1 00:00:16,800 --> 00:00:20,380 There have been 42 Presidents of the United States. 2 00:00:20,380 --> 00:00:21,900 Some touched by greatness. 3 00:00:21,900 --> 00:00:26,860 The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. 4 00:00:27,900 --> 00:00:30,700 Others remembered as failures. 5 00:00:30,700 --> 00:00:35,060 There can be no whitewash at the White House. 6 00:00:35,060 --> 00:00:40,100 What makes the difference? What is the secret of Presidential success? 7 00:00:40,220 --> 00:00:42,660 For those seeking the White House, 8 00:00:42,660 --> 00:00:46,900 what lessons does the past offer for How To Be A Good President? 9 00:01:01,660 --> 00:01:06,220 The British have long been fascinated by the Americans. 10 00:01:06,220 --> 00:01:08,100 We even have a museum dedicated to them. 11 00:01:08,100 --> 00:01:10,380 Perched on a hill near Bath, 12 00:01:10,380 --> 00:01:15,420 the American Museum aims to deepen our understanding of the United States. 13 00:01:16,540 --> 00:01:20,340 But there's one part of the American setup we struggle to understand - 14 00:01:20,340 --> 00:01:21,420 the Presidency. 15 00:01:21,420 --> 00:01:25,380 We have nothing quite like it, and the role is hardly straightforward. 16 00:01:25,380 --> 00:01:27,820 The demands on it are evolving all the time. 17 00:01:27,820 --> 00:01:31,300 That's especially tricky for the people who have to do the job. 18 00:01:31,300 --> 00:01:34,700 It's been said the presidency is now so complicated, 19 00:01:34,700 --> 00:01:36,180 nobody can do it well. 20 00:01:36,180 --> 00:01:39,180 Nevertheless, some have been much better than others. 21 00:01:39,180 --> 00:01:42,860 Who have been the effective ones, and who found wanting? 22 00:01:42,860 --> 00:01:45,140 What are the qualities that count? 23 00:01:45,140 --> 00:01:48,180 That's a question that matters to Americans, of course, 24 00:01:48,180 --> 00:01:50,100 but given America's role in the world, 25 00:01:50,100 --> 00:01:51,620 it matters to the rest of us. 26 00:01:54,180 --> 00:01:58,620 We've asked 11 experts to choose a president each, 27 00:01:58,620 --> 00:02:03,580 describing the strengths they brought to the Oval Office. 28 00:02:11,060 --> 00:02:14,460 First up, Theodore Roosevelt. 29 00:02:14,460 --> 00:02:18,020 At 42, the youngest ever President of the United States. 30 00:02:18,020 --> 00:02:22,580 Among his achievements, the Panama Canal and a Nobel Peace Prize. 31 00:02:22,580 --> 00:02:26,060 He was also an environmental trailblazer, 32 00:02:26,060 --> 00:02:31,100 placing 230 million acres of countryside under Federal protection. 33 00:02:31,500 --> 00:02:35,540 # Oh give me land Lots of land 34 00:02:35,540 --> 00:02:38,500 # Under starry skies above 35 00:02:38,500 --> 00:02:42,500 # Don't fence me in... # 36 00:02:42,500 --> 00:02:47,460 His concerns about America's natural heritage about the land, 37 00:02:47,460 --> 00:02:50,140 the wide open spaces, are central to him 38 00:02:50,140 --> 00:02:55,180 because they reveal his feelings about the way human societies have to live in the world 39 00:02:57,380 --> 00:03:00,100 over which they have stewardship. 40 00:03:00,100 --> 00:03:01,900 It was a very modern idea, in fact. 41 00:03:01,900 --> 00:03:06,900 Also they reveal his belief that a president can do things. 42 00:03:07,940 --> 00:03:10,620 "I can establish a national park. 43 00:03:10,620 --> 00:03:15,700 "I can make sure this is some sort of sanctuary that is never despoiled." 44 00:03:16,300 --> 00:03:21,020 So, on the one hand, he was able to kindle in many Americans 45 00:03:21,020 --> 00:03:25,180 a sense that they lived in a place of precious beauty. 46 00:03:25,180 --> 00:03:26,860 And at the same time to say, 47 00:03:26,860 --> 00:03:30,860 "Look if there's one thing I can do, I've been elected here, this is it. 48 00:03:30,860 --> 00:03:34,540 "I'm going to leave this country in a better state than I found it." 49 00:03:40,540 --> 00:03:44,540 He believed that what the presidency was, 50 00:03:44,540 --> 00:03:48,340 was an opportunity to lead and persuade. 51 00:03:48,340 --> 00:03:51,620 He talked about daring to fail greatly. 52 00:03:51,620 --> 00:03:54,300 And that's what made him, I think, 53 00:03:54,300 --> 00:03:59,140 one of the most remarkable presidents either of the 19th century or the 20th. 54 00:03:59,140 --> 00:04:04,220 By all accounts he was an absolutely entrancing figure. 55 00:04:05,460 --> 00:04:10,540 He was big, he was ebullient, effervescent. 56 00:04:11,180 --> 00:04:15,820 He was a president who understood that the ways of communicating with your people 57 00:04:15,820 --> 00:04:17,700 were changing very, very fast, 58 00:04:17,700 --> 00:04:20,300 and they were becoming much more complicated. 59 00:04:20,300 --> 00:04:23,540 But they were also becoming rather more enticing. 60 00:04:23,540 --> 00:04:28,540 It was a society alive with commentary and news. 61 00:04:28,820 --> 00:04:33,020 And of course that's what he adored. He enjoyed speaking, meeting people, 62 00:04:33,020 --> 00:04:36,700 pressing the flesh, going on trains across the country 63 00:04:36,700 --> 00:04:38,260 and all the rest of it. 64 00:04:38,260 --> 00:04:42,100 And it fitted his personality like a glove. 65 00:04:47,380 --> 00:04:52,380 I think he was a great president because what he demonstrated 66 00:04:52,500 --> 00:04:56,500 was that a serious office needs serious people. 67 00:04:56,500 --> 00:05:01,260 He was a big man, not just in physique 68 00:05:01,260 --> 00:05:04,820 but in brain and in emotion. 69 00:05:04,820 --> 00:05:08,540 And I think that what he showed was that those qualities 70 00:05:08,540 --> 00:05:09,820 are of the essence. 71 00:05:09,820 --> 00:05:13,100 Doesn't mean you won't make mistakes or take a wrong turning. 72 00:05:13,100 --> 00:05:16,140 If you don't have that you're not big enough for the job. 73 00:05:24,300 --> 00:05:28,780 It's worth remembering that the President is not a glorified Prime Minister. 