Is Obama the most unpopular POTUS?

What is it about Obama that  apparently causes so much loathing?

 

The US press comments and blogs and political cartoons are astonishingly vicious and vindictive.

 

According to them, he is dirigiste, a Muslim, a non-birther, a person without a recorded past, and – worst of all – a Socialist. America’s liberal approach to defamation allows the media to get away with stuff that might be actionable in England, especially the repeated accusations that he forged or concealed his birth certificate so as to trick his way into the White House.

 

The ‘birthing’ charge is totally spurious. The Constitution says ‘No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President’. Place of birth seems not a consideration. Citizenship is the key, otherwise millions of American born overseas, such as to families serving abroad with the military, would be disqualified. (There were no ’natural born’ citizens a the time of the Declaration of Independence because all Americans were subjects of King George III). Obama had an American mother, so he is a citizen registered as such.

 

If truth be told, he is not too popular in the UK either. Harping on about his grandfather having been roughed up by the Brits during colonial times in Kenya did not go down too well, especially as there is not a shred of  verifiable evidence to support the charge. Press reports that the White House felt snubbed by the Commons vote on Syria were greeted here with a certain amount of sniggering – kettle and pot and all that, after his dumping of the Churchill bust and his treatment of Gordon Brown!

 

Over the years POTUS has had varying degrees of acceptance in the UK, but in the US Obama seems to be in a class of his own when it comes to calumny.

 

‘In the President’s Secret Service’ has assessments of POTUS back to Nixon from the people who knew him best, the Secret Service agents at the White House.

 

Nixon was a weirdo who never, ever, spoke to his wife. Kennedy had the sexual drive of a ram. Johnson was a foul-mouthed thug who would hold meetings whilst seated on the lavatory with the door open. Ronnie was loved by his staff, a very astute, intelligent and witty man. Mrs. R would have been sacred in India. Carter was despised as a canting humbug.  Bush Snr. was respected and liked, as was Mrs. B. Clinton treated his terms of office as one long party. Hillary was another candidate for India. Dubya was a ball of fun; the agents would play practical jokes on him, such as turning up in an old clunker and telling him that the official limo had broken down.

 

Mrs Bush was idolized. She was invariably kind and considerate to staff. On one very cold day she offered one of Dubya’s woolly hats to the agent shivering at the front door. When he politely declined, Dubya said ‘You never say ‘No’ to the First Lady’, so wear it he did.

 

What will be their judgment of Obama?