Tuesday, October 6, 2020

The Worst of the Worst

One of the things people, and particularly historians, will discuss for decades — if not longer — is whether Mafia Mulligan is/was the worst president of all time or not. 

Yes, yes, Andrew Jackson, James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Warren Harding. And Woodrow Wilson. We have had some real winners. And by winners, I mean losers, of course.  

John Scalzi just did a short run-through, which is what got me going on this. He omitted Wilson from his list, but I have added him because of how he brought back the Klan and destroyed desegregation in the federal government. Scalzi concluded, unassailably, that no one alive has seen a worse president than Mulligan.

I would argue that Mulligan is the absolute worst even beyond that caveat because, while those others may have been just as bad in many senses, all they could have destroyed was the United States, while Mulligan has the power to destroy the country and our entire habitable biosphere, and he may yet do that, whether in the short term or by setting us up for the long term. None of those 19th century guys or even Harding or Wilson had the power to do that.

If there were a Mount Rushmore for the worst presidents, Mulligan would be on it with these guys. 

Where would it make sense to put such a monument to horribleness and turpitude? 

Somewhere on a landfill, perhaps. Carved into the side of an already desecrated open-pit mine in Montana. Or constructed out of pipes on the largest sewage treatment plant ever created.


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