74 00:05:28,780 --> 00:05:30,700 The job is completely different. 75 00:05:30,700 --> 00:05:32,540 For one thing, he's head of state. 76 00:05:32,540 --> 00:05:36,660 His office is meant to be above petty partisan politics. 77 00:05:36,660 --> 00:05:40,300 Its symbols, the White House or Air Force One, 78 00:05:40,300 --> 00:05:42,900 are symbols of America itself. 79 00:05:42,900 --> 00:05:44,340 But here's the paradox. 80 00:05:44,340 --> 00:05:48,820 We may call the President of the United States the "most powerful man in the world" 81 00:05:48,820 --> 00:05:50,940 but he can have less direct power, 82 00:05:50,940 --> 00:05:55,620 especially over domestic policy, than even his British counterpart. 83 00:05:55,620 --> 00:05:57,660 In Britain, a new Prime Minister 84 00:05:57,660 --> 00:06:01,380 commands a majority in the House of Commons. By definition. 85 00:06:01,380 --> 00:06:04,580 He has party whips to keep his MPs in line. 86 00:06:04,580 --> 00:06:07,460 But a new president can face hostile majorities 87 00:06:07,460 --> 00:06:09,740 in both Houses Of Congress. 88 00:06:09,740 --> 00:06:13,420 Those senators and congressmen are elected separately from him. 89 00:06:13,420 --> 00:06:15,220 They owe him nothing. 90 00:06:15,220 --> 00:06:19,340 As a result, even members of the president's own party 91 00:06:19,340 --> 00:06:22,580 can feel no obligation to follow his lead. 92 00:06:25,420 --> 00:06:30,420 For Theodore Roosevelt, that meant relying on what he called the "bully pulpit", 93 00:06:30,420 --> 00:06:33,940 preaching his message directly to the American people. 94 00:06:33,940 --> 00:06:38,980 If you could get the public on side, the politicians would soon follow. 95 00:06:42,260 --> 00:06:44,180 Theodore's distant cousin, 96 00:06:44,180 --> 00:06:48,140 Franklin D Roosevelt, was a master of persuasion. 97 00:06:48,140 --> 00:06:53,220 It looks, my friends, like a real landslide this time. 98 00:06:55,820 --> 00:07:00,180 Franklin Roosevelt became President of the United States 99 00:07:00,180 --> 00:07:04,420 in March of 1933, in the absolute depths of the great recession 100 00:07:04,420 --> 00:07:07,460 following the great Wall Street crash of 1929, 101 00:07:07,460 --> 00:07:09,620 millions of people unemployed. 102 00:07:09,620 --> 00:07:13,780 Despair, poverty. 103 00:07:13,780 --> 00:07:15,500 'At his family home in Hyde Park, 104 00:07:15,500 --> 00:07:19,340 'President Roosevelt received the congratulations of his fellow townsmen.' 105 00:07:24,980 --> 00:07:28,220 He came from this immensely patrician New York family 106 00:07:28,220 --> 00:07:30,300 and he had been reared, as it were, 107 00:07:30,300 --> 00:07:32,780 with every privilege and self confidence 108 00:07:32,780 --> 00:07:36,500 that came from that advantage of education and that, no doubt, 109 00:07:36,500 --> 00:07:38,740 helped him not to be scared of anybody. 110 00:07:38,740 --> 00:07:43,780 'The banks closed. President Roosevelt taking financial measures against the Depression. 111 00:07:44,460 --> 00:07:48,420 'Social security founded as he instituted a series of New Deal reforms.' 112 00:07:48,420 --> 00:07:53,420 Our capacity is limited only by our ability to work together. 113 00:07:54,260 --> 00:07:59,060 What is needed is the will. I propose to sail ahead. 114 00:07:59,060 --> 00:08:04,100 I feel sure that your hopes and your help are with me. 115 00:08:06,180 --> 00:08:10,340 For to reach a port, we must sail. 116 00:08:10,340 --> 00:08:12,780 Sail, not lie at anchor. 117 00:08:12,780 --> 00:08:16,220 Sail, not drift. 118 00:08:16,220 --> 00:08:21,180 Well, I think he understood that in order to fight the Depression 119 00:08:26,540 --> 00:08:30,500 the big vested interests of the American economy. 120 00:08:30,500 --> 00:08:35,500 It is cruel that the toes of some people are being stepped on 121 00:08:35,820 --> 00:08:38,660 and are going to be stepped on. 122 00:08:38,660 --> 00:08:42,700 But these toes belong to the comparative few. 123 00:08:42,700 --> 00:08:45,340 I mean he made himself fantastically unpopular. 124 00:08:45,340 --> 00:08:50,380 He was hated by American Conservatives during his time 125 00:08:50,460 --> 00:08:53,700 with a degree of hostility that is hard to comprehend. 126 00:08:53,700 --> 00:08:58,780 This was a politician absolutely embattled in the rigours 127 00:09:02,580 --> 00:09:07,500 and, if you like dirty work, of hard politics with ruthless opponents. 128 00:09:22,420 --> 00:09:25,980 For me, Franklin Roosevelt was undoubtedly the greatest president 129 00:09:25,980 --> 00:09:30,300 of the 20th century, perhaps of any American century. 130 00:09:30,300 --> 00:09:33,100 He confronted the two great challenges, 131 00:09:33,100 --> 00:09:37,180 two greatest challenges, in my opinion, of American history 132 00:09:37,180 --> 00:09:39,500 the Great Depression, and Adolf Hitler. 133 00:09:42,780 --> 00:09:45,700 And it was a crisis of confidence, 134 00:09:45,700 --> 00:09:49,980 a crisis of self-confidence, of a whole country. 135 00:09:49,980 --> 00:09:54,860 And his overriding gift and genius as a leader 136 00:09:54,860 --> 00:09:57,700 was to be able to find the words 137 00:09:57,700 --> 00:10:02,780 and the body language, and the style 138 00:10:05,220 --> 00:10:08,940 which the United States for a while seemed to have lost. 139 00:10:08,940 --> 00:10:13,940 First of all, let me assert my firm belief 140 00:10:13,940 --> 00:10:18,980 that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. 141 00:10:19,940 --> 00:10:23,260 So, I think the name of Franklin Roosevelt 142 00:10:23,260 --> 00:10:27,300 will ring down the centuries for a very long time to come, 143 00:10:27,300 --> 00:10:31,140 as long as the history of the United States is written. 144 00:10:37,500 --> 00:10:41,100 After FDR, the job was never the same again. 