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The Leaders We Deserved (and a Few We Didn't): Rethinking the Presidential Rating Game | 
 enlarge | Author: Alvin S. Felzenberg
Publisher: Basic Books
Category: Book
List Price: $29.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 18694
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 480
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.7
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.5 x 1.5
ISBN: 0465002919
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.099
EAN: 9780465002917
ASIN: 0465002919
Publication Date: June 9, 2008
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Product Description
It’s a perennial pastime to rate U.S. presidents on an all-time ranking: Certain presidents were “Great,” others were “Near-Great,” and so on down to “Failures” and “Unmitigated Disasters.” (OK, we made that last category up.) But as Alvin Felzenberg points out, there are many flaws with these rating systems. Despite reams of new historical information, the rankings never seem to change very much. They all favor a certain kind of president-those who tended to increase executive power. That aside, the idea of rating presidential performance on a simple linear scale is absurd. The Leaders We Deserved (and a Few We Didn’t) breaks presidential performance into easily understandable categories-character, vision, competence, foreign policy, economic policy, human rights, and legacy-and assesses, for each category, the best and worst. The result is a surprisingly fresh look at how the various presidents stack up against each other, with some of the “greats” coming off far worse than their supposedly mediocre colleagues.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...
 Truth in Ratings September 6, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
In this book Dr. Felzenberg undertakes to rate US presidents by establishing standards in certain areas, such as Character, Vision, National Security and others. We are all familiar with the ratings game played by historians, most of whom are university professors and political liberals. They generally rate presidents without announcing any standards they employ. Their results leave me too often believing that the standards are determined by how liberal or conservative a president has been. By their definition liberal is good and conservative, bad. In other words actual performance in office by a president is less important that how the professor/historian himself votes. Felzenberg does not play that game. I found his reviews instructive and highly interesting. This is an excellent book and I recommend it very highly.
Move Over, Arthur Schlesinger! August 30, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
As Obama and McCain now move to rewrite Presidential history, it is a very good time to receive Al Felzenberg's very good new book that also does. The Leaders We Deserve sets a new and better standard for Presidential ranking surveys. Move over, Arthur Schlesinger!
As a kid in 1962 I remember first seeing Schlesinger's Presidential ranking in the New York Times magazine. It surveyed 75 historians. It was and for some still is the summary snapshot judgment about Presidential governance. It shaped my presidential ranking perception for most of my life. Of course Lincoln was first and Washington second, as in any survey well they should be. FDR, hero of our fathers' generation, was unquestioningly ranked 3rd. "Progressive" Wilson was 4th, "philosophe" Jefferson 5th, and "democratic populist" Jackson 6th. By contrast, "stodgy" Eisenhower was down at 22nd. And "drunkard" Grant was a "failure". The Schlesinger ranking was a historical pronouncement presumed wise and well for a generation of American history students.
When later in life I was unshackled from liberal shibboleths and began to think for myself, I questioned on what basis and by what criteria was Schlesinger's survey made. To my knowledge Schlesinger offered his 75 colleagues no standard or criteria for their choices. How could Hoover, who made such a bust of the calamitous Depression, be rendered a historical gentleman's C in his rank of 19th? How could Grant, the determined yet magnanimous commander in the Civil War and presidential guardian of African Americans rights during the difficult days of Reconstruction, be ranked last, while the traitorous Doeface Buchanan could muddle through at 29th?
Felzenberg offers a objective approach, based on metrics established in six categories: character, vision, competence, economic policy, preserving and extending liberty, and defense, national security and foreign policy. Within each category the presidents receive scores of 1 (low) to 5 (high). Scores of all six categories are added and averaged. In each category Felzenberg ably compares and contrasts various presidents, allowing him to manifest his copious knowledge and comfortable writing style.
In history, as in politics, objective measurement leads to unexpected (inconvenient?) conclusions. Despite his eloquent writings, a temporizing and dissembling Jefferson drops to 14th for his more than mediocre vision and competence as president. Wilson, the priggish absolutist whose rigidity torpedoed the possibility of the League of Nations, and whose righteous but racist personal views tried to keep blacks and women in their place, is downgraded to 14th. The forthright but obscure Coolidge finally receives a fairer assessment, rising from 27th to 12th. Grant finally ascends from presidential ranking hell to take a place he more deserves at 7th. Eisenhower, wiser now than then we knew, rises to 5th. And the criminally racist Jackson, cruel perpetrator of the Trail of Tears upon Native Americans, the worst ethnic cleansing committed in North America, is rightly banished to the lower half at 27th (and should be removed from the $20 bill!)
No such ambitious work can cover all the possible ground. More detail about Polk, for instance, whom Schlesinger ranks 10th but Felzenberg demotes to 20th (and ranks among the worst in character) would have been interesting. A few unedited misspellings also distract just a little from the smooth read. And could the title have been sharpened to something more punchy and particular? (Hard to say: my own lame supposition of something like "Presidential Promise Realized and Refuted" reminds me how difficult a titling task can be.) But these are mere triflings.
On an important presidential subject in this important presidential year, Felzenberg delivers. As an excellent study of the history and caliber of Presidents, and especially in its offering of an objective metrics-based framework for measuring them, Felzenberg's book should be assigned in all high school American history classes. Responsible citizens should also take it up. After his detailed analysis and enlightening assessments, Felzenberg offers a guide for what to seek and to avoid in presidents. As now we progress these next two months to one of America's most historic elections, Al Felzenberg's The Leaders We Deserve can help ensure that we chose even more wisely--and thus realize what his fine book reports and recommends.
