but what bridge players call a "void".
14
What makes a good modern president? Someone who cares for all citizens. Regardless of color, religion, gender, economic ranking, and age. Oops that sure does not fit a president who has rolled back healthcare, raised fear over immigrants, Muslims, women who have been attacked, rescinding laws for automatic weapons, cut back on programs for children, the aged, and the environment. Nope, what we have now is a man that bows before the NRA, the rich, corporations, and Vladimir Putin. At least Tricky Dicky did not do that.
16
We're still in the early innings, but Donald hasn't murdered anyone yet so far as we know. Compare to Richard Nixon, who should get a zero. The calamitous loss of life in SE Asia and knowingly sending American soldiers to their deaths so he could get re-elected...could there be anything more immoral? And I haven't even mentioned his other shenanigans. Donald is a piker compared to him, at least so far.
3
The perfect site location for the Trump Unpresidential Library is painfully obvious. It should be located in Moscow right next to the Kremlin.
15
Trump won't get a library, just a giant Presidential "Participation" trophy.
14
I don't care what anyone says, George W Bush will always be the worst President in History
6
Let's hope so.
If Trump starts a hot war with North Korea, he'll make it to #1 on the All-Time Worst List. (If it's nuclear, there might not be anyone left to make lists.) Otherwise, the Bush 43 crown is safe for a while.
2
Thanks, Gail. Laughing helps. A little.
11
It's getting hard to think of new ways to ridicule Trumo. Now we even have to
start talking about his Post -Presidency
5
A Trump presidential museum. Oh, dear God, I never thought of that. Something else to keep me awake at night . . .
6
Is Trump committing treason by not actively working to protect US Elections agains Russian influence?
5
Dear Mr. President,
Put down your tweeter and your comb and act like an adult.
Thank you.
6
A Trump library would only contain unpaid bills from his contractors, not to mention the thousands the legal writs he collected from the people who have sued him.
9
A Trump library could be very educational if it included his tax returns! It will obviously include "The Art of the Deal" so it will have at least one book. And if you have one really incredibly great book, greatest ever, do you need anything else? The other books and papers would just feel sad and inadequate in the presence of such excellence.
4
If there must be a Trump library, put it East of Mar-a-lago, so we can be rid of it as soon as possible. I can see it holding Trump's phone and a scrolling display of his most offensive Tweets. These might focus on the lack of teeth the EPA now has, among other things. The irony is enticing.
6
Best line is the last line. It made me laugh out loud.
2
Trump's presidential library will be a collection of tweets and the scores of his golf games, with all the cheating showing. There might also be a copy of The Art of the Deal, with the sections about lying as a strategy highlighted. And should also be a transcript of an interview with the actual author of the book, the "as told to" guy. After all, it's never been proved that Trump can actually write. We know he can't read.
80
Buchanan may have proven to be something of a lightweight as our 15th president, but he had also served his country as a senator from Pennsylvania, as a Secretary of State, and as an Ambassador to both Russia and the United Kingdom. In addition, unlike Trump, Buchanan did not seek and receive five military deferments for “bone spurs,” and he served his country during the War of 1812. In my humble opinion, all of that service to his country, no matter how flawed or ineffective he may have been, puts him light years ahead of our current president on the “best presidents” list.
91
Good point. Not to be forgotten. However, and separately, he failed miserably as a President.
A Trump Library is an oxymoron. Libraries are filled with knowledge and seekers of truth. Ask Trump if he even has a library card.
21
The Worst POTUSH
You’d think there is no where to go but up. And we’d be wrong! He still has 12 points to erase so he can never be beaten in the future.
3
Trump's presidential library will consist of copies of The Art of the Deal (even though his ghost writer has since denounced Trump) and DVD's and CD's of Fox News and Talk Radio shows. In other words - all "Real News".
6
Little known fact-- but very true: Trump has been talking about creating a cemetery (for family, plus 284 plots for the public) on the Bedminster property. So he can have his library-- which won't need much space-- plus a Huge Golden Shrine close to the 18th hole.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-mystery-of-donald-trump-and-...
3
Only Nixon could go to China. Only Trump could be Russian OWNED.
6
Trump will build a library then cheat all the workers and contractors out of their money. Once a cheat always a cheat. Will the contraction helmets say Cheat America out of their money? James Buchanan is looking better and better.
8
Have to wonder about your values. Perhaps the worst thing a President can do is get young Americans killed fighting an unnecessary war. Using this yardstick, we would have quite different ratings.
4
When the U.S. is well past this, the country will have definite proof that it is robust enough to weather and outlast a malignant national tumor and keep going. That's the only upside, albeit a big one.
7
Thought and Prayers.
1
Gail Collins, I could read you all day long. Perhaps the fact that I burst out laughing at least five times helps. Brava!
8
Trump likes to be the best at whatever he does. He's doing his best to be the worst president. You know, I think he's succeeding too. He's winning that race to the bottom.
17
Bad as President or bad in what they did? Nixon was interested in foreign policy, even diplomacy, involved in SALT, opening to China &c. Trump, by far the least competent in modern times, isn't yet responsible for deaths anywhere like his last few predecessors. G.W. Bush is still by far the worst, for beginning the ongoing avalanche of the Middle East by stupidly, & against repeated warnings, blasting a single stone, as the ongoing horrors of Syria alone demonstrate. He has no modern compeers.
6
Cute column. But where does President Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld now appear on the list?Just wondering.
11
He ranks 30. It’s in the link
What we are seeing in Trump is an unstable, paranoid President slowly
descending into madness. His ridiculous tweets are the best indicator.
No one in the White House is safe. Nor is the country. However, the
Congress and sensible people in the Cabinet are doing their best to make him Irrelevant. Soon he will be tweeting from Bellview.
6
A 2017 C-SPAN poll of presidential historians came up with very similar rankings of presidents as the poll of American Political Scientists, although President Trump was not included in the poll of historians.
see: https://www.c-span.org/presidentsurvey2017/?category=1
Below are the criteria that the historians were asked to consider in judging American presidents.
Public Persuasion
Crisis Leadership
Economic Management
Moral Authority
International Relations
Administrative Skills
Relations with Congress
Vision / Setting an Agenda
Pursued Equal Justice For All
Performance Within Context of Times
I wonder how voters would rate Trump's performance on each of these attributes?
I would rate Trump as puzzlingly but scarily good at public persuasion, and really, really horrible on all the rest of the criteria.
Maybe worth considering when Americans go into the voting booth and decide which candidate to vote for and why--which then makes one wonder what criteria Trump voters are using to decide who should be POTUS.
4
Where is the rank order of best to worst Congresses ever? This has got to be one of the lowest.
21
Reading this and listening to NPR, where the guest speaker on the morning program says that Putin's friendly outreach to trump was purposely created to sow chaos in the US as a means to discourage Russians from wanting our form of government. So, trump is the useful tool. Too bad for us.
3
Gail is right that we do not need a library for the current president. Yes, it is amusing to ponder a library for the dotard, but the less said about him the better. Let us hope that the high school students will coalesce nationally and mobilize the vote of all ages, for if the participation rate increases it is likely that we will rid our country of the worst president in our history before his term expires. The man is demented, not just mean spirited and dishonest so perhaps a Democrat dominated congress will impeach him.
9
While maintaining a sense of humor is important in this dark time, this article, in spite of all it's candor and humor misses a very important point.
When a president is derelict in his duty and refuses to stand by his oath to protect and defend the Constitution and the people of the United States of America,he is more than just the worst president in history . He becomes a criminal, and a traitor, and a clear and present danger to the national security of this country.
At this point it is somewhat irrelevant whether the president is willfully ignorant or delusional , it is equally irrelevant that he is a person of low moral character.
What is key here, and what will eventually end his presidency, is his gross dereliction of duty, the most fundamental foundation upon which the responsibility of a president of the United States stands .
18
It'll be the first presidential library with more space devoted to the gift shop than devoted to exhibition space.
15
The exhibition space IS the gift shop. Do you think there is anything that will not be for sale?
3
Oral history in Atlanta, among the working class AfricanAmerican and melange families, holds that Buchanan's grandchild was Walter White of the Atlanta NAACP. As Mr. White was descended from elite Anglo-African Southerners on both sides of his family, he was able to use his knowledge of Anglo society and his blond hair and blue eyes to pass as white, when necessary. He used his skills and abilities to further the cause of civil rights and human rights.
Having Mr. White as his grandson was the most admirable quality Buchanan possessed.
3
Except for one small thing. Don't be filed by the media reps of polling. Half the country is starting to think he may be one of the best presidents.
1
Wow. Conservatives really are bad at math. Half the country? No wonder it's so easy for Republican politicians to trick you guys into voting for them.
13
No libraries, yes, no libraries. Well, maybe Twitter records but that would be a social media “thing “ so, no libraries. Hehehe.
2
A Trump presidential library, first of all it will be built with "Other People's Money". Profits from the library will go to the Trump Library Foundation.
Please oh please, promise to investigate the library foundations finances and track what it buys to decorate other Trump properties.
5
Dear Gail, It is always comforting to hear that, The Donald, has succeeded once again to win the big prize. I am quite sure that Sarah Sanders can put a spin on things. Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said today, "President Trump has once again surpassed any expectations and has won hugely at being the very worst President ever. It has been an honor to assist him in his efforts. His stated goal is and has always been to go below zero. No more questions on that topic or guns. Next question please." Clueless in Oregon. RAW
12
What I found most interesting is that even the subset of conservative scholars in the survey, while not putting him dead last, put him a couple of slots from the bottom.
Now the question is, how many young Americans graduating from good high schools have even heard of Buchanan?
4
In the event that there is a Trump presidential library, suggest that it be built in Russia.
9
I am looking forward to the gift shop. It will be filled with Trump whatever:ties, liquor, steaks, applications to Trump University, etc.
8
Richard Nixon gets a bad rap. Detente, OSHA, the EPA, China, SALT I, taking America off the deflationary gold standard. Yes he was a crook, but for a Republican he was pretty good. He wasn't as liberal as Rockefeller but compared to Reagan and all those who have followed him, Nixon is about as good of a Republican political candidate the country has seen in a very long time.
Trump appears to be even more crooked than Nixon but without the latter's guile, political instinct, and moderate tendencies. Candidate Trump had some sensible ideas that he ditched as soon as he took office. This is one reason why the country is in so much trouble.
6
We now know that Richard Nixon committed treason (in approaching the North Vietnamese before the election and urging them not to sign an agreement at the negotiating table to end the war before he became president). Ronald Reagan did something similar with Iran.
1
Given that Trumpists are still repeating the whopper about President Obama's having been repudiated by the Supreme Court, "more than any President in history," I'd suggest that Trumpists should take comfort in the fact that if these same historians were surveyed regarding the biggest Presidential liar in our history, their guy would have no close competition.
https://www.factcheck.org/2014/07/obama-and-executive-overreach/
Oh, and it occurs that we should all be gladsome nobody's asking about rating the worst passel of American voters ever.
9
Nope, no presidential library. Just a book section of Trump books in the Trump tower and other Trump property gift shops, along with presidential memorabilia. The biggest one will be in Trump Tower Moscow. This assumes, of course, that he doesn't start a nuclear war.
2
I'll have to concede, backing off from my opinion that Obama was the 21st century version of Buchanan. I thought so because of his lack of initiative in 2009-2010 with a near super majority of his own party in both houses of Congress to get progressive legislation passed (a la FDR and LBJ). There are immense differences between the outstanding Obama and the egregious Buchanan/Trump, but I'll still cringe when I recall Obama saying with Trump next to him in the Oval Office just after the election: "If You Succeed, Then the Country Succeeds." Huh?? https://www.nbcnews.com/video/president-obama-to-president-elect-trump-i...
I don’t think that Obama is thinking Trump is succeeding
1
Even more hilarious than your usual great satire, Ms. Collins. Your last line is pure gold. Thank God we can laugh at this.
5
No library for books, to be sure, but a large one will be needed to contain the millions of tweets documenting official policy of the Trump presidency.
7
I really don't think William Henry Harrison should even be included on the list. It should be like baseball. You should need a minimum number of at-bats before you even qualify. Although I guess you could legitimately dock him a few points for not having the sense to come in out of the rain, and the cold.
8
Well, at least Buchanan didn't advocate a Civil War, the way Trump was threatening to do if he didn't win in 2016, and he may do again if the Democrats win Congress in 2018. Assuming, that is, that in the next few months he doesn't get us into a new war with North Korea or Iran, or both, in which case who knows what might happen.
12
What is the purpose of such an article? To make fun of Trump? This material will have no effect on those who voted for him, and what we need to focus on is how to defeat him in three years. Given the lack of Democratic leadership, a strong economy, substantial tax legislation, popular rollbacks of business regulations, etc., that seems a remote possibility. Laugh at Trump all you want. But he is, unfortunately, a winner.
4
Trump inherited a strong economy and he's doing his level best to ruin it for 99% of the country.
6
Well, question Gail’s choice of topic all you want but she just won the George Polk Award for her column so so much for your comment. Congratulations, Gail, keep up your great work.
5
I'm unsure how a history of racist greedheadery, grabbing $1.6 billion from taxpayers, five or six bankruptcies, 3500 suits, payoffs to hookers, a scraped-out election win rooted in complete irresponsibility, and reeling from scream to scream to Twitter while piling up mountains of debts for the grandkids to pay makes one a "winner."
However, I'm pretty sure that having a wide range of professional historians place you alongside the dolt who kicked off the Civil War is a, well, bad sign.
4
You go, girl! I thoroughly enjoyed you making lemonade out of our current lemon.
15
My personal favorite, Andrew Johnson, is getting short shrift. But how exciting to know we are witnessing history in the making. The greatest worst president. Make America great at being terrible again. As for the Trump library site--Rikers Island? Surely there is a prison with some spare space somewhere --where the little man with the big ears hasn't co-opted all of the space with dangerous non-violent marijuana felons. It really shouldn't take much space: compendiums of tweets, notable lies, a symbolic book and an unread intelligence briefing, cabinet members' qualifications for the jobs they're doing, legislative wins, indicted advisers, and maybe unaudited golf scores. It shouldn't take much space--the worst president should have the greatest worst library ever. Or maybe we can just let Putin take over the library project and site it in Moscow? --something really nice funded by the main beneficiaries of the Trump regime--the Koch cabal, Anderson, Singer, Mercer and company plus Russian kleptocrats. People, we need to think outside the box. This president is truly special.
16
Did Obama get extra points for having been slapped down by the SCOTUS for illegal and unconstitutional acts more times than any other President in history.
It is likely the experts making the evaluations are highly partisan. It's hard to understand that they would rate Obama highly, given the fact that his legacy is close to zero, having been based on executive orders and a creative sense of the law.
4
Nope, not partisan. Read the original article. Even the conservative scholars ranked him something like 8th from the bottom.
2
Two points: 1) Buchanan went into office with the widest experience in government of any president we’ve ever had; while Trump demonstrates that inexperience is no virtue (especially when combined with egomania and malice), Buchanan demonstrates that experience is no guarantee that a candidate will make a competent president. 2) Something cannot be “centered around” something else; for crying out loud, there could be children reading this column, ready to follow your example as a respected writer!
Even ranking Trump at the bottom on the American Political Scientists' survey will not communicate to Trump, the GOP, Trump supporters, and future generations what a terrible president Trump is and all the damage he does both domestically and internationally.
At least Buchanan had some positive qualities, but Trump is way far down on the negative side of the political leadership graph, and appears to be the biggest presidential bottom feeder ever at the very depths of the proverbial DC political swamp, thereby giving a boost to Hoover and Harding.