145 00:10:41,100 --> 00:10:44,380 Historians speak of the Imperial Presidency - 146 00:10:44,380 --> 00:10:46,980 a larger, more muscular institution 147 00:10:46,980 --> 00:10:50,860 that saw itself as responsible for managing the economy 148 00:10:50,860 --> 00:10:52,740 or providing for the poor. 149 00:10:52,740 --> 00:10:55,700 That expansion of the executive endured, 150 00:10:55,700 --> 00:10:59,020 and the presidency itself has only got larger. 151 00:10:59,020 --> 00:11:00,380 When Roosevelt died, 152 00:11:00,380 --> 00:11:04,380 the weight of that great office descended on his Vice President, 153 00:11:04,380 --> 00:11:09,420 a man who would demonstrate the value of political modesty. 154 00:11:09,420 --> 00:11:14,260 Tragic fate has thrust upon us grave responsibilities. 155 00:11:14,260 --> 00:11:16,260 We must carry on. 156 00:11:16,260 --> 00:11:19,540 APPLAUSE 157 00:11:19,540 --> 00:11:21,500 I think Truman is the perfect example 158 00:11:21,500 --> 00:11:24,540 of somebody who is underrated before he becomes president. 159 00:11:24,540 --> 00:11:29,540 One of the very first things that happens was the bombing of Japan. 160 00:11:32,820 --> 00:11:34,700 And that was regarded, I think, 161 00:11:34,700 --> 00:11:36,900 as extraordinarily controversial to this day. 162 00:11:36,900 --> 00:11:39,100 People still ask whether it was really necessary. 163 00:11:39,100 --> 00:11:41,020 Truman was driven by fear 164 00:11:41,020 --> 00:11:45,580 of what was expected to be huge casualties among Allied troops 165 00:11:45,580 --> 00:11:47,580 if they attempted to invade mainland Japan. 166 00:11:47,580 --> 00:11:49,420 I think to this day we simply don't know. 167 00:11:49,420 --> 00:11:53,060 As a result of that, Truman became very, very determined 168 00:11:53,060 --> 00:11:55,940 to try to avoid war if he possibly could. 169 00:11:55,940 --> 00:11:58,580 So, the next major threat came in 1948, 170 00:11:58,580 --> 00:12:01,220 when the Russians blockaded Berlin.... 171 00:12:01,220 --> 00:12:03,260 'Berlin becomes a city of darkness 172 00:12:03,260 --> 00:12:08,260 'as all ground communication is severed and industry comes to a standstill.' 173 00:12:08,260 --> 00:12:11,660 Don't forget this is three years after the end of the Second World War 174 00:12:11,660 --> 00:12:15,580 and here is the single largest army on the surface of the globe. 175 00:12:15,580 --> 00:12:20,140 Truman was offered several options, one of which was to do nothing, 176 00:12:20,140 --> 00:12:24,900 the second of which was to start a Third World War with the Soviet Union, 177 00:12:24,900 --> 00:12:27,580 and the other one of which he thought up himself, 178 00:12:27,580 --> 00:12:32,260 and that was the breaking of that blockade by the most astonishing airlift. 179 00:12:40,180 --> 00:12:42,820 Which went on for some six months or more, 180 00:12:42,820 --> 00:12:46,100 conducted mainly by the United States and the British air forces, 181 00:12:46,100 --> 00:12:49,540 which brought enough food and materials into Berlin to keep it alive 182 00:12:49,540 --> 00:12:53,900 month after month until, after six months, the Russians finally lifted the blockade. 183 00:12:53,900 --> 00:12:56,460 'The blockade of Berlin is due to end, 184 00:12:56,460 --> 00:12:59,780 'as crowds gather at the Russian-British frontier.' 185 00:13:03,100 --> 00:13:07,660 It was a brilliant way of showing that you can have a huge challenge and deal with it, 186 00:13:07,660 --> 00:13:10,180 without the obvious ways of military force. 187 00:13:13,660 --> 00:13:17,340 'President Truman signs the bill that puts the Marshall aid plan into operation.' 188 00:13:17,340 --> 00:13:21,380 'American resources, machinery, food, necessities, 189 00:13:21,380 --> 00:13:24,580 'to back up countries on the side of freedom.' 190 00:13:24,580 --> 00:13:28,420 His greatest up, probably his greatest single achievement, 191 00:13:28,420 --> 00:13:30,940 was the launching of the Marshall plan. 192 00:13:30,940 --> 00:13:34,540 Now, two things a new president could learn from that. 193 00:13:34,540 --> 00:13:39,540 One was that Truman deliberately did not take credit for it much of the time. 194 00:13:39,540 --> 00:13:44,540 He left Marshall, the great war hero of the Second World War in the United States, 195 00:13:44,540 --> 00:13:47,820 to take the lead in the selling of the Marshall plan. 196 00:13:47,820 --> 00:13:52,740 And because Marshall was close to being godlike in the United States at that time, 197 00:13:52,740 --> 00:13:56,540 there was far less opposition to the Marshall plan than one might have expected. 198 00:13:58,100 --> 00:14:00,740 So that, I think, is chalked up to Truman's credit 199 00:14:00,740 --> 00:14:03,580 and it shows the astonishing capacity of a man 200 00:14:03,580 --> 00:14:07,300 who is more modest than his actual talents deserve him to be. 201 00:14:07,300 --> 00:14:10,660 Without a doubt, the Marshall plan can be described 202 00:14:10,660 --> 00:14:13,500 as the great peacetime victory of the Western World 203 00:14:13,500 --> 00:14:16,100 and particularly the recovery of Western Europe. 204 00:14:16,100 --> 00:14:18,860 'Parading with old-time comrades, 205 00:14:18,860 --> 00:14:23,900 'veterans of the 35th Division with whom young Harry Truman served in France 206 00:14:24,340 --> 00:14:26,300 'in the First World War...' 207 00:14:26,300 --> 00:14:28,860 He is then faced with the certainty all over America 208 00:14:28,860 --> 00:14:30,260 he's going to be defeated. 209 00:14:30,260 --> 00:14:32,300 His Gallup Poll readings are low, 210 00:14:32,300 --> 00:14:34,900 and he goes into election with the absolute assumption 211 00:14:34,900 --> 00:14:37,860 from all corners of the United States, that he's going to lose. 212 00:14:37,860 --> 00:14:42,620 'I want to say to you, that for the next four years 213 00:14:42,620 --> 00:14:46,700 'there'll be a Democrat in the White House, and you're looking at him.' 214 00:14:46,700 --> 00:14:49,140 CHEERING 215 00:14:49,140 --> 00:14:50,700 He campaigns vigorously, 216 00:14:50,700 --> 00:14:53,500 nobody else believes in him but he believes in himself. 