Fresh, unconvential take on presidential ratings August 19, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Reviews criticizing this book for its supposed conservative bias are off target. (For example, Lyndon Johnson, generally a conservative bete-noire, comes in for great praise for his role in civil rights.) Anyone who's read the book will know that its most original contribution is assigning credit and blame, where appropriate, to lesser-known presidents whose actions had an important impact on economic history, civil rights, etc. For example, the discussions of the civil rights accomplishments of oft-neglected presidents like Grant and Coolidge, or of the various failings of an oft-praised president like Madison, add much new to our generally facile understanding of these presidents.
Of course, many readers may disagree with the author's characterizations of Reagan, which are probably the most controversial element of the book, but the sections on Reagan are neither hagiography nor polemic; they present facts in a measured fashion, and readers are free to interpret them differently than the author does. That does not detract from the overall value of this excellent and thorougly-researched book for readers of all political stripes.
Finally, readers interested in US economic history will find this book a fascinating review of economic policy, especially the monetary system, from the early republic through the modern era of the Federal Reserve system.
This book is highly recommended for readers of all political backgrounds. Though they may disagree with a few of the conclusions, the author's scholarship is undeniable, and Democratic-leaning readers interested in civil rights will find the book's discussion of those issues especially interesting.
A Fun and Very Informative Book August 18, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Admittedly biased by a personal friendship with the author, I still found this book to be not only Dr. Felzenberg's best work to date, but for a political historian, refreshingly balanced, insightful, and a easy to read.
This is book is ideal for the political junkie and amateur history who tires easily with heavy tomes more focused on often insignificant historical facts instead of interpretation and analysis. While I'm sure I do not agree with all of Dr. Felzenberg's rating (I thought he was a little harsh on Richard Nixon, and was too kind to Mr. Manifest Destiny, James K. Polk, the only President who really lied to start a war), he has successfully established a new benchmark for rating Presidents as objectively as humanly possible.
His greatest service, however, may be exposing the heavy biases of respected historians such as Dr. Arthur Slezinger, who clearly rated President by how they matched up against his liberal idealogy of bigger and more intrusive government. No liberal, Dr. Felzenberg nonetheless made an obvious attempt at fairness and balance in his ratings. I suspect such biased readers and historians will chafe at his high rating of Ronald Reagan and others, but I defy them to find flaws in his presentation.
I strongly recommend this book to: political junkies; anyone who is interested in the history of the Presidency; and high school and college teachers looking to orient their pupils on the presidency. I especially recommend it to journalists, who by and large are ignorant of history and can't handle book above an 8th grade level (much less digest it). It was a terrific and fascinating read.
Proudly conservative take on ratings game August 11, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I noticed that most of the negative reviews of this book seem to come from liberals. Well you have a right to your opinion -- and by God! I have a right to mine.
The presidential ratings game the Schlesingers started is so slanted toward the left as to be virtually worthless. It seems that the surest way of getting a high rating is to participate in yet another expansion of federal power.
After all, historians are biased in favor of presidents who did something they can write about. Advocates of federal restraint, like Cleveland and Coolidge, make dull copy.
Let's face it -- the presidential ratings game is just that. It's less factual than the sportswriters' votes for the college football championship.
Felzenberg introduces a measure of discipline by breaking the ratings into six classifications, weighted equally for the overall score.
Liberals should be able to take comfort from the high rankings awarded to Truman and FDR, the latter despite a fairly tough critique of the New Deal. The author is, if anything, even more tough on Hoover, noting that many policies we associate with the New Deal started with the Republicans.
The difference here is that at least some in the GOP, as embodied by Ronaldus Magnus, learned that the best thing the government can do in an economic downturn is let the market work itself out. The Democrats, on the other hand, evidently learned nothing, and still view the New Deal as a public policy triumph, when in fact it prolonged the Great Depression.
The only other long depression in American history followed Andrew Jackson's demolition of the national bank. Is there a pattern here?
As an unapologetic conservative, I'm a little disappointed that my all-time favorite Democrat, Grover Cleveland, didn't score higher.
Actually, Felzenberg is fairly open to big-government policies, as witnessed by his ranking of Theodore Roosevelt third behind Lincoln and Washington. I don't believe that anyone had coined the phrase "big government conservative" during TR's lifetime, but it fits like a glove.
Much as I admire TR for his undoubted patriotism and colorful personality, the really outstanding president of that era was the martyred William McKinley, who inherited the mantle of limited government from Grover Cleveland.
Of course, it's all a game, and this book was written to provoke debates. Felzenberg does a vastly better job defending his ratings than any other historian I've read who attempted the same task.
I don't have to agree -- just indulge me by arguing from facts and logic instead of slogans and fear, which is all the left has been offering for decades.
I'm recommending this book to all my conservative friends. In fact, on the phone the other day, my friend and I were wracking our brains for the absolute worst president in American history.
We both blurted out simulataneously: "Woodrow Wilson!"
Actually Felzenberg gives the booby prize to James Buchanan for having allowed the War Between the States to happen.
The way I figure it, Buchanan was a weakling, but slavery was such a poisonous issue that something had to break.
Wilson -- the beau ideal of the sanctimonious Puritan reformer -- dragged the nation into a European war we had no business in. After victory in 1918, Wilson ensured we would lose the peace by insisting on the breakup of the Hapsburg Empire. Supposedly, this was to be done along ethnic lines, but the reality is that the Hapsburg successor states were nearly as polyglot as the "ramshackle empire" itself. The resulting power vacuum left Central Europe and the Balkans ripe for devastation by fascism, Nazism, and communism.
Good going, Mr. President!
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