The following was written for Z Magazine and ZNet. Commentaries such as this one are a premium sent to Sustainer Donors of Z/ZNet. To learn more about the project, please consult http://www.zmag.org

Will Pudd’nhead Be the Dumbest,
The Most Dangerous
U.S. President Ever?

By Doug Dowd

It’ll be a horse race, given some of the competition noted below. (You may have your own candidates for rottenness; be my guest.) But, stuck as we are with this spoiled brat, we can take some perverse satisfaction in recognizing that many of his predecessors have also been dumb and/or dangerous—even rotten to the core, some of them.

Take Andy Jackson, for starters. If he had gained his greatness in today’s world, at least when it’s on its best behavior, he would be high on the list for a crimes against humanity trial, right up there with Milosevic and Pinochet. Like not a few other of our great leaders (up to and including Ike), Jackson came to prominence as a “successful” general; however, as Howard Zinn points out (in his People’s History of the United States, which most of you have read; if you haven’t, do so now, and get your head screwed on straight on U.S. history): “If you look through high school textbooks in American history you will find Jackson the frontiersman, soldier, democrat, man of the people—not Jackson the slaveholder, land speculator, executioner of dissident soldiers, exterminator of Indians.”

Jackson was elected President in 1828; his prominence and power extended from the 1820s through the 1840s. Both before and during his presidency, he was active in “Indian removal.” The processes were nasty and brutish, but not short; unknown tens of thousands of Native American men, women and children were wounded, raped and/or killed; and all were forcibly moved from their ancient lands and located in The Great American Desert—a fate which, extending as it has up to the present, can be thought of as a variation on the modern concentration camp. Jackson participated as an army general in the beginnings of that policy; when he became President he presided over it and worsened its means and ends.

He was not dumb; just vicious. Despite (because of?) all that and more, he was elevated to the status of a national hero—for example, in the book The Age of Jackson (by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., 1945, for which he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. Zinn, who—unlike Schlesinger, Jr.—deserves it, is not, I believe, holding his breath awaiting the telegram).

As for dummies, how about McKinley, Harding, Coolidge, and Ford (that’s not Henry, but Gerald, of whom LBJ famously said, “He can’t cross the street and chew gum at the same time.” And there were Truman and Reagan, dumb or not, the two most dangerous and destructive of all. Try not to throw up.

McKinley was inaugurated in 1897 and assassinated by an anarchist in Sept. 1901. (I had a professor at Berkeley in 1947 who told us that his—anarchist—family celebrated that event every September. Shame!) In his tenure as President, the USA—having exercised its self-styled “manifest destiny” so as to occupy the entirety of what became the continental USA (and lest its weaponry rust from disuse)—declared war against Spain and began its expansion into the Caribbean, Central America, and the Far Pacific (most bloodily the Philippines). The lines I am going to quote could be those of a canny war criminal rather than of a dummy; but for the several hundred thousand Filipinos who died under U.S. bayonets and guns, it made no difference at all. And this is (some of) what McKinley said to a group of ministers:

“The truth is I didn’t want the Philippines, and when they came to us as a gift from the gods [!!], I did not know what to do with them....I walked the floor of the White House night after night until midnight; and prayed Almighty God for light and guidance more than one night...and then one night late it came to me this way—we could not give them back to Spain...we could not turn them over to France or Germany, our commercial rivals in the Orient—that would be bad business and discreditable...we could not leave them to themselves—they were unfit for self-government....there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them....And then I went to bed and went to sleep and slept soundly.” (quoted in Zinn)

And speaking of “education,” at one point McK stated “I don’t know for sure where those islands are...maybe 2,000 miles away?” (They are in fact about 10,000 miles from D.C. Shouldn’t there be a law that you have to know where people are before you order some 300,000+ of them to be slaughtered?)

As for Harding and Coolidge...Harding was elected in 1920, a GOP backlash against Wilson (who was hated as much as Clinton came to be, if on different bases). Harding was from Ohio, a hard-drinking (during Prohibition, yet) womanizer—neither the first nor the last of that ilk to occupy the White House. He was also known for his mental laziness and being prone to being easily corrupted both in Ohio or D.C., most famously for Teapot Dome oil reserves (1922 et seq.), in which he was up to his tummy. His career, never threatening to become distinguished, ended abruptly and scandalously in a room in the Palace Hotel, in San Francisco (1923), ending what appeared to be a hot time on the old town. His VP was Calvin Coolidge. “Silent Cal,” as he was justly called, had gotten in the political spotlight by breaking a Boston police strike (1919). His only utterance of note, more in the nature of a hymn than a thought, was “The Business of America is Business.” When Dorothy Parker (a justly-loved wit of the 1920s) was informed he had died, she asked “How did they know?” Several decades after his death, his widow, in an interview for The New Yorker, was asked what life was like with Silent Cal: “Boring,” she said.