217 00:14:53,500 --> 00:14:57,060 He goes on talking like somebody who's going to be the next President, 218 00:14:57,060 --> 00:15:01,140 the newspapers go on talking like somebody who knows that Dewey will be the next President, 219 00:15:01,140 --> 00:15:06,140 to the actually extraordinary point that the Chicago Tribune carried a headline which said, "Dewey wins" 220 00:15:07,060 --> 00:15:10,300 the very night that Truman won, and won by a fair majority. 221 00:15:10,300 --> 00:15:13,140 'Came home from his great victory with Vice President Barclay. 222 00:15:13,140 --> 00:15:16,100 'Washington turned out in its hundreds of thousands to welcome him.' 223 00:15:16,100 --> 00:15:17,620 But what does it all add up to? 224 00:15:17,620 --> 00:15:22,060 One is that if you let other people take the credit you can do an amazing amount, 225 00:15:22,060 --> 00:15:27,060 you should never be a slave to the polls, as those two examples show very clearly. 226 00:15:27,340 --> 00:15:32,420 And thirdly, you have to have the ability to ride with and then dominate events, 227 00:15:32,660 --> 00:15:36,740 and the events that, as it were, besieged Truman's period as President 228 00:15:36,740 --> 00:15:40,860 were, by any standards, extraordinary in their scale and their threat, 229 00:15:40,860 --> 00:15:44,260 and therefore, I think one can say that he was actually, 230 00:15:44,260 --> 00:15:48,740 modest though he was, underestimated though he was, quite a great President. 231 00:15:56,380 --> 00:15:59,420 Of course, a President, like any politician, 232 00:15:59,420 --> 00:16:01,420 is at the mercy of events. 233 00:16:03,820 --> 00:16:07,780 'It's weary business chasing Red bandits and liberating a country 234 00:16:07,780 --> 00:16:10,420 'whose only wish is freedom from aggression.' 235 00:16:10,420 --> 00:16:11,660 During the Cold War, 236 00:16:11,660 --> 00:16:15,500 Americans looked to the man in the White House to be their protector. 237 00:16:15,500 --> 00:16:20,500 Steady in the face of danger from abroad, pragmatic at home. 238 00:16:21,020 --> 00:16:24,340 'When the ballots had been counted and the nation had spoken, 239 00:16:24,340 --> 00:16:27,060 'General Ike rolled up a majority of six million votes 240 00:16:27,060 --> 00:16:28,780 'over his Democratic opponent. 241 00:16:28,780 --> 00:16:32,140 'After 20 years, the administration had changed hands 242 00:16:32,140 --> 00:16:36,660 'and the public met its new President and the incoming First Lady of the land.' 243 00:16:36,660 --> 00:16:39,740 The key point about Eisenhower is this - 244 00:16:39,740 --> 00:16:44,100 he is probably the most underestimated of all the Presidents 245 00:16:44,100 --> 00:16:46,500 in the entire American history. 246 00:16:46,500 --> 00:16:50,540 He is portrayed and seen as a bland, 247 00:16:50,540 --> 00:16:54,380 rather aimless President, 248 00:16:54,380 --> 00:16:57,620 but he brought extraordinary qualities to the job 249 00:16:57,620 --> 00:17:00,380 which are only now properly appreciated. 250 00:17:00,380 --> 00:17:03,740 # Straight down the middle 251 00:17:03,740 --> 00:17:06,060 # It went straight down the middle... # 252 00:17:06,060 --> 00:17:10,300 Eisenhower wasn't a political machinator. 253 00:17:10,300 --> 00:17:13,300 Moderation in all things is not quite the description, 254 00:17:13,300 --> 00:17:16,020 but he was constantly seeking for the Golden Mean. 255 00:17:16,020 --> 00:17:21,060 # It went straight down the middle like they said... # 256 00:17:21,300 --> 00:17:24,500 The key factor throughout his entire career 257 00:17:24,500 --> 00:17:26,900 was that he was non-ideological. 258 00:17:26,900 --> 00:17:31,340 He was extraordinarily pragmatic, in the very best American sense. 259 00:17:31,340 --> 00:17:34,780 He'd grown up in that kind of environment of pragmatism, 260 00:17:34,780 --> 00:17:37,780 independence and had learned to respect that in the army. 261 00:17:37,780 --> 00:17:41,300 You can't get by on ideology in the army. 262 00:17:41,300 --> 00:17:43,020 You get by on things that work, 263 00:17:43,020 --> 00:17:45,380 so he brought that attitude to the presidency. 264 00:17:47,940 --> 00:17:51,140 'Little Rock, Arkansas, and the first phase of the trouble. 265 00:17:51,140 --> 00:17:54,060 'The white population are determined to prevent coloured students 266 00:17:54,060 --> 00:17:56,260 'from going to the school their own children attend. 267 00:17:56,260 --> 00:18:00,300 'Any coloured person anywhere near the school came in for violent abuse. 268 00:18:00,300 --> 00:18:03,540 'President Eisenhower sends 500 troops to keep order 269 00:18:03,540 --> 00:18:06,340 'and to see that the law of the land is obeyed.' 270 00:18:06,340 --> 00:18:10,300 The first great racial crisis at Little Rock, 271 00:18:10,300 --> 00:18:13,980 I was in the South at the time. 272 00:18:13,980 --> 00:18:16,100 It was a tinderbox. 273 00:18:16,100 --> 00:18:17,820 There was no question about it, 274 00:18:17,820 --> 00:18:21,620 that the blacks were being discriminated against and brutally treated. 275 00:18:21,620 --> 00:18:26,620 You could have easily had something like a second civil war in the South 276 00:18:26,860 --> 00:18:30,820 if the pressure on the bigoted, entrenched whites 277 00:18:30,820 --> 00:18:34,820 who feared what was happening, had been too intense. 278 00:18:34,820 --> 00:18:37,660 So, in a sense, he fudged it politically, 279 00:18:37,660 --> 00:18:40,100 but I think it was good to do that. 280 00:18:40,100 --> 00:18:43,100 Leadership is a word and a concept 281 00:18:43,100 --> 00:18:47,220 that's been more argued than almost any other I know. 282 00:18:47,220 --> 00:18:50,300 I am not one of the desk-pounding types 283 00:18:50,300 --> 00:18:55,340 that likes to stick out his jaw and look like he is bossing the show. 284 00:18:55,660 --> 00:18:59,700 I would far rather get behind and, recognising the frailties 285 00:18:59,700 --> 00:19:02,220 and the requirements of human nature, 286 00:19:02,220 --> 00:19:05,300 I would rather try to persuade a man to go along. 