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John Zogby: It's Friday and welcome to a yet another edition of the Zogby Report, Real and Unscripted. We're kind of at a pivotal moment here because we have the end of a presidency and a president who's already issued his farewell.
John Zogby: And as we're in transition to a week from now, we'll have a new president. And so I thought today, Jer, what we would do is put some final touches on the Biden. presidency, and then like everybody else make the transition and talk about prospects for the presidency. How's that sound to you?
Jeremy Zogby: That sounds appropriate.
John Zogby: Okay, good. So let's start with Biden.
John Zogby: I know that, uh, maybe most. People out there, uh, may not be baseball fans, but I want to begin with a baseball parable anyway, because I think it has a larger [00:01:00] story. The greatest winning pitcher left handed pitcher in major league history is a fellow by the name of Warren Spahn. He was huge when I was a kid in the fifties and early sixties, one more games, lots of strikeouts, a championship.
John Zogby: rings obvious choice for the hall of fame. But the thing that was striking to me about Warren Spahn was that he did not know when to give it up here. He had compiled all these great numbers. He was in his mid forties and yet his mantra was, I can still pitch. I can still pitch. I can still play. And he was traded from his long time.
John Zogby: Team, uh, the Braves, Boston, then Milwaukee, then to the New York Mets and the San Francisco Giants. And he was not doing well. And so he even [00:02:00] tried by this time, as I recall, age of 46, 47, pitching in the very low. minor leagues and still with this belief, I can still pitch, but now he's getting shelled, meaning 17 18 year olds fresh out of high school are hitting him, hitting home runs off of him.
John Zogby: He's a disaster. And the feeling then was that he was going to destroy His entire legacy and that the only thing people will ever talk about, uh, concerning Warren Spahn was the fact that he just did not know when to quit. So I looked up Warren Spahn. I did actually a couple of months ago and then I did just prior to this podcast.
John Zogby: And what I discovered was that there was no mention of hanging around too long. I mean, there were these fleeting kinds of [00:03:00] abstract references to him still pitching, but you know, no commentary and certainly nothing demeaning about it. And I think that brings us to Joe Biden. Um, I have very strong feelings as you know, about Gaza, not that Gaza was a it was a catastrophe and it was, uh, like George W.
John Zogby: Bush. Uh, before him in Iraq, um, it was a gratuitous, um, a self imposed, uh, wrong thing to do, that it was immoral, cost lives, it was genocidal, and President Biden is the deputy butcher of the people of Gaza because of his ongoing support. For Israel with a possible hostage deal now, notwithstanding, [00:04:00] it's the year and a half plus that counts for me with that said, and that in itself hurting his legacy, I still believe that Joe Biden.
John Zogby: Will be treated kindly by historians for his first year and a half in office on infrastructure, on saving the economy, on putting spending money in people's hands, causing inflation, but then dealing with inflation and so many other domestic initiatives that will put him on the level of Uh, Franklin D Roosevelt, uh, and for that matter, Lyndon Johnson.
John Zogby: And while I mentioned Lyndon Johnson, I remember the days when Johnson was considered in the twenties somewhere in the ranking. Of us presidents. And of course, at that point in time, there'd been only 36 [00:05:00] presidents. So he was in the lower third. And now we see Johnson, um, you know, bordering on the top 10 for his domestic, uh, initiatives and programs and a mention obviously of the disastrous war in Vietnam, but almost a willingness.
John Zogby: To give Johnson a pass on Vietnam because of, of, what he was able to do with the war on poverty, uh, the great society, uh, Medicare and Medicaid and, and so on. So my judgment. Not that Joe Biden will reach the top 10 and probably in pretty short order. He started his first rating was at about 14. He'll slide a little bit, but he'll be back among the top 15 presidents, even with these disasters and even with.[00:06:00]
John Zogby: That Warren Spahn like experience of not knowing when to quit. Hubris, um, arrogance, narcissism. There you go. My take on Joe Biden still makes it into the hall of fame like Warren Spahn.
Jeremy Zogby: So as you classically say on this this podcast, I I I disagree But I will give you this no, no, honestly, I I think people who disagree with you Would instantly charge you With partisanship. But what I listened to, I did not hear partisanship. I believe that your methodology is summed up by looking at by by evaluating and analyzing how presidential historians rank presidents and how with each generation or through generations, those change. [00:07:00] And that is a, that's a very objective basis. And that was what I heard in your assessment. Um, and so for that, I say that that was, was not partisan. Uh, the first thing I would say is that the phenomenon of ranking presidential historians, I think, is a modern phenomenon. I don't think that this was a thing that was going on in the late 19th century. I don't think it was a thing that was going on at the turn of the century. I, to my understanding, this is born of the last 50, 60, 70 years where you get your professors, whether they're from Duke, Yale, Harvard, Princeton, very top notch schools, very good schools. And they look at the presidency and they talk about who's number one and who's the best.
