The least good US president
A poll of polls placed James Buchanan 43rd out of 43 US presidents. According to Tom Geoghegan, for BBC News: Buchanan consistently ranks bottom in lists of
best presidents
.
So that would place him top in lists of worst presidents! Marketing is all about perspective and spin, and we all love winners. Apparently.
Antipathy towards Buchanan stems largely from his failure to prevent the US from sliding into civil war. But a counterargument is that he exercised prudence in not provoking war, because like Lincoln he understood it would be easier to rouse the North to fight if the South started it
.
If that were the case, it might place Buchanan in a similar position to that of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, at least according to the conspiracy theorists.*
Not so bad, really.
* You might need to don your tinfoil hat before reading!