287 00:19:05,300 --> 00:19:07,980 Because once I've persuaded him, he'll stick. 288 00:19:07,980 --> 00:19:11,900 If I scare him, he'll stay just as long as he's scared, and then he's gone. 289 00:19:11,900 --> 00:19:14,340 The important thing about Eisenhower 290 00:19:14,340 --> 00:19:16,900 is not to be confused by the public image, 291 00:19:16,900 --> 00:19:20,340 which was a benign, importantly benign, public image. 292 00:19:20,340 --> 00:19:23,780 Privately, he was enormously shrewd and visionary, too. 293 00:19:23,780 --> 00:19:27,220 I mean, you think of the Cold War, what could have happened. 294 00:19:27,220 --> 00:19:30,260 'The suspenseful moment when East and West meet 295 00:19:30,260 --> 00:19:34,780 'in the form of the Eisenhower-Khrushchev venture into personal diplomacy.' 296 00:19:34,780 --> 00:19:39,820 So, Eisenhower could see there was no point in getting into a war with the Soviet Union, 297 00:19:40,740 --> 00:19:43,100 so he didn't do any vainglorious gestures, 298 00:19:43,100 --> 00:19:46,740 but quietly he tried to work on peaceful aspects 299 00:19:46,740 --> 00:19:50,740 where there could be a communion of common interests 300 00:19:50,740 --> 00:19:53,660 between the Soviet Union and the West. 301 00:19:53,660 --> 00:19:58,740 I'm looking forward to the talks we will have together. 302 00:20:02,180 --> 00:20:06,900 to stick to maintaining America's defence without being provocative. 303 00:20:06,900 --> 00:20:11,940 I trust that a full and frank exchange of views on many subjects 304 00:20:12,500 --> 00:20:17,220 may contribute to better understanding on both sides 305 00:20:17,220 --> 00:20:20,900 of unresolved international questions. 306 00:20:25,980 --> 00:20:29,980 I think that the ability to inspire the American people, 307 00:20:29,980 --> 00:20:34,100 that they were going somewhere in the right direction, 308 00:20:34,100 --> 00:20:39,140 and that their ideals of fairness, equality and of peace meant something. 309 00:20:39,620 --> 00:20:43,820 And maintaining peace in a dangerous and hostile world, 310 00:20:43,820 --> 00:20:47,300 are things through which whoever is President 311 00:20:47,300 --> 00:20:50,100 must draw sustenance from the way Eisenhower did it. 312 00:20:50,100 --> 00:20:54,180 # God bless America 313 00:20:54,180 --> 00:20:59,260 # My home sweet home. # 314 00:21:10,860 --> 00:21:14,260 Some political skills are truly indispensable. 315 00:21:14,260 --> 00:21:16,500 Before you can be a great President, 316 00:21:16,500 --> 00:21:18,940 you have to get the job in the first place, 317 00:21:18,940 --> 00:21:21,060 and that takes a talent for winning elections - 318 00:21:21,060 --> 00:21:23,460 even a gift for play-acting. 319 00:21:25,220 --> 00:21:30,220 It means seeming like an ordinary Joe, even as you claim extraordinary talents. 320 00:21:30,540 --> 00:21:35,100 You have to persuade Americans you could be their affable next door neighbour, 321 00:21:35,100 --> 00:21:38,420 the kind of guy they'd want at their barbecue sharing a beer. 322 00:21:38,420 --> 00:21:40,980 Add to that good looks, an easy manner 323 00:21:40,980 --> 00:21:43,940 and a glamorous partner, and you're made. 324 00:21:43,940 --> 00:21:46,900 # Everyone is voting for Jack 325 00:21:46,900 --> 00:21:50,580 # Cos he's got what all the rest lack 326 00:21:50,580 --> 00:21:53,940 # Everyone wants to back Jack 327 00:21:53,940 --> 00:21:56,620 # Jack is on the right track... # 328 00:21:56,620 --> 00:21:59,300 The man who had it all, the full package, 329 00:21:59,300 --> 00:22:01,460 was John Fitzgerald Kennedy. 330 00:22:01,460 --> 00:22:06,500 When this little-known Senator ran against Eisenhower's sitting Vice President, Richard Nixon, 331 00:22:07,060 --> 00:22:08,820 the contrast was remarkable. 332 00:22:11,620 --> 00:22:14,180 Like everybody else, I was hugely influenced 333 00:22:14,180 --> 00:22:15,700 by this charismatic figure 334 00:22:15,700 --> 00:22:18,620 who seemed to offer tremendous hope for the future. 335 00:22:18,620 --> 00:22:22,020 Here was a man who recognised the importance of television, 336 00:22:22,020 --> 00:22:24,580 recognised the importance of the media 337 00:22:24,580 --> 00:22:27,420 and was able to exploit that dramatically, 338 00:22:27,420 --> 00:22:30,660 assisted by his good looks, his physical presence, 339 00:22:30,660 --> 00:22:32,540 and by his rhetorical skills. 340 00:22:32,540 --> 00:22:35,940 My fellow citizens of the world, 341 00:22:35,940 --> 00:22:40,940 ask not what America will do for you, 342 00:22:41,020 --> 00:22:45,060 but what together we can do for the freedom of man. 343 00:22:47,100 --> 00:22:49,260 People also wanted to be persuaded 344 00:22:49,260 --> 00:22:51,900 that this was really an exciting threshold, 345 00:22:51,900 --> 00:22:55,700 and not for just America, of course. There was the global impact as well. 346 00:22:55,700 --> 00:22:58,900 And that was the force of not only his personal charisma, 347 00:22:58,900 --> 00:23:01,740 but his charisma as transmitted through the media, 348 00:23:01,740 --> 00:23:05,180 and that wouldn't have been possible in a previous generation. 349 00:23:05,180 --> 00:23:09,260 'The evidence is incontrovertible. 350 00:23:09,260 --> 00:23:12,780 'Aerial cameras in American military reconnaissance planes 351 00:23:12,780 --> 00:23:14,620 'made remarkable photographs, 352 00:23:14,620 --> 00:23:17,980 'such as this one of a medium-range ballistic missile base 353 00:23:17,980 --> 00:23:21,260 'which documents the Soviet offensive build-up in Cuba.' 354 00:23:21,260 --> 00:23:23,820 It could have been the beginning of a nuclear holocaust. 355 00:23:23,820 --> 00:23:25,620 The World could have been destroyed 356 00:23:25,620 --> 00:23:28,700 in the days and weeks of the Cuban missile crisis. 357 00:23:28,700 --> 00:23:30,980 I don't think that's being alarmist. 