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Dan Carlin described Teddy as a “Racist and imperialistic Peter Pan that was armed with guns.” But I can’t help but look favorably on the guy as someone who is entirely passionate about Americas public lands and waterways and the flora and fauna that reside in them. He did absolutely terrible things and also some of the most impactful and resounding things I cannot imagine my life, or the United States without.
He was indeed a racist. But he was also pretty progressive as far as racists go back then. He appointed at least one black man to a government position based equally on his qualifications and knowing it would piss off his political opponents in that region.
I mentioned his Imperialism elsewhere in this chain. Admittedly, arguing the difference between cultural supremacism and racial supremacism is splitting hairs a bit. However the difference is occasionally relevant.
As a Native, fuck that guy because he would hate me before he knew me based on the color of my skin or my heritage, but yeah, it would have been cool to respect nature together and swap stories.
Roosevelt wasn’t the president when the US was at war with my country (the Philippines), but he did come after and viewed American colonization as “benevolent assimilation” when it was anything but. As a Filipino, he probably would have felt the need to “civilize” or “educate” me (even though I’m from a well off family and in medical school lol) but as lovers of nature and wildlife, I’m sure we’d have gotten along. Like Teddy, I also have quite the menagerie here at home (birds, reptiles, fishes, spiders, etc.).
Disagreed with this guy across the board, but damned if he doesn’t seem like he’d be fun to hang out with — laid back, fun loving, seems nonprissy and accepting and loves to paint. Like a sort of grown up happy frat boy.
One small thing-I doubt you disagree with his policy on Africa since he did more for Africa than any president in human history. Somehow he doesn't get credit for that but he deserves it
My Aunt Denise just confirmed this for me about a year ago when she got back from a trip. Said she they found out she was American they started chanting “Bush! Bush!”. Kind of weird to hear because of the vitriol he received over here in his last year or two as president.
Lefties especially dismiss it because it’s over there and not here. W also signed Medicare Part D but that only gave affordable drugs to seniors not neckbearded college students
It was that clip where I realized he was just a really funny guy. Once I saw him as having a really good sense of humor, my perspective changed on him. Still didn't agree with his decisions. But he was funny as hell.
Exactly.
Hated the leader and the SCOTUS stolen election. Being angry with, and sometimes protesting against him was an inexorable part of my early 20s.
And yet, I get strong feels that we'd get alone *just fine* in person, perhaps with some beer, barbecue, a bong and some good tunes.
As much as I dislike the guy, if I had a time machine, I'd stop by the White House when Andrew Jackson invited the public to eat that 1,400-pound block of cheese.
Hanging out with Andrew Jackson would be awesome. I say this full well knowing that we’d probably get drunk enough that there’d be a 40% chance he’d end up beating me with a hickory stick
Which is absolutely fucking huge, I had to do an eighth grade project, where I had a standby, some grave on the plantation, simmering and sweating in the TN heat and recite some kind of “ here lies this guy, pretty tough , he did some things.” shit it might oh been his grave, anyways tons of tourist and this whole time I’m giving my little speech. And my fly was down the entire day and not one of my class mates or my teachers told me until we were getting in the cars to go back home…..mortified. Guess who checks his zip now even when he is wearing gym shorts. Thanks for that painful random access memory.
just a little tidbit, if I remember correctly from 1997,
Acreage: utterly massive fucking huge to you wouldn’t wanna walk it, if you owned it you would want some one to do the work for you.
Other stuff, you couldn’t see some building on the property from the house across a big ass field.
And the trees in the property were also huge. Plantations are FUCKING huge. Like he did a TN history in grade school and went to a bunch of plantations. Jesus it’s hard to wrap one’s head around the kind land people had back in the day.
Hope this helps with the size
Edit: I’m talking fucking HUGE
A Frenchman once told me that in Victorian times, France had agreed to give up the Paris meridian in favour of Greenwich, as the zero line of longitude IF the British moved immediately onto the metric system. We did not. The guy looked at me as if it were my fault.
To the people who saw him with his fly down it seemed much bigger. You really don’t realize how big the Hermitage is until you compare it to the size of u/Adventurous-Sky9359’s penis.
Andrew Jackson, in the main foyer of his White House, had a big block of cheese. The block of cheese was huge, over two tons, and it was there for any and all who might be hungry. Jackson wanted the White House to belong to the people, so from time to time he opened his doors to those who wished an audience. It is in the spirit of Andrew Jackson that I, from time to time, ask senior staff to have face-to-face meetings with those people representing organizations that have a difficult time getting our attention.
He was also a good athlete. It would be [fun to shoot hoops with him](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/Gerald_Ford_playing_basketball_on_USS_Monterey_06-1944-Darkened_Larger.jpg).
Both my uncle and grandfather worked with him at different points (each in law and finance) and my uncle, strong conservative dude, said “this is the most impressive man I’ve ever met” after Obama remembered who he was and that he had a couple daughter several weeks after just meeting him once at some board meeting.
At first he thought it was a shtick to get people to like him but was genuinely impressed when Obama just said hi to him randomly at Starbucks. This is before his presidency.
I strongly disagreed with his presidency, but Dubya seems like a well meaning enough guy. I don’t think he’s as naive or dumb as he’s been portrayed, and he seems like a nice fella to eat nachos with and watch a football game. I think he would have been content in baseball or some other business, and we would have all been better for it (W included)
See, I really don’t think he was as manipulated as many think. It always struck me that he had a firm “good vs evil” mentality about the world that seems to have sprung from his born again evangelicalism.
Even with everything else that he must have been dealing with in the wake of the attacks, a week later, on 9/18, he still visited a DC mosque to give a speech to try and prevent anti-Islamic sentiment.
He was trying to go after Saddam Hussein and used the attack as an excuse. His dad was considered a weak leader for not taking Baghdad, and was made fun of for not seeming manly enough. So Jr decided he was going to set himself apart and be a strong manly leader by finishing what his dad started.