Jeremy Zogby: And it's kind of like for American historian geeks, it's kind of like what sports statistics is for sports fans. Um, but the fact is [00:08:00] what's different with sports, um, is that those measurements are fixed. I think we're on the cusp of, of, um, a new era of, of a new zeitgeist, of a new way of looking at things as what happens with history when revisionism and generations move on.
Jeremy Zogby: And so I, I think there could be a total break with how we assess precedents. And so, you know, I think future historians, presidential historians are probably going to look different than this crop of who've been doing this for 10, 20, 30 years. But with that said, let's try and move beyond partisanship and politics in my assessing because If you ask Republican leaning or Republican individuals now, the first thing they're going to talk about, inevitably, is either Afghanistan and the [00:09:00] failure of exiting Afghanistan, or That's very commonplace that they will talk about inflation. That's very commonplace. You, of course, will also hear about immigration and just looking at the statistics. If you look at the Department of Homeland Security and you look at the previous few administrations and the increase of incidents, um, border incidents. And um, of course, you know, liberals will talk about Gaza, um, I think moderates and independents will talk about the cost of living, the standard of living, and how under his presidency, uh, maybe, maybe, maybe a majority of people would say this, they would cite it. that a class of people became even more over wealthy to the likes of which history has never seen and most [00:10:00] people got poor and that happened on Biden's time. But what I want to look at that I think will be the defining feature. Of Joe Biden's legacy and will prevent him from being in, um, let's say the, the top 20 or top 15 and probably in the lower rankings of maybe even the lowest 10 or the lowest 15 was the age factor.
Jeremy Zogby: But let's, let's cut to the chase, the wide recognition that Biden was in decline from the very beginning. And we are now learning that journalists. We're well aware of this and there was a, there was a cloud of, of, of, um, of a, of a, of a tense feeling that you knew if you were a journalist were not to talk about this, you were not to cover this. And so it was hidden, and I think that [00:11:00] that is the defining feature. Um, unfortunately for, for President Joe Biden was that when he got into office, his state of, of, and, and I'm, we're not even talking about the DSM four from the American Psychological Association, we're not getting into, you know, narcissism and, and, um. and different pathologies. We're talking about actual cognitive decline. And for that, when we realize this and we learn about this, we know that that he wasn't really the decision maker. He couldn't have been the decision maker. And, um, and I think that's a major stain and that prevents him from having a mid or high tier ranking.
John Zogby: Okay. And I think all that's fair. Um, and you know, just a few bullet points. Okay. Before you move on to Trump, one is that the presidential rankings [00:12:00] by historians began under Arthur Schlesinger Sr. And it was, you know, uh, revived under Arthur Schlesinger Jr., both of whom were left of center. Many historians.
John Zogby: Political scientists are left of center. In recent years, there's been an effort to bring in more conservatives and to balance things off, even to the point where the wall street journal has done its own, um, rankings and, uh, C SPAN had done its own rankings with even more balance, um, you know, uh, among.
John Zogby: The ideologies of, of historians. That's number one. Number two are the changes that we've seen. So real quick, Harry Truman left office with the lowest approval ratings of any president in American history and is now regarded as the sixth [00:13:00] or seventh, uh, greatest president, uh, and that of course with the atomic bomb, I remember Dwight Eisenhower at 20.
John Zogby: 21 in rankings, and now he's right behind Theodore Roosevelt, uh, number five, competing with Jefferson, five or six. I've seen Richard Nixon go from dead last in the immediate aftermath of Watergate. To a much greater appreciation, uh, for the foreign policy genius that was Nixon. And that's not a moral or ideological judgment on my part.
John Zogby: It's the fact that he was a very smart president. Bill Clinton, eight years of peace and prosperity. He gets more credit for it than the low rankings of Bill Clinton, uh, for moral example and moral leadership. So. That's kind of where, uh, as you point out where I'm coming from, um, [00:14:00] Let's take a look at Trump and, uh, I'm just going to take a stab at it because he's been president before.
John Zogby: And the first round, um, did not fare well with historians. He's either dead last, or he might say, thank. Thank you, Jimmy Buchanan and Franklin Pierce, uh, for holding up the bottom for me, just above them, uh, at, at the very bottom. And I think a lot of it had to do with the fact that I don't know that he expected to win in 2016, so I don't know that there was really an agenda.
