Eleven Through Fifteen

Again, I reiterate that this list is not ordered. While tomorrow’s list-makers will be the least “worst”, those in spots 1-15 on my list are just plain terrible and I didn’t try to make any distinctions based on the degree of loathsomeness.

11. Timothy McVeigh, terrorist–For killing 168 Americans.

12. Herbert Hoover: Not everyone who gets a town (or many towns shanties) named after them is admirable. First, he signed the Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act. Really, If I can’t count on Republicans to at least back free trade then what are they good for? Hoover unwisely decided that the best solution to the burgeoning Great Depression was to sit back and let the business cycle proceed without intervention. I could forgive that, but signing the Hawley-Smoot Act was the height of folly.

13. Richard Mellon Scaife: Cooky billionaire who funds just about every institute or institution that annoys me-from bribing Arkansan Troopers to funding AEI, Heritage, Hoover, Cato (actually, I like Cato. They generally have a line and they stick to it, criticizing politicians who cross their philosophy, with little concern for the ramifications. Contrast that the AEI economists’ basic silence on Bush II’s expansion of Big Government), Free Congress Foundation, the American Spectator, and a host of conservative institutions and investigations. Amazingly enough, he’s the glue that gives credence to Hillary Clinton’s vast right wing conspiracy.

14. Strom Thurmond: The longest filibuster in Senate history (1957, just over 24 hours) trying, thankfully in vain, to block passage of the 1957 Civil Rights Act. Thurmond “Blue Slipped” black and pro-civil rights judicial nominees. But most of all, he makes the list for making me feel like a jackass for being from the South. Here’s a clip from his party’s platform back when he ran for president:

We stand for the segregation of the races and the racial integrity of each race; the constitutional right to choose one’s associates; to accept private employment without governmental interference, and to earn one’s living in any lawful way. We oppose the elimination of segregation, the repeal of miscegenation statutes, the control of private employment by Federal bureaucrats called for by the misnamed civil rights program. We favor home-rule, local self-government and a minimum interference with individual rights.

We oppose and condemn the action of the Democratic Convention in sponsoring a civil rights program calling for the elimination of segregation, social equality by Federal fiat, regulations of private employment practices, voting and local law enforcement.

We affirm that the effective enforcement of such a program would be utterly destructive to the social, economic and political life of the Southern people, and of other localities in which there may be differences in race, creed or national origin in appreciable numbers.

15. Andrew Jackson. For signing the Indian Removal Act of 1830: This act lead directly to the marches along the path called the Trail of Tears: Between 1838-39, 14,000 were marched 1,200 miles through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, and Arkansas…about 4,000 died on that trail.

AB