Since the Republicans continue to turn a blind eye to the damage Trump does, or, worse, excuse his behavior, they will not impeach him.
Therefore, we must figure out how to get Trump to resign.
Problem: Trump has no conscience or shame, so whatever horrendous things the Mueller team discloses about Trump's relationship with the Russians, Trump will blame it all on Hillary and Obama and get back to work making America Worse (to the delight of the Russians).
One thing the media can do to push ahead the egomaniac Trump's resignation is to stop reporting his "approval" rating (a low of 37% and dropping), and only report his "disapproval" rating, which is 56-59% and rising. Put it into perspective: Emphasize this is the majority of us!
Trump watches TV all day to see how he is doing, so weeks of hearing the majority of Americans really disapprove of him might get him to resign.
Somebody has to cancel this obscene Trump show!
11
Trump will not resign. Vote as if your life depended on it!
Because it probably does.
2
Oh God, I forgot about the presidential library. Now, I'm really depressed.
13
Don't be. How much can a shoebox with a remote control in it cost?
16
Why would we need a presidential library for YKW, who doesn’t read?
An account with amazon cloud or some such for all the tweets would suffice.
The toupee could go to the Museum of Odd Reliquaries for his fans.
10
I hope presidential libraries don't use taxpayer funding. Between a library and a ludicrous, expensive parade, plus extraordinary travel costs, Donald is perhaps our most expensive president ever, monetarily, as well as in damaged reputation of the whole country.
6
The Trump Museum should be located in a prominent place in a city that is closely associated his presidency. Red Square comes to mind. No need for a library, but a one page memo, featuring bullet points and Trumps name in every paragraphh shall be prominently displayed. In lieu of a library filled with books, the favored media of coastal elites, a military parade will be held daily.
10
Best Op-Ed of the week! First time I've read about Trump and *smiled* in a long time!
For the Trump presidential library, the designers should definitely consult with the set designers of "Idiocracy." It's well in keeping with Trump's brand of 'bookishness,' though I expect it will all be improved with gilt and mirrors...
...or perhaps guilt and mirrors.
Sounds like an apt description of the quintessential Donald Trump, doesn't it?
8
Assuming Trump has a presidential library, suggest it be placed next to the wall he plans to build on the border of Mexico; and if Mexico pays for the wall, let's put it on the Mexico side of the border.
10
Trump's vainglorious image on my future grandchild's placemat of presidents would make me lose my appetite. To me, he will always be the WHOPPER president - he loves to eat them and he loves to tell them.
9
Gail, your last sentence is laugh-out-loud funny. Keep up the good work.
8
We all know that the Trump Presidential Library will be the biggest, best Presidential Library ever.
8
The appropriate location for a Trump presidential library should be a Superfund site.
16
I can't wait for the Mittster to take his seat in the Senate. Should be good for another round of dog-on-the-roof yokes.
6
Romney will cozy up to trump because trump will replace Pence with Romney in 2020. If trump wins (perish the thought) Romney has a clear path to the 2024 election, either as the incumbent VP or as POTUS if the obese, aging septuagenarian, fails to survive a second term.
1
buchanan? the first gay president? i am sure sometime in this century we are going to have a gay person running for prez..... we need to get the facts straight now to avoid the inevitable controversy over who was the first!
5
You mentioned his name 3 times, which was 3 times too many; I was hoping your title indicated a DT free zone but, alas... on the other hand, you neglected to mention that DT is the first of his kind: the first homunculus to be elected POTUS, which is kind of a milestone, right?
It's like he and his clan are certainly hominids, but they do act more like proto-humans; atavistic throwbacks from some million-year-old dead-ended branch of the family, mercifully put down by evolution, that we tended not to talk about any longer, until we're forced to, like now.
11
Donald Trump, the Accidental President.
13
Oh, yah. So much winning. Can hardly stand all the winning American is getting.
7
He is not and never will be my President.
16
It's official. The experts--neither the liberals nor the Democrats,but rather the experts of all political persuasions who study presidents and presidential administrations--the experts agree that Mr. Trump is the worst president that we have ever had.
Worse than Buchanan who had been at the bottom of the list. Worse than Jackson who perpetrated genocide. Worse than Harrison whose administration lasted only one month. Worse than Nixon who resigned to avoid impeachment.
President Obama? He was top ten.
Make my day, Mr. President. Please fail yet again to control your impulses. Please continue your obsessive racist quest to annihilate everything that our excellent first black president accomplished. The more you chase his complementary and opposite image, the more we know about you.
11
I don't think it's fair to make comparisons between Trump and his predecessors. Trump is in a league of his own. Buchanan was completely incompetent but there were no suspicions of his being corrupt. Nixon was competent and corrupt. Trump is incompetent, corrupt, xenophobic, racist, misogynistic, mendacious, in fact, and this is not hyperbole: I cannot come up with one positive adjective to describe Donald Trump. I may go for shrewd but shrewd assumes a degree of intelligent flair, which Trump is devoid of, and denoting that a person is shrewd is a left-handed compliment.
13
He is an effective insulter
Presidential Museum idea, a la Maya Lin. Circular walkway, lined in dark stone (like coal), winding in corkscrew fashion down, down, down into darkness. No lights, nothing to guide visitors except the faint glow at the far end, a short plinth supporting a radioactive hairpiece.
13
It's Obama's fault we have Trump. It's always Obama's fault for anything.
Maybe if Obama hadn't dissed Trump at the press dinner with a rousing laugh, Trump would have been content to chew orange peels in Trump tower until he was in foreclosure.
It's Obama's fault that Trump looks so bad. After all, a slim, trim, chic, handsome, intelligent, polite, civil, articulate, well-educated, thoughtful, quiet man is the starkest contrast to a the over-stuffed, orange whoopy cushion now occupying the oval office.
25
The Trump museum should be just offshore of Mar Lago on a drilling platform.
Over the door will be a sign saying:
WELCOME TO COVFEFE
20
Can you picture the teacher, a nun of the order of the Incarnate Word either with a concealed weapon, or, wearing a gun belt?
6
Let me imagin, a Trump library.
Los Vegas, Atlantic City, Florida or a corn field in Iowa, would be locations to consider. One large room with teleprompters displaying all his tweets and insults. Comments from all the women he has harrased and philaderd with. lots and lots a photos ( having a good laugh with Russian diplomats). But only one book The Art of the Deal.
3
The guys has been in office for one year and he’s now the “worse president ever”? Why? Did he start a war? No, he in fact he help defeat ISSIS after the two prior president failed. Did the economy fall into a depression or recession because of his policies? No, in fact the economy is growing at 3% and unemployment is at a 17 year low, thanks to his deregulations and tax cuts. Has he incarcerated immigrants and re-segregated blacks? No, he’s offered “dreamers” amnesty and a path to citizenship, which was rejected by democrats. The left wing myth of who Trump is does not align with the facts and it’s not surprising that academics have a low opinion of him, but this ridiculous attempt to judge a president based on his first year of office is devoid of any scholarly standards and should be dismissed as purely intellectual self gratification.
2
No, he is the worst president ever because in his short tenure he has lied to the American people every time he has opened his mouth (or issued a tweet). He has enriched himself and engaged in corruption on a scale heretofore unknown in the U.S. presidency. He has appointed or nominated to almost every government agency and judgeship people who are utterly incompetent to hold said office, or whose politics are in express opposition to the agency they are supposed to "lead". He has invited into his inner circle people of low moral character which match his own perfidies and has consistently excused or defended their behavior. He has refused to defend the nation against an enemy which has interfered with our sovereign right to chose our own leaders even when he knows that nations is planning to repeat this behavior (and indeed is still using the same methods to sow division and lies even now). He has attacked citizens of this country whose views differ from his own as "traitors". There is no other former holder of the office in which Trump now resides who can even come close in the race to the bottom - and he's only been in office for a year and a month, with no redeeming qualities in sight. And if you think it's bad now, you ain't seen nothin' yet.
P.S. The state of the economy that you are attempting to give Trump credit for is large,y due to the policies of the Fed under Janice Yellen. Appointed by Barak Obama. We have yet to see what the current chair will do.
15
If there was such a museum, probably paid for by Trump as who else would put money into a losing proposition about a loser president. My suggestion is for it to be placed directly on a piece of swamp land that otherwise would never get sold, not even under protections removed by Pruitt.
There will be one shelf acting as a presidential library as I heard Trump has written TWO. Since he has the worst reading and comprehension skills ever, they must have been written by ghost writers. There are however, tons of books written about Trump, and saying nothing good, as what good is there to say, and how sad is that as an epitaph on a man never mind a president.
3
He may be ranked at the bottom, but he doesn't care. He'll simply point to the multiple enemies who make him look bad. Once a narcissist, always a narcissist. Being President is a difficult job, and the man is simply not up to the task. Thank you for bringing some humor into the news. We must laugh to keep from crying.
6
I haven't laughed this hard from reading an op-ed in a very long time, Gail. This was just what I needed.
And I thank you for that.
8
Trump's a lot more honest than the last guy. When speaking about the big issues, Obama lied EVERY single time. The progressive who insinuated that he slept with his U.A. ambassador didn't help.
You have to give Obama credit for realizing that progressivism could never be economically sustainable, but it never changed a thing he wanted to do TO the American middle class, to our religious heritage, and to capitalism.
1
You are tragically confused and ignorant.
5
Any future Trump Presidential Library must have a conspicuous sign displayed on its entrace doors marked "X-Rated" to prevent children from entry.
I don't think we want school busses full of children to enter such a library and be exposed to photos of Stormy Daniel or the other playboy centerfold lady whose name escapes me now. (Let alone the allegations in the Steele Dossier, much of which will be found to be true by the time the library will be ready to open its doors to the public).
4
Gail earned her Polk Award for alchemy: turning depressing political lead into Golden laughter. Unfortunately, by putting Trump in a list of Presidents, even on the bottom, normalizes a sociopath who should have been on the Do Not-vote list. What, there is no such thing as a Do Not-vote list?
Well then, that is a list that Trump should come in first !
5
Thanks for making us laugh, but seriously, how much longer are we going to put up with his distinction, "the worst president in the history of the United States?"
4
I believe that the crack about the library is unfair. The shelves will be full of books written about what I call,"The Mess".
4
History will look back referring to Trump as Don the con. We don't know if the con will stand for confidence man or convict, maybe both.
7
Gail, thx for a morning of grim chuckles! Ah, I wish I had your job - so like shooting already-dead fish in a barrel. Unfortunately, my job is closer to shooting mosquitoes at a distance of 20 miles. I, along with a few grizzled veterans of a war about as long and successful as Afghanistan, am trying to get our country to wake up to the implications of having decided to allow our votes to be counted in the partisan, proprietary, pitch-dark of cyberspace.
One of the implications is Trump (and his army of GOP enablers), which of course furnishes the dead fish you shoot so accurately (although of course they will build him a presidential library, plated in gold no doubt, and certainly BIG, but - call it concept art - entirely empty: 22 miles of shelves, no books).
Perhaps, if you grow tired of your easy job, you'll consider joining us in a harder one - working for the restoration of public, observable vote counting in our country? Your assistance is needed and would be most welcome. We'll even teach you to shoot mosquitoes 20 miles away.
8
Groan...
Cabinet won't replace him.
Congress won't replace him.
He won't resign...
Seems the only thing is massive and continuing public demonstrations. Maybe that will work, somehow?
5
His library, lacking books, would instead have to be a gold-plated monument (or perhaps a repurposing of the Guggenheim's infamous solid-gold toilet, which was offered to Trump for display in the White House) surrounded by an industrial swamp (he's creating so many), off-limits to pedestrians (much too toxic) but visible from shore. Nature eventually overtakes it.
6
trump's 'presidential' library will be the best library that world has ever seen. On display will be the best front covers of him from Time magazine which will come in various sizes. One as a coaster and a larger one will be a place setting for those special dinners throughout the year. And there's golf and hotels. These hotels are the best that have ever been designed and built with perfect golf courses that will amaze everyone. Then golden Statues of trump will be everywhere. They will also come in different sizes. And everything is for sale. Even copies of all the 'executive orders' that have totally saved America from criminal immigrants and treasonous people who don't stand up for the national anthem, or clap during the 'State of the Union' speech.
It will be the best library to ever have been built with the finest treasures from the legendary life of the best president ever to rule America. Did I leave anything out?
6
Pretty close, but you left out all the winning.
For Trump, who probably hasn't opened a book since college except for those by one of his ghostwriters, a presidential media room would be more appropriate.
4
The obvious place for the Trump presidential library is Trump University where the archives will be available for future scholars and biographers.
8
What would one put in a Trump presidential library? He doesn't read anything. Maybe a bunch of TV screens playing old speeches. That would be about it.
3
Drumpf's library will consist of several loose leaf binders filled with his tweets. They can be housed in a specially built room on the 19th hole at MaraLago.
5
ha,ha. I had dream a few days ago in which found myself consoling G.W Bush who appeared in the dream to be depressed and discouraged over the unpopularity of his late presidency. Naturally I pointed out to him that compared to the present incumbent he , Bush, had been a rock star, a stellar chief executive never mind bis having needlessly shattered Iraq, strengthened Iran and generally messed up the middle east. What is messing up the middle east compared to messing up America? And yes, Nixon, too figured in the dream, probably also in comparison to the present incumbent. I felt a certain amount of nostalgia for him and the times when there was still a certain level of political honor in the country.
5
I have no doubt that Trump's presidential library will be the biggest and best presidential library ever. It will have more books than any other presidential library - hundreds of thousands of copies of Art of the Deal by Donald J Trump, How to Get Rich by Donald J Trump, and The America We Deserve by Donald J Trump.
3
They talk about footnotes at Cooperstown. Roger Maris got to many games to break the Babe's record. Bonds would get the juiced asterisk, Charlie Hustle the Vegas asterisk. As for La Donald, he is far too great to be ranked alongside other Presidents. Instead he should have pride of place as the number one Manchurian to ever hold the office.
5
Donald Trump's library will be in Sing Sing. He can share a jail with Manafort, Gates, Sessions and Kushner.
9
Antonia, We have a saying in Yiddish that translates, "From your mouth to God's ears."
Honored in such a library should be a Hall of Non-Heroes who take money from the NRA, to enshrine in perpetuity the murder of schoolchildren & other victims of Guns in America.
2
Trump Presidency will go the way of Trump Casino, Trump University, Trump Magazine, Trump Water, Trump Steaks, and so on: chronic grifterdom!
9
Thanks, Ms. Collins. I enjoyed that.
Some Virgil coming up. Sorry!
Aeneas (Book XII) is marching on King Latinus and his senate. What to do? What to do? Virgil TELLS us what they did:
Flent maesti mussantque patres.
"The downcast fathers weep and mutter."
They didn't do anything.
Just now, I was looking at Bruce Catton's "The Coming Fury." And some Buchanan quotes stick in my mind:
A South Carolinian comes charging into the house of a prominent Washington hostess, waving a telegram. South Carolina has just seceded from the Union. Whoopee! Buchanan (pale as death) sinks into a chair. Finally, he speaks:
"Madam, would you be so good as to order my carriage?"
Now there's a clarion call if ever I heard one! Here's another--addressed to a prominent Southerner:
"Mr. Toombs, you press me too importunately! You give me no time to say my prayers. I never make an important decision without saying my prayers."
"If the trumpet shall give an uncertain sound (it says in Scripture), who shall prepare himself for the battle?"
