Why are Presidents of the USA treated as villains?

Whether we agree with their politics or not, they are the executive of the country and they are people as well. They should be treated with respect. Constantly all I see is bashing of them.

It seems like Presidents are only loved after they leave office.

Why should they be treated with respect?

They're authorities. Odds are, all of them have done/ordered done enough civil liberties/human rights violations to warrant hanging them several times over.

Government secrecy and the fact that authorities protect their own is the only thing that keeps most guys in power away from a well-deserved lethal injection... Or a firing squad.

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:48:22 AM by SavageHeathen

And what makes us so different? Could you look someone in the eye and say you wouldn't have done some of the same things?

Exactly. It's kind of necessary once you think about it though. Your in charge of 250 million people. Of course your going to violate SOME of their rights!

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:51:04 AM by PinkHeartChainsaw

Do you have specific examples they are treated as villain ?

Comedy Show sometimes makes fun of president, but certainly they are not treated as villain.

Criticizing Presidential handling on specific policy (terrorism, drugs, Katrina, War, etc ) is legitimate part of living in Democracy.

And various poll show that President (whether D or R) almost always more respected than various institution (Congress, Business, labor Union, bureaucracy, etc)

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:52:07 AM by PhilippeO

Proffessor, because they fuck up some body's life somewhere.

Well, Obama for one. He seems to be the favorite punching bag for ultra conservatives. Same with Bush. I have no idea what he could have done to build such a Hatedom, although I did not follow his politics as closely.

My point is, we should be critisizing their policy, not bashing their character and make personal attack.

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:57:33 AM by TheProffesor

A reason American presidents are often treated like villains is simply because one of the downsides of being in charge is taking responsibility whenever things go wrong.

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:09:19 AM by tropetown

People who consider Obama socialist tyrant or Bush ordering 9/11 is quite rare.

Most just criticize their policies, Bush on Katrina and Iraq War, Obama on Obamacare and TARP. and it legitimate to criticize them on democracy.

and Presidency is still respected institution, when some senator tell "You Lie" on Obama last year, even some Republican criticize him for disrespectful to Presidency.

They have access to superweapons. Many of their actions have been ethically challenged — see supporting dictatorships in South America, the Patriot Act, extraordinary renditions, etc.

How are they not supervillains?

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:15:54 AM by Carciofus

only Americans have the divine right to talk shit about our leaders, for everyone else it is a privilege

Everyone has the divine right to talk shit about people in charge everywhere. It's also 100% kosher for foreigners to be pissed off at the US government whenever it interferes with their lives.

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:43:10 AM by SavageHeathen

well im only bothered when punk ass brits on xbox live call 9/11 a government inside job and say that our boys are all a bunch of murderers who kill and rape for fun en masse

sadly this happened to me and for an hour on GTA 4 it was a shit throwing match while everyone blew each other up in the game

i feel bad for the everyone else, they had to listen to me and the brit argue for at least 30 minutes, not really an hour

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:51:26 AM by jasonwill2

Presidents get loads and loads of respect; just about every president has someone willing to defend him. But this is America, where we can say anything we want and where media makes its reputation off accentuating the negative. I don't think they're treated as villains by most people, but you get more screen time if you badmouth them. (Lately the most negative thing about Obama is that he's not got enough guts. In spite of the fact that he doesn't have the power people think he does; the power and responsibility are shared with Congress.)

Plus, Republicans lately just insanely bash Obama because they think it will hurt his chances of getting re-elected. I have found, however, that many foreign powers actually like Obama as he has done a good deal to improve international relationships that Bush damaged.

Also, I wouldn't bother trying to debate with Savage; he thinks all authorities are scum and that a leaderless utopia is possible. Pretty much the exact opposite of you, Professor, and just as impervious to other's views.

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:55:20 AM by AceofSpades

@OP,

When the President isn't actually incompetent, it's because people don't comprehend that the government of a continent-sized nation with 312 million people can't cater to every individual no matter how hard it tries.

i like obama

@jasonWill: I reckon it was probably done on purpose. They wanted you to get angry, either because of schadenfreude or because it gives them an edge.

As mentioned, presidents sometimes order or are responsible for events that cost a lot of lives. Sometimes lives are lost due to their inaction, or because they didn't do enough. Sometimes, no matter what they do there are deaths and the pres will still be blamed for it by one side or the other.

So to say the least I disagree with Savage's post 2. Going by that view, every president or other executive to have power over other's lives should be killed because their action, inaction, not enough action or too much action caused deaths - even if they caused less casualties than any alternative they could have picked.

You have to realize that being in charge of a large country with every single thing you do being held against you, no matter how justified is extremely stressful.

This. Nuff Said. There jkust aren't enough people who care about others besides themselves, especially outside of gov't anyway, TBFH!

That would fix a lot of things wrong with our Gov't. Too bad we'd be a dictatorship - I'm so no one wants that, even if it does lead to better gov't and better social relations for our people... So yeah, that's not the best idea, now is it?

Truth is, yeah. And I agree - YOU CAN'T SAVE, HELP, OR PLEASE EVERYONE! But you can at least try, especially with the struggling majority that is the Middle/Lower classes, TBFH. Just so as long as it doesn't cause more problems!

EDIT- Damn... I'm sounding violent again...

edited 2nd Nov '11 5:49:14 AM by LostAnarchist

Well, making internal improvments in the U.S. is hard. State's Rights. Anti-government sentiment. So the paradox is that our Presidents are handcuffed from doing anything domestically that people will remember. I doubt we'd ever have a Pax Obama, or hell, even a sound budget or some nice clean roads.

We get squat.

Why? Because since Newt Gingrich's congress everyone hates each other.

There really is a difference between lives lost due to incompetence or due to malevolence. In both cases the President (or whoever...) should not get re-elected, but incompetence is not what makes a "villain". It is bad, but excusable; nobody is perfect. That covers the majority of deaths due to inactivity.

However, we all know that sometimes the US President does sign orders that will lead to the death of people through action. And that is villainous. And concerning those things, I'm more or less agreeing with Savage.

I almost, ALMOST say I approve of hanging people who commit villainous acts in gov't or those who a shit job in gov't.

If only to raise the IQ of the American species... Too bad people will just start dying left and right.

edited 2nd Nov '11 6:16:06 AM by LostAnarchist

So the Americans are a different species of Humanity now? That explains a lot...

And about the OP: Maybe it is the (Percieved) Power of the post, that almost anything could be achived by his say-so? It works as head of a Conspriacy, especially if the person (or author) isn't American.

edited 2nd Nov '11 6:46:25 AM by Greenmantle

the president has a lot of power, but not the amount people think he has. they over estimate what he can do.

all he can really do is exectuive action and enforce laws, he cant make laws or render judgment. we have a thing called checks and balances.

right now the ppl to blame for the economy and such is mostly congress, not Obama. i mean congress has a 9% approval rating come on now that is horrible

edit: sorry for typos I have a huge glare on my screen and i can barely see

edited 2nd Nov '11 7:09:21 AM by jasonwill2