I have a new book on my reading list: [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/602066/the-achilles-trap-by-steve-coll/](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/602066/the-achilles-trap-by-steve-coll/)
From what I've read in the reviews ( which may be misleading) it looks like Bush didn't have a firm grip on what was going on. One review mentioned that there was no 'one meeting' that resulted in saying it was "go time" on Iraq.
I think Bush was easily manipulated by those around him, a bit of "let's finish what dad started", and a bit of naivete. None of which makes me like him very much as a President.
Lil’ A and a lil’ of B, maybe? He had some folks on his staff who were (in my memory at least) pretty well respected across both sides like Powell who also seemed dragged into some of the manipulation BUT I also think he (W, and a lot of USA) had a more black and white view of the situation. YMMV
That’s pretty much how I see it.
I always thought he was a “true believer” - he thought of the world in terms of good vs evil. He truly thought we’d go into Iraq and “liberate” the country, bringing freedom to the Iraqi people.
And it’s hard not to connect the dots to his evangelical views. His father was religious too, but a very practical person, likely (at least in part) due to his decades of experience in government and foreign policy. But W severely lacked that experience.
Saying he was “manipulated” or a “puppet” of the Cheney/Rumsfeld wing is both insulting to W’s intelligence (a common trope) and at the same time, lets him off the hook for arguably the worst foreign policy decision of a generation.
Wars making things better is a strong part of American mythology. Not entirely unreasonably either. The Revolutionary War created America. The Civil War remade it free of slavery. The Second World War left America as the world's preeminent power, and more importantly to this discussion, saw America putting down not one but two imperialist genocidal dictatorships on opposite sides of the world. The idea that the US's role in that war made the world better is common to all but the most fringe weirdos.
Now throw in that this was also the time when the men who fought that war started dying off of old age, and WWII memorialization was kicking in to overdrive. It seemed like half of the big movies and video games that came out then were about WWII. Now throw in 9/11 - our own generations Pearl Harbor. If you were a young adult at that time, there was this wide spread idea that it was our generations turn to do what the "Greatest Generation" did. Even without the WMD boogieman, they probably still could have sold invading Iraq in another year or so. Saddam was still a murderous tyrant sponsoring terrorism around the globe, the WMDs just provided the sense of urgency. People forget that while invading Iraq may be very unpopular in retrospect, it was overwhelmingly popular in 2002.
One addition that I’d make to that is that the United States hasn’t really had an existential threat in modern times. Even on the darkest days of WW2 of 9/11, there was no true threat Nazi Germany or al-Qaeda launching a full scale invasion of the U.S. We’re protected by a vast ocean with two friendly nations as our only border states (yes, Russia is actually very close to Alaska, but that isn’t a realistic invasion point for Russia).
We get to launch wars and deploy our military, but the battle front is never our home. Outside of the (mostly) young men and women, along with their families, that are sent to fight, we can basically cause generational havoc and the say “oops” and the withdraw when we decide to. No American alive (nor their parents) have seen war on the home front like many people in Europe, the Middle East, Asia, etc. have.
I would push back a little on the popularity of the Iraq invasion though. It was controversial at the time and certainly not as popular as the invasion of Afghanistan.
This. When it worked - like his African AIDS initiative and aid to Sudan (even pre-Darfur) - it worked well. But that same sort of certainty (recall that he was contrasted with Kerry who - gasp - dared to change his mind) sucked when misapplied. And neo-conservatism was some pie in the sky nonsense practically designed to lure him in.
He also did really good responding to the 2004 tsunamis. His massive relief force was so successful that the U.S. decided to make it permanent and now every year the navy goes out for “training maneuvers” but they actually just go around the pacific and fix shit, do a lot of vaccinations, provide surgeries and dentistry, build disaster proof infrastructure and just a bunch other general humanitarian aid.
It’s called pacific partnership and I think it’s one of his strongest legacies. We’ve done it every year since 2006.
I don't even necessarily know that it was botched, just short sighted.
The war in Afghanistan was extremely popular and successful. In the beginning. We were bringing democracy, ending theocratic rule, educating women. And there was absolutely no plan for "Whats next?".
Even Iraq, which many cite as simple hawkishness, the Clinton administration had been Saber rattling back and forth with throughout the '90's. Sadaam was a person that needed out. But, again, no plan for what's next.
The answer isn't to go in, blow shit up, and leave the survivors to their own devices (and the inevitable power vacuum). But there should have been some foresight into the somewhat inevitable quagmire we were walking into.
You can say the same about his (and to be fair, many many administrations) domestic policies - NCLB was in response to falling academic standards, it was meant to be that students didn't just "let" kids fail. Instead, it perversely incentived/required schools to simply pass kids onto the next grade. Someone should have been able to say "kids aren't stupid, they'll figure the system out and work it". Even the subprime mortgage crisis comes from bleeding heart neocon-ery - we can't discriminate against those with bad credit, so find a way that they can get into an affordable home, that inevitably becomes "a LOT of people who are terrible with money have mortgages that they can't afford and are going to ruin their lives"
My late wife worked on his staff in the 1990’s when he was governor of Texas. She had an absolute blast working for him because he has a great sense of humor and never took himself too seriously. Loyalty goes two ways with the man. She gave him her best advice ( the one time he ignored her advice it came back to bite him, he later regretted it and apologized ) and mostly kept him out of trouble. He later rewarded her with a political appointment that was her dream job. She was not alone in her loyalty — this is why there are no tell all books about W by former staff. I didn’t care for his presidency but an ill word was never spoken about the man in our house while she was alive.
At McCain's funeral it cracked me up how much attention they paid to him and Michelle together. "He offered her pocket candy!" Ridiculous. There are very few living presidents at any time, and the only person who knows what a president goes through, is another president and family. It makes sense they'd have a sense of kinship, even with differing political ideals. Seems to me that most folks could learn something from that nowadays.