Poor Mr. Buchanan! The times really were extraordinary. Soon another voice would be heard. A stronger voice. From a stronger man:
"In YOUR hands, my dissatisfied countrymen, and not in MINE, rests the momentous issue of CIVIL WAR. . . ."
I really don't think Mr. Trump and Mr. Buchanan have the slightest thing in common.
Except that we don't much like EITHER of them.
(Some of us anyway.)
Thanks again.
4
He's the best worst president we've ever had.
8
Perhaps the presidential library will be in Fort Leavenworth?
9
It should be placed in a defunct casino.
Donald Trump, a wannabe Joey Bishop. Cheesiest “President” ever. Casinos, golf courses, beauty pageants, country clubs. Ugh. What an embarrassment.
9
And I failed to mention the hair. I'm not giving the guy a hard time for going bald; it happens to most men. And if he weren't president representing this great nation, I wouldn't care that he has some kind of dye job comb-over pompadour thing, but it just looks so unprofessional. Is there a CEO or head of state (besides North Korea's) who looks like that? And the spray-on tan...ugh. So embarrassing.
4
Yep, I agree Gail, no need for a library. All his "ideas" can fit on that one sheet of note paper.
6
The Trump Library location? A dump in New Jersey springs to mind.
12
Next to where Hoffa is buried. New Jersey doesn't want Trump either.
3
Perhaps a presidential TV room complete with McD's burgers on hand.
3
Nice
A presidential Tweetery?
2
How about the Trump Liebrary...
12
This is idiotic. Beyond idiotic. It is embarrassing that historians have fallen prey to recent memory syndrome. By no means does Obama belong in the top 10. He was adequate or at most good. 50 years from now his lasting legacy will be that he was the first mixed race President.
Trump worse than Buchanan? Utterly ridiculous. Trump has light years to go before he even reaches the depths of George W. Bush.
3
If you read the previous "expert" ranking of Presidents, the analysis of Obama was not very flattering. It can be summarized as "unimpressive". Remember, the "experts" are predominantly liberal Democrats, so a bias factor should be assigned to their "work".
1
Only from the very original Ms. Collins: at least we're not going to need a presidential library. Ha. I had not thought of that until this column, this day. As Susan from OH notes as well, it will/would have to be, gilded gilded. And so sorry, Marjorie Meriweather Post, but your beautiful Mar-a-Lago will be Mar-a-Mar. So be it. Nice to think of the guy in the White House NOT in the White House. When? Can't be too soon.
6
How about Rikers Island for Trump's Presidential Museum?
11
"One big plus. We’re not going to need a presidential library."
Oh? Where will they put all the Twitter texts? On a thumb drive? A gold-plated one, of course. Archivists, librarians and other IT specialists need to invent a word to describe a collection of Twitter messages and also name the repository for such collections. Let's have a contest to come up with the best ones.
Example:
Twitterography collected in a Twittertorium.
Tweetonomy collected in in a Twitsoleum.
Trumpianisms collected in a Tweetolarium.
I think there are infinitely more possibilities out there in NY Times Readerland.
This is disgusting, I know, but we owe it to history, or herstory, whatever.
5
Trump came in last of U.S. presidents, but would be ranked 1st by comrade Putin.
7
Congratulations, Gail, on the George Polk award!
5
At first, I thought no one would donate to a memorial library for a president who is in the pokey (and doesn't read). Then it occurred to me we wouldn't throw Donald in the slammer out of respect for the office.
Then I remembered that 25% of Republicans still supported Nixon on the day he resigned his office. The House Judiciary vote was 27 to 11, with 6 of the committee's 17 Republicans joining all 21 Democrats in voting to send the [impeachment] article to the House.
Even after the hearings and the tapes, 11 pubs on the Judiciary still believed Nixon was the One.
The Trump library will be in Manhattan, upstairs from a tailor shop, in the back.
6
i forgot the cite: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/watergate/articl...
Dear Gail,
Please stop your biased, fake news reporting. Trump is FIFTH in the list!
If we count from the bottom up.
And we count only Republican's opinions.
As always, this is the Democrat's fault, that voted him dead last. We all know that Academy has a liberal bias. And like that stupid things that they call facts.
4
I say give the man a presidential library: half a shelf at the Queens Public Library branch in Flushing.
3
You won't just exit through the gift shop, you'll enter through a gift shop too! Then you'll tour the Trump Library of Greatest Tweets, which will be decorated in a way over the top version of Versailles (see photographs of Trump's NYC residence for a glimpse of what nausiating gaudy looks like). Be sure and visit the cafe, serving nothing but fast food and diet soda. Exiting through the gift shop you'll notice that copies of Trump's "genuine" Renoir are for sale.
2
Nothing is foreordained.... As bad as some have been, and there is little doubt that we now have the worst, imagine what might have been:
Lincoln won his first term in a three way race.
One of the three was Stephen Douglas, the Illinois Senator running as a Democrat.
Douglas's running mate was a southern slave-holder; a traditional formula for bridging geographic considerations.
Douglas was defeated of course, but he died about a month after Lincoln was sworn in. Imagine fate IF Douglas had won; a slave-holder would have been president in 1861.
In our time, we can only hope to get past both Trump and Pence.
4
Nixon: "It’s true that he conspired to undermine the Constitution, but at least it wasn’t with the Russians."
Simply classic.
9
Donald needed flash cards to get through a meeting yesterday. His Twitter habit has completely destroyed his attention span - if he ever had one.
2
One thing that should be on prominent display in Trump's library is the FAKE Time cover. That will pretty much sum up the whole Trump episode.
3
You outdo yourself every time Gail Collins!!
2
The museum should go on that vacant land/garbage dump Trump donated to the State of New York for a big tax write-off
3
Read Candice Millard's wonderful book "Destiny of the Republic" and never underestimate President Garfield again. I actually cried when reading about Garfield's death in this book, and apparently much of the country mourned his passing after his assassination.
I imagine that I will not cry when our current president goes to his final reward and joins the annals of history. But I'm crying now when I think of what our country has become under his regime. (I was going to say "leadership" but that's the wrong word.)
7
I am assuming that you are a special education teacher by your heading. II was also a special education teacher. Just think of all that money Trump wants to spend on training teachers on using a gun. That money could go to helping children who have behavioral and learning problems. That money could help to train teachers and administrators how to work with students who are troubled. That money could go to trained counselors, social workers and other mental health workers to help children cope with the stressors of growing up in our troubled world. Donald Trump and the NRA don't get it. We teachers do and especially special education teachers.
5
Trump will insist on his presidential museum being on Mount Rushmore.
Gilded, and in front of all those other guys.
4
With the world in turmoil I reflect back to Adlai Stevenson at the Democratic
National Convention in 1952 - a giant of a statesman and the right man at the wrong time to become President of the United States. His words accepting the nomination stay with me:
"Let's talk sense to the American people, let's tell them the truth.”
He was passionate about democracy as the most generous form of government and about the United Nations when he said about the UN:
"our only ultimate shield against disastrous war." "Man in his civil society has learned how to live under the law with the institutions of justice, and with a controlled strength that can protect rich and poor, weak and strong alike."
I keep wondering in my own mind – why are we Americans so easy to forget lessons learned from the past? With superb statesmen and leaders of our past, why have we not learned lessons to guide us in the future? Why must we learn and re-learn from all the mistakes of the past? How can we possibly gain the confidence of our younger generations to encourage them to accept leadership for the future? Guess what? We’re going to need all of them!
3
I am a distant descendant of James Buchanan, a great-great-great-great-great-great nephew (of which there are many, I'm sure). I told my sons that they are, with the addition of seventh "great", Buchanan nephews as well. But that they should also probably keep this to themselves - owing to their uncle's dubious legacy.
So for me, the Trump presidency represents the opportunity for a coming out of sorts. We will be able to claim a connection to a president who at least wasn't the rock bottom worst. I've been searching for a silver lining and I suspect that this will the one for which I have to settle.
4
May be time to re-read, Memories of the Ford Administration by dear departed John Updike. He loved writing about James Buchanan and captured what our world was like in 1974-76:)
1
"Looking at the list, you have to wonder what the Trump Presidential Museum would look like. Where do you think they’d put it?"
Fresh Kills Landfill in NJ come to mind.
4
I actually have wondered what they are going to put in the presidential library. Film clips? News segments? Tweets? I think they are going to have a whole lotta empty shelf space.
2
Says it all: "One big plus. We’re not going to need a presidential library."
5
Very sad these days that we have suddenly lost the Cold War and the Civil War in one fell swoop.
2
What great fun, thinking about a Trump Presidential Library!
I'm going to go with Mar-a-Lago, for the very fact that it will eventually be under water. Housing the "library" should be a simple matter of building a single display, with an animatronic Trump sitting on a golden toilet, tweeting furiously while Fox and Friends plays on a TV in the background. I suppose one could have a second display featuring some briefing materials he didn't read, but why go to the expense.
9
Trump's Presidential library will be a room full of empty shelves. Not unlike his closet which is full of empty suits.
7
Or Trump's Cabinet which is equally occupied by empty suits.
6
What if a presidential library was built for Trump...and nobody went.
6
His thirty five present will go with their guns and confederate flags.
1
After more than century, historians must have assumed Buchanan had a lock on the dubious title: worst president ever. Surely no one in these highly sophisticated better educated times would ever consider electing someone worse than Buchanan. Who knew?
Let that be a warning to all who assume. Never say never.
DD
Manhattan
2
I don't know a lot about Buchanan but let me offer this. The constitutional democracy he inherited was kaput, finished. Factions were against each other and Buchanan apparently took his job to preserve, protect and defend, rather seriously endorsing Dred Scott and trying to keep the Union together. His successor had to remake the constitution without shredding it. Lincoln had to inspire "a new birth of freedom" and federalism in other to save the Union and prevent foreign intrusion, which was a distinct possibility. Lincoln stepped outside of his brief, something Buchanan wouldn't do. As for Trump, he seems to be leading the charge to demolish the democracy which makes him quantifiably worse.
4
After Trump we might need a time machine to erase his presidency. The man doesn't appear to read even the simplest directions. Maybe we should erect a new dam and name it after him as an ironic salute to what Trump is incapable of doing: holding back.
However, I do think that the lead in to Donald Trump's presidency is worthy of a library. Why? Because of how both parties failed to serve the citizens of America. The ways in which our elected officials were subverted by unlimited campaign donations, the NRA and other special interest groups, and popularity polls. If the only thing an elected official uses to measure him/herself is polling statistics said official is not a good representative. Nor is the official willing to stand by his/her convictions. As for morals and ethics, too many of our elected officials have proven to be without them unless it gets them elected into office.
Being popular is not the same as being knowledgeable. One could wish that our politicians understood that.
4
How about a holographic "Jungle Room" where Trump loyalists (entry free to all females) can enjoy a lifelike experience of being alone in a room with an unfettered Donald.
5
One of your best Gail, thank you.
3
I can envision 32% of Americans lining up at the Trump Library to view its book.
19
Are the rights to "Jailhouse Rock" still available for the museum theme music?
4
It’s good to laugh and for that I say Thank You.
6
One thing that is sure: the Trump Museum and Library will be the biggest (bigliest?) of any ever built. It will be better than all others . . . anywhere, throughout the world, no doubt. In fact, no one will have ever had a Presidential Museum and Library the likes of his. Upon this we can count.
6
Great closing line.
3
How can a president who doesn't read have a presidential library? It will probably be a souvenir shop selling oversized suits, Chinese-made ties and Ivanka's fashion line.
18
In addition to the traditional recreation of the Oval Office, it should have a mock-up of the Fox and Friends set.
11
.... and lets not forget, the Trump Non-Library must contain the MAGA (a.k.a 'Many Are Getting Arrested') section with a revolving door to record for future generations all the Liers, Law-Brakers, and the rest of corrupt, incompetent members of this administration...
2
Yes, on James Buchanan being the worst president until Mr. trump. Let's not forget President Buchanan also vetoed the land-grant college act back in 1861. This provided Vermont's Justin Morrill the opportunity to reintroduce it after Lincoln was elected president making Morrill and Lincoln the fathers of American public higher education in 1862! Morrill also introduced a second land-grant college act that became law in 1890. What kind of schools did those land-grants become? Here's a small sample: The University of California, Mississippi State University, Cornell University, Tuskegee University, The University of Florida, The University of Illinois, The University of Maryland Eastern Shore, New Mexico State University, Washington State University, and Texas A&M to name just a few members of the very best public university system created on this Earth. Every land-grant university is a wonderful institution, well-connected to its stakeholders (students and potential students, citizens, alumni, state legislatures, and taxpayers) across the country. And, if the United States' public university system were to be proposed today, you could go to the bank with the knowledge Mr. trump would veto the bill. Buchanan was terrible and, Ms. Collins, you are correct about the man who now is the worst president in history!
241
Excellent comment, however I believe the entire university of Maryland system, based in college park, was a land grant establishment.
2
University of Connecticut too. They are still raising cows there (best ice cream in the world!)
5
Cornell's not a public university.
1
We will not need a presidential library, we will need a presidential tweetary after President Trump presidency.
7
The location of the Trump Fake Presidential Museum? Gail, there will be only one fitting venue for such a structure, on Red Square, just outside the towering walls of the Kremlin, next to dear Lenin's Tomb!
And after Comrade Donald departs from this earth world, voila!, his museum can also serve "double duty" as his final resting place. I can imagine the long lines of Muscovites, patiently waiting in the swirling snow, to enter this sacred space fully funded, of course, by Vladimir's top oligarchs. Make Russia Great Again!
7
This situation isn't quite as scary as when...
"Nobody’s Better Than You-Know-Who"
https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/12/barack-obama-presidency-cult-worr...
"...As American society grows less literate and the state of its moral education declines, the American people grow less able to engage their government as intellectually and morally prepared citizens. We are in the process — late in the process, I’m afraid — of reverting from citizens to subjects. Subjects are led by their emotions, mainly terror and greed...
4
mebbe your comment explains the people who still love Trump. My hairdresser told me that she loves him. I told her we'd better NEVER discuss politics again.
Your hairdresser probably loves bitcoin, too...
Once your hairdresser starts talking, you know there's something you gotta get into or out of, quickly...
And bigly
A hologram would depict him tweeting--misspellings included.
4
Clearly experts place Obama as the least effective president in U.S. history, the weaponization of the IRS and the FBI, fast and furious, Syria red line, the poor management of the economy sitting in the doldrums for 8 years. Obama executive orders are easily done away with. His legacy has dwindled to nothing.
The experts clearly agree Obama was horrible for the U.S. and the citizens
2
Oh, is that what they're saying in the Trump TV bubble. Don't come outside into reality. Keep supporting the Manchurian Candidate.
2
Harrison died early and Trump did not. . .shouldn't go there. So
Please Lord. Not a picture of Trump on any currency. Its bad enough that we have Jackson.
There is a garbage dump on Staten Island that would make a perfect museum for Trump's reign.
Trump in a new tweet blames Obama for the Russian meddling while Trump called for it during his campaign Obama held back advertising the Russian meddling because he did not want to be accused of favoritism. Trump's irresponsibility has no bounds.
8
Pssst, Ms. Collins, When it comes to where to build the Trump un-Presidential Library, don't even whisper about climate change.
Because of climate change there is no better venue then to build it at Mar-a-Gaudy.
Voila, all future generations will be spared to even remember that this country once had a self declared "very stable genius", one who knew "great words, the greatest ever" to boot.
10
When considering US societal dysfunction, along with governmental bankruptcies; any opinion (more of the same) of its proponents demands scrutiny at the least, and practically, rejection until all other options are considered.