358 00:23:32,620 --> 00:23:36,060 The President is surrounded by advisers, 359 00:23:36,060 --> 00:23:38,940 and a lot of the advice he was getting 360 00:23:38,940 --> 00:23:43,980 was calling for strikes against the Soviet missiles within Cuba, 361 00:23:44,380 --> 00:23:47,860 to just destroy them rather than have a diplomatic solution. 362 00:23:47,860 --> 00:23:50,220 Kennedy came to the conclusion that, 363 00:23:50,220 --> 00:23:52,740 while you could not rule out a missile strike 364 00:23:52,740 --> 00:23:54,580 against the Soviet missiles, 365 00:23:54,580 --> 00:23:56,620 that would have to be a last resort 366 00:23:56,620 --> 00:23:59,540 if the diplomatic options were getting nowhere. 367 00:23:59,540 --> 00:24:01,300 So the decision to go for a blockade, 368 00:24:01,300 --> 00:24:05,700 to actually blockade Cuba, to make sure that no new missiles could be brought to the island, 369 00:24:05,700 --> 00:24:09,580 that ultimately did the trick in a non-violent way, 370 00:24:09,580 --> 00:24:12,620 and it is to Kennedy's credit that he overruled advice 371 00:24:12,620 --> 00:24:16,500 even from within his administration and realised that their advice, 372 00:24:16,500 --> 00:24:20,460 actually, was far more dangerous than the policy that he chose. 373 00:24:20,460 --> 00:24:25,020 And it's not just that he delivered a good result or the right result. 374 00:24:25,020 --> 00:24:27,380 the way in which that result was processed, 375 00:24:27,380 --> 00:24:30,420 The way in which decisions were reached in Washington, 376 00:24:30,420 --> 00:24:35,380 owes a considerable amount to Kennedy's statesmanlike qualities. 377 00:24:35,380 --> 00:24:39,340 CROWD: We want Kennedy! We want Kennedy! 378 00:24:39,340 --> 00:24:41,780 We want Kennedy! 379 00:24:41,780 --> 00:24:44,500 This is a crucial question both in the United States and the UK 380 00:24:44,500 --> 00:24:46,940 - what do the public want from their political leaders? 381 00:24:46,940 --> 00:24:51,260 And so you can have Presidents or Prime Ministers who have great intellectual ability, 382 00:24:51,260 --> 00:24:54,620 but if they don't have that ability to communicate and to inspire, 383 00:24:54,620 --> 00:24:56,700 then they will end up delivering far less. 384 00:24:56,700 --> 00:25:00,300 And Kennedy had that ability. 385 00:25:00,300 --> 00:25:03,980 It was most exercised in the sphere of international affairs, 386 00:25:03,980 --> 00:25:09,020 and the world was the better for it, as a result of his presidency. 387 00:25:09,340 --> 00:25:14,340 But I think that was the most powerful quality that he could exhibit. 388 00:25:25,460 --> 00:25:30,300 In November 1963, John F Kennedy was assassinated. 389 00:25:30,300 --> 00:25:35,340 A few hours later, Lyndon Johnson was sworn in as President aboard Air Force One. 390 00:25:39,940 --> 00:25:45,020 Of course, this was the most emotional takeover, probably, in the history of the United States. 391 00:25:45,780 --> 00:25:49,300 Kennedy shot, and then Lyndon Johnson having to take over, 392 00:25:49,300 --> 00:25:51,140 a very different character. 393 00:25:51,140 --> 00:25:52,900 So it was all very dramatic, 394 00:25:52,900 --> 00:25:55,820 and he must have felt such a mixture, I think, of emotions. 395 00:25:55,820 --> 00:26:00,900 How do you replace this mythical Kennedy name? 396 00:26:02,060 --> 00:26:07,180 All I have, I would have given gladly 397 00:26:07,460 --> 00:26:12,060 not to be standing here today. 398 00:26:12,060 --> 00:26:15,380 And I don't think he's had the credit that he's due 399 00:26:15,380 --> 00:26:20,420 for much of the inspirational stuff that has come out of the United States. 400 00:26:22,220 --> 00:26:27,260 For some reason, the Kennedys have always been credited with it 401 00:26:30,220 --> 00:26:33,900 'Mr Johnson proposes an education programme that will ensure every American 402 00:26:33,900 --> 00:26:37,060 'full development of his mind and skills.' 403 00:26:37,060 --> 00:26:42,140 He had a vision, he called it his Vision of the Great Society. 404 00:26:42,540 --> 00:26:45,980 And what was remarkable about this Texan, you know, 405 00:26:45,980 --> 00:26:50,900 was that he was very aware the American Dream had not delivered 406 00:26:51,300 --> 00:26:56,380 for large swathes of the population - for the old, for blacks, for the poor. 407 00:26:58,100 --> 00:27:03,140 And he really deeply felt that America could not call itself great 408 00:27:04,220 --> 00:27:09,260 unless it had delivered to all these other sons and daughters. 409 00:27:10,220 --> 00:27:15,180 The new bill expands the 30-year-old social security programme to provide hospital care, 410 00:27:15,300 --> 00:27:18,500 nursing home care, home nursing service 411 00:27:18,500 --> 00:27:21,740 and out-patient treatment for those over 65. 412 00:27:21,740 --> 00:27:25,180 He passed legislation on Medicare. 413 00:27:25,180 --> 00:27:30,260 For the children of the poor, he had this amazing vision that they should be educated beyond their means. 414 00:27:35,380 --> 00:27:39,500 Congress passes the most sweeping Civil Rights Bill ever to be written into the law, 415 00:27:39,500 --> 00:27:42,900 and thus reaffirms the conception of equality 416 00:27:42,900 --> 00:27:47,060 for all men that began with Lincoln and the Civil War 100 years ago. 417 00:27:47,060 --> 00:27:52,060 Now, with the civil rights, where Kennedy had been promising blacks 418 00:27:53,060 --> 00:27:56,580 all sorts of things but really been playing political games, 419 00:27:56,580 --> 00:27:59,420 this big Texan decided time was ready, he'd do it. 420 00:27:59,420 --> 00:28:04,260 Because it's not just negroes but, really, it's all of us 421 00:28:04,260 --> 00:28:09,300 who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. 422 00:28:13,540 --> 00:28:17,700 The Kennedys talked and Johnson did. 423 00:28:17,700 --> 00:28:19,220 Remarkable! 424 00:28:21,940 --> 00:28:24,780 Johnson was not a very nice man. 425 00:28:24,780 --> 00:28:28,860 He was crude, he was rude, apparently he told filthy jokes. 