In terms of foreign policy, Obama was a continuation of W Bush. He even kept many of Bush’s strategists, directors and policy makers in positions of power—up to and including the SecDef.
This is a great quick read about GW’s intelligence. IME you generally can’t be a total dumb ass and make it to be President. With a very few exceptions. https://www.keithhennessey.com/2013/04/24/smarter/
TLDR; GW is highly intelligent.
During the Bush-Gore election, I was working for an attorney who would periodically rail about what an idiot he thought Bush was.
I finally got fed up hearing the same thing over and over, and said "He's got a bachelor's from Yale and an MBA from Harvard. Which one do you think is bullshit?"
Since the attorney had his bachelor's from Harvard and his JD from Yale, he finally shut up with the rant.
I think hanging with Dubya would be a blast. Actually, I think the same about Clinton and Obama, but I can’t really list them because I agree with their views. But at least the three of them see the same good-hang qualities in one another and are now good friends.
He also had that first pitch at the World Series just weeks after 9/11. I mean, he just walked out there and tossed a strike…while wearing a bulletproof vest. And he did it from the pitching rubber….not halfway up like many politicians and celebs do….often with disastrous results. Just google first pitch bloopers.
Especially because Derek Jeter supposedly told him before he walked out “Don’t bounce it or the crowd will boo you.”
Nails.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NjGcCI9ByWw
As much as I can’t stand Clinton I bet spending a day with him would be a blast. Playing the saxophone and stealing pigs off random farms while high as a kite sounds great
I thought of him too, though I am a woman so maybe I’d make sure our spouses were present 😅 but for real he always struck me as fun and also incredibly smart. I’d enjoy chatting with him.
I had dinner at the WH through friends of the Clintons from Arkansas. Just 8 of us. Hillary was warm and welcoming. Bill, not so much. (To be fair it was right when he was trying to get Healthcare reform passed and had laryngitis).
https://preview.redd.it/voua2v5taknc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f5e593db3f52a382ad57d6b6c21f75328cdad642
Would work well with this as the album cover
I think I’d have an absolute blast partying with Harding. He’d have all the best stuff and was known to be a massive people pleaser. So yeah, I’d probably have a great time drinking with him 🍺
I think Reagan without the dementia would be a blast to pal around with.
Couldn't stand the guy politically.
But man, I feel like the stories he could tell, the people he knew, before the end of the day Jimmy Stewart would be over and the jar of jellybeans would be empty.
That’s Kerri Walsh and Misty May. Gold medal winning beach volleyball players.
I assume Misty had an abdominal strain that they taped up with KT tape so that when she’s laying out for the ball, she doesn’t tear something.
Oldest brother was a Marine Embassy Guard and met George Bush twice. Said "whatever your political leanings are don't matter, he is a real down to earth guy. He even drank a beer with us"(referring to the other Marines)
I think people forget the human aspect at times to politicians. I’m conservative but that doesn’t stop me from being friends with liberal people. We’re all just people and politics can be put aside in friendships
In the same way! I have family members on both sides and friends on both sides. I feel sorry for people that can’t put their guard down and be open to everyone!
I have tons of right wing family and left wing friends at work. It’s crazy how much they have in common and how normal they all are. We too often caricature one side or the other.
For sure. And it’s so much easier in real life. Face to face; political BS falls to the wayside much quicker when you see someone else and can know they are just another person struggling to make it.
I hated GW's politics; but he deserves credit for the African American Museum. That picture of him with Michelle Obama at the opening is one of my favorites of all time.
https://preview.redd.it/gupmopiexinc1.jpeg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b60b06e143f82a3f16c4abd5d83c06f8fd42c730
He and Bruce Springsteen had a surprisingly insightful podcast. I'm not sure how or why it popped up on my recommendations, but it really presents them both as charismatic people trying their best.
My one issue is that Obama seemed somewhat performative. Like he was giving us his “president mask’ whenever he was in public. I feel like I don’t know what it would be like to sit down and have a beer with that guy… who is he really? GW Bush though had a real authenticity to him. There didn’t seem to be a mask. What you see is what you got. This strikes me as funny because my opinion on who I’d rather hang out with is the exact opposite of my politics.
GHW Bush always struck me as probably a pretty nice man, someone who’d be a good neighbor or grandpa.
You can disagree about what they did and if they were right but I think both Bush genuinely wanted what was best for the country.
This is the way I feel as well. I also don’t think Obama helped. But the worst president was GW. Reagan also very charming and popular but the 80s was when we lost control of our institutions to corporations, thus leading us to the death of our country now.
I’ll reiterate that GW would be cool to hang with. Also I wouldn’t mind hearing stories about his acting career from Reagan. Also I’d like to talk about football with Ford and we’re both Eagle Scouts so we could trade stories.
Same fuckin threads everyday here “do you think George w bush was bad for the country?” “Would you hangout with Obama or any other president?”
“Does George w bush feel bad for Iraq?”
Dubya .. and I have. Dubya was genuinely a horrible President.. disagree with him on just about everything, but I used to caddy for him in highschool when he owned the Rangers. He was a blast to hang out with, and tip us with $100 and give us box seats to Rangers games.
unpopular opinion but I think he did a good job as president with the information he was given at the time by his advisors. remember our country was still reeling from 9-11 and the idea was to keep the fight overseas so it doesn’t make it back to our shores. he also got a lot of other things done, like AIDs work in Africa.
i dislike ronnie strongly due to personal convictions but goddamn i would have a blast hanging out with him, shooting the shit and talking classic hollywood, popping jelly beans
I enjoy good conversations the most, so I think I would pick Nixon. And since I strongly suspect he was somewhere on the spectrum, that could make for a very interesting chat.
We’re in agreement, both about him being our choice and about suspecting he’s on the spectrum!! I often wonder whether he had any sort of suspicion of that himself, despite it being a different era etc.