12 out of 100? I.e. 88 out of 100 are content with dysfunction and bankruptcy; possibly because they don't recognize it. Probably because to react would be an admission of necessary redress. From which a cause must be assigned.
Trump should be in a minus column. He lost the election by over 3 million votes. He shouldn't be considered a person of presidential status. No rating. We need a do over without the electoral college.
4
This American President's popularity rating is higher than Mr. Obama's at he exact same time in their respective presidencies. You're right about one fitting in a minus column. If we compare Presidents who never averaged better than 1.3% GPD growth, Obama is at the worst end of that category.
Because the GOP blocked any of Obama's ideas especially the investment in infrastructure.
1
We're not going to need a presidential library."
Sigh The reality is beyond imagination.
Let's use this to rise to our best natures!
5
I'd have thought that William Henry Harrison would have come in as the *best* president ever: he didn't hang around long enough to mess anything up.
3
A Trump 'library' belongs in Russia and contain an exhibit that continuously shows episodes of Fox and Friends. Maybe it would need to be surrounded with a wall which would be constructed using funds donated by Mexico.
14
Nixon was the evil genius of late 20th century American politics. Had his mental make-up not been suffused with paranoia and had he not inherited the Vietnam war from LBJ, he probably would now be judged as a great president, so far as anyone could have been from the tumultuous times of the late 1960s and into the 70s. As it stands, he is a prime example of a pathology enveloping madness residing in the White House.
Trump appears nowhere as complex. He seems to have one set goal, night, day and early morning tweeting: me, me, me and, by the way, here's more about me. Watching him polling surviving families of mass murders what their choices would be in regard to guns for teachers in schools, he seemed like a man utterly lost, as if he had just wandered into the White House off the street and been handed some cue cards. Here sat a man pretending with all his might to empathize, even though the discussion had nothing to do with Mar-a-lago, or, for that matter, golf courses anywhere. He tried.
Except for the damage that can be caused, the presidency is not the be all and end all of American life. Its time to revive a bumper sticker from long ago and substitute a new name: ars longa Trump brevis.
16
I keep thinking "O tempora, o mores!l
1
The Trump Presidential Museum will be in the middle of the Okefenokee Swamp. Let him try to drain that swamp, he only made the Washington swamp deeper.
10
Thank you for the comic relief , Gail.
I picture a presidential library with hundreds of wax dummies where people can go and do things to him that he’s done to us, like insulting him, bullying him, punching him, and firing him. It would be very popular, and sweet revenge.
8
Someone in Bahrain was given 5 years for insulting tweets. Might be a way out for us.
15
Given that Trump has an upside down view of the world, being at the bottom of the list as the worst president, he believes that he is at the top of the list.
He will wallpaper his empty library with the list … upside down.
10
I read a lot of excellent ideas with regards to the upcoming gaudy Trump Library.
I suggest we take a collection right now and build it by 2019.
After all of this is done just lock him and his relatives in there and only allow incoming tweets.
We will "drown" them all under their own detritus.
5
Obama in the top ten? He lied to the American public to get Obamacare passed. He exercised no control over Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, when he had to know she was guilty of various misconduct, such as her use of a non-secure email system. His administration covered up egregious misconduct at the IRS, after first stating any wrongdoing would be dealt with severely. And how about the red line in Syria, where he failed to follow through, resulting in a lack of respect for America internationally.
3
The Fox News and right wing spin machine perversion of the Obama presidency obviously didn’t affect the ability of 91 historians and presidential scholars to objectively evaluate and rank him as the 8th best President.
3
As usual, Trump supporters look around for someone else to complain about, whether it's justified or not.
1
Trumpista carping about HRC non-secure e-mail when Trump gives up highly classified info obtained from Israel to Russians IN THE WHITE HOUSE. How's that for reckless disregard for national security. How about 130 Trump administration staff and appointees still incapable of obtaining security clearances, yet being privy to classified intelligence briefings and other classified information. How about Jared trying to set up back channel communications IN THE RUSSIAN EMBASSY, using RUSSIAN Transmitters and codes? Benghazi? Where are the endless Niger investigatons by Trey Gowdy.
Lock him up.
1
Buchanan wasn't all bad. In the pre-Trump era, I can see why he would be towards the bottom of the list. The list is short and there is some very stiff competition. However, look on the bright side. Buchanan basically ensured the Lincoln presidency by opposing his former opponent's bid for the Democratic nomination. Stephen Douglas and John Breckinridge split the pro-slavery Democratic vote and Lincoln was handed the White House. So there's one thing to be grateful about.
In another example of a bad president behaving good for the wrong reasons, Buchanan defended federal inaction against southern secessionists by citing constitutional limits on executive power.
“It is beyond the power of any president, no matter what may be his own political proclivities, to restore peace and harmony among the states. Wisely limited and restrained as is his power under our Constitution and laws, he alone can accomplish but little for good or for evil on such a momentous question.”
He was essentially defending slavery but that's still not something you'd ever hear Trump say.
Aside from the explicitly racist policies, Trump is definitely more of a Warren Harding type without the competence. They both come from a media background. They are both morally reprehensible. They both filled the White House with corrupt lackeys. They are both completely incoherent on policy. Really, the primary difference is Harding was capable of appearing presidential in the public mind. Trump is not.
6
With all affection and gratitude to Gail Collins for fortifying us with regular doses of humor to help us survive the Trump years, I think she overlooked the real reason that Bill Clinton has become less fashionable. Though he is a great orator and thinker, his welfare reform is now seen as flawed and possibly a little heartless. His friendliness toward business at a time when the criminal greed of hedge fund managers was beginning to make headlines, culminating in the 1999 repeal of the Glasshouse-Steagel Act and other bits of similar legislation, are now seen (by some) as helping to usher in the present age of corporate power and excess.
10
It is not clear to me what criteria historians are using to rank presidents. Is it popularity? Perhaps that is why Reagan ranks so high. If rankings were based on whether the president made a positive or negative impact on the future of the country, Reagan would rank much lower--he's in my bottom five because of the lasting damage from his administration.
If the ranking is based on their impact, why is W.H. Harrison ranked so low? He obviously did no damage to the country in his 31 days as president--he was dying of pneumonia after his two hour inauguration speech. I have him somewhere in the anonymous middle.
And there is Buchanan--his rap is that he didn't prevent the Civil War, he just postponed it until he got out of office. Quite frankly, the southern problem and slavery (on which the entire southern economy was based) was not tractable. South Carolina seceded when a candidate from the new Republican Party was elected. The Party was basically a coalition between the moneyed interests and abolitionists. The election of Lincoln (number 1 or 2 on everyone's list) precipitated the Civil War. Dubya already knocked Buchanan out of the bottom spot.
Until historians clearly specify their criteria, the list is meaningless.
4
The criteria used for evaluating presidents is available online. Google it.
Or as Trump would say, "I became president when nobody thought I could. I won in a landslide and I now rank in the top 98% of all presidents in American history."
9
You could put his library in an old phone booth. It can't possibly have more than one or two books in it that may have been gifts of some sort. Also probably in pristine condition since never opened.
7
The Sonoran Desert would be an ideal place for the grand, beautiful and golden Trump Monument and Museum-a reminder of what happens when a moron is elected as President.
Just think of all of those "bad hombres" that would march past the Golden Monument and Museum and pay homage as they attempt to smuggle those drugs and rape and murder white people in this country.
Yes indeed, Trump has lowered the bar beyond Nixon in his "presidential" abilities.
5
Please don't mar the beautiful and relatively pristine Sonoran Desert with a Trump Monument and Museum.
Dan, I suggest an appropriate place might be Bears Ears or Grand Staircse Ecalante ... or what remains of them.
3
"The Trump Library of American Carnage." Just think of it. And there will be the "America First" room, with enlarged photos of the original America First rallies held in New York City by Nazi sympathizers in the 1930s - including The Donald's dear old dad, that cuddly ol' slumlord and card-carrying member of the Master Race.
And his German grandfather, the first Drumpf to broach our "strong border" to dodge the draft back home and to head out to the Pacific Northwest seeking fame and fortune as the proprietor of saloons and brothels in rough mining camps.
Best of all, Fearless Leader's legacy of words to live by. The "grab 'em by the kitty kat" tapes. Stormy and friends and six figure hush money payoffs from "the fixer," Mr. Sez Who. "Carry 'em out of here on a stretcher" and "I'd like to punch that guy in the face." Who can forget "I like heroes that weren't captured, ok?" And "enemy of the people." Or "alternative facts." "A complete and total ban on Muslims until we figure out what the hell is going on." And that fabulous Boy Scout speech - what an inspiration!
All of these memorable, poignant, uplifting and downright poetic words to live by, straight from the mouth of the man with the Best Brain. They will be carved in pink marble on the walls of the Library. Kids will memorize and recite this stuff in grade school someday. Brings a tear to your eye, doesn't it?
Ah yes, such memories of American exceptionalism we'll have to share with our grandchildren!
8
Gail just think good tines are back. Mitts Back. Get ready Gail.
10
Laughing out loud; but only for a second, given the gravity of Trump's perversity in reminding us how stupid he is in his self-adoration...while systematically destroying our trust in each other. "Schadenfreude" aside though, we are screwed, and likely crazy loons ourselves...for electing such an antediluvian beast...and expect edible fruit from an old, twisted and poisonous tree ( with my excuses to the noble tree!). Although you didn't mention the republican party, they do deserve explicit 'hand clapping' for being the enabling lap dogs of this most vulgar bully in the Oval Office, double-faced hypocrites finally revealing themselves as the "Buchanans" of yesteryear...in today's upside-down Trumpian world. Well, if we can split our differences amicably, there seems concurrence in at least one issue: Trump is, indeed, and by far, the worst president in American history. The question is, are we that far off morally, that we accept him as the new normal, instead of firing him from his stolen seat, so to restore 'law and order'?
5
Trump's barely into his first year and already he's at the bottom of the presidential barrel because he's a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot beloved by Nazis.
16
Slow news day.
2
This presidency is mimicking the Reagan one. Cut taxes, spend money for a defense that is already overgrown. (Remember Starwars) Use Racism to appease a base. Transfer wealth from the middle and low to the Rich.
Both are loved by their Republican base. Reagan got a beautiful Library by the Pacific. So don't be surprised by a beautiful one on the Atlantic.
Hopefully Trump will be followed by a President that raises taxes Like Reagan had, before we break the bank.
10
As a foreigner one has the advantage of distance. I understand the daily obsession of liberal thinkers with Trump. It is horrible for your country to be represented by someone so childlike and dumb. If I were an American I would try to hide that fact when I am traveling outside of the US!
But the real problem is not Trump. Trump was elected just like Hitler has been elected. Yes, there are also populist movements in Europe but there they hover around 20-25%. Possibly because we remember Hitler better but probably because US public education is one of the weakest on earth. The US population accepts that politicians lie. In the Netherlands the foreign minister just last week was caught having lied and he was gone in a few days. Trump is lying as a second nature. Obvious facts for instance on gun-control that have been supported by all kind of scientific analysis are just reversed but we cannot expect better in a country where intellect is distrusted (climate) and rather than knowledge, money rules. So forget about Trump, Trump is just a logical consequence of his supporters, half of the American people who continue to support him while having the full facts (I certainly agree with Trump that he wasn't elected due to Russian meddling he was elected because 50% of the Americans are as dumb as he is.) Focus on these supporters and try to understand the processes within these supporters that currently are leading to the end of the American moral and economic superiority period.
28
To start with he was not "elected" (and miles away from 50 percent of the electorate) but "selected" by a centuries old system that was designed to protect rich slaveholders in small states from the greedy rich slaveholders in big states. At this point it is more like one out of three Americans want him run out on a tarred pole, and in my 70 years that is quite unique.
5
I could not agree with you more. But it wasn’t even 50%. And there are some Trump supporters who are waking up. Not enough yet but nonetheless they exist.
2
Mr. Bierman has just said everything I wanted to say but was too polite to say. Thank you.
2
Top of your game today, Gail.
8
Trump isn't only the worst president. He'd also score at the bottom of any list of the worst person in the last 71 years. Some are stupid, some are ignorant, some are corrupt, some are pathological liars, but this guy is all of those things and more. He is a combination of vileness we've never seen before in public life.
Makes you wonder about the people who still support him.
32
Trump's supporters are just like him. They admire him because he has gotten away with doing publicly those things they would be called out for. He is their hero
6
Maybe his presidential library should be located in Moscow.
16
More fake news. Fact is President Trump is the GREATEST of the worst presidents ever!!
EVER!!
13
Yes, Marta, I agree.
Let me suggest that by being so terrible, Donald Trump is dramatically changing the destiny of the nation for the better.
Trump is so bad, that he has made politics interesting, again. He threatens our future. He creates crisis, after crisis, all the time. He makes headlines, daily.
With Obama, there was no drama. The country got by, but we the people were uninvolved, aloof, uncaring. Trump keeps us on the edge of our seats.
We, the American people need to be involved.
Thank Trump for waking us up!
========================
7
The key question is: Why would the Republican Party choose an ignorant, racist and known sexual predator to represent them? A proven fraud and failure at business who was only rescued by Russian laundered money? What does it say about the sickness of our political system that paves the way for a mentally unstable scoundrel like Trump to occupy the Oval Office?
Trump is who he is and always has been, an ignorant egomaniac and charlatan. He is the face of the Republican Party who put him in the Oval Office.
Only a massive voter uprising can rescue our democracy and save our country from the shame brought to our people by the Republican Party and their mascot, Donald Trump.
26
Methinks thou doth protest too much, lass. Mr. Blow, an example admittedly hard to find, is clearly not better than you. He is so full of hate and demonizing others he disagrees with that there's no room for a humorous aside.
So, you've still go that going for you, which is nice, as they say....and the primary reason many of us read your column. I mean, who else could beat to death a roofed-dog story? who? I mean like over, and over, and over again.
2
May it continue until Trump is gone.
4
I could. And do. Every chance I get.
3
Our Times:
Nobody Knoweth Less Than Deplorable's Deplorable Know-Nothing President:
President Russia, Party Leader of the Russian Republican Party
1
The bar to beat: Dred Scott to the Civil War...
Aren't you setting it a little high for Donny Johnny?
3
Isn't a Trump Library a little facetious considering the imbecile can't read?
14
Hey Gail!
Do you know the best thing about Trump?
Wait for it...
He is not BO or Hiliary.
Think about it!
2
The Trump Presidential Library will be in a locker in the Men's Room at Mar a Lago.
10
No presidential library,j ust a presidential thumb drive
7
Site of the Trump presidential museum, how about St. Petersburg?
8
It makes me really sick when I imagine an average innocent persson somewhere in the middle of this country is reading this garbage from the so called most prominent news paper in the US and feels sickness as much as I feel. Do not focus on Trump’s known flaws but on people who have no other choice but him. This waste of resource is terribly sick, really. Please do not write anymore this kind of distorted exposure of deep hatred. Shame on you, poor lady.
"...raging dumpster fire of a President...". Heh heh heh!
7
gee, I was so sure Gail was going to work at least one mention of Shamus into this.
Poor old Donnie Johnie. He has such a high opinion of himself, but nobody shares it.
Among the presidential expert historians, Donnie Johnie comes in dead last.
What a loser.
3
Wonder if his presidential library will have a section for Putin?
2
Aww, Gail, please: "...Better than You-Know-WHOM."
Let's not dignify this administration's attempted destruction of logic and language!
JV
1
It's hard to laugh during a catastrophe, but thanks for the historical perspective.
God may forgive the modern GOP, but I don't.