We left Gerald Ford trying to coordinate his gum chewing with his street crossing. There is little more that needs saying, except that he came before the public eye in Michigan not for military but for football accomplishments (he was a linebacker). He did seem to be dumb in his public statements; that did not keep him from being shrewd: after all, he went from VP to Prez by promising Nixon a pardon (which he granted). That cost him nothing but a quick swipe of the pen, some hard breathing, and a little gossip. But, he was heard to say, “Nobody’s perfect.” (It has not been ascertained whether he was referring to Nixon or himself.)

And then we come to Truman and Reagan, who, in my judgment, have been the most dangerous and destructive of all presidents—if also widely popular (even in comparison with FDR), Reagan undoubtedly the most popular president ever. And as I will argue, the worst. What that tells us about the people of our country is another matter. First Truman.

You have to be pretty old to know the path that took Harry Truman from running a haberdashery shop in Independence, Missouri, to being Prez. Sitting in the middle of that path was probably one of the two or three most powerful city political machines in the nation: Prendergast, of St. Louis, Miissouri. Such machines are always looking for electable—and controllable—candidates, and they found one in Harry S Truman. He was not exactly a war hero, but he had been in France for WWI, in charge of an artillery outfit. (You can do a lot of damage to others with artillery, but in 1918 seldom could others do damage to you, unless you were in retreat, and Harry got there when the Germans were on the run.) So he was placed (formally “elected”) in the House and then the Senate, and there he was in 1944, when FDR was going to run for a third term. His VP had been Henry Wallace, formerly Secy. of Agriculture and, I may say, one of the few distinctly well-informed and decent people who have ever had that job. He was the natural for FDR’s third term: personable, popular, competent. He also happened to be distinctly liberal; and the Southern Demos would have nothing to do with him. Diddle dee, diddle doo, and a compromise was made that would soothe both North and South: Harry Truman. Everyone knew about FDR’s heath, that he was on his way out, physically. (He died four months after his inauguration in 1945).

So Harry became Prez in May 1945. And he immediately fell under the sway of the military bigwigs (for whose manifold wishes he maintained a lasting subservience) and the crew that was shaping up as the Cold War Brigade. Thus he OK’d atomic bombs on Japan, instead of taking the peace they were offering (his sticking point, he said, was that Hirohito had to get off the throne; we bombed, and, uh, signed the peace and, uh, Hirohito stayed on the throne. Shoulda kept dropping them bombs!). Hiroshima was in fact the first salvo of the Cold War. Truman needed no persuading to become part of its front line, nor was he against McCarthyism, until—or even after—McCarthy went after him and his Secy. of State, Dean Acheson. (Imagine a Wall Streeter from tip to toe, accused of being a Communist! Truman couldn’t.)

Apart from a bit of self-defense here, Harry was just as anti-Communist as the next guy—in fact, more so than the next guy. Sure he did a coupla good things; just as sure he did a lot of bad ones. More than anything else, his role—as head of the Democrats—in cooperating with McCarthyism—never understanding that McCarthyism has no limits to it, that, as the Protestant minister in Germany put it, they come for the Jews today, they come for us tomorrow (or words to that effect). Not that it would have been okay if it had had some limits to it. What must be understood, must be, is that as MicCarthyism cleansed the unions, politics, the universities, and the entertainment world of those anywhere left of center—and it did that, almost totally.

It was at the same time going to prevent future generations of workers, politicians, teachers and “entertainers” (which includes writers, inter alia) from being seen or heard, making it possible, for the same reasons, for conservative and right-wing nitwits to take their place. And the result: an open door to, among other things, Reaganism. To which we now turn, but only briefly: when there’s a stinking pig in the room, you don’t have discuss it.