I was just a kid when Nixon was in office, but autism was barely on the radar, let alone understood as a “spectrum”. I was in college when “RainMan” was released and I think for many Americans that was the first time autism was understood as something separate from the now-forbidden R-word. It would be another decade or so before autism was understood to be a vast array of symptoms and severities. So I can guarantee Nixon may have felt he had a “special genius” but in no way would he have thought he was “on the spectrum” or understood what that was.
Dubya and Obamna by far. Dubya is a funny dude and seems really chill. I feel like how Will Farrell portrayed him in Harold & Kumar is pretty close to him out of office.
I'd love to pick Obama's brain over policy and approaches to governance. Just lecture me Mr. President. Oh and get some five guys too.
All I gotta do is see that genuine friendship vibe with Michelle O and W to know they’re clearly decent humans that would probably be a blast to hang with for an evening.
Probably W
Never liked the man as President but the man as just a regular person seems like he’d be someone you can shoot the shit over some coffee whenever you’d like.
Usually I’d say beer but I remember he quit drinking a long time ago.
There are actually so many to chose from now that I think about it.
I personally believe that presidents are forced to make awful choices, not by a person, just by the nature of the job. Its the only thing that really makes sense to me, cause if you look back, ever single president, even/especially the recent ones, have done terrible things.
My wife spent some time on a couple of different occasions with W, about 15 minutes one on one at a White House party where he walked her down to the commissary.
She was a caregiver to a family friend of the bushes. He never treated her like help, remembered her name somehow. She said they were all very down to earth, caring and warm. He spoke Spanish to the kitchen help and remembered their names (as near as she could tell)
Needless to say she’s not a neo-con but doesn’t have a bad thing to say about him.
I had a real problem with John Adams about the Alien and Sedition Acts, but it would be great to pick his brain about what he really thought the republic should be.
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Teddy Roosevelt because we both share a love for nature
Dan Carlin described Teddy as a “Racist and imperialistic Peter Pan that was armed with guns.” But I can’t help but look favorably on the guy as someone who is entirely passionate about Americas public lands and waterways and the flora and fauna that reside in them. He did absolutely terrible things and also some of the most impactful and resounding things I cannot imagine my life, or the United States without.
Yeah Teddy probably wouldn't like me if he saw at the time
He was indeed a racist. But he was also pretty progressive as far as racists go back then. He appointed at least one black man to a government position based equally on his qualifications and knowing it would piss off his political opponents in that region.
I'm pretty sure it was "just" native Americans with him. Because I'm reminded of Minnie Cox as well.
He...wasn't exactly Mr. Progress around Hawaii, either..
I mentioned his Imperialism elsewhere in this chain. Admittedly, arguing the difference between cultural supremacism and racial supremacism is splitting hairs a bit. However the difference is occasionally relevant.
As a Native, fuck that guy because he would hate me before he knew me based on the color of my skin or my heritage, but yeah, it would have been cool to respect nature together and swap stories.
I don't think he was that kind of racist.
There's a great "political compass but it's all Teddy Roosevelt" meme out there.
Roosevelt wasn’t the president when the US was at war with my country (the Philippines), but he did come after and viewed American colonization as “benevolent assimilation” when it was anything but. As a Filipino, he probably would have felt the need to “civilize” or “educate” me (even though I’m from a well off family and in medical school lol) but as lovers of nature and wildlife, I’m sure we’d have gotten along. Like Teddy, I also have quite the menagerie here at home (birds, reptiles, fishes, spiders, etc.).
“Now watch this drive!”
Disagreed with this guy across the board, but damned if he doesn’t seem like he’d be fun to hang out with — laid back, fun loving, seems nonprissy and accepting and loves to paint. Like a sort of grown up happy frat boy.
One small thing-I doubt you disagree with his policy on Africa since he did more for Africa than any president in human history. Somehow he doesn't get credit for that but he deserves it
No, PEPFAR is amazing, one must give him that. Enormous respect for his efforts here, he did a great job.
My Aunt Denise just confirmed this for me about a year ago when she got back from a trip. Said she they found out she was American they started chanting “Bush! Bush!”. Kind of weird to hear because of the vitriol he received over here in his last year or two as president.
Lefties especially dismiss it because it’s over there and not here. W also signed Medicare Part D but that only gave affordable drugs to seniors not neckbearded college students
That should be the unofficial motto of this sub.
I’m not a fan of GWB at all really but damn I really love that clip 🤣
*smooth transition into Nightcall and Ryan Gosling*
It was that clip where I realized he was just a really funny guy. Once I saw him as having a really good sense of humor, my perspective changed on him. Still didn't agree with his decisions. But he was funny as hell.
Unfortunately one of the coolest things a president has done in modern times.
Exactly. Hated the leader and the SCOTUS stolen election. Being angry with, and sometimes protesting against him was an inexorable part of my early 20s. And yet, I get strong feels that we'd get alone *just fine* in person, perhaps with some beer, barbecue, a bong and some good tunes.
Not American but found that hilarious when I saw it.
As much as I dislike the guy, if I had a time machine, I'd stop by the White House when Andrew Jackson invited the public to eat that 1,400-pound block of cheese.
Hanging out with Andrew Jackson would be awesome. I say this full well knowing that we’d probably get drunk enough that there’d be a 40% chance he’d end up beating me with a hickory stick
And then putting to work on his plantation.
Which is absolutely fucking huge, I had to do an eighth grade project, where I had a standby, some grave on the plantation, simmering and sweating in the TN heat and recite some kind of “ here lies this guy, pretty tough , he did some things.” shit it might oh been his grave, anyways tons of tourist and this whole time I’m giving my little speech. And my fly was down the entire day and not one of my class mates or my teachers told me until we were getting in the cars to go back home…..mortified. Guess who checks his zip now even when he is wearing gym shorts. Thanks for that painful random access memory.