The record is damning: Joe McCarthy, Watergate, the looting of our treasury for the 1%, Iran-Contra, the politicization of the Supreme Court (Clarence Thomas), 9-11, Iraq, the 2008 crash, and now President Train Wreck.
Maybe the traumatized Florida kids can start to put a dent in the madness?
7
A Presidential Library? What would you put in it? Why would you want to remember this? Well I guess we memorialized the holocaust. We should build a grand, gaudy building and yes put nothing in it. Maybe one bad hair piece.
4
Congrats on your Polk Award, Gail
3
Let's keep the Trump presidential library where it already resides, next to his toilet. You can't tweet all the time.
2
trump's library will probably be in Russia! Maybe a co-library with Putin! A whole wing on how to launder Russia's dirty money!
2
Is there any opinion writer at the NYT that ever has anything, I mean anything, positive to say about this administration? Just once. Wouldn't that be something?
Whether you like him or not, he is president.
For all your bluster, try doing this in North Korea, speaking of Kim this way. See how long you last.
3
"Trumpty Drumphty sat on a WALL..."
4
Gail, “centered ON” (review the definition of “center”) or “revolved AROUND.” But not “centered around.” It’s oxymoronic. Just saying. —Your Devoted, if nerdy, Follower.
There will be one actual book in the Trump presidential library that I know of: The one with Hitler's speeches that his first wife Ivana once mentioned in an interview...
4
Fox and Friends call Trump the greatest president ever. So this is fake news. sad!!
1
Trump should be placed at 100 in anticipation of the next 65.
7
Wow. Is it just the history nerd in me, or was this one of Gail Collns' funniest columns ever?
3
How could anyone put Obama in the top ten? The man accomplished nothing. His Nobel peace prize was a joke.
3
NYC made him, NYC can keep him......including a so-called presidential library
2
Yup, there it is, more Clinton bashing.
Much as we all like many of the references to dogs in your columns, that "hound dog" line about Clinton is getting old and frayed around the edges.
Please give it a rest ...
2
When all is said and done, and Trump's complicity with Russian efforts to manipulate our democratic traditions is laid bare, Trump will go down in history as this country's first traitor President.
When the Mueller investigation is over, and the trials have ended, we'll know that Trump has ties to organized crime, that he is a money launderer, that he is a serial assaulter of women, that he has sold the national interest so that his private business can make more money on overseas hotels, and that he might be the most unreconstructed racist since Woodrow Wilson.
When Donald Trump's presidency mercifully ends, we'll know that our country will have passed through the worst phase of its whole history, led by a man so corrupt, so ignorant, and so vile as to be the very antithesis of everything the framers hoped for our chief executive.
7
What about the many people who still support Trump and who demonstrate the complete mental inability to critically judge Trump and the stain of disrespect he has made for the office of the president for the greatest nation in the world.
These Trumpers are unreachable and still have the ability to re-elect this clown.
1
Not that I feel for Trump, but let's be honest, he had no tools to be a great President, in fact, he really has no tools to be a great real estate mogul, or a great reality tv personality---he does in a strange way speak to how the American dream works...Basically, Trump and his entire family are incompetents who inherited great sums of money...hired a shrew lawyer...had no moral or ethical compass...and presto, he made billions---ok, maybe millions.
1
This was a no- brainer right out of the blocks... anything good that might come from this presidency... will come by mistake! “ i grab them right by the....!”
1
Trump' presidential "libarry" will probably be in former strip club in Queens and will contain only an outdated iPhone and a McDonald's drive through.
5
And a remote control.
3
He can put up the Trump Presidential Museum in the Kremlin. It would be most fitting over there.
2
Sorry, Gail, H.L. Mencken said it better:
“The larger the mob, the harder the test. In small areas, before small electorates, a first-rate man occasionally fights his way through, carrying even the mob with him by force of his personality. But when the field is nationwide, and the fight must be waged chiefly at second and third hand, and the force of personality cannot so readily make itself felt, then all the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre — the man who can most easily adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum.
The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”
10
Let me suggest that by being so terrible, Donald Trump is dramatically changing the destiny of the nation for the better.
Trump is so bad, that he has made politics interesting, again. He threatens our future. He creates crisis, after crisis, all the time. He makes headlines, daily.
With Obama, there was no drama. The country got by, but we the people were uninvolved, aloof, uncaring. Trump keeps us on the edge of our seats.
We, the American people need to be involved. Thank Trump for waking us up!
==========================================================
4
How tedious the NYT is becoming. Truly. Thanks for the latest daily installment of “Everything Trump is bad/evil/corrupt.” One year into a presidency hardly provides any perspective into the ultimate success or failure of that individual as president and his presidency. Jimmy Carter was probably the nicest man we ever had as president, but his presidency was certainly not the most successful. Remember, as president he stated at one point he was “ashamed” of our country. Reagan was dismissed as a simpleton by the liberal intelligencia and underwent daily criticism (but certainly not as rapacious as Trump), and history has been kinder than his contemporaneous critics. Even Nixon got a complement from “Linda” from Oklahoma in this Comments section.
We live in an era where our national attention span, perspective and memory are a nanosecond. Time will tell.
3
Everything Trump IS bad/evil/corrupt and it's important to keep calling it out so that it isn't normalized by the time we finally see him gone.
1
His presidential library will be in cyberspace.
@MeMeMeme #Like,Covfefe
Written in Cyrillic.
5
Sorry-totally off topic, but now that Romney is running again can we revisit the tale of the dog the roof? Still makes me giggle.
3
see Republicans on here complimenting Trump. Ruining our judiciary, environment, ignoring pressing environmental issues, defunding education and healthcare (flu shots at schools would have saved lives but federal money for that program is gone), secrets Israelis may have died to attain, emoluments (Don Jr in India, Ivanka's Chinese trademark deal and conversation with Japanese Prime Minister), and on and on. Obamacare could have been fixed. Tax deal is permanent for corporations but Medicare and Medicaid are on the chopping blocks. Our taxes are scheduled to rise right after the midterms so none of this stock market rise is great. Every investment house has said that Americans now need more for retirement as the safety net will be gone. Deductions for charity - gone. No safety net to take over. And guns. Background checks. Bump stocks. Without concealed carry? One can only hope. This is just the tip. So to those who love Trump? Please consider saving the US from Russian take over. My dad fought the Nazis he escaped. This guy thinks they're good people's. Smh.
6
No, no, Trump has a book:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trum...
1
Shouldn't the Trump library be in Moscow? Maybe Mexico or Russia could pay for it.
2
The randiest president of all time?
I suppose he would think it a compliment.
Let's not forget that the founding fathers were a very randy bunch. Jefferson got it on with (and by that a I mean raped) his slaves. Hamilton paid a man for accès to the man's wife. And Franklin was all over the place. So Trump is carrying out the intent of the founding fathers.
1
Oh, god, I hadn't even thought of the Trump Presidential Museum. Leftover Maga hats, golf clubs, . No books over a page long in the Trump Library except, of course, The Art of The Deal!
2
Good article but one point of clarification, Queens is in NYC!
1
The thought of a Presidential Library to honor a con artist/low life/ignoramus WHO DOESN'T LIKE TO READ...is outrageously hysterical. Rather we should allow HIM to pay for his own monument: Perhaps a museum in the image of a giant cheeseburger, or a giant filet 'o' fish sandwich, or a giant golf course, or a monument depicting trump, sean hannity, and putin in a fierce 3-way embrace...but, please, something without books. trump lies quite enough, thank you, without creating a pretense of scholarliness when we finally come to the end of his ignorant, anti-intellectual, non common sensical, and willful destruction of all that was good about our country.
1
Mara-a-Lago will NOT be underwater! We're gonna Build a Seawall!
And the whales are gonna pay for it! (They've been sending us some pretty bad hombres, folks.)
5
Is anyone surprised that Trump, who struts his incompetence daily, is ranked at the bottom of the poll? This column is cute, but adds nothing new.
2
I am puzzled that he managed to score 12 points out of 100; did Michael Cohen get to one of the the experts who were polled?
2
Suspect he'll want his "museum" near the Kremlin, where he's really appreciated.
The fact that he had to have a note to remind him to listen and to act like he cared at today’s listening event to hear the students from Parkland and parents from Columbine and Sandy Hook puts him at number 45. That he nodded or Nunes’ biased memo to be published but would not allow Schiff’s to be heard publicly shows that for biased partisan politics he again is #45.
For his “fake news” and constant badgering of our law enforcement agencies he is again on the bottom floor. For his nepotism in allowingg Kushner to have security clearances despite his chevkered record and for his sons to use his office to promote his businesses he again is at the bottom of the basement.
However, he breaks all presidential records for being the best friend to Putin and for selling out his country to Russia without one word of protest against Putin and his troll factories. He is an anathema to all the values that our founding fathers articulated in our Constitution.
The inscription on his unpresidential library should read, “Ask not what Russia can do for you, ask what you can do for Russia!”
6
Heartfelt and belly laughing thanks for always helping us get through hard times with your trenchant, multi-faceted humor—glad to see they Polked you with a much deserved journalism honor —here’s to many more.
2
If we make it through this disaster of a cretin, a thousand years from now Trump will still be at the bottom. And this Congress will be there with him.
4
Just the title of op-Ed gave me a horse laugh. Thanks for that Gail.
1
I believe we can all agree that George W. Bush was not a good president. But there is a difference between incompetence and malignance. Unfortunately the current president is both incompetent and malignant.
7
Might seem Pollyannish but...
After Buchanan we get Lincoln, after Bush we get Obama, so after Trump...WOW!
7
Funny! Sad....
1
Give Pence a chance.
A perfect place for the Trump Museum would be Coney Island, on the boardwalk. It would help revitalize Coney Island and remind people of it's good old days of Coney Island hucksters. A Trump statue with his Mussolini glare would be a major attraction.
1
Only the democrats could lose to this guy
1
I disagree with the commentators who suggest there will be no need for a Trump Presidential Library. To the contrary, we will not only need a librarian but a staff of professional archivists to catalogue, arrange, and index the issues of "Wealth" and "Money" magazines that will constitute the sole contents of the building.
1
Nixon actively worked to subvert the Vietnam peace process in order to guarantee his election over Humphrey. He was a traitor that cost thousands of US servicemen their lives, and thousands upon thousands of Vietnamese theirs. Then Watergate happened. How is he not the absolute bottom in historical polls? I understand he was extremely popular at the time of his re-election, so from a purely political standpoint, he was better than dirt.
Trump, so far, has done less clearly permanent damage than W did. But if the norm erosions are not reversed by the next president, I do believe Trump is the worst ever. For contrast, Buchanan is usually considered dead last because he kept failing at handling the North-South division, but that was a monumental challenge that only Lincoln, through war no less, could take on. If Trump had to deal with such an existential problem, the US would probably end up looking like Syria does right now.
2
There will be at least one book available for Trump's skimpy library.
According to his former wife Ivanna, Trump had a copy of Hitler's "Mein Kampf" and/or a book of Hitler's speeches on his bedside nightstand.
Now there is heavy reading for the man who abstains from reading.
Let us hope that the actual nightstand itself can be located for the recreation of the scene where all those early am Tweets were formed and sent reeling out to the world at large.
Cut and paste all those massive missives into one grand coffee table sized tome and there you have it.
The little library for a little mind, a little heart, and little hands.
3
Please forgive me, but my first thought at Mar-a-Lago going underwater was: oh let it be when 45 is there with his VP, cabinet, the speaker of the house, and Mitch the witch...
1
Yes, he will need a library. Where else will he keep his Dr. Seuss?
1
The Library for 45 should be online. Tweets that turn out to be of historical import could be stored in a time-thimble out on the submerged flotsam of Maralago, which might be doubling as a penitentiary by that point. Melania and her folks can give their Chain Migration tours from the historic Green Card Room. How about a Mermaid Room where Sarah and Kelly and Gen Kelly float around.
2
Keep on being snarky Gail, that's what you do best. By the way, were any of these so-called political experts the same ones who called the election for Hilary?
1
Do we really need a library to remember the administration of a man who doesn't read?
1
You really outdid yourself this time, Gail! I particularly loved your crack about not needing a Presidential Library. But I beg to differ! And I have some ideas! (Sorry, the caffeine’s kicking in.) May I modestly propose that the Trump Presidential Library should be:
1) located in Atlantic City. We can repurpose the now-shuttered Taj Mahal, scene of much money laundering, and the locals need the jobs;
2) financed entirely by foreigners, particularly the Russians. Hey, maybe the Mexicans will kick in some dough as well, since they’re not paying for the wall;
3) completely devoid of books or printed matter more than one page in length;
4) surrounded by a “big, beautiful wall,” the higher the better;
5) free to enter if you’re from one of the states that voted for Trump in 2016. For people from those other states, it’s $50 a pop;
6) etc.
Thank you for inspiring me, Gail. You are truly a beacon in dark times!
2
Just give it some time.
Once the Russians hack the list he’ll move up one or two places for sure.
3
I hear there is a guy running for the Senage in the west that has a dog. Got anything on him?
Presidential Golf Course? Perhaps, but I’d rather see Trump Prison.
4
Presidential Library?? There are only two books to put on a shelf!
1
Our leader should get a shelf in the Obama Library. If we tell him it is the very best shelf in the library and everybody is saying so, then he will be OK with it.
I had a book to suggest for Trump’s presidential library but realized he probably hasn’t finished coloring his first one.
4
"We’re not going to need a presidential library."
There will be a library.
It will contain three books.
“The Art of Deal,” five million copies, or more if necessary to assure that his library always remains bigger than President Obama's.
“The Art of The Swindle” ghosted for him by Steve Bannon that relates the entire truth about the 2016 election campaign and its non-dealings with Russia, also five million copies.
“Fire and Fury” by Michael Wolff, one non-circulating copy kept in a locked underground vault that relates the entire sorry truth about Donald Trump.
Deluxe leather-bound versions of “The Art of The Deal” and “The Art of the Swindle” clad in alligator, crocodile and ostrich skin allegedly hand-signed by Trump and Bannon will be available for purchase in the gift shop, along with large-scale replicas of The Wall that Mexico forgot to pay for and assorted handbags and jewelry selected by Ivanka Trump, all made in China.
There will be a casino in the basement and a branch of the Deutsche Bank. There will also be an interdenominational chapel for use by members of some religions,
Plans are currently in the making for a 90,000 seat sports complex next door to the library where professional wrestling matches will be held and the National Anthem will be played 24 hours a day.
Where the library will be? That is still an open question, but current thinking is centered on Reno or Las Vegas, NV, provided that all of Nevada’s legislators vote against impeachment.
1
The Donald J. Trump Presidential Library will be a shelf in a bathroom in Trump Tower. Admission free with proof of Russian citizenship.
A library for a President who doesn't read, an oxymoron if I ever heard one. How big a place do we need for a ream of bullet-points and cheat sheets ?
1
Hey! You completely forgot about Millard Fillmore, Gail.
Instead of a Presidential library, what about a brothel attached to a McDonald's? More or less sums up the man.
5
Wheatland is a lovely house and a good tour. It's just the kind of house I'd expect a gay president to retire to.
The most galling aspect of this poll, for Trump, is how low he ranks compared to Obama.
You just can't hold up your head any more in public, can you, Trump?
I mean you lost the election by 2.6 million popular votes, and now the expert presidential historians rank you so far below Obama that - well, you're the worst, dead last among all the presidents we've ever had.
What a loser.