And Reagan stank. He changed our world, and we have to work like stink to even get back to where we were in the ‘70s, which was a long way from Paradiso. Reagan was, as I see him, a very smart dummy. He was as ignorant as a potato about the world, but that didn’t keep him—in fact it helped him—to take strong positions on almost everything: once he was told what to do. And he was told what to do, and how to do it. Read Garry Wills’s Reagan’s America to find out just what I mean here by “coached”: he was given his lines, and even a third-rate actor (and he was better than that—he was second-rate, I’ll give him that) can do the lines given a little time and help. Reagan was groomed; and, given his natural ability to soften up a crowd, he did real good. He went from being a New Dealer to being a right-winger without even knowing he was even shifting gears. Why? Because it paid off, that’s why—from crappy Hollywood films to crappy policies for California, to crappy policies for the USA; tomorrow (which came and went while he sat in the White House) the world.

And now, whether they are conscious of it or not, a very large majority of our politicians at the local, state and national levels are Reaganites in action, if not in their own (’scuse me) self-image. The Cold War and empty-headedness that Truman so skillfully (whether consciously or not) brought into being, and that was carried on toward deepening and expansion by Ike and Kennedy and LBJ, was brought to perfection by Reagan: the very most popular Prez in our history, could’ve gotten a third term without taking a breath if the GOP, trying to stop FDR from #4, hadn’t already set the limit to two. That GOP, no sense of history or of the future.

Back to the Brat. No, he’ll have be satisfied with being Number 2 or 3, for destructive and dangerous—although, who knows? Maybe Pudd’nhead will be able to preside over WWIII? Anyhow. Whatever else nasty one can say about those discussed above (and most other presidents), they had to do something to get on and up the ladder to the White House. Not Pudd’nhead. He just had to be born to his Daddy and Mommy, whose silver-spooned mouth he was repeating. George Sr., quondam President himself, was the spawn of a rich and politically influential Connecticut family (Sen. Prescott Bush). As soon as he could, he transplanted himself to the less demanding squats of Texas. Like Puddn’head after him, he was a Yalie; and being a Yalie then and now might mean 1) you had done well in high school, 2) you were a good athlete, or 3) your Daddy or Grandpa had been there before you, 4) you were loaded, and 5) that upon graduation you’d be invited to join the CIA. Daddy didn’t join it right away, but he was invited to be the Chief of it (that’s the Bush way); and that’s what made him Your Veepness.

Like Joe McCarthy, Daddy got to be known as a war hero; like Joe, he didn’t deserve it. Oh, he flew a plane (and Joe, though not in an air crew, got to go up once in a while); trouble is, one day in the Pacific when he was flying one, it was disabled by enemy fire and wasn’t going to make it. Daddy had a crew of two others. The pilot of a plane, like the captain of a ship, is supposed to see to it that his crew gets out before he does so himself. Daddy bailed out; his two crew members went down in flames. (That has been documented; and was during the election of ’92, but somehow never got to be known. Mystery.) Pudd’nhead avoided that kind of embarrassment by avoiding combat, with the help of—Providence?

Pudd’nhead, like his Daddy, got into Yale because Gramps Bush (Prescott) had been there and was, to boot, rich and a Senator. Now that’s affirmative action! Puddn’head hadn’t done any studying at Andover, and he did even less at Yale. With a life like that, a guy gets habituated to just taking it easy and letting the good times roll. And why not? Why not say, sure, if you want to give me that oil stock at bargain prices, why not? And why not buy into a baseball club if you have the money and you know you’re gonna get Austin taxpayers to foot the bill(s). And when someone says, we wanna get rid of that Ann Richards, and you can be governor. Why not? And step by step, before you know it, he’s running (or walking) for Prez. And, one way and another, he won. He’s our Prez now.

There he is, the spittin’ image of the classic fraternity boy: crocodile smile, lizard eyes, ignorant as a turtle, and so accustomed to being dishonest about everything that he wouldn’t know the truth if it came up and peed in his eye. But it doesn’t matter his enthusiastic or reluctant supporters say; he’s good at uniting us, he’s picking a “good team” that isn’t dumb, and–