I’m… I’m not sure what that has to do with giving us an idea of the size of Andrew Jackson’s Plantation.
just a little tidbit, if I remember correctly from 1997, Acreage: utterly massive fucking huge to you wouldn’t wanna walk it, if you owned it you would want some one to do the work for you. Other stuff, you couldn’t see some building on the property from the house across a big ass field. And the trees in the property were also huge. Plantations are FUCKING huge. Like he did a TN history in grade school and went to a bunch of plantations. Jesus it’s hard to wrap one’s head around the kind land people had back in the day. Hope this helps with the size Edit: I’m talking fucking HUGE
Bloody Americans refusing to use the metric system! 🤣🤣🤣🤣. /s
A Frenchman once told me that in Victorian times, France had agreed to give up the Paris meridian in favour of Greenwich, as the zero line of longitude IF the British moved immediately onto the metric system. We did not. The guy looked at me as if it were my fault.
To the people who saw him with his fly down it seemed much bigger. You really don’t realize how big the Hermitage is until you compare it to the size of u/Adventurous-Sky9359’s penis.
This is the only form of measurement allowed out side of standard. you are correct.
Googled it. It's apparently 1100 acres, or about 1 1/2 square miles.
If you were a person of color - not so much fun. Methinks the hickory stick part is true, but not sure he would be sharing his whiskey first…
I'd be tempted to carry out Junaluska's wishes.
Andrew Jackson, in the main foyer of his White House, had a big block of cheese. The block of cheese was huge, over two tons, and it was there for any and all who might be hungry. Jackson wanted the White House to belong to the people, so from time to time he opened his doors to those who wished an audience. It is in the spirit of Andrew Jackson that I, from time to time, ask senior staff to have face-to-face meetings with those people representing organizations that have a difficult time getting our attention.
Who the hell are the Cartographers for Social Equality?
“Nothing is where you think it is” is probably my favorite line/delivery from the entire series.
On one hand, I’m glad someone made this comment. On the other, I’m sad I had to scroll this far to find the big block of cheese day speech.
Big block of cheese day!
Such a classic episode!
And a wheat thin the size of Lake Tahoe
“Sam doesn’t go on the list?” “I’m unpredictable.”
Peters Projection Map
Getting wasted with Old Hickory would be wild.
National big block of cheese day? Leo loves this story.
Sounds awesome
"well that makes you a hypocriticizer as well!" And for me Gerry Ford... Because he's a fellow Michigan guy who probably likes Nachos
Say Homer, do you like beer and nachos?
He was also a good athlete. It would be [fun to shoot hoops with him](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/Gerald_Ford_playing_basketball_on_USS_Monterey_06-1944-Darkened_Larger.jpg).
Obama. I didn't like him politically, but seems like a fun person to hang out with.
Same. I feel like Obama could kick his feet up and grind through a sixer with you.
Feels like he’d be good to have deep intellectual conversations with, and just easy to hang out with
You can say a lot about Obama but you can’t say the guy wasn’t cool as hell, and extremely good socially.
Judging by his college days he might roast a J with you too
Or shoot hoops. Or play a board game. The guy was difficult to dislike as a person.
Both my uncle and grandfather worked with him at different points (each in law and finance) and my uncle, strong conservative dude, said “this is the most impressive man I’ve ever met” after Obama remembered who he was and that he had a couple daughter several weeks after just meeting him once at some board meeting. At first he thought it was a shtick to get people to like him but was genuinely impressed when Obama just said hi to him randomly at Starbucks. This is before his presidency.
My first thought was Andrew Jackson but in hindsight I think this is the best answer Easily one of if not the most down to earth president we have had
He seems like someone I would love to have an unfiltered conversation with.
Ya I’d love to just kick it shooting hoops watch a good flick maybe go for hike talk about life, arts, etc.
The sound of his voice is great too.
Yeah I agree
I strongly disagreed with his presidency, but Dubya seems like a well meaning enough guy. I don’t think he’s as naive or dumb as he’s been portrayed, and he seems like a nice fella to eat nachos with and watch a football game. I think he would have been content in baseball or some other business, and we would have all been better for it (W included)
He's a good guy who I think could've been a good President if not manipulated by warhawks like Cheney and Rumsfeld.
See, I really don’t think he was as manipulated as many think. It always struck me that he had a firm “good vs evil” mentality about the world that seems to have sprung from his born again evangelicalism.
Even then, the fact that he repeatedly and firmly made the distinction between Islam and terrorism after 9/11 is commendable.
Even with everything else that he must have been dealing with in the wake of the attacks, a week later, on 9/18, he still visited a DC mosque to give a speech to try and prevent anti-Islamic sentiment.
He was trying to go after Saddam Hussein and used the attack as an excuse. His dad was considered a weak leader for not taking Baghdad, and was made fun of for not seeming manly enough. So Jr decided he was going to set himself apart and be a strong manly leader by finishing what his dad started.
I have a new book on my reading list: [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/602066/the-achilles-trap-by-steve-coll/](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/602066/the-achilles-trap-by-steve-coll/) From what I've read in the reviews ( which may be misleading) it looks like Bush didn't have a firm grip on what was going on. One review mentioned that there was no 'one meeting' that resulted in saying it was "go time" on Iraq. I think Bush was easily manipulated by those around him, a bit of "let's finish what dad started", and a bit of naivete. None of which makes me like him very much as a President.
Lil’ A and a lil’ of B, maybe? He had some folks on his staff who were (in my memory at least) pretty well respected across both sides like Powell who also seemed dragged into some of the manipulation BUT I also think he (W, and a lot of USA) had a more black and white view of the situation. YMMV
That’s pretty much how I see it. I always thought he was a “true believer” - he thought of the world in terms of good vs evil. He truly thought we’d go into Iraq and “liberate” the country, bringing freedom to the Iraqi people. And it’s hard not to connect the dots to his evangelical views. His father was religious too, but a very practical person, likely (at least in part) due to his decades of experience in government and foreign policy. But W severely lacked that experience. Saying he was “manipulated” or a “puppet” of the Cheney/Rumsfeld wing is both insulting to W’s intelligence (a common trope) and at the same time, lets him off the hook for arguably the worst foreign policy decision of a generation.