2
Trump is a clown and our President. He is awful by every measure. But, GWB was the worst. He ignored intelligence briefings, and started wars that will never end. He and Cheney broke the world, broke the American economy, and created ISIS. So far, DJT's worst offense is that he sold our democracy to the Russians who own him.
1
The counter-factual historical unknown is whether or not great events make great persons or great persons make great events. While Trump has been President longer than William Henry Harrison he has had only a year to show how much better or worse than our other Presidents he will ultimately become.
Will we be rejoicing that we are all still here in 2020 relatively unscathed? Will we be rising and singing the Russian or Chinese national anthem and saluting their national flags at sporting events? Will the House of Trump have dissolved Congress and suspended the Courts while replacing the White House with the Bedminster NJ summer palace and the Mar-a-Lago winter palace? Will Donald, Jr, Eric and Ivanka become Prince and Princess while Tiffany sulks and Barron waits?
5
I'd give Trump the rank of worst for character, as liar, egotist, racist, xenophobe, misogynist, ignoramus and bully. For actual deeds as president, it's hard to beat George W. Bush as worst: An unnecessary bloody war in Iraq, justified by lies, and whose incompetent execution is still creating death and misery across the Middle East and Africa. Ever hear of ISIS before Bush? And Bush's economic policy failures crashed the US and world economies, with at least hundreds of thousands of people losing homes and jobs.
Dear Leader Trump may yet "top" those "achievements," but he isn't there yet. He's a worse man, but less effective in implementation, so far. And of course, George W. Bush was more polite in his public appearances...
3
But Gail, HE is the BEST at being the worst. After all, it's only been just over a year " in office " for the Presidential Apprentice. Imagine what could happen IF he serves out the full term. North Korea, Iran, his BFF Putin, the possibilities stagger the imagination, and the blood pressure. As for his presidential library, Twitter has that covered. It's all there, Donald's greatest hits, and they just keep on coming. It truly is a peek into his mind, just like books about serial killers, psychopaths and con artists.
But, there is good news. Romney is officially running for the Senate. Perhaps, for the optics, there will be a new Dog. Seamus 2.0.. That would make a great picture, riding around D.C.. INSIDE the car.
5
Your last line, Ms. Collins, reminded me of a list of books (incredibly impressive) Obama had read while serving as President of the United States. He is a true intellect, full of curiosity, which, I think, is the main factor in the desire for intellectual pursuits. And then we now have the dummy. Ugh!
3
I've been indulging in binge Obama YouTube watching, and what has jumped out at me are: 1) his sense of humor; 2) his sense of humanity (watch him talk about Sandy Hook without puddling up—I dare you); 3) how much he loves, respects and relies on Michelle; and 4) how good he is with children. I'm so happy for his daughters that they have such amazing parents.
Dropping to the bottom of Gail's column...about not needing a Trump Presidential Library...I'm not so sure. True, that Trump may not have left many papers for the Library, except for Big Mac wrappers. But considering his tenure in totality, at lease we will save money by not having to build a non-fiction section for any of his material.
1
Pssst! New York City has five boroughs. Queens is one of them. New York City is not confined to Manhattan. Gail's comments on where to put the Trump Museum (a Library is too much to expect?) remind me of a poster I saw in Sweden: Keep Sweden Clean! Someone added the helpful suggestion: Dump your garbage in Denmark!
5
If Trump's dream comes true, he'll be the "last" president in more ways than one.
His aim is to be the USA's first tsar.
3
As I noted to considerable response the other day, three cities start out with strong claims on a Trump Presidential Library — Atlantic City, Palm Beach and Vladivostok.
3
I thought the survey Ms. Collins referred to was preposterous - it normalized Mr. Trump.
Surely it’s obvious that he is in a league of his own. In the future (if there is a future) historians will have two categories when ranking bad presidents: a) Mr. Trump, and b) everyone other than Mr. Trump.
It will be understood by all that who whoever is ranked worst in the second category is still a thousand times better than Mr. Trump.
4
Gail,
Nice piece but you've misinterpreted reality.
Trump, and all things he does or touches, are always the biggest, the greatest, the hugest and even, on occasion, the dumbest. His crowds, his buildings, his golf clubs and yes, even his lies outdo even his most envious opponent or competitor.
He went to Washington to drain the swamp, to change and destroy the status quo, to make America Great Again. You just can't do that from the top or even the middle of the list. In the minuscule mind of Trump, being at the absolute bottom of a list obviously prepared by Hillary, CNN and the Democrats is exactly where he wants to be. Another victory against the establishment that must and will be celebrated by this administration, Sean Hannity, Rush and all the other wackos currently at the Trump trough.
Gail, We all know that in the world of Trump, up is down, truth is fake news, lies are truth, climate change is a hoax, the Russia investigation is a witch hunt, and on and on. So it should have been embarrassingly obvious to you that in his ego centered and temporary world, BOTTOM is TOP. His version, to be eloquently presented by Sara Huckabee is that he is right where he wants to be, where he needs to be, where he said he would be to get the job done.
And now Devin Nunes will discover and release a new list.
.
4
My hope is that the Presidential Museum for this sitting president will be placed entirely inside the hole of any putting green at Mar a Lago.
5
The Trump library will consist of one manilla folder surrounded by a Yuge tacky gift shop. Spend $50 or more and you get a free thumb drive of Hillary’s emails.
7
Go Gail. You make any morning in this dark world a bit brighter.
4
But Gail, a presidential library would mean he is gone...
4
You can be sure, though, that DT's "Presidential Library" will the best one (and the largest one)!
1
I was just about to say "And the emptiest" and then it occurred to me that there will have to be a fairly sizable room for all of the paperwork from Mueller and his team.
Gail, since I'm one of them I know your regular readers are a stoic & classy bunch not easily startled, but did you all know Buckingham Palace invites those taking its tour to enter & browse The Queen's Gift Shoppe before departing the royal premises and truth be told, not everything there is as tasteful as you'd have expected. (http://www.royalcollectionshop.co.uk/souvenirs-1.html). Gail I think you should dedicate a future column inviting readers to suggest the alluring keepsakes that will be on the gilded shelves for sale at the Donald J. Trump Presidential Library, Museum and Adult Superstore.
3
Of course the Trump library will be fantastic. it will have the biggest books with the best words. Reading them will make you, like, really smart.
2
Wow! My eyebrows darted up reading 'cohabiting'! Am going to look into that, just for fun. One can count on you, Gail, to dive deep into American History and find these little tidbits.
I'm not sure Trump can be called our worst president because he's not really president, he's the 'illegitimate' president and does not really belong in our White House. He's there only because of the Russians. Hopefully we will be rid of him soon and we never again will have to see him sit obscenely, wide-spread, tie dangling. (He should win 'worst president' on this alone. Did his mother teach him nothing?).
6
There will need to be Trump Presidential library. Even the worst President gets one. I'm thinking it will be different than those other boring old libraries though. There will be books of course. Not ones with words, mind you but with cool pictures you can color in, if you want to fork over twenty bucks for a box of Trump brand crayons. I'm thinking there will be several shades of gold in the box.
Of course there should be interactive exhibits too. Maybe a truck you can sit in and go vroom-vroom?! I think there would also need be a Trump insult generator. You put in your name and some personal information and you get a nasty personal tweet right then and there.
It's gonna be awesome! The greatest library ever.
4
The Trump Presidential Library will full of all of Trump's accomplishments. Pictures of the great crowds at the inauguration. Golf scores of note. Then, ...
I'm sure there will be more accomplishments to be highlighted in the TPL.
"But it's not like he grabbed anybody." Thanks, Gail!
3
Why would Trump need a library? He refuses and can't read.
1
You are a JOY. Thank you!
1
Both presidents are simply nuts. The pathological behavior is their common good. There's no excuse for it and you can't hide it.
The only questionable thing is: why must such crazy guys reach such high political positions?
1
The presidential library should be in a Federal prison where trump and his minions belong.
5
I'd forgive and take Nixon back in a heartbeat when I think about the Frankenstein we have for president now.
1
Presidential Library? Try Resistance Memorial Center.
1
Is there a ranking by their hairstyles? Crewcut, Brill Cremed, The Bedford Crop, Regency Style, Pompadour, Powdered Wigs or the Classic Trump burnt Cheerios meringue egg whipped light and airy combover? (With extensions)
2
From now on, the survey report really ought to have an extra column for Fake Presidents.
I only hope there's never another entry in it.
3
I hereby suggest the Trump library be built in Queens. That is, along the Queens shoreline of Newtown Creek; it’s already a dead waterway full of oily muck. What could a little more detritus possibly matter?
4
I’ve always liked the name Millard Fillmore because it never sticks in your head (Willard Billmore? Dillard Gilmore?), and it evokes fantasies of a bumpy candy bar by reminding us all, unanimously, of the word “filbert,” a sort of hazelnut.
But what about TRUMP?
Time for a folk song.
All good folk songs are roped together strongly with rhymes. Like sailing ships ... but musical.
See: “There’s a lake of stew and of whiskey too, you can paddle all around ‘em in a big canoe.”
So how to immortalize Trump in an all-American song?
Begin with the rhymes ...
Bump
Hump
Rump
Slump
Dump
Gump
Jump
Lump
Mump(s)
Pump
Sump pump
Whump
Somebody wake up Pete Seeger or Woody Guthrie. Thanks so much ...
4
I really think Buchanan gets a raw deal. He wasn't some skirt-chasing drug addict, unlike JFK (ouch, right? Well, it's true). He didn't get killed by anybody, that's always a plus. The Civil War really came about because of an inevitable collision of factors way beyond any one person's control; slavery had been outlawed in much of the civilized world, and yet the Southern economy seemed to depend upon it, and the past collided with the future, with the past losing (as it usually does).
Trump on the other hand, has been unequaled in how much he lies. And in how ignorant he is about all matters foreign and domestic. There has never been a more bragging, boorish, embarrassment in the White House, not even close. He makes people long for Nixon, Bush, Carter, whomever their least favorite president was so far.
He's the worst, and if America gets through this, then I hope to God he is the worst we'll ever have. If America doesn't get through this, well then at least many millions of us chose this fate, and the rest of us failed to stop it, and so we'll deserve our final outcome.
For now though, thankfully Trump is as ineffective as he is incompetent and ignorant, so I'm thinking we'll survive. Now next week, how about we talk about that docu-drama about New York fashion, "Black Pants".
2
Ms. Collins...oops, one second..just read that we won a gold and silver in men's free-style halfpipe. I was worried for a while thinking our poor Olympic athletes were suffering from the "Trump effect."
Now back to that informative presidential list which I saved and your pick-me-up column which I will also save. First, I can't tell you how happy I am to see Trump at the bottom where he belongs. Actually, he should be sub-basement. And that guy who I miss so much, Barack Obama, has climbed up. Bravo, sir, and well deserved!
Now, a few things I just learned from you. Buchanan cohabited with William King for a number of years..both bachelors, you write. Actually, that is quite progressive. Three cheers for them. And Nixon moved up. Believe it or not, I would rather have him at the helm than Trump. As you said, at least he kept his corruptness within our borders.
Finally, the Trump Library..a contradiction in terms if ever there was one, for sure. Do we even know if he ever or has ever read? Well, he must have learned at least one of the three R's.."Riting" if not knowing how to "spel", as sometimes seen from his frantic Twittering. So let's find a place for this phantom library..how about the Everglades, not too far from Mar-a-Lago, yet susceptible to sinking.... If only...
3
Andrew Johnson was the worst President, assuming Trump does not start a nuclear war with North Korea.
If he does, he will be the worst President, but there won’t be anyone around to make note of it.
2
I recommend Trump Memorial in front of Taj Mahal Casino in Atlantic City.
Morally Bankrupt and Financially Bankrupt.
If Trump is at the bottom of the list of worthy presidents, then 47% of voters are down in the same cesspool with him.
Just try to get a Trump voter to give a rational explanation (I said *rational*) for their adoration of this swindler of innocent students at his fake university. They rejoice in his wanton criminality as a sign of liberation from constraining morality - that is their identification with him.
1
His statue could include a list of talking points in his hands......
Linking Buchanan to the Dred Scott decision is foolish. Whether or not he agreed with it, not only didn't he sit on the Supreme Court neither did anyone he appointed to it when the case was decided.
1
A 12 ! Woo-hoo! 60 under par!
1
Since Trump doesn't read or write, all his presidential library would have in it is tapes of "Fox and Friends" on a TV.
I think we can safely rank Corrupt Donnie at 52nd best, at least for a while.
Take heed, gender-besotted and otherwise stampede-prone fans and facilitators of Hillary Clinton, she of the "sterling resume." Buchanan had the best resume of any president to date, and look how good a predictor of performance it was.
Hate to ask it, but why would there be a presidential library for a president who doesn't read?
Seems like it would be a waste of money to build something nobody would want to see.
We're going to need a place for all of Mueller's paperwork.
You never fail to deliver a respite from the most aggressive assault on our conscious as well as subconscious nature. Your humorous columns are like good, old fashioned chicken noodle soup when one is sick of being demoralized
Postpone any thought of retirement until this is all over.
1
Alas, the punchline of the last sentence reveals the probability of Donald J. Trump ever reading this, or any other article in the New York Times. And we all know that everyone, especially Chief of Staff Kelly, know better than to read it to him.
It's going to take someone carelessly, perhaps over the breakfast table, reading this aloud, as if to practice their budding skills.
What do you say, Barron, are you up for this?
Keith Olberman used to have a segment on his MSNBC show called “The Worst Person in the World.” He would announce that part of the show in the same exaggerated tone as a ringside announcer asking, “Are you ready to rummmmmmmmmm-ble?!!!
Each day would be a new Worst Person in the World: Bill O’Reilly, George W. Bush, Roger Ailes, etc.
If Keith were still doing his show, he’d be announcing You Know Who, every single day.
You Know Who enjoys the double billing of being both the most famous, and The Worst, person in the world, all at one time.
Well done, sir. Well done!
1
The presidential library will be housed in a small phone booth outside of Moscow.
1
Trump's over-reliance on Twitter diminishes the office and makes him appear just plain dumb. I would say it makes him appear dumber than he actually is, but in his case, the opposite may be true. Nixon probably deserves better just because he was the last Republican President capable of complex thought, however twisted. At least he could speak in complete sentences.
Thanks for the catnip Gail. I always enjoy a good laugh. Well, back to reality. What do the Democrats stand for?
One of your best, among so many, Gail. So happy we have you to keep us sane.
1
The only book needed in the Trump Presidential library is a classic: Alexander's No Good, Terrible, Horrible, Very Bad Day.
Simply put - spot on...and worst means worst.
Trump Golf (https://www.trumpgolf.com/Our-Courses), love the cute gold crest, lists 18 course worldwide with 2 in Dubai. I think the Trump Museum should be in Dubai. It's close to Russia and we know how the oligarchs like warm weather. Furthermore, as the sea level rises Dubai can build another island to houses the Trump memorabilia.
1
While attempting to clean the outright mis-attributions and stretches of the imagination threaded throughout Mr. Luettgen's blathering attempt at trump-sizing, I realize it's time to give his feeble nonsense the benefit of the doubt...his thoughts, such as they are, just did not translate well from the Russian.
2
I am definitely with A. Suffering through an insufferable entity like Trump, is so not worth dwelling on. Meanwhile, Black Panther is the most uplifting thing happening to us.
1
Well Republicans will never believe anyone could be worse than Jimmy Carter. And Obama is ranked eighth, one ahead of their beloved Ronald Reagan. Tsk, tsk, tsk. The irony!
1
Marsh-a-Lago?
Considering how fond Trump is of superlatives, it is very fitting that he will be marked as the worst president, ever.