426 00:28:28,860 --> 00:28:33,020 He arm twisted, sometimes physically, 427 00:28:33,020 --> 00:28:38,100 you know, kind of almost imposing his great physical presence on people. 428 00:28:38,100 --> 00:28:42,620 And he said... He said that he was a dominating personality 429 00:28:42,620 --> 00:28:46,100 who believed not in following public opinion 430 00:28:46,100 --> 00:28:49,500 but in making public opinion follow him. 431 00:28:52,020 --> 00:28:55,220 Doors open in 30 TG. In 30 TG. 432 00:29:00,620 --> 00:29:04,140 Johnson was one of those leaders 433 00:29:04,140 --> 00:29:07,620 who had incredible ideals, 434 00:29:07,620 --> 00:29:12,260 but also a totally misguided obsession about a war 435 00:29:12,260 --> 00:29:16,340 that he should have ended and instead chose to accelerate. 436 00:29:16,340 --> 00:29:20,060 # I got a letter from LBJ It said this is your lucky day 437 00:29:20,060 --> 00:29:22,860 # Time to put your khaki trousers on 438 00:29:22,860 --> 00:29:27,900 # We've got a job for you to do Dean Rusk has caught the Asian flu 439 00:29:27,900 --> 00:29:31,740 # And we are sending you to Vietnam... # 440 00:29:31,740 --> 00:29:36,740 think Vietnam was the most amazing... amazing, popular... 441 00:29:38,540 --> 00:29:43,540 anti-war movement that, probably, the world has ever seen. 442 00:29:44,100 --> 00:29:46,380 And he was helpless before it, in the end. 443 00:29:46,380 --> 00:29:50,620 And...and...he never recovered. 444 00:29:51,660 --> 00:29:54,540 I shall not seek 445 00:29:54,540 --> 00:29:56,620 and I will not accept 446 00:29:56,620 --> 00:30:01,620 the nomination of my party for another term as your President. 447 00:30:02,020 --> 00:30:05,700 I can think of no other President, post-war President, 448 00:30:05,700 --> 00:30:10,100 who pushed through so much legislation 449 00:30:10,100 --> 00:30:14,500 which has changed the way we think about equality, 450 00:30:14,500 --> 00:30:17,220 equal rights, human dignity. 451 00:30:17,220 --> 00:30:21,620 And I think that is a huge accolade 452 00:30:21,620 --> 00:30:25,700 for a politician and an American President. 453 00:30:25,700 --> 00:30:28,980 And I don't forgive him Vietnam, 454 00:30:28,980 --> 00:30:34,060 but I do think that one has to give him credit for what he has left behind, really, 455 00:30:35,020 --> 00:30:38,660 for the progressives of the world. 456 00:30:38,660 --> 00:30:41,740 # There's something happening here 457 00:30:41,740 --> 00:30:46,740 # But what it is ain't exactly clear 458 00:30:48,020 --> 00:30:51,340 # There's a man with a gun over there... # 459 00:30:51,340 --> 00:30:54,020 This is what the war in Vietnam is all about. 460 00:30:54,020 --> 00:30:57,660 The Marines have burned this old couple's cottage 461 00:30:57,660 --> 00:30:59,740 because fire was coming from here. 462 00:30:59,740 --> 00:31:03,860 Constitutionally, a President has a much tighter grip on foreign policy 463 00:31:03,860 --> 00:31:06,300 than he does on matters closer to home. 464 00:31:06,300 --> 00:31:09,020 A foreign policy triumph can transform 465 00:31:09,020 --> 00:31:14,100 a reputation, as both Truman and JFK proved. So foreign policy success 466 00:31:15,340 --> 00:31:18,580 books you a place among the presidential greats, right? 467 00:31:18,580 --> 00:31:20,700 Wrong. Take Richard Nixon. 468 00:31:20,700 --> 00:31:24,060 Before he came into office he set himself three goals - 469 00:31:24,060 --> 00:31:27,100 end the war in Vietnam, strike a balance of power 470 00:31:27,100 --> 00:31:30,820 with the Soviet Union and open up a relationship with China. 471 00:31:30,820 --> 00:31:35,820 He achieved all three, and yet Richard Nixon is remembered for Watergate. 472 00:31:36,500 --> 00:31:39,500 I think he came into consciousness 473 00:31:39,500 --> 00:31:43,420 when I was at university, and he was running for President. 474 00:31:43,420 --> 00:31:47,220 And our university professor said to us, 475 00:31:47,220 --> 00:31:50,220 "This man will bring disgrace on the presidency." 476 00:31:50,220 --> 00:31:54,780 And we were all just, you know, university kids, and we were sort of looking at each other 477 00:31:54,780 --> 00:31:57,820 thinking, "We know he's uncool, but is it worse than that?" 478 00:32:02,460 --> 00:32:07,100 There can be no whitewash at the White House. 479 00:32:12,140 --> 00:32:17,220 Nixon had a very lovely, authoritative voice. It was a familiar voice, as well. 480 00:32:17,860 --> 00:32:22,860 Ladies and gentlemen, I didn't realise so many of you would stay up so late. 481 00:32:29,420 --> 00:32:33,540 I mean, like Fat Tony mobster shady. 482 00:32:33,540 --> 00:32:37,780 He came across as uneasy in his skin. 483 00:32:37,780 --> 00:32:39,700 He came across as calculating. 484 00:32:39,700 --> 00:32:41,100 Why do I feel so deeply? 485 00:32:41,100 --> 00:32:45,540 Why do I feel that in spite of the smears, the misunderstanding, 486 00:32:45,540 --> 00:32:48,980 the necessity for a man to come up here and bare his soul as I have, 487 00:32:48,980 --> 00:32:52,340 why is it necessary for me to continue this fight? 488 00:32:52,340 --> 00:32:57,380 And I want to tell you why - because, you see, I love my country. 489 00:32:58,380 --> 00:33:02,780 But he had a wonderful speaking voice, so when you heard him on the radio, you'd listen to him 490 00:33:02,780 --> 00:33:04,820 and you thought, "That's my guy." 491 00:33:04,820 --> 00:33:09,860 The people who voted for him were the people who approved of McCarthyism. 492 00:33:10,700 --> 00:33:14,420 And I think maybe, in a way, the civil rights struggle, 493 00:33:14,420 --> 00:33:19,460 the anti-war struggle, the rise of women, the coming-of-age of these teenagers, 494 00:33:19,900 --> 00:33:24,940 I think it drove the nation to the arms of Richard Nixon, and so Richard Nixon represented stability. 495 00:33:26,060 --> 00:33:31,100 And they wanted to roll back the JFK, Lyndon Johnson, Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy years. 