Okay so this is the megameme going on everywhere right now, and it is a toughie... I'mna post my list right now, and then expand on the why later.
I'm limiting my list to people who have been americans for the majority of their lives, and not just as a recent thing (various canadian and british actotrs for example), and who have had the worst impact on us as a nation, or whos actions typified the worst there is about us as a society; not jsut individual psychopaths or mass murderers.
10. J. Edgar Hoover: He almost singlehandedly created the worst elements of the law enforcement culture we have today, took actions that were harmful to the country simply because they increased his own personal pwer; and acted asan unelected legislator through the use of blackmail and dirty tricks
9. Rachael Carson: She created the modern environmental hysteria movement out of whole cloth.
8. Joseph McCarthy: Never has a man been so wrong, while being right. Through the most vile and despicable tactics he destroyed the anti-communist movement.
7. Alan Dulles: If it were not for the excesses of Dulles, Hoover could never have gotten away with what he did, nor would there have been a church comittee, and ultimately I doubt there would have been a 9/11.
6. Walter Cronkite: Two Words, Tet Offensive. Is that all? Hell no, but it symbolizes the damage he did, and the actions he legitimized.
5. Gloria Steinem: She was the chief propagandists for the myth of having it all, which is half of what is destroying our country
4. Richard Nixon: In destroying himself, he both destroyed the presidency, and enabled the rise of unchecked media power in those that followed Cronkite, Woodward, and Bernstein
3. Jimmy Carter: Another couple of words (three this time), Operation Eagle Claw. Again this is a mere tiny symbol of the true damage he did.
2. Lyndon Baines Johnson: The single worst president of the United States, and the president to do the most damage by far. The great society, the viet nam war, and the political double dealing all combined to nearly destroy our country. It only took Nixon and Carter to damn near finish the job as the natural progression. The reprecussions of these things are rippling through our society as I write this, and will continue to do so for generations to come.
1. John Dewey: He created and specifically designed the modern public education system to create good liettle ignorant socialist conformists; and that's exactly what we're getting out of it.
The problem with making this a list of individuals, is that in some cases there is an entire group that must be held responsible, for example I cannot blame FDR entirely for the new deal and the social security act etc... but I must blame all of congress, and the American people of the time for acquiescing.
