The culture war is fought and lost or won in a million little nooks and crannies in our society. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The collective perception of historical ephemera that tumble-dries together to form “the public consciousness” is one of those collections of crannies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And somewhere in that perception floats the collective dog’s breakfast of ideas and ideals that form the cultural idea of what is and was good, and what isn’t and wasn’t. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
You ask most Americans “who was the worst president in American history”, you will get many answers. Conservatives and progressives may differ – Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush likely trend toward the top for both, respectively. There are some consensus picks; Andrew Johnson, James Buchanan and a few others. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But among the eternal parade of cultural skirmishes that could stand some winning, the left’s rewriting of history re Woodrow Wilson needs to be turned around and pointed back toward history’s lower colon, where it belongs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nA national consensus on hating Wilson is long overdue. It is the patriotic duty of every decent American. While conservatives have particular reasons to detest Wilson, and all his works, and all his empty promises, there is more than enough in his record for moderates, liberals, progressives, libertarians, and socialists to join us in this great and unifying cause.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The roll call of the worst presidents in American history includes some consensus top choices. James Buchanan and Franklin Pierce both contributed mightily to the nation\u2019s slide into the Civil War, and Andrew Johnson did enduring harm to Reconstruction in the war\u2019s aftermath. But all three of those men were repudiated by the end of their single term in office. They left no heirs who would acknowledge their influence, no fleet of academic hagiographers who could see themselves reflected in those presidencies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Wilson, by contrast, served two full and consequential terms. He was the only Democrat re-elected to the job during the century between 1832 and 1936. He was lionized by liberals and progressives in academia and the media for most of the century after he left office in 1921. In my youth, and perhaps yours, Wilson was presented in history books as a tragic hero whom the unthinking American people didn\u2019t deserve. He was often placed highly on academics\u2019 rankings of the presidents. Princeton University named its school of international relations for him. Even in rescinding that honor in June 2020, the university\u2019s press release declared<\/a>: \u201cThough scholars disagree about how to assess Wilson\u2019s tenure as president of the United States, many rank him among the nation\u2019s greatest leaders and credit him with visionary ideas that shaped the world for the better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nah. Wilson was a human pile of flaming trash. He was a bad man who made the country and the world worse. His name should be an obscenity, his image an effigy. Hating him is a wholesome obligation of citizenship<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
Let us count the ways:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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- He institutionalized racism, segregation and eugenics just as America was slowly evolving out of each. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
- He was the father of the modern administrative state – he brought academic contempt for The People to that bureaucracy, where it’s metastasized for a century now. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
- With the income tax administered by that administrative state, he started the roll down the slippery slope from liberty to corporatist servitude. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
- He started the notion of “the living Constiitution”. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
- His “contirbutions” to foreigtj policy did more than most to facilitate the rise of Naziism, Fascism and Communism; his wartime regime was a catastrophe for civil liberties. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
- He was the father of the “imperial presidency” – taking a slim win (41% of the vote, after Roosevelt and Taft split the Republican vote) and acting like it was a mandate.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- And he may have botched the Feds response to the Spanish Flu even worse than Biden and Trump’s Covid campaigns. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n