Disagreeable and Dumb
When the vice president has a negative trait – look out.
One of my current colleagues worked on the Mitt Romney 2012 campaign.1[1] He told me he was entrenched in the vice presidential selection process, which ultimately went to Congressman Paul Ryan.2[2]
I’ll have to check with him about the science and art involved in selecting a running mate, but I’m sure it wasn’t easy. Inevitably, every presidential election has a debate over the merits of the vice-presidential selection, and whether the electorate cares enough to swing the election because of the decision. I tend to think that in the 21st century, the VP choice is a consequential one, not to be taken lightly.
Election geniuses will point to whatever appeared as a misstep in a campaign, and putting someone on the ticket could be a massive mistake, so much so that it will turn out to be a pretty good movie to watch and praise for not happening.3[3]
It’s funny, if you put someone in charge of looking for your running mate, and he comes back with a one-word response: Me, you could end up with a terrible vice president, one that results in a lot of unnecessary deaths. But what if you simply pick someone who has no clue about anything?
On the other hand, what if you worked a presidential election before the 12th Amendment and you were stuck with a guy the entire country had voted for the job? Instead of getting someone you could control, you had someone who openly opposed your leadership and disagreed with fundamental ideas of the Republic.
It’s these ideas, the disagreeable and dumb vice presidents, that we dive into in our latest edition of the vice president rankings.
46: John Calhoun
7th Vice President
Term – March 4, 1825 – December 28, 1832
Presidential Administration: John Quincy Adams’ only term (Okay History 2021 Presidential Ranking: 21) and part of Andrew Jackson’s first term (Okay History 2021 Presidential Ranking: 12)
The Good:
I guess you could argue that Calhoun was bipartisan, since he is the most recent vice president to have served under two different presidential administrations, John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson. We all know how crazy the presidential election of 1824 was, and Calhoun put himself in the middle of it. But he was smart enough to realize it would serve him better to commit to the vice president job, which he landed fairly easily.
The Bad:
The good section is filled with nothing but how good you were at just getting elected, and you can be sure the bad section will end up being really bad, and it proves to be true for Calhoun.
Calhoun got right to work, first disagreeing with JQA on his foreign policy, thinking that the president of the United States shouldn’t worry himself about such matters. He disliked the 6th president so much that Calhoun wrote Jackson, telling him that he would support Old Hickory’s election efforts in 1828.
That decision proved wise as Jackson swept into office and eventually swept Calhoun out. Why? Although both men were slaveholders, Calhoun felt states had more sovereignty than the United States itself. Which makes you wonder why, if he felt that way, would he have taken the supposed second-highest job in the country? Calhoun advocated that states could nullify laws passed by Congress, and Jackson nullified his voice by kicking him out of the job.
Did he become president?
Nope. Thank goodness, because John Calhoun looks scary as all get out.
Why did I rank him here?
I have always remembered Calhoun as one of those South Carolinians who just LOVED South Carolina so much simply because someone came up with the concept of South Carolina. You could easily rank him last. But this is close enough.
45: James Danforth Quayle
44th Vice President
Term – January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993
Presidential Administration: George H.W. Bush (Okay History 2021 Presidential Ranking: 20)
The Good:
Dan inspired all of us who feel imposter syndrome to know that it’s okay. He was an actual imposter, someone so entirely unqualified, even for a job that I don’t think should even exist. But Dan Quayle was the original “DEI hire” that the right now likes to use. He was admitted into law school despite failing a comprehensive exam — apparently as a diversity candidate, minority being defined, in his case, as really dumb. Dumb people need jobs too, and Quayle was the poster boy for what Dumb people could aspire to.
The Bad:
Dan can’t spell. Of course, if this were a requirement to get the job, I’d 100% never be vice president. But Quayle was a walking gaffe machine, way before social media was a thing. I can’t imagine the memes a 21st-century Vice President Quayle would produce today. Dan built many careers for the members of Saturday Night Live in the early 1990s.
Did he become president?
No. In fact, Quayle never became a serious player in the Republican Party after he left office. For the rest of the 90s, he wrote a couple of books and announced he wouldn’t run for governor of Indiana or for the GOP nomination in 1996. He did return to the arena for the 2000 elections, which began with him facing his former boss’s son, and by the end of the first Iowa straw poll in August, he was finished; he hasn’t run since.
Why did I rank him here?
Quayle never inspired any confidence. If Bush had died in office, the United States would have been invaded by a dozen countries. Heck, Canada might have gotten into the action because a teenager would have run the country. Quayle once got into a fight with a fictional character, Murphy Brown, a woman who was a hard-charging journalist, and the decisions she made in her made-up life, including not having a child. To which Dan Quayle wagged his finger like a weirdo as a fighter for family values, and that, in fact, all fictional characters need to have children. The entire circumstance was weird.
We are slowly getting through the vice president rankings. Are you enjoying them? Did I rank these guys accurately?
I know that we haven’t even gotten to the guys we have never heard of – mostly because I need to read more about the guys we have never heard of. Then we will see if I got these rankings correct – but I’m feeling pretty confident at the moment.
As a reminder, I will be taking Monday off due to the Easter holiday. Happy Easter to you all, and thanks again for all your support.
Appreciate you all!
Okay,
Chris
You tend to meet people like this in Washington. I like the guy as well. Good people.
Who is Catholic. Just FYI.
Game Change in 2012 and the defeat of Sarah Palin
Have a good Easter!