Talk:Historical rankings of presidents of the United States

Christina Greer versus Tina Green

These people appear to be completely unrelated, but the hyperlink embedded in Christina Greer's name links to Tina Green's Wikipedia article. Recommending the hyperlink be removed.72.68.108.107 (talk) 01:56, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

New ranking (2020) – please

See this ranking from 2020: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ps-political-science-and-politics/article/presidential-greatness-in-a-polarized-era-results-from-the-latest-presidential-greatness-survey/169AFBF02BBE5938C2FA78902A1CB77B/core-reader Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:33, 15 July 2020 (UTC)

As a rule of thumb, we don't use citations behind a paywall. -- Sleyece (talk) 22:55, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

@Sleyece: That is absolutely false. See WP:PAYWALL. We don't reject sources just because they're behind a paywall. This is Wikipedia policy, not just a guideline. ~Anachronist (talk) 00:04, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm glad you volunteered! Now, Anachronist, go pay your way through that wall and report back what you find! -- Sleyece (talk) 01:01, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

@Sleyece: You have missed the point, which was that your reply above was inappropriate and incorrect; there is no such "rule of thumb" as you stated. We don't reject paywall sources, period. The abstract is free, and contains sufficient information for citing something. And if I wanted a copy of that article to reference in an article rather than simply glance through, I'd get it from a public library that subscribes to Political Science & Politics. If the OP has access to it, then the OP can propose a change. ~Anachronist (talk) 01:08, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Passing the buck off on OP, then? This is why paywall sources fall through. I've seen it many times. No one wants to front the money to add them to Wikipedia, so they fall by the wayside. -- Sleyece (talk) 19:29, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, but Anachronist is right. We have an explicit policy that sources do not have to be freely accessible. And paywalls are quite permeable for wikipedians. See e.g. WP:REX and The Wikipedia Library Bundle (https://wikipedialibrary.wmflabs.org/users/my_library/). I'm a big fan of open knowledge, but it's a fact that currently many of the best sources are not available freely. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:43, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

@Snooganssnoogans: There are different rankings presented in that article (which, admittedly, I accessed via sci-hub). One is a general ranking of "greatness" and another is a ranking of how "polarizing" a president is. The context of that article is to characterize the differences in ranking based on ideology of the experts who ranked the presidents. A most interesting fact is that Trump is characterized as the most polarizing president regardless of the ideology of the expert doing the ranking.

What exactly do you suggest using from this article? ~Anachronist (talk) 00:12, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

There are no new rankings to be extracted from that article. It is a meta-analysis of the results from the 2018 APSA survey, which is already included in the page. Not a new survey. Don Cuan (talk) 09:47, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Update

This sentence "The bottom 10 often include James Buchanan, Warren G. Harding, Andrew Johnson, Franklin Pierce, Millard Fillmore, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Ulysses S. Grant, Zachary Taylor, and George W. Bush" is incorrect. Many, including polls on this page, say that Trump is the worst or one of the worst Presidents. Trump should replace Grant or Bush in this sentence. Pennsylvania2 (talk) 19:20, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

I'd say, wait until he is a past president. And there needs to be a discussion about which one would be replaced in the bottom 10 list. ~Anachronist (talk) 21:59, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

After rearranging the paragraphs in chronological order, it appears that Bush has been bumped up into the third quartile to make way for Trump in the bottom quartile. It would still be wrong to say the bottom 10 "often include" Trump, though, because only two surveys have included Trump so far. ~Anachronist (talk) 02:44, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

i don't think we need to include Trump yet because it's too early. wait till 2025 because results of presidents' actions only begin to show after 4-5 years out of office.84.54.77.22 (talk) 14:50, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Improper citations

Still newer at editing. But the 2 links for Joe Biden's rank are both from 2018, before he was in president and the data does not include him on those 2 links. Suggest removal or finding of alternative sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chlorophyllum (talk • contribs) 03:09, 15 March 2021 (UTC)

Luck

I didn't read the whole article but wondered how luck- that the Siena poll lists- would play into a President's overall rating. It seems that bad luck should excuse low marks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ‎24.184.73.156 (talk • contribs) 00:19, 1 May 2021 (UTC)

Ideological balance of experts surveyed

Ideological balance is mentioned, briefly, in only two places in the article: Two surveys conducted by the WSJ mentioned in "Notable scholar surveys", as well as a subsection that was deleted and I just restored about rankings based presidents' leadership about diversity and inclusion.

However, there are far more surveys represented in this article than just those, and we have no way of knowing the ideological balance.

As I have previously stated (archived now), if one sorts any of the tables by political party, a rather glaring pattern jumps out: The Democrat group is predominantly blue/green and the Republican group is predominantly red/orange.

Possible explanations:

1. Republican presidents are in fact generally worse than Democrat presidents.
2. The table is constructed from data based on survey responses from biased experts.
3. The surveys have a systemic sampling bias favoring one ideology.