What about the team he is said to be picking (but, like everything else, is having some “team” do the picking for him: that was part of the deal, wasn’t it, Daddy?). First, General Colin Powell, Secretary of State. He is noted most for the positions he took in the Gulf War: Don’t go in unless you’re going in with massive—in effect, unbeatable—force. That can mean many things; it has come to mean one of two: 1) nukes, or 2) an air war combining carpet bombing plus guided missiles. Both of those things also mean very few U.S. casualties plus very many civilian casualties—also known as collateral damage. Powell has expressed serious misgivings about the Viet Nam war, in which he served two tours. He seems to be admired for having said in his memoir that he went to Viet Nam (in 1962) “standing on principle and convictions...and watched the foundations eroded by euphemisms, lies and self-deception.” Indeed. What “foundations and principles” could have justified that war, even without the “euphemisms, lies and self-deception”? Or has it not occurred to Powell that the euphemisms, circumlocutions, blatant lies, etc., were essential to fight such a war, because it had no acceptable foundations or principles.

And had he been in charge in Viet Nam, would he then have done what he did for the Gulf War—used the massive weaponry at our disposal, rather than allow the war to drag on to defeat? Well, we used very massive weaponry (and effective enough to kill 3 million people); that leaves only nukes, General Powell. I am afraid that such a pleasant man with such frightening ideas scares me more than a little.

And then there is the national security adviser (Kissinger’s old post): Condoleeza Rice. You will be startled (or tickled) to learn that I once debated her, at Stanford (in the mid-80s, I think it was). She was an Assistant Professor of something. They don’t come any brighter; and I wouldn’t want to meet anyone more aggressive. I think we were debating about foreign policy and Reagan, etc. I can’t say I won; I’m not sure anyone could, against her. (Well, maybe Chomsky.) She is energetic, intelligent as they get, and dangerous. She has Cold War genes. And the Cold War gene is not just, or even mostly, one that has to do with meeting threats from abroad (nor was it when it the Cold War started, no later than 1945). The Cold War has always meant the narrowing of options for all nations and all people in the USA, constricted to the point where the most powerful elements of the status quo—not least but not only its giant corporations—will be able to maintain a status quo that is theirs, will have access to whatever they want at home and abroad, and that any misgivings will be trumped before they are announced, which was, of course, the job of McCarthyism. And did it work? Do dogs have fleas? Ms. Rice and others like her—the Legion family—think that what they’re for and what they’re against is, with or without just these words, the will of God, all else is heresy. Pudd’nhead has neither the inclination nor the ability to doubt that.

In a nutshell, Puddn’head’s two major advisors are dangerous as hell; they’d be dangerous even if he were smart. But he’s dumb. His, shall we say, untrained incapacity wouldn’t matter in a world which, though riled by serious disturbances here and there, was capable of dealing with those problems without threatening the stability of the rest of the world or massive disaster. Ireland, whatever its tragedies, is an instance of that kind of a world; the Middle East is not; nor is it likely that the area comprising Russia (and previous dominions), India, and China will long remain, so to speak, non-explosive. And there are nukes in those places.

And then there is the U.S. economy, and the world economy for whom it is the consumer of last resort. Have you noticed that, just in the past six months the opinion makers have gone from opining that a) it seems possible that we can go on indefinitely without a recession, to b) it seems possible that the recession now on its way can be managed to have a “soft landing,” to, c) (December 2000) it is becoming a possibility that there will be a serious recession, because of all that excess capacity, all that debt, all those oncoming surprises.

So here we are. We have P. in the White House, a divided Congress, a Congress whose members have mostly become “adults” (I use the word loosely) in the past 30 years in which conservative economic policies have come to be accepted unquestioningly. When there is a serious recession—or worse—we’ll need some serious understanding of what’s happening and what to do about it. But we’re back in the ’20s so far as economic thought is concerned.

So, I now answer my question about Pudd’nhead: he may or may not be the dumbest, but in the times in which we live and that are edging toward us over the horizon, we’d be in trouble with the best and the brightest and most decent prez we’ve ever had, whoever that might have been...

FDR you say? For three years after his election, FDR sometimes merely followed the same policies as Hoover—and sometimes gave us even worse ones. It was only after 1935, prodded by Harry Hopkins and Eleanor and what there was of organized labor, that the “Second New Deal” took hold.

LBJ, you say? OK, he was pretty good on domestic policy, but he was responding to pressures from an increasingly vigorous liberal-left movement—and even so was too weak to pull us out of Viet Nam.

Who else?

So, Bush, Schmush; it’s always been up to us, it is now. And time is short.

Jan. 6, 2000