{"id":2036,"date":"2005-12-27T23:01:24","date_gmt":"2005-12-28T06:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2005\/12\/27\/the-ten-worst-americans\/"},"modified":"2005-12-27T23:01:24","modified_gmt":"2005-12-28T06:01:24","slug":"the-ten-worst-americans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=2036","title":{"rendered":"The Ten Worst Americans"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alexandra at All Things Beautiful<\/a> is asking bloggers to list who they think are the ten worst Americans of all time. Too many of the lists so far, both left <\/a>and right<\/a>, are both too partisan and too recent.<\/p>\n

(Protein Wisdom’s<\/a> list is hilarious, by the way.)<\/p>\n

I can’t think of ten offhand, but I’m sure you folks can suggest some more.<\/p>\n

Let’s see….<\/p>\n

1) General Jeffrey Amherst<\/strong> (after whom town and college are named), for giving smallpox-infested blankets to Indians. From a letter he wrote to Colonel Henry Bouquet in 1763: “”Could it not be contrived to send the ‘smallpox’ among those disaffected tribes of Indians? We must on this occasion use every stratagem in our power to reduce them…. You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians by means of blankets as well as to try every other method that can move to extirpate this execrable race. I should be very glad to hear your scheme for hunting them down by dogs could take effect.”<\/p>\n

2) President Andrew Jackson<\/strong>. The Trail of Tears alone is enough to get this racist madman on the list. Although arguably General Winfield Scott<\/strong>, who was more directly responsible for the Trail of Tears, deserves the spot more. Call this one a toss-up.<\/p>\n

3) How about a simple serial killer? H. H. Holmes<\/strong><\/a> may have killed as many as 150 people, torturing some of them first. He seemed to kill men as part of elaborate scams, children for convenience, and women because he just liked killing women. His elaborate deathtrap-filled Chicago mansion burned down not long after he was arrested; the site is a post office now.<\/p>\n

4) Texas cop Tom Coleman<\/strong>, who railroaded dozens of people (mostly black men) into prison on trumped-up drug charges so he could be a big man at the station house. Seems a little petty to include him on a list with mass-murderers, I admit, and maybe I’ll replace him with someone Ever So Much More Evil later. But I just hate this dude.<\/p>\n

5) J. Edgar Hoover<\/a><\/strong>. “McCarthyism” should have been called “Hooverism”; Hoover, like McCarthy, was a strong believer in using the power of the government to crush dissent and ruin lives. But unlike McCarthy, he was smart enough to keep himself in the saddle for decades. Although hateful towards civil rights, he did have soft spots for blackmail and for the mafia. (It’s also rumoured that he was a cross-dresser; if so, that’s the only thing I like about Hoover.)<\/p>\n

6) Senator John C. Calhoun<\/a><\/strong>, America’s most prominent supporter of slavery and arguably the single person most responsible for the “no compromise on slavery! never!” position of the South which (again, arguably) led to the civil war. Fun fact<\/em>: A Senate resolution in the year 2000 declared Calhoun one of the “seven greatest” Senators ever!<\/p>\n

7) In comments, Robert suggests another current-day dude: Fred Phelps<\/strong>, possibly the most hate-filled man in America. According to Wikipedia<\/a>, some of Phelps’ relatives and associates “claim that Phelps suffers from a mental illness that leaves him unsatisfied with life unless he can be responsible for the suffering of other human beings.”<\/p>\n

Post your suggestions in the comments!<\/p>\n

Hat tip: The Argument Clinic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

UPDATE: This list by Joseph Marshall<\/a>, in the comments at All Things Beautiful, features some very well-chosen names. (And I’m not only saying that because some of the names appear on my list as well!)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Alexandra at All Things Beautiful is asking bloggers to list who they think are the ten worst Americans of all time. Too many of the lists so far, both left and right, are both too partisan and too recent. (Protein … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[92],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-whatever"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2036","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2036\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}