1
I love you Gail Collins. And I am so proud you recently received an award. Nobody deserves it more!!!!!! Also, great article.
Gail you are a gifted writer. But this subject has been beaten to death with no happy ending. Next is a beauty contest. And then rating our presidents on their sex appeal. Looks like we go a lot of time on our hands for nonsense. And Rome burns.
"One big plus. We’re not going to need a presidential library."
There's always reruns on t.v. at 2:00 in the morning.....
It’s nice we live in country where we can make jokes about the president without being called a traitor. That’s still the case, isn’t it?
2
Trump won't need a library. He'll just want a huge statue erected somewhere... and I suggest the 5th hole of some golf course with enough hills to need help aiming for the little hole. Some place most of us will never fathom visiting. Like Moscow.
Trump is uniquely positioned.
Uninformed, maybe intellectually impaired, psychologically deranged, and maniacally intent on making the country more polluted, less welcoming, poorer, sicker and reduced in stature among all the nations in the world. No other President was so intent on reducing what it means to be an American. Indeed, he wins the contest!
1
"...the Trump Presidential Museum would look like. Where do you think they’d put it? Queens? Mar-a-Lago? Please, God, not at Trump Tower. New York City’s already suffered enough."
Ms. Collins:
Guess in which city Queens is located. You could read our Wikipedia article. You will be so surprised.
Yeah, don't you need books at a library? Trump does't/can't read so no need for books. Pictures, yeah, pictures will be good. Lots of snaps with the Dumpster and his glitzy friends. Video, Debbie Does Dallas, Wanda Whips Wallstreet, Behind the Green Door, the whole collection. And a digital of the worst inauguration speech of all times.
1
Lincoln’s Twitter feed would have been full,of jokes: rib ticklers, howlers! Could Trump even memorize a joke long enough to relate one?
Well, there's no point in having a Presidential Library for a president who doesn't read. But, if it's not awash due to global warming, maybe Mar a Lago would make a good monument.
Congratulations! Well deserved.
Only Nixon could go to China. Only Trump could be Russian OWNED.
Gail, Instead of a library with books, (what books?), how about a Tweetbary with only Presidential Tweets? And why in the USA? How about Moscow? That's where I think Trump should retire and build his golf courses. He and Vlad can play golf and talk about the good ole days.
332
Yes, and don't forget to use the word "twit," as in "The Twit who Became President!"
6
Has anybody told him yet? Oh, what am I thinking? We'd have seen the twitter storm if they had.
4
Left out of your reprisal of Presidents past is George W. Bush. Surprising since he's the one who got us into the "wars without end" for the last almost full seventeen years. He's the one who probably promoted Trump, if only for himself to rank higher in the list. No one wants to be at the bottom. Though Trump may champion it, because, after all, if you turn the list upside down, he's on the top!
2
I will be thrilled to see a Trump Library. It will mean he is out of the White House!
1
For the first 12 months of his presidency, he was a loser, would never be renominated and certainly would never serve another term. Yes, he was elected by fewer than 50% of those who voted and had to be conveyed to Washington DC in the secret because of possible assassination. As US President he was constantly relentlessly ridiculed by the press as a buffoon, a fool, and country lawyer out of his depth. Yes, he was the 16th President and the first elected Republican President following in the foot steps of James Buchanan.
In my voting lifetime which began with Dwight Eisenhower, Trump is hands down the worst president. He excels only in bad things: an unprecedented level of lying, little or no empathy for others, completely self-centered, no morality that I can detect and on and on. I would think that ex-presidents like Van Buren, Arthur and Buchanan are safe from finding themselves in the dreaded worst president slot.
10
My English neighbor put it best, in regards to djt: "what a tremendous waste of space".
He will be first, and hopefully last, to not qualify for a presidential library. Presidential shelf? 4 ft at most. A few bucks at Home Depot.
8
when trump first announced his candidacy, John Stewart showed a picture of trump's hair and said 'this is the first time I just have to show a picture of a presidential candidate and not have to write a joke'
3
With Nixon, and I remember him so well, you had a Shakespearian character, a Lear of wasted ambition. The great and brilliantly crazy Hunter Thompson wrote about Nixon the way that Marlowe wrote plays: in full indecorous voice, his heart broken by a monster who nonetheless spurred him on to some of the finest political fulminations in the history of journalism. Now we have this. Nixon made people rage and think and demand the best of their intellects in the face of his predations. I thought until a few days ago that Trump has just made us stupid with depression. But then those kids, those extraordinary kids from Florida, started to speak. And I wish old crazy Hunter was still around to listen. But we can.
10
Moscow is the appropriate Trump library location. But it won't have any books in it - at least that he has read.
4
"Where do you think they’d put it? Queens? Mar-a-Lago? Please, God, not at Trump Tower. New York City’s already suffered enough."
Queens would not be a good place for the picture-book library devoted to our national shame. Queens is home to one of the most internationally diverse plots of land on the planet and any tribute to a man who hates immigrants (despite being the grandson and husband of immigrants) would not attract respectful attention.
I agree that NYC has suffered more than it's share of the sad, sad man in the Oval office. However, I beg you to leave Queens off your list. We had him before Manhattan did and just as a reminder - Queens is in NYC.
4
Our current President is actually worse than the worst in that he is at the bottom now and forever more at the bottom he will be, at least we can hope. His legacy will outlive him though, as it will take generations to clean up the mess he has made of our country and its reputation.
6
Not to mention our air, our waterways, our oceans, our exquisite national parks.... You get my drift.
Ah, Gail Collins, Always good for a silly goat, Billy goat story when the nation is talking about ways to safety proof our schools, and the kids are up in arms about how the adults haven't been able to protect the from their peers. Thanks for another good chuckle, Gail. You go, girl!
1
Obama will be appreciated even more when America learns to appreciate all of it's citizens equally and realize how he has served them all more than other American presidents.
1
Time will tell, but he is the most painful to watch esp at the televised visit with the young people from Florida. The man can't run two thoughts together and express them without sounding like a twelve year old I hate to think what he is like in front of other world leaders.
3
Comparing past presidents is a lot like ranking crazy exes. Over time, we think more fondly of some, far less so of others. But when we recall one so insane, so repugnant to our sensibilities that the memory still gives us nightmares, then we know we've reached the barrel's bottom. Which is why it's extremely unlikely Trump will ever be displaced from his position at the bottom of our presidential barrel -- no matter how many more centuries our jittery republic may have left before it eventually dies.
4
Gail, I don't know how to break the news to you but that poll was rigged. Rigged! That I can tell you. It was a fake poll.
The above message was brought to you by the Make America Great Again Committee to Re-Elect Trump.
Instead of a presidential library, we shall have to put up with a presidential television set with one channel, All Me All the Time, and life-sized card board cut outs and diploma coloring books in the gift shop.
Perhaps, as a Pennsylvanian who grew up in Chester County, I do celebrate now that county might be in one, not three, Congressional Districts.
3
Congrats on the clean voting setup, BTW.
Thank you. It's better to laugh than to cry. And before all the whining begins: for goodness sake, Eisenhower and Teddy were Republicans. Nobody wants to get rid of (actual) conservatives or your guns. We just want the crazy to please stop now.
3
I do actually want to get rid of the guns.
1
Donald Trump is worse than worst! I'm not making this up but today, as shown on national TV, Trump was shown holding a cue card on what to say in response to the grieving Florida high school students who pleaded for action on gun control. The cue card, printed in hand, read: "I hear ya."
4
Hilarious! Thanks for the laugh.
Well... MAYBE a library. To display all his tax forms.
1
Ms. Collins, you outdid even yourself with that last line. Thanks, I seriously needed that.
But, on a more somber note, Jeffrey Toobin's "Trump's Miss Universe Gambit" in the current New Yorker is a must-read. It's all there, every corrupt and salacious detail. This guy's total package is one-of-a-kind, or so we can hope.
Meanwhile, Eric is in India on a corruption mission for the "family" business. You couldn't make this stuff up if you were on acid.
5
Rather than a presidential library, what about a golden casino, where the life and times of Donald Trump can be tastefully celebrated in his signature style? Naturally, preferential access will be given to former and current members of Trump’s inner circle, including the movers and fakers of the dark web, the friends from Fox News and the one who rules them all, gun-toting cult leaders of the NRA, and personal envoys from the Kremlin.
266
Great idea! I vote for the defunct trump casino in Atlantic City, boarded up and with splashes of graffitti...the perfect tribute to this grotesque man.
5
I admire you for still finding something about this president to laugh at, Gail. He stopped being funny for me a long time ago.
2
Mueller will continue to indict. Democrats will take the midterms. Trump will be ousted in disgrace. Turmoil will reign for a deserving GOP. Democrats will retake the White House.
It is the worst of times. But it will be the best of times, soon enough.
As the best president once said: “Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
4
trump has earned his place in the cellar. Buchanan was inept, but he was not fundamentally corrupt, he did not have the character of a philandering mobster, he was not ever implicated in criminal enterprise, and he was not a traitor. He was just in over his head given the time he happened to take office.
trump will cement his place at the bottom before he is finally either ejected or forced to resign.
Unfair hit on Dred Scott. It was not his decision. It was a case kicked around the federal courts for 12 years, and the final decision was rendered by Andrew Jackson appointee Roger Taney.
2
As a favorite comedienne, Kate Clinton, said about presidential libraries and Reagan: A shelf at the Gene Autry museum ought to be entirely enough! For Trump, maybe a small spiral-bound book on how to cheat at golf, in the sale bin of the Walmart sporting goods section.
1
Thank god for Gail. Laughter, even when snide, is not only the best medicine, it's a wonderful way to RESIST.
1
Great column. A presidential library for a president who can’t/won’t or doesn’t read seems a waste of money. Maybe a room with a television set to Fox News with a bed and a cell phone would be enough.
Please no, not New Jersey! We've suffered enough with having Donald's once and future court jester as Governor for eight years. Have pity on us, Ms. Collins!
1
Until Trump kills millions in secret wars in Southeast Asia, Nixon will still be the worst president in my eyes. By the way what about Mitt Romney's Senate run? Let's have some more Seamus on the roof of the car columns and say a few words about Ann. Thank you in advance.
1
As a Vietnam combat veteran I hate Richard Nixon. Not only did he prolong the war, announcing a few days before the '72 election a peace agreement he could have achieved at any time after his election, we have lately found out that he conspired, using Anna Chenault and others, to subvert LBJ's peace efforts in order to insure his election. I think of all the Americans, Vietnamese and others who died for his sick ambitions, of all who grieved and suffered. Morally, he was a mass murderer. I hate Nixon as no other. Why am I now nostalgic?
1
Things have changed quite a bit since whenever.
We don't need a President anymore, and would be better off without one.
Just a simple parliamentary system, with the elected leader of Congress, functionally in-charge.
And a lottery system to select our Congressional reps, like jury selection, from a pool of pre-qualified applicants.
In so many ways, our governmental structure that dates back 230 years is an anachronism, that is not working as designed.
And this editorial?
"the worst thing is good enough to be laughed at, though it be good for nothing else. And the best thing, though it be good for something else, is good for nothing better."
T.L. Peacock
1
Gail, last time I checked Queens was part of New York City, has that changed with the gerrymandering and all?
"Trump came in last, with a score of 12 out of 100.
Choose the best way to look at this:"
E) Who did Trump pay off to buy 12 points? An honest score would have been -12 out of 100.
While Trump needs no library for obvious reasons, he certainly deserves his own Ripley's "Believe It or Not" museum. One wing alone will be named, "No One Can Believe It." It will contain exhibits of "Americans" and be devoted to world travelers who can't believe anyone, any one, ANY, ONE, AT ALL! voted for Trump.
Other exhibits will reveal Trump's hands to be much smaller than those of a toddler and his skull even smaller than an aboriginal shrunken head. Trump's actual two-foot long, yellow-dyed, dozen strands of hair will be on display with a two-hour long video showing how he daily, elaborately coifed it into his hairdo.
The museum will amaze, astonish and entertain attendees with facts about Trump's remarkable life of deceit, duplicity, deception. How he practiced the Art of the Steal and how he came to be owned by Vladimir.
And as where to build it? Well, isn't that also obvious? Moscow.
4
Trump is not only the worst President ever, but his Presidential Monument will be a Twitter account rather than a library and possibly will be a hacked blot provided
by his Russian allies.
1
What does he need a library for? He’s a genius who knows everything, thus has no need to research anything.
2
The poll also ranks W. H. Harrison and Garfield near the bottom. Something is wrong there: Harrison died a month after his inauguration and Garfield was murdered only a few months after his. They didn't have time to accumulate a record---how can they be evaluated at all?
Dear Mss Collins.-
Wish this contest isnot openned to international areas, this would very likely spoiled the magnifecent results so, far obtained.
Marvelous column ms collins. ( from mexico).
1
I'm confused about the drop of Jackson's standing. If it's because of his attitude toward Native Americans then why hasn't Washington fallen because of his attitude toward African-Americans. Are Native American lifes somehow more valuable than those of African-Americans?
And as to those Native Americans, remember that Thomas Jefferson put into the Declaration of Independence a reference to "merciless Indian savages." Sounds like he and those who voted to ratify it including another future president, John Adams, didn't exactly have a positive attitude toward them.
1
Thank you, Ms. Collins, for your leitmotif about Mr. Trump, our first PINO (President-in-Name-Only). Humor makes almost anything better.
1
Trump will want a library. The 18* books where he's credited as author and every periodical with his picture on the cover.
*18? Well, that's what Wikipedia says, but it can't be right. He hasn't even read that many.
1
I am looking forward to the Commemorative set of Trump Presidential Handcuffs - done in gaudy gold-plate. It could be a lovely addition to the Trump Library, which could be contained in a bathroom magazine rack.
1
As bad as this president is, think how much worse it could be:
President Sarah Palin.
President Kid Rock.
Does anyone really doubt that those two could not be elected, given what's happened since 2017?
2
The terrible, but unlikely, thing is that he might move up because he was forced into doing something that he was against. Like gun control. Like global warming. Like preserving Obamacare.
So what do we do then?
Not to worry. It will never happen.
1
The Trump Presidential Museum And Casino
I can see it all now.
Even though i don't want to.
2
Fantastic column, as usual. But where was Andrew Johnson on the list? He was also dreadful.
1
No, Ms. Collins; we're not going to need a "presidential" library for Donald Trump. But a very small wing in one of the federal penitentiaries would do very nicely, methinks. If the good burghers in Colorado wouldn't mind if the Trump Library is housed at ADMAX, the Alcatraz of the Rockies. Far away from anywhere.
2
The Trump Presidential Library will be *full* of important historical documents!
Unfortunately, most of them will be in the form of indictments, plea deals, court transcripts, and very probably a Supreme Court decision or two.
466
The Trump Presidential library will not contain Trump's personal and family income tax returns and business records.
2
rumor has it that there are "serious" discussions underway to construct the trump presidential museum in either leith, north dakota or moscow. just a rumor. wouldn't want to confuse a rumor with fact. that just wouldn't be right.
5
Let's wait. As the phrase states, "some have greatness thrust upon them." However, such greatness had better hurry up in Trump's case, as the more likely scenario right now is that he will be forced to resign probably no later than the end of 2018.
By the way, I see no mentions in Gail's article about Warren G. Harding. I thought Harding was right up there in the top 5 worst presidents. Now, if Dick Cheney had become president, or of course Spiro Agnew, there would be a real cluster of the worst.
3
Trump’s presidential library would be a compilation of his snarky tweets.
Fact is, they’d probably need a lot of room.
