This is of course an incomplete list, these are just some that came off the top of my head. Just for the sake of consistency, don't include people who have done most of their "evil" since the turn of the century.

Best
Calvin Coolidge
Norman Borlaug
Jonas Salk
J. Presper Eckert / John Mauchly

Worst:
Woodrow Wilson
The Dulles brothers
Timothy McVeigh / Terry Nichols
Al Capone
Charles Manson
Joe McCarthy

Calvin is a bit of an odd choice, not saying I disagree. I'm curious as to what your rationale for it is.

Worst

Lee Harvey Oswald
Bernie Madoff
Aldridge Ames
Deep Throat

Best

Everyone in our military who helped us kick ass and take names for over 100 years.

Edit. Missed the American part

Oswald would have to be up there.

Best: Ronald Reagan

Worst: Saul Alinsky

Worst. Absolute worst:

Barack Hussein Obama

Best: Churchill

Worst: Mao, Lenin, Stalin

(10-21-2013 08:43 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst

Lee Harvey Oswald
Bernie Madoff
Aldridge Ames
Deep Throat

Best

Everyone in our military who helped us kick ass and take names for over 100 years.

No sure if serious.

(10-21-2013 10:02 PM)UConn-SMU Wrote:  Best: Ronald Reagan

Worst: Saul Alinsky

Best: Michael Jordan

Worst: Reagan.

(10-22-2013 12:35 AM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(10-21-2013 08:43 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst

Lee Harvey Oswald
Bernie Madoff
Aldridge Ames
Deep Throat

No sure if serious.

A random and curious list, to be sure.

If "Deep Throat" is meant to signify William Mark Felt (1913-2008), the FBI official who was J. Edgar Hoover's most devoted and loyal disciple among all of the Bureau's upper-level executives, it is really weird to include him on the list. He was an obscure bureaucrat for almost his entire life. At age 92 and suffering from dementia, his daughter announced that Felt was "Deep Throat" of Watergate fame, the anonymous source who gave a series of unrecorded, off-the-record interviews to a Washington Post reporter in 1972-73. The daughter candidly admitted that she was making the announcement in hopes of gaining money for her children's college and other family expenses. The reporter (Bob Woodward) then stated this was true, even though Felt himself had denied it, repeatedly and publicly (and -- on one occasion -- while under oath, testifying to a federal grand jury) in the 1970s and 1980s.

(10-22-2013 01:19 AM)Native Georgian Wrote:  

(10-22-2013 12:35 AM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(10-21-2013 08:43 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst

Lee Harvey Oswald
Bernie Madoff
Aldridge Ames
Deep Throat

No sure if serious.

A random and curious list, to be sure.

If "Deep Throat" is meant to signify William Mark Felt (1913-2008), the FBI official who was J. Edgar Hoover's most devoted and loyal disciple among all of the Bureau's upper-level executives, it is really weird to include him on the list. He was an obscure bureaucrat for almost his entire life. At age 92 and suffering from dementia, his daughter announced that Felt was "Deep Throat" of Watergate fame, the anonymous source who gave a series of unrecorded, off-the-record interviews to a Washington Post reporter in 1972-73. The daughter candidly admitted that she was making the announcement in hopes of gaining money for her children's college and other family expenses. The reporter (Bob Woodward) then stated this was true, even though Felt himself had denied it, repeatedly and publicly (and -- on one occasion -- while under oath, testifying to a federal grand jury) in the 1970s and 1980s.

That's just great. Another graduate of my alma mater who is famous for the wrong reasons. The other is Sarah Palin.

(10-21-2013 11:35 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst. Absolute worst:

Barack Hussein Obama

I'm not even sure if Obama registers on the list for the 20th century. If you want to include him on your 21st century list, that's fair enough I guess. At least you're saying he's American.

Obviously Hitler would be there if it wasn't Americans only.

Best - FDR, JFK, MLK, Will Rogers, Upton Sinclair, John Steinbeck
Worst - Richard Nixon, any mass murderer or any of the three men who assassinated our world leaders in the 1960's.

(10-21-2013 11:35 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst. Absolute worst:

Barack Hussein Obama

He can't be on the list, this list is about Americans only!

lol, just couldn't resist!

(10-22-2013 01:19 AM)Native Georgian Wrote:  

(10-22-2013 12:35 AM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(10-21-2013 08:43 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst

Lee Harvey Oswald
Bernie Madoff
Aldridge Ames
Deep Throat

No sure if serious.

A random and curious list, to be sure.

If "Deep Throat" is meant to signify W:lmfao:illiam Mark Felt (1913-2008), the FBI official who was J. Edgar Hoover's most devoted and loyal disciple among all of the Bureau's upper-level executives, it is really weird to include him on the list. He was an obscure bureaucrat for almost his entire life. At age 92 and suffering from dementia, his daughter announced that Felt was "Deep Throat" of Watergate fame, the anonymous source who gave a series of unrecorded, off-the-record interviews to a Washington Post reporter in 1972-73. The daughter candidly admitted that she was making the announcement in hopes of gaining money for her children's college and other family expenses. The reporter (Bob Woodward) then stated this was true, even though Felt himself had denied it, repeatedly and publicly (and -- on one occasion -- while under oath, testifying to a federal grand jury) in the 1970s and 1980s.

I think he meant Linda Lovelace.:lmfao:

Billy Graham.

Benjamin Spock.

Worst:

Malcolm X
David Duke
Charles Whitman
John Wayne Gacy
Ted Bundy
Jeffrey Dahmer

Best

Thomas Edison
Albert Einstein
Henry Ford
The Wright Bros.
Bill Gates

(10-21-2013 11:35 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst. Absolute worst:

Barack Hussein Obama

So what did he do as a state representative, professor and community organizer to be worthy of that tribute?

(10-22-2013 06:38 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  

(10-22-2013 12:35 AM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(10-21-2013 08:43 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Worst

Lee Harvey Oswald
Bernie Madoff
Aldridge Ames
Deep Throat

No sure if serious.

I think he meant Linda Lovelace.

I wondered that, too.

(10-22-2013 05:31 AM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  Best - FDR, JFK, MLK, Will Rogers, Upton Sinclair, John Steinbeck
Worst - Richard Nixon, any mass murderer or any of the three men who assassinated our world leaders in the 1960's.

Good stuff, FBO.

To be sure, by now even the majority of left-wing liberals have (very, VERY slowly) come around to the reality that JFK was a drug-addled, narcissistic creep, and that Richard Nixon was a middle-of-the-road "New Deal Republican" who ended a war started by his Democrat predecessors. But for a long time, one could go far in the academic/media world just by (in effect) expressing hatred of Richard Nixon.

It's curious how presidents like FDR and JFK and LBJ actually Did have the IRS audit their political enemies and actually Did intervene in politically-sensitive investigations by various law-enforcement agencies, and suffered no political consequence whatsoever for having done so. Whereas Nixon merely wanted to do these things, and simply talked about doing these things in private conversation with his own aides, but lacked the nerve and/or competence to actually do them, yet he paid the maximum political consequence for having done so. An interesting juxtaposition.