U. S. Foreign relations. After him will be professor of ukrainian history and the director of the Ukrainian Research institute at harvard university. We will start with frank. Frank first of all, i want to join others in thinking mel and will. It is an honor to be in this room with most with so many people whose work i respect so much. What i have done is basically extrapolate from the oped i wrote a light of some comments the people made yesterday, other oped, particularly mels question about irrationality. I also have the perspective of George Kennan. Its been easy for americans to feel irritated, angry, exasperated, resentful or disgusted with the russian government to whether that country is being run by lennon, stalin, khrushchev, or putin. The quashing of pole, and the most recent aggressions against georgia and ukraine. Not to mention the berlin in cuban crisis of half a century ago and the egregious interference in our election last year. It is therefore understandable, but als
As 2016 is a president ial election year, the Program Committee assembled a roundtable of scholars willing to talk about president ial leadership, what about its failures gather rather than its successes. This seems particularly timely as the trump juggernaut rolls forward. Just yesterday the clinton and Sanders Campaign engaged in a verbal sparring match about who is the most unqualified to be president. So things are getting interesting. The panel we have here today, all of these scholars, have written about president s who were bad in their own special way. Although it didnt occur to me it did occur to me on the train coming up that bad to whom might be an important qualifier. What did it mean to be a bad president . What counts as bad . How do we define a bad president . And specifically, who might have been the worst president ever. Our panelists are david greenberg, associate professor. Are you cool professor now full professor now . Sorry, a little inside baseball. Associate pro
Host welcome to the oah 2016 , and welcome to the plenary panel, worst president ever. I am claire potter, professor of history and director of the Digital Humanities Initiative at the new school and i want to let those in the audience, who are tweeting know that the tag for oah badpres and you might want to add the tag oah2016. The theme of the conference, as chosen by john butler is on leadership. As 2016 is a president ial election year, the Program Committee assembled a roundtable of scholars willing to talk about president ial leadership, what about its failures gather rather than about its excesses. This seems particularly timely juggernaut rolls forward. Just yesterday the clinton and Sanders Campaign engaged in a verbal sparring match about who is the most unqualified to be president. So things are getting interesting. The panel we have here today, all of these scholars have written about president s who were bad in their own special way. [laughter] did occur to me on the train
I am a professor of history and chair of the panel. For those tweeting, the tag for this session is oah badpres and you might want to add the tag oah2016. The theme is on leadership. As 2016 is a president ial election year, the Program Committee assembled a roundtable of scholars willing to talk about president ial leadership, what about its failures gather rather than its successes. This seems particularly timely as the trump juggernaut rolls forward. Just yesterday the clinton and Sanders Campaign engaged in a verbal sparring match about who is the most unqualified to be president. So things are getting interesting. The panel we have here today, all of these scholars, have written about president s who were bad in their own special way. Although it didnt occur to me it did occur to me on the train coming up that bad to whom might be an important qualifier. What did it mean to be a bad president . What counts as bad . How do we define a bad president . And specifically, who might hav
Franklin roosevelt appoints him in the summer of 1941 aswhat eventually becomes the office of strategic services. Kind of a strange choice because donovan was a staunch republican, had run for governor of new york on an antiroosevelt, antinew deal platform. But he was also a man of irrepressible spirit, boundless optimism, full of ideas and, in a sense, hehe reflected the qualities of Franklin Roosevelt so he was named the head of our first spy service. Cspan as you know, they called him wild bill donovan. Tell us a wild story. Guest well, oneone of theone of the conclusions i reached about donovan was that he was a magnificent magnet for attracting talent. His oss attracted College President s, semanticists, philosophers, writers, journalists, photographers, actors, cameramen. Arthur goldberg had been an oss veteran, subsequently goes on the supreme court. Historian Arthur Schlesinger jr. Was with the oss. The french chef julia child was with the oss. But what kind of strstruck me abo