Those aren't mutually exclusive explanations. Democrats may make better presidents and the surveys may have built-in bias.

It is an undeniable fact that Democrat presidents are generally viewed more favorably by historians, but what information do we have about the experts who were surveyed? Well, some work has been done to answer that. This source mentioned in a section above describes research results that "call into question such ratings insofar as they exist absent the political and ideological context of the reviewer". The article characterizes the differences in ranking are colored by the ideology of the experts who ranked the presidents, and says the population of those experts leans significantly toward Democrat.

Given those facts, a short sentence in the "Notable scholar surveys" about the possibility of bias in the survey results is needed. ~Anachronist (talk) 19:36, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

"Republican presidents are in fact generally worse than Democrat presidents." That does not really translate well in the rankings. Counting the Democrats and where they are typically ranked:

• Andrew Jackson. Ranked Blue. He is typically considered one of the most influential presidents, the founder of Jacksonian democracy.
• Martin Van Buren. Ranked Orange. His presidency is primarily associated with the Panic of 1837, and the costly Second Seminole War. His term is remembered as a disaster, and he was nicknamed "Martin Van Ruin".
• James K. Polk. Ranked Green. A highly successful expansionist, having annexed Texas, California, and vast Mexican areas. Typically ranked highly, but tensions over slavery in the annexed areas are considered one of the main causes of the American Civil War. He gets part of the blame.
• Franklin Pierce. Ranked Red. His support for the Kansas–Nebraska Act is considered one of the causes of the American Civil War. He was deeply unpopular, and is typically ranked among the worst presidents.
• James Buchanan. He tried to turn Kansas into a slave state, helped split the Democratic Party into two rival factions, and the American Civil War effectively opened in his term. He is actively condemned by most historians, and ranks among the worst presidents.
• Grover Cleveland. Ranked Green. Typically considered a successful leader, and is praised for his personal honesty. His failure to effectively face the Panic of 1893 is the main criticism against him.
• Woodrow Wilson. Ranked Blue. His principle of "ethnic self-determination" had global effects in the 20th century, and his international police is highly regarded. His support for racial segregation is the main criticism against him.
• Franklin D. Roosevelt. Ranked Blue. Typically regarded among the greatest president. His New Deal redefined liberalism for several decades, he is credited for ending the Great Depression, and he was an effective war leader in World War II.
• Harry S. Truman. Ranked Blue. Deeply unpopular during his term, reassessed as a folk hero a few decades later. Described as exceptionally hard-working, his "integrity and accountability" was contrasted favorably with dishonest presidents such as Richard Nixon.
• John F. Kennedy. Ranked Green. Well-regarded for his charisma, for his support for the civil rights movement and the Apollo space program, and his New Frontier policies. Blamed for the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the increased American involvement in the Vietnam War, and his scandalous personal life.
• Lyndon B. Johnson. Ranked Green. Praised for his civil rights policies, his creation of Medicare and Medicaid, and his war on poverty. Widely blamed for his perceived mishandling of the Vietnam War, and the high casualties of the war.
• Jimmy Carter. Ranked Orange. His term is largely associated with stagflation, with the Iran hostage crisis, with the 1979 oil crisis, with the Three Mile Island accident, and with a deterioration of relations with the Soviet Union. His presidency is considered a failure, with the Camp David Accords as his only long-term success.
• Bill Clinton. Ranked Green. Highly regarded for his effective economic policies, and a series of achievements in international policy. Blamed for his scandalous personal life, and perceived to be untrustworthy by a majority of Americans.
• Barack Obama. Ranked Green. Highly regarded for his effective economic policies, his significant changes to financial regulation, and attempt to overhaul health care in the United States. Whether his military policies were effective is still considered questionable.
• Joe Biden. Not ranked yet.

Dimadick (talk) 18:02, 1 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, you can find bad Democrats and good Republicans. What I suggested above is to group the list by party affiliation, then stand back from your screen and look at the dominant colors. The Democrat group is predominantly blue and green, while the Republican group is predominantly red and orange. My original point was to propose reasons why this is the case. ~Anachronist (talk) 05:10, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

Accessibility Issues in Article

Hey y'all,

There are several tables in the article that solely rely on the use of color to convey information. The sole use of color to convey information could create a barrier for people with disabilities to perceive the content in the article. Please review Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility and WCAG 2.0 Success Criterion 1.4.3 for additional information.

This can be resolved by additionally adding in a text-based method of identifying the information communicated in color; the colored backgrounds do not need to necessarily be removed altogether or changed (unless they violate color contrast requirements; normal sized text should have a color contrast ratio of 4.5:1 between the text color and its background content, and can be checked using the WebAIM Contrast Checker), but there does need to be text-based alternatives to the information being communicated through color alone.

Thank you!

SunnySydeRamsay (talk) 18:04, 10 June 2021 (UTC)