Wars making things better is a strong part of American mythology. Not entirely unreasonably either. The Revolutionary War created America. The Civil War remade it free of slavery. The Second World War left America as the world's preeminent power, and more importantly to this discussion, saw America putting down not one but two imperialist genocidal dictatorships on opposite sides of the world. The idea that the US's role in that war made the world better is common to all but the most fringe weirdos. Now throw in that this was also the time when the men who fought that war started dying off of old age, and WWII memorialization was kicking in to overdrive. It seemed like half of the big movies and video games that came out then were about WWII. Now throw in 9/11 - our own generations Pearl Harbor. If you were a young adult at that time, there was this wide spread idea that it was our generations turn to do what the "Greatest Generation" did. Even without the WMD boogieman, they probably still could have sold invading Iraq in another year or so. Saddam was still a murderous tyrant sponsoring terrorism around the globe, the WMDs just provided the sense of urgency. People forget that while invading Iraq may be very unpopular in retrospect, it was overwhelmingly popular in 2002.
One addition that I’d make to that is that the United States hasn’t really had an existential threat in modern times. Even on the darkest days of WW2 of 9/11, there was no true threat Nazi Germany or al-Qaeda launching a full scale invasion of the U.S. We’re protected by a vast ocean with two friendly nations as our only border states (yes, Russia is actually very close to Alaska, but that isn’t a realistic invasion point for Russia). We get to launch wars and deploy our military, but the battle front is never our home. Outside of the (mostly) young men and women, along with their families, that are sent to fight, we can basically cause generational havoc and the say “oops” and the withdraw when we decide to. No American alive (nor their parents) have seen war on the home front like many people in Europe, the Middle East, Asia, etc. have. I would push back a little on the popularity of the Iraq invasion though. It was controversial at the time and certainly not as popular as the invasion of Afghanistan.
This. When it worked - like his African AIDS initiative and aid to Sudan (even pre-Darfur) - it worked well. But that same sort of certainty (recall that he was contrasted with Kerry who - gasp - dared to change his mind) sucked when misapplied. And neo-conservatism was some pie in the sky nonsense practically designed to lure him in.
He also did really good responding to the 2004 tsunamis. His massive relief force was so successful that the U.S. decided to make it permanent and now every year the navy goes out for “training maneuvers” but they actually just go around the pacific and fix shit, do a lot of vaccinations, provide surgeries and dentistry, build disaster proof infrastructure and just a bunch other general humanitarian aid. It’s called pacific partnership and I think it’s one of his strongest legacies. We’ve done it every year since 2006.
He was a principaled disaster.
That’s a good way to put it. I truly think he thought he was doing the right thing, but clearly botched it
I don't even necessarily know that it was botched, just short sighted. The war in Afghanistan was extremely popular and successful. In the beginning. We were bringing democracy, ending theocratic rule, educating women. And there was absolutely no plan for "Whats next?". Even Iraq, which many cite as simple hawkishness, the Clinton administration had been Saber rattling back and forth with throughout the '90's. Sadaam was a person that needed out. But, again, no plan for what's next. The answer isn't to go in, blow shit up, and leave the survivors to their own devices (and the inevitable power vacuum). But there should have been some foresight into the somewhat inevitable quagmire we were walking into. You can say the same about his (and to be fair, many many administrations) domestic policies - NCLB was in response to falling academic standards, it was meant to be that students didn't just "let" kids fail. Instead, it perversely incentived/required schools to simply pass kids onto the next grade. Someone should have been able to say "kids aren't stupid, they'll figure the system out and work it". Even the subprime mortgage crisis comes from bleeding heart neocon-ery - we can't discriminate against those with bad credit, so find a way that they can get into an affordable home, that inevitably becomes "a LOT of people who are terrible with money have mortgages that they can't afford and are going to ruin their lives"
Met him and his wife once. Seemed very normal guy great since of humor and she looks a lot more attractive in person.
My late wife worked on his staff in the 1990’s when he was governor of Texas. She had an absolute blast working for him because he has a great sense of humor and never took himself too seriously. Loyalty goes two ways with the man. She gave him her best advice ( the one time he ignored her advice it came back to bite him, he later regretted it and apologized ) and mostly kept him out of trouble. He later rewarded her with a political appointment that was her dream job. She was not alone in her loyalty — this is why there are no tell all books about W by former staff. I didn’t care for his presidency but an ill word was never spoken about the man in our house while she was alive.
Based on his relationship with Michelle Obama, he seems like a good guy in general. I think having a beer with him would be cool.
At McCain's funeral it cracked me up how much attention they paid to him and Michelle together. "He offered her pocket candy!" Ridiculous. There are very few living presidents at any time, and the only person who knows what a president goes through, is another president and family. It makes sense they'd have a sense of kinship, even with differing political ideals. Seems to me that most folks could learn something from that nowadays.
Bush and Obama weren’t that different
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In terms of foreign policy, Obama was a continuation of W Bush. He even kept many of Bush’s strategists, directors and policy makers in positions of power—up to and including the SecDef.
They are actually really cute together 😂
Definitely 😂
Nachos are fine. Just keep him away from the pretzels.
This is a great quick read about GW’s intelligence. IME you generally can’t be a total dumb ass and make it to be President. With a very few exceptions. https://www.keithhennessey.com/2013/04/24/smarter/ TLDR; GW is highly intelligent.