6
Thank you, Gail. We need a levity break from the horror of the last few weeks.
5
Let's give Donald Trump his due, since he became the worst of the worst in just a little over a year! We may have to create a new scale by the time he is done... Or maybe he will become the best Russian president that there ever was.
5
I would put Trump's museum on a barge in the Hudson. With the hope that it would lose its moorings and drift away.
3
One big plus that Trump has is that he is denigration-proof. I can't think of anything negative that could be said that would be worse than the reality.
3
A survey of "scholars" is hardly a good measure, considering that over 90% of university professors are Democratic Party supporters.
Not exactly a gene pool of neutral observers.
Maybe it's not that the observers are neutral but that they
are really SMART!
2
it's not that most professors are democrats because being a republican is a viable option, rather most highly educated people who write peer reviewed papers believe in science and republicans do not. So how could they be a republican?
2
I’m sure the mindless college dropouts who inhabit FOX would be better.
1
I humbly nominate Moscow for the site of the Trump Presidential Archives. The 22-minute retrospective video, hosted by Steve Doocy, will feature commercial breaks for Trump Wine, Trump Steaks, KFC, and Jacoby and Myers.
4
Dead Presidents. All they are good for are faces on our currency. Most of them were also fumbling, mumbling, bumbling along guys who got stuck with an impossible job. Except for a Kennedy Dollar which I prize still, None were memorable in significant ways. FDR served forever but both Truman and Eisenhower proved it was no great feat.
Today we have an example of the most incompetent and divisive president ever. He will ultimately self-destruct. The game is over for both parties. They need a caretaker president with impeccable manners, pleasant voice, and nearly equally divided House and Senate with enough Independents to make things interesting. Bump stocks - Most congress folk and administration big whigs didn't even know there was such a thing...
1
The Trump vs. Nixon comparison is an interesting one -- a comparative pathology. Nixon was 'way more paranoid than Trump, but not remotely as narcissistic. Nevertheless, Nixon understood far more than Trump, and Trump has certainly managed to tell more lies than Nixon did, although perhaps not ones which are as big. Nixon's most egregious acts were to sabotage LBJ's peace efforts (probably treason), impossibly messing up this country (to say nothing of SE Asia) for decades, as well as to set the country on the track of grossly exacerbating race issues (by being "tough on crime"). We don't entirely know what mischief Trump has gotten up to, personally financially or politically, with Russia yet. On the other hand, he ran an even more crassly racist campaign than Nixon's, and his actions in office have followed that line.
Nixon cared for his own glory, but at least wanted that to come as a result of his accomplishments for the country. But Trump, as far as we can tell, cares infinitely more about himself than anything else.
382
Nixon was far more politically savvy. He had, after all, served as Vice President under Eisenhower, had been in both the House and Senate as well. Like Trump he understood the power of the media in his famous "Checkers Speech." Like Trump as well, he would have his own love-hate relationship with the mainstream media, though not nearly to the degree Trump has had so far.
Nixon was no saint, but he did some useful things like creating the EPA, which Trump now seeks to dismantle. In the end, Nixon became his own worst enemy, though he did receive a good bit of "political rehabilitation" later in life. The worst that happened to Nixon, imho was President Ford's pardon. It effectively put the President above the law, and later presidents from Reagan with Iran-Contra, to George W. Bush and Iraq have only pushed the limits. A bit. Trump is running for a touchdown from his own team's goal line. And he's running a on a clear path.
102
In spite of all his badness, Nixon still recognized China and gave us cleaner water, cleaner air, and Title IX -- all very progressive policies.
2
So right, SC. Also, Nixon, despite his deficiencies, was a statesman who advanced our relations with the USSR and China. While his Watergate crimes were domestic, he had international achievements. Trump is a disaster (and may ultimately be proven a criminal) both domestically and internationally.
5
Well, Mr. Trump has given new meaming to the presidential notion, "The Buck Stops Here." Would be fun to try other presidential slogans on him for size.
"President Nixon. Now, more than ever!"
3
Presidential library? Too little, too late. Will be his head on Mt Rushmore - put up while he's still in office (another 20 years if GOP has it's way). Fully funded by tax dollars (unlike his infrastructure plan).
2
Trump may be rated last of all our presidents, but he is still overrated at that
6
Unfortunately the historians have allowed daily presentation trump the important reality disasters of the the last R president, George W. Bush.
Trump still has the opportunity to top W. by getting us into a war or by his tax cuts bringing on runaway inflation. But absent those, he is more of a liar, crook and boor than W., but not a worse president.
Consider the three legged stool of disasters brought on by W. First he got us into not one but two unnecessary wars. Second, he was the first president since George Washington eliminated torture to bring torture back. And of course there were other hits to our reputation and honor: Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and dark sites. They hurt our standing in the world, arguably, more than the ineptness of Mr. Trump. And for the third leg of the W. stool of damage to America, how about the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Trump may win on worst style, but to date, W. runs away from him on disastrous substance and policy.
3
W was a fool, but not a Russian fool.
2
He and his Republican friends claims that school shootings are the result of mentally ill people getting access to guns. Their solution to this problem is to decrease funding for all government medical programs including mental health.
5
Would the Trump Library be the first to charge for admission? Because you know it's going to charge for admission.
2
It is an established face that trump was the worse candidate and now is the worse president ever in American History.
It is not a time to be coy Gail, write a serious column on how to get this scoundrel to lose his job in 2020, when he is still not in his present moment.
Every single of his behavior proves him to be in oblivion, when he looses his trend of thoughts with his googly eyes and broken speeches.
2
I don't believe Trump will finish his term - not because of impeachment but his Everest sized ego. The pressure will continue to increase and he will resign in a manner that set's himself up to be seen has a hero (in his mind). He can never accept being last in anything. That way a silly asterisk can be placed by his name and it won't be like he should be compared to the rest of the Presidents because of fake news. Of course this is wishful thinking on my part. Then maybe Pence could take over last place as number 46.
1
That final sentence cracked me up!
2
How smug we are today.
Trump has only just completed his first year of office, and the radical left wing Progressives are now ready to compare their heavily biased measure of his administrations performance with completed terms of all other presidents.
Maybe that's a good joke for the lefties.
Laugh on.
In the meantime, Trump and his team will continue to restore balance to the federal courts, elevate federalism to its rightful status over statism, reduce the tax burdens on citizens and businesses, reverse federal government overreach, and eradicate as much of the abuses of the statist-collectivist Progressives as is humanly possible.
29
So, Donald Trump is the real-life embodiment of Howard Roark and John Galt? Figures.
5
Objectivist-
You are being sarcastic, correct?!
8
Please send me some of whatever it is that you are smoking. Sounds like good stuff!
13
Buchanan was reportedly our first and only gay president. Perhaps it's a sign of the growing success of the LGBTQ community that he's moved up a place in chief executive ratings. Perhaps Trump's poor rating reflects bias against straight men who cannot seem to control their sexual impulses. Of course, neither man admitted any deviation from the straight and narrow.
Now I'm confused. I knew we didn't need a presidential library, but now that your editorial has sparked my imagination, I'm torn between our need for a presidential cell phone or a presidential cell!
Actually the "Trump Guillotine" has a ring to it. You do know that Jimmy B. served as Andy Jackson's Minister to Russia. I'm sure some readers are saying, "Borscht" to that.
4
Trump is Nixon without the intelligence, charm or ethics.
7
Please note Queens is part of New York City last I looked although folks from Manhattan often need a reminder.
1
Thank you Gail. Your humor is much needed these days. To end informed and NOT mad, even when there is plenty in the piece to be mad about, is only because of the way you write.
Pssst.. Romney is back. More Seamus please. Can’t wait!
Had to laugh out loud repeatedly! Thanks for that.
Perhaps the idea of putting the Trump Presidential Museum at Trump Tower isn't such a bad idea after all. Nobody would visit except possibly for some parents with young children who wanted to finish coloring the two books shelved there.
Presto! Traffic decongested as soon as the museum is built. Almost as good as putting a parking lot at the Trump Tower site.
1
Wonder where the ego that knows no bounds will pick as a site for his presidential library ? Perhaps we'll have access to those pesky tax returns there .
What Library? It will just be a gift shop.
24
No doubt full of trump ties (and trump vodka and trump steaks?)
1
I hope next time there's an annual rating, historians will take a good hard look at their rehabilitation of George W Bush.
I think they have fallen for what they themselves might refer to as "presentism," looking at the Bush presidency in relation to how horrible the Trump presidency has been. Yes, Trump is bad, but that doesn't make Bush Jr. and his invasion and occupation of Iraq all that much better.
7
George W Bush was the worst Appointed President ever.
Let us not forget the 5 Republican members of the Politicians in Robes Club- a.k.a. the Supreme Court of The United States- big-footed over the Supreme Court of Florida and essentially appointed one of their own President. Funny how the party who pushes the mantra that government closer to the people is best used the Federal Government to bully Florida's government in how they choose their electors. Even Sandra Day O'Connor said it was a mistake.
He then ignored warnings from the outgoing Administration regarding OBL & Company until after 9-11. Then he attacked Iraq- which had exactly no part in the plot that unfolded that day. He pulled troops out of Afghanistan chasing OBL to prepare for the folly of the Neo-Con dream of creating an Ayn Rand type Paradise in Iraq.
His gutted Habeas Corpus, kidnapped people off the streets of allied countries, tortured against US Laws and Treaties, ran torture sites in nations run by Dictators supposedly in the service of defending Democracy.
He pushed through Tax cuts that turned large surpluses into deficits and exploded the national debt. He pushed through a Medicare Drug program that locked in high prices and was not paid for- like his two wars.
Out in the business world, his minions gutted regulatory agencies to allow coal miners to dump toxic "fill" into streams that are the headwaters for large rivers. He let Wall Street run wild until the crash of 2008.
10
In the future every USA town will have a statue of Trump, but not above, but below the ground level. And the citizens will regularly visit it and spit on it.
It will considered a patriotic act.
2
With the remarks he made tonight, I think our current White House occupant is headed for a negative ranking - you know, lower than what's - his - name in 2028.
If I had to sum up in one sentence why Buchanan was last, it would read: He willingly refused to see what was in front of him.
The same goes for Trump.
4
So our America has descended culturally so much that a past president who speaks politely in complete sentences and who practices compassion by expressing appropriate condolences rates higher than other presidents who are considered more rude on a regular basis.
Does this mean that a polite but incompetent president is preferable over a competent president who is routinely rude on the phone or in person? That means the polite, reticent, and gracious but questionably effective Obama was better at his job than the blunt and profane Harry Truman who wrapped up WW II and rebuilt Europe with the Marshall Plan.
It's true that America has grown ruder over the last fifty years but, personally, I became an expatriate fifteen years ago not over rudeness but more over Bush's unnecessary war in Iraq, the lying by his administration to the United Nations and the American people, and the increased affection for guns as a means of settling grievances between citizens!
1
The best way to look at this, Owsley and I decided, after an informal survey, is 'OMG, we could have a double header if they manage to slip Pence in there.' Could Pence pull behind Buchanan? Only the lapse of time would confirm this queasy speculation. Dear Lord don't let the thought spoil my fish fry.
2
I think William Henry Harrison should be listed no worse than third from the top as opposed to third from the bottom. He was too sick to create a lot of problems.
2
Trump will be viewed as the worst. Following him as a close second is George W. Bush. In third place will be St. Ronnie of Reagan who started the process of transferring wealth from the many in the middle class to the few in the 1% through trickle down economics. Trickle down economics is somewhat analogous to what dogs do to trees and fire hydrants.
3
When the inevitable tweet appears as Trump defends himself as perhaps the greatest President ever, I already have my note composed and ready to share:
"I hear you." And, "I feel your pain."
1
And if we needed yet another proof that the current leader of the US is the worst, it happened yesterday: he has to carry a cue-card urging him to empathize with his audience when meeting with parents of children dead in the Valentine's Day massacre and students who will never be the same again after what they experienced on that day.
I'm so in awe of those Parkland survivors and mourners, and so is the entire world. Even the NRA spokesperson was all atremble in front of them at the Town Hall last night! And yet the man in the White House has to be reminded to be nice when he met them.
Every day I wake up thinking things can't get worse, and then they do.
1026
I can guarantee you that Obama carried no cue card with him When he went to Newtown. Every day I wake up wanting to vomit. I am 62 years old. It is in comprehensible to me that a snake oil salesman Was elected President of my country. It is unspeakably sad.
7
I am a believer in giving the devil his due and I did approve of the meeting in the White House with Trump and the survivors. We need to talk and listen. And then I learn he had a cheat sheet so he says the appropriate things. Oh, good Lord!
4
Clearly, T. didn't write the talking points, it looked like a Jr. High kids' writing, probably Hopey or pearl necklace Sarah. And, of course, he had the cuffs of his shirt sleeves embroidered with #45 on them. If anyone thinks that everything isn't about him, they are sorely mistaken. I watched the video of the young man and the Sandy Hook mother, I cried the whole way through. Her son would be the same age as my oldest grandson is now. I can't imagine. I try to be hopeful, but when the Congress doesn't change things after 5-year-olds were shot while hiding in a closet, then how can we believe they will change now? Arming teachers? Really? As Trevor Noah, suggested, let's just have snipers on the schools' roof, barbed wire and a moot.
4
Actually his library will be where the court documents will be stored.
3
Gail,
I believe that President Trump will have one of the most interesting Presidential libraries ever. As another poster noted in these comments, he will be the first president to have a Twitter collection included in his memorabilia. There will be a viewing room in which memorable moments from his presidential speeches will be played in a repeating twelve minute loop. But there will be the "Two Minutes of Hate" auditorium that will play his campaign rallies non-stop. One room will be filled with memoirs written by his current and future staffers. One room will be filled with supportive headlines drawn from the covers of Weekly Tabloids. There will be a room dedicated to Mike Pence, whose admiration for The President ultimately lead to his appointment as a Supreme Court Justice. It remains to be seen whether there will be a special tribute from Mitt Romney prominently posted in the gold plated atrium. And,I expect that his memoir, "The Art of the Feel" will outsell Hillary Clinton's "What Happened."
343
Add speeches to the collection. Include the cue card to sympathize with the Parkland students.
There are plenty of items to put in his "library" that are not books to be read.
This is a wonderful fantasy, Gail, imagining not only is trump out of office but how to fill his museum after he is gone. Gives one hope!
5
We are "stunned," as general Kelly often claims to be, that 2 professors had to conduct a poll to reach this conclusion....
Already determined to be the winner of the losers, can't Dumpf just resign now and give Pence a chance to be rated.
And, by the way, the gilded up-and-down thing will be an escalator, not a staircase
4
I'm not a religious person by nature, but I really hope there's a meditation room built into the library: a place to find serenity.
1
Do not be to sure about that Presidential Library. Stranger things have happened. Most serious journalists did not give Trump a chance to win the Republican Primary, yet he insulted his way to victory. Then the same journalists did not think it was possible Trump would end up in the White House, but he did.
So don't discount the Library.
1
Yes, but what would be in it? Flattering biographies of 45? Fake Time magazine covers? Maybe his notes from yesterday's listening session? "Try to look interested when parents talk about the murder of their children." How about those "45" embroidered cuffs? His doctored golf score crds?
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A better survey would have included Presidential historians, who might be more likely to know about the times and events each President has contended with. Not that I think blotus would fare any better, but history is a different discipline than political science and I believe historians usually produce such rankings. This seems more like a stunt.
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The last two lines...your best in quite a long time. Will have me grinning for most of the day. Thanks!
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