I find this sort of fascinating. We surveyed 1800 TPM Readers to find out who they thought was the “greatest president” out of the last five Democratic presidents: Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, Clinton and Obama.
Probably not surprisingly the overwhelming choice was Barack Obama at 49%. As I wrote a few days ago, we’re beginning to see the full scope and consequence of Obama’s presidency. And there’s some big advantage of just being the current officeholder with familiarity, intensity of current partisan affiliation and so forth. But what got me was the rest of the field. Here are the numbers.
Obama 49%
Johnson 18%
Kennedy 15%
Clinton 12%
Carter 6%
What really jumps out to me is Clinton at 12%. Clinton is a recent president. His wife is running for president. And, as we saw at the 2012 convention and in so many other ways, he still cuts a massive figure among Democrats. He’s widely seen as a master political strategist (though I think that judgment is overrated) and a master communicator. And yet 12% is pretty feeble for an audience that is made up mostly of Democrats. I’m also a bit surprised that LBJ rates quite as high as he does here. Higher than John Kennedy.
What do you think?
