KaiBear said:
whiterock said:
KaiBear said:
Oldbear83 said:
KaiBear said:
Bestweekeverr said:
KaiBear said:
Bestweekeverr said:
KaiBear said:
FLBear5630 said:
KaiBear said:
boognish_bear said:
Grant, an often overlooked American who served and led when needed. Never gets credit he deserves.
George Washington
Theodore Roosevelt
Steven Jobs
Albert Einstein
You can't be serious.
Grant was a butcher.....lost men to Lee at almost a 3-1 ratio. Grant simply had a many more men to begin with and understood the math.
This is lost cause nonsense. The Union was fighting a mostly offensive war, of course they were going to lose more men. Lee/the confederacy lost every offensive campaign they tried to muster. Grant was the best general in the Civil War and if he was put in charge at the beginning the war would have been won much sooner. Lee was the better tactician, but Grant was the better strategist. Tactics wins battles, but strategy wins war.
Grant's presidency is looked at more favorably now than it typically has been. He pushed for the ratification of the 15th amendment, created the first national park at Yellowstone, and actively tried to dismantle the KKK.
His worst trait was that he was too trusting, which led to the corruption that most historians agreed he had no involvement in.
Grant's army outnumbered Lee approx 3-1 and by this time the South was barely able to feed or otherwise supply Lee's troops.
Students are taught about Picket's hopeless charge at Gettysburg.....but weeks after that battle Grant did one even worse at COLD HARBOR. A battle were Grant repeatedly sent his men in suicidial charges against Lee's entrenched army on higher ground. Confederates inflicted over 15,000 casualties on Grant's troops in less than 48 hours.
The north was outraged over the slaughter....even Lincoln's wife openly referred to Grant as a 'butcher'.
Always been amusing to me how the entertainment industry never made a movie about COLD HARBOR.
Grant failed in every business he attemped prior to the Civil War.
He accepted significant financial 'arrangments' as president....only to loss all the money in bad investments.
Would have died broke had he not mustered the strength to endure his cancer ( Grant was a habitual cigar smoker ) and finish his autobiography. Grant died onlt a few days after its completion.
Pickett's charge is taught because it was the turning point in one of the most important battles in the Civil War. Cold Harbor isn't taught because it was Lee's last victory, and it did not have a significant impact on the war. Although the Union lost more men in total in the overland campaign, Lee lost more men relative to his total number. Wouldn't that make Lee the butcher?
Mary Todd didn't like anyone very much and no one liked her. I don't blame her too much given what she went through, but she no military expert so I don't know why I would value her military opinion.
I don't understand your point with the rest... Grant was a bad person because he didn't have an acumen for business?? He was a bad person because he died poor?
You say he fought through a painful cancer to finish his Memoirs so that his family would be taken care of... I think most people would find that extremely admirable.
It most certainly was admirable. However he was a mediocre officer in the Mexican American War....and resigned his commission. Failed in business both before and after the civil war. The guy drank far too much and was not particularly bright.
Grant makes the bottom 5 list of US presidents consistently for valid reasons.
I'm curious. What criteria do you use in grading Presidents?
Accomplishments vs lack of accomplishments or acts destructive to the American people.
Most accomplished
Washington
Polk
T. Roosevelt
F. Roosevelt
Reagan
Most destructive
Biden
Wilson
LBJ
Obama
Nixon
Trump belongs in the "most accomplished" category. Depending on how the last 3 years go (and specifically whether he will be able to get Vance/Rubio elected), he might push FDR for top of the list. So many things....transforming us from a consumer economy to a production economy......conducting the next census, which will move the Electoral College into structurally red territory...cementing a generation conservative SCOTUS judges.
No POTUS in my lifetime has worked to implement the platform with such urgent resolve. He has not an ounce of the Bushie notion that we cannot push too hard for fear of losing the next election. He understands that we elections will be lost, therefore the most important thing is to actually accomplish as much of your agenda as you can before the loss happens. So refreshing.
That's the way Dems do it. The enact their agenda. If it costs them elections....fine. Then the GOP has to spend its capital undoing the Democrat agenda (rather than enacting the GOP agenda). That is the proper way to play the game.
IMO Trump is in the 'undecided ' column. Until he allowed Israel to use our military to save their ass ( again ) I might have ranked him higher,
Sigh. You are a lot smarter than barBEARean. We do not bomb Iran because Israel demanded we do it. We bomb Iran because they are a strategic threat to us.
But this bull**** war could end up getting hundreds of thousands of people killed.
I only care about how many of our kids get killed. And it won't be very many. Open question whether the butchers' bill will hit double digits.
This war is NOT in the strategic interest of the United States. This is NOT putting America First.
This war is about bribery of our entire federal government.
BS. You refuse to see the obvious threat Iran posed to us because it forces you to rethink your position on Israel (who has more skin in the game than we do, per capita....they're fully mobilized and doing the riskiest parts of the mission).
However now that we have already been manipulated into being Israel's pigeon once again.......I hope our military can completely destroy Iran without the need for ground troops.
War is anything but 'amazing' at eye level.
And sometimes it needs to happen. Rarely is there a clearer case for needing it than the mullah regime in Iran. I mean, the *******s tried to assassinate a President of the USA, fer crissakes. That alone justifies what we are doing now.