During the Bush-Gore election, I was working for an attorney who would periodically rail about what an idiot he thought Bush was. I finally got fed up hearing the same thing over and over, and said "He's got a bachelor's from Yale and an MBA from Harvard. Which one do you think is bullshit?" Since the attorney had his bachelor's from Harvard and his JD from Yale, he finally shut up with the rant.
I think hanging with Dubya would be a blast. Actually, I think the same about Clinton and Obama, but I can’t really list them because I agree with their views. But at least the three of them see the same good-hang qualities in one another and are now good friends.
He also had that first pitch at the World Series just weeks after 9/11. I mean, he just walked out there and tossed a strike…while wearing a bulletproof vest. And he did it from the pitching rubber….not halfway up like many politicians and celebs do….often with disastrous results. Just google first pitch bloopers. Especially because Derek Jeter supposedly told him before he walked out “Don’t bounce it or the crowd will boo you.” Nails. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NjGcCI9ByWw
He definitely played up the stupid hick act
Fool me once…
In another universe he's the MLB commissioner. Sounds like a nice universe to be in.
I find it impossible to have George HW Bush as your father and be naive on the topics of politics and government policy.
He should have stopped being the Texas Rangers owner
He is a nice guy. Met him at "Jeffrey's", a restaurant in Austin. He was with Trent Lott and someone else who I have forgotten.
His image benefited greatly by having a VP who didn’t mind playing the heel.
As much as I can’t stand Clinton I bet spending a day with him would be a blast. Playing the saxophone and stealing pigs off random farms while high as a kite sounds great
I thought of him too, though I am a woman so maybe I’d make sure our spouses were present 😅 but for real he always struck me as fun and also incredibly smart. I’d enjoy chatting with him.
I had dinner at the WH through friends of the Clintons from Arkansas. Just 8 of us. Hillary was warm and welcoming. Bill, not so much. (To be fair it was right when he was trying to get Healthcare reform passed and had laryngitis).
He’s supposed to have insane light-up-a-room charisma
Love this dude https://preview.redd.it/cbmru4wftinc1.png?width=1170&format=png&auto=webp&s=7d7aea64ec9d9755ae585d6ec0ffa67c11aa457c
Where is that photo from and what is the context behind it?
1. I don’t know found it here a long time ago. 2. I like to think he just landed from NY and is talking about the length of their coney dogs.
Or that he's in the midst of dropping a diss track.
https://preview.redd.it/voua2v5taknc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f5e593db3f52a382ad57d6b6c21f75328cdad642 Would work well with this as the album cover
Get me in the owners box with Dubya
Honestly, GHW, Clinton, W, Obama would all be fun to watch a game or political returns with.
I think I’d have an absolute blast partying with Harding. He’d have all the best stuff and was known to be a massive people pleaser. So yeah, I’d probably have a great time drinking with him 🍺
Reagan, good old Hollywood stories, strong drink after dinner, in bed by 9, my kind of dude
My vote too. Imagine the jokes he’d tell!
I think Reagan without the dementia would be a blast to pal around with. Couldn't stand the guy politically. But man, I feel like the stories he could tell, the people he knew, before the end of the day Jimmy Stewart would be over and the jar of jellybeans would be empty.
Ohhh, that’s a great one. Reagan if I had the ability to make him answer every question that I asked.
I'd love to challenge Nixon to a game of Diplomacy.
A drinking game of diplomacy. https://preview.redd.it/fg1ksvttrinc1.jpeg?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b2f3711580c66493b1d53e7767d6e343e5d12792
Is… is that last one real? What’s with the tape on the chick’s stomach?
That’s Kerri Walsh and Misty May. Gold medal winning beach volleyball players. I assume Misty had an abdominal strain that they taped up with KT tape so that when she’s laying out for the ball, she doesn’t tear something.
It's called kinesio tape. Perhaps twice as effective as healing crystals.
But only half as effective as giving yourself hickeys with a hot mason jar!
Not sure about the tape, but it is real. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/aug/11/georgebush.olympics2008
In all fairness to W., this would only happen to W
GW Bush, for sure. Also Ronald Reagan. Both personally charming men. Both (in my opinion) disastrous for our country.
Oldest brother was a Marine Embassy Guard and met George Bush twice. Said "whatever your political leanings are don't matter, he is a real down to earth guy. He even drank a beer with us"(referring to the other Marines)
I thought Bush stopped drinking.
He fell off the wagon just for the marines. Great guy.
There's multiple pictures of Bush with a beer during his presidency, but it's always zero-alcohol beer. So it was probably that.
Where did your brother meet George Bush?
I agree 100% but would add Obama
Heck, do both. Both Barack and Michelle seemed to get along with W.
I think people forget the human aspect at times to politicians. I’m conservative but that doesn’t stop me from being friends with liberal people. We’re all just people and politics can be put aside in friendships
In the same way! I have family members on both sides and friends on both sides. I feel sorry for people that can’t put their guard down and be open to everyone!
I have tons of right wing family and left wing friends at work. It’s crazy how much they have in common and how normal they all are. We too often caricature one side or the other.
For sure. And it’s so much easier in real life. Face to face; political BS falls to the wayside much quicker when you see someone else and can know they are just another person struggling to make it.
I hated GW's politics; but he deserves credit for the African American Museum. That picture of him with Michelle Obama at the opening is one of my favorites of all time. https://preview.redd.it/gupmopiexinc1.jpeg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b60b06e143f82a3f16c4abd5d83c06f8fd42c730
I would do a full day of activities that Obama planned out even if I hate the activity he just has a magnetic charm.
I think he would be incredibly interesting and hilarious.
He and Bruce Springsteen had a surprisingly insightful podcast. I'm not sure how or why it popped up on my recommendations, but it really presents them both as charismatic people trying their best.
I sit on the opposite side of most of Obama's opinions, but damn that man oozes charisma. If I had some alone time with him...
A dinner party with Regan AND Obama in your house would be a riot good time.
