So for another perspective, maybe a look at the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt would be helpful. Roosevelt, it must be noted, was far from a screw-up. In fact, Roosevelt was certainly clever enough to conceal the extent of a paralytic illness he suffered -- polio -- from the public during his unprecedented four-term presidency.At least for a while anyway.
But while there's no general consensus among historians that neither Roosevelt's waist-down paralysis nor his "wheelchair presidency" wound up diminishing the image of a strong American presidency, we can't gloss over the Fillmore-esque nature of the disgrace he brought to the presidency when he ordered the forced internment of Americans of Japanese heritage after Pearl Harbor was bombed.
So indeed, the American Presidency has endured the sufferings of arguably intellectually unscrupulous presidents like Jackson or Fillmore, sickly ones like Harrison, and at least one who held down the office in a wheelchair.
But has the American Presidency itself -- as an institution -- ever had to endure the kind of lavish disdain for its standing, integrity, prestige, customs and traditions as it has under "president" donald trump?
Who other than trump has been less adept at handling the limitless responsibility that comes with being President of the United States? Who has been more profound in his contempt for its traditions, customs, and norms? Has any "president" managed to besmirch the honor, lower the dignity, abuse the power, and diminish the splendor of the American Presidency in a more blatant, callous, and comprehensive manner than the current occupant of the White House?
At least by the standards established through fairly recent presidential history, the answer would seem to be an emphatic "no."
Or, as they say in Russia; "nyet."
The Gipper
It's no competition. Perhaps the closest would be Ronald Reagan, the sainted "amiable dunce" whose 1980 presidential campaign committed what is today being alleged of the trump campaign -- colluding with a hostile foreign adversary.
In Reagan's case it was Iran, with whom an ultimately successful "October Surprise" conspiracy to influence the 1980 presidential election was plotted and executed. The quid pro quo here was that as president, Reagan would provide Iran weapons and sanctions relief in exchange for freeing 52 Americans taken hostage during the 1979 siege of the U.S. embassy in Tehran.
But only if Iran agreed to wait until after the 1980 presidential election before granting the release. Sure enough, on November 4, 1980 Reagan was elected by landslide, and on the January, 20, 1981 date of his inauguration -- the hostages were released.
But Reagan further upped the ante with Iran later during his presidency. Perhaps emboldened by his presidential campaign's successful foray into the morass of shady geo-political alliances, his next caper involved the covert sale of weapons to Iran. It was part of a plot to raise funds to support the Contras, a Nicaraguan anti-communist militia, and came to be known as the Iran-Contra affair.
But even when considering "The Gipper's" vaguely treasonous abuse of presidential power, it's difficult to point the finger at Reagan or any recent president whose behavior indicated a disdain for the presidency equal to that shown by trump.
Certainly not the impeached philanderer, Bill Clinton -- aka "Slick Willie" -- despite his having launched a bombing campaign against targets in Afghanistan and Sudan to deflect from the disgrace his behavior with Monica Lewinsky brought to the White House.
Not John F. Kennedy -- "The Notorious JFK" -- another wayward-eyed philanderer-in-chief who allowed not just his fairly overt adulterous dalliances, but also his Bay of Pigs fiasco to shame his presidency. Not Kennedy's vice-president, Lyndon Baines Johnson -- aka, "LBJ" -- the conflicted former Texas governor who assumed the presidency following Kennedy's assassination. He later declined to run for a full term after The New York Times' publication of the Pentagon Papers , exposed his lies about the scale of America's involvement in Vietnam.
Not "Poppy" -- George H.W. Bush -- for whom suspicions about his role as vice-president in facilitating the illegal sale of arms to Iran during the Reagan presidency helped sully Bush's own one-term presidency.
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