John Zogby: And a lot of his piecing helter skelter. Uh, however, was available to say yes and willing to hang on for a few months, um, kind of defined his presidency as did some [00:15:00] outrageous statements about COVID, about blaming Joe Biden for the terrible withdrawal in Afghanistan. And yet this was the policy that, that, uh, Donald Trump had signed off on.
John Zogby: And then of course. There is the whole moral and legal question surrounding Donald Trump. This time around is an opportunity for redemption. Uh, there seems to be much more clarity coming from Donald Trump in terms of who he wants to appoint, why he wants to appoint them. He has, uh, I'm going to put it in quotes, a majority.
John Zogby: In the house of representatives, we'll have to see, and a good majority in the Senate where a number of those appointments are going to come from. And he looks, um, to be someone with a clear, uh, agenda on the other hand. Um, [00:16:00] what may define. Uh, Joe Biden's presidency ultimately, and we'll have to see, is the same thing that is in the top three in defining Dwight Eisenhower's presidency, which is his farewell and his warning about the military industrial complex.
John Zogby: And I can't help but look at, uh, Jeff Bezos. And Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg and, and Cook, uh, and so on and see, is this a billionaires club? Is this really an oligarchy? Um, let's see, um, if in many ways, uh, Donald Trump's, um, second term is defined by that.
John Zogby: I. Prospects are not good for Donald Trump.
Jeremy Zogby: uh, and for the first hundred days, you're not talking about future rankings or, or are you?
John Zogby: No, not the first hundred days. We're going to have [00:17:00] to, nobody ranks the first hundred days until
John Zogby: the second year in office.
Jeremy Zogby: Yeah. Okay. Um, I mean, I guess I'll, I'll just go in short order. I think Trump knew he could win. Trump seems like the type of person, the type of. personality that walks into a room and can sniff fear. And maybe it wasn't fear when he entered the political arena in 2015 and 2016, but it was, it was confidence. And the way he could project it and the way that he could get under people's skin. And I think as soon as he saw that, and he executed that with one Republican candidate after the other, Jeb Bush, Rubio, I think he knew, okay, I'm knocking these guys off. I think I can win. I think he knew he could win fairly quickly and maybe even before, um, we [00:18:00] also have to remember that in 2020. Uh, COVID broke out at the time a campaign started, arguably the first week or the first weeks, um, that grueling process of, of running for reelection and, uh, an emergency, a global emergency. So, uh, that, that puts some context, but I want to jump straight to, to Biden's farewell. Um, you know, if I compare it to Eisenhower, Eisenhower did give us a wonderful gift in that farewell speech, warning us of the encroaching dangers of the military industrial technological, uh, complex that, as he said, would rob the future bright minds of scientists and engineers, um, for the cause of war and empire.
Jeremy Zogby: He didn't use those terms, but that's what he was talking about. [00:19:00] And the loss of individual liberties at home. Um, but there wasn't something partisan in that warning. My assessment of that speech is he was genuinely concerned. And that it wasn't because a young Kennedy, JFK, was taking office that Eisenhower felt the need to push that out.
Jeremy Zogby: I have a strong sense that That Biden's, you know, um, uh, part two of that warning is more partisan because we know the Biden administration was very well surrounded by Silicon Valley and we know that Silicon Valley is Mark Zuckerberg revealed that, uh, that the executive branch, more specifically the White House, um, and the intelligence agencies were pushing him and giving the directions on what to do about misinformation and disinformation, not just with COVID, but even politics in general, other [00:20:00] issues. And so it is quite hypocritical. And, uh, troubling that Biden makes that warning, but it really only looks like it's directed at people like Musk and the recent coming out of Zuckerberg in favor of Trump, it is wrapped up more in partisanship, I believe. than it is in genuine concern, because there is, um, a strong sense of hypocrisy to it, given the level of coordination between Silicon Valley and the White House under Biden.
John Zogby: Once again, we see the world, uh, from two different angles, but, uh, we, we, we do talk about it gently. Don't we? Um,
John Zogby: okay. I, you know, I, I can't argue. With you, because I, I think that it's legitimate. Um, everything you're saying is, is legitimate. We'll [00:21:00] just have to see how it plays out.
John Zogby: Uh, next week, of course, we're going to talk about the inauguration and the laying out of, uh, of, of goals.
John Zogby: And, uh, we'll take it from there. We'll have, uh, uh, this podcast, we'll have, uh, four years of job security.
Jeremy Zogby: Yeah. Wonderful.
John Zogby: Have a good week.
Jeremy Zogby: You too.
John Zogby: Take care.