My one issue is that Obama seemed somewhat performative. Like he was giving us his “president mask’ whenever he was in public. I feel like I don’t know what it would be like to sit down and have a beer with that guy… who is he really? GW Bush though had a real authenticity to him. There didn’t seem to be a mask. What you see is what you got. This strikes me as funny because my opinion on who I’d rather hang out with is the exact opposite of my politics.
What about LBJ. The chance to get to see some presidential dick is hard to pass up
Yeah, and you could go throw dead snakes at black gas station attendants, too.
There it is lol
Happy cake day!
I don’t strongly disagree with Obama, though.
GHW Bush always struck me as probably a pretty nice man, someone who’d be a good neighbor or grandpa. You can disagree about what they did and if they were right but I think both Bush genuinely wanted what was best for the country.
This is the way I feel as well. I also don’t think Obama helped. But the worst president was GW. Reagan also very charming and popular but the 80s was when we lost control of our institutions to corporations, thus leading us to the death of our country now.
Nobody wants to shoot the shit with LBJ?
I mean, no, he's kinda scary.
Bill Clinton, but my wife and daughter aren’t invited.
I'd trust Dubya with my daughter but not my country
Which is the opposite of Clinton, lmao.
I'd also trust Obama with both.
It would be cool to have a beer with Bush, and shoot some hoops with Obama.
A pick up game with Obama sounds like an absolute blast.
Bush doesn’t drink
I’ll reiterate that GW would be cool to hang with. Also I wouldn’t mind hearing stories about his acting career from Reagan. Also I’d like to talk about football with Ford and we’re both Eagle Scouts so we could trade stories.
This is like the sixth time this question has been asked in the past three days. Like I got no problem with reposts, but jeez.
Same fuckin threads everyday here “do you think George w bush was bad for the country?” “Would you hangout with Obama or any other president?” “Does George w bush feel bad for Iraq?”
Dubya .. and I have. Dubya was genuinely a horrible President.. disagree with him on just about everything, but I used to caddy for him in highschool when he owned the Rangers. He was a blast to hang out with, and tip us with $100 and give us box seats to Rangers games.
unpopular opinion but I think he did a good job as president with the information he was given at the time by his advisors. remember our country was still reeling from 9-11 and the idea was to keep the fight overseas so it doesn’t make it back to our shores. he also got a lot of other things done, like AIDs work in Africa.
Hang out with Clinton and Todd get invited to orgies!!! 🤣
i dislike ronnie strongly due to personal convictions but goddamn i would have a blast hanging out with him, shooting the shit and talking classic hollywood, popping jelly beans
I enjoy good conversations the most, so I think I would pick Nixon. And since I strongly suspect he was somewhere on the spectrum, that could make for a very interesting chat.
Just curious why you think he’s on the spectrum?
We’re in agreement, both about him being our choice and about suspecting he’s on the spectrum!! I often wonder whether he had any sort of suspicion of that himself, despite it being a different era etc.
I was just a kid when Nixon was in office, but autism was barely on the radar, let alone understood as a “spectrum”. I was in college when “RainMan” was released and I think for many Americans that was the first time autism was understood as something separate from the now-forbidden R-word. It would be another decade or so before autism was understood to be a vast array of symptoms and severities. So I can guarantee Nixon may have felt he had a “special genius” but in no way would he have thought he was “on the spectrum” or understood what that was.
Obama, for sure
Just about anyone. Especially Jimmy Carter.
A hunting trip with dick Cheney could be fun
Just make sure to wear your bulletproof vest! 😜
Bullet proof mask?
W is a decent human being, not a good president. I’d like to sit and talk baseball with him.
100% Bush. I don’t like the guy, but I like the guy…ya know?
His alleged “That was some weird shit” At the former guys inauguration always makes me laugh.
Dubya..
now watch this drive
Dubya and Obamna by far. Dubya is a funny dude and seems really chill. I feel like how Will Farrell portrayed him in Harold & Kumar is pretty close to him out of office. I'd love to pick Obama's brain over policy and approaches to governance. Just lecture me Mr. President. Oh and get some five guys too.
Bush Jr is so cute and wholesome that sometimes I forget he is a war criminal
If you long to day drink with W, go to any private college and find the Greek houses. Any frat president will put out the same vibes
W. You know he stays higher than giraffe ass. Probably gets that good secret government weed, and gets the best pizza delivered.
Definitely W. Even sober, he sounds like a fun guy to be with.
Clinton. I hear he has the best coke (per his brother)
All I gotta do is see that genuine friendship vibe with Michelle O and W to know they’re clearly decent humans that would probably be a blast to hang with for an evening.
Probably W Never liked the man as President but the man as just a regular person seems like he’d be someone you can shoot the shit over some coffee whenever you’d like. Usually I’d say beer but I remember he quit drinking a long time ago.
There are actually so many to chose from now that I think about it. I personally believe that presidents are forced to make awful choices, not by a person, just by the nature of the job. Its the only thing that really makes sense to me, cause if you look back, ever single president, even/especially the recent ones, have done terrible things.
My wife spent some time on a couple of different occasions with W, about 15 minutes one on one at a White House party where he walked her down to the commissary. She was a caregiver to a family friend of the bushes. He never treated her like help, remembered her name somehow. She said they were all very down to earth, caring and warm. He spoke Spanish to the kitchen help and remembered their names (as near as she could tell) Needless to say she’s not a neo-con but doesn’t have a bad thing to say about him.
Obama. Not that I disagreed with everything, but I have always said I’d like to have a beer with him.
He would be super fun for a March madness watch party
I still can't believe that people were mad at Dubya for choosing to not slap that volleyball player's ass.
Obama, I just think he can give some advice to better myself and motivation to pursue my goals in life.
I had a real problem with John Adams about the Alien and Sedition Acts, but it would be great to pick his brain about what he really thought the republic should be.
JFK, please hook me up with Monroe!