496 00:33:36,220 --> 00:33:39,620 It was those people saying, "We want our country back again." 497 00:33:39,620 --> 00:33:43,020 So let us pledge together, your Congress, 498 00:33:43,020 --> 00:33:48,100 our Congress, at the end of its term will be able to look back 499 00:33:52,540 --> 00:33:57,540 He'd been around a long, long time, and he'd worked his way up from the bottom. 500 00:33:58,420 --> 00:34:03,500 He was a guy who wasn't in JFK's money loop or looks or anything, you know? 501 00:34:05,380 --> 00:34:09,820 The typical loser who actually makes it. 502 00:34:09,820 --> 00:34:12,660 It's down to character. 503 00:34:12,660 --> 00:34:17,740 And if you wanna say anything, Nixon had stamina. He had stick-to-itness. 504 00:34:19,900 --> 00:34:23,660 he believed in himself, and that's what really kept him going. 505 00:34:23,660 --> 00:34:26,500 # Well, I won't back down 506 00:34:26,500 --> 00:34:28,340 # No, I won't back down... # 507 00:34:28,340 --> 00:34:33,380 I welcome this kind of examination, People have got to know whether or not their President's a crook. 508 00:34:33,900 --> 00:34:38,380 Well, I'm not a crook. I've earned everything I've got. 509 00:34:38,380 --> 00:34:43,420 And so, for me, in that sense, he strips away all the facade and the... 510 00:34:43,420 --> 00:34:47,020 the bamboozle of the American presidency and reveals 511 00:34:47,020 --> 00:34:51,540 its sort of sweaty, gritty kind of slog which you have to be 512 00:34:51,540 --> 00:34:54,740 to become President of the United States. 513 00:34:54,740 --> 00:34:56,940 You have to have enormous stamina. 514 00:34:56,940 --> 00:35:00,740 # ..No, I won't back down... # 515 00:35:01,820 --> 00:35:06,500 Of course, persistence was not enough to save Nixon from Watergate, 516 00:35:06,500 --> 00:35:09,300 with its political dirty tricks and cover-up, 517 00:35:09,300 --> 00:35:13,700 a scandal that eventually made him the first president ever to resign. 518 00:35:13,700 --> 00:35:18,260 After two years of Gerald Ford, 519 00:35:18,260 --> 00:35:23,300 the American public was desperate for a fresh start and for decency in the White House. 520 00:35:26,740 --> 00:35:31,460 This inauguration ceremony marks a new beginning. 521 00:35:31,460 --> 00:35:33,780 There's a time in the politics of every country 522 00:35:33,780 --> 00:35:36,860 when suddenly the electorate decides it wants a change. 523 00:35:36,860 --> 00:35:39,620 And it didn't take much leading in that direction 524 00:35:39,620 --> 00:35:41,900 once you'd had the Nixon presidency. 525 00:35:41,900 --> 00:35:45,860 People wanted someone as different from Nixon as you could be, 526 00:35:45,860 --> 00:35:49,860 someone open, who believed in the essential goodness of mankind, 527 00:35:49,860 --> 00:35:52,940 someone who wouldn't lie to the American people. 528 00:35:52,940 --> 00:35:57,700 Let us learn together, and laugh together, and work together 529 00:35:57,700 --> 00:36:02,780 and pray together, confident that in the end we will triumph together. 530 00:36:05,860 --> 00:36:09,540 One of his great problems was that he got to Washington and he thought, 531 00:36:09,540 --> 00:36:11,900 "Right, this place is full of devious, nasty, 532 00:36:11,900 --> 00:36:15,380 "conspiratorial scumbags," basically and, of course, he's right. 533 00:36:15,380 --> 00:36:19,220 But to be a successful president, you've got to deal with those people, 534 00:36:19,220 --> 00:36:21,940 and he was always unwilling to do that 535 00:36:21,940 --> 00:36:23,900 and he couldn't make friends. 536 00:36:26,380 --> 00:36:29,220 He'd get senators into the White House and he'd beg them 537 00:36:29,220 --> 00:36:31,980 to support some bill or other that he was promoting, 538 00:36:31,980 --> 00:36:34,460 and at the end he'd say, "Thank you. Goodbye." 539 00:36:34,460 --> 00:36:37,500 And they'd think, "Well, isn't he even gonna offer me a drink? 540 00:36:37,500 --> 00:36:42,300 "Isn't he even gonna share a few anecdotes with me or give me a few judgments on other politicians?" 541 00:36:42,300 --> 00:36:45,540 That's what they expect, that's the way Washington works. 542 00:36:45,540 --> 00:36:48,660 It works on the oil and grease of friendship and favours. 543 00:36:48,660 --> 00:36:51,660 Carter didn't want to play that game, which was in one way 544 00:36:51,660 --> 00:36:55,180 why he was so admirable and another reason why he failed so often. 545 00:36:55,180 --> 00:36:57,940 # Trouble 546 00:36:58,980 --> 00:37:01,500 # Trouble, trouble, trouble... # 547 00:37:01,500 --> 00:37:05,540 Petrol queues are a daily ordeal for millions of motorists, 548 00:37:05,540 --> 00:37:09,180 where the wait can last for up to five hours and are confronting 549 00:37:09,180 --> 00:37:12,940 Mr Carter with the greatest domestic crisis of his presidency. 550 00:37:12,940 --> 00:37:15,300 # ..Worry 551 00:37:16,500 --> 00:37:18,580 # Worry, worry, worry, worry... # 552 00:37:18,580 --> 00:37:21,380 Carter had all the vision and none of the competence, 553 00:37:21,380 --> 00:37:25,420 So, for example, when the Ayatollah went back to Iran, they seized 554 00:37:25,420 --> 00:37:30,460 the American embassy hostages, he sent an assault team to try and rescue them. 555 00:37:31,180 --> 00:37:36,220 Late yesterday, I cancelled a carefully planned operation which was under way in Iran 556 00:37:37,180 --> 00:37:42,180 to position our rescue team for later withdrawal of American hostages. 557 00:37:43,580 --> 00:37:47,340 A wonderful idea, the most daring rescue imaginable, 558 00:37:47,340 --> 00:37:49,100 but it was a complete failure. 559 00:37:49,100 --> 00:37:51,100 # ..Trouble 560 00:37:51,100 --> 00:37:56,100 # Oh, trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble... # 561 00:37:56,660 --> 00:37:59,140 He was famous for being obsessed by detail. 562 00:37:59,140 --> 00:38:03,420 And there's a famous story about a well-known New York Democrat, 563 00:38:03,420 --> 00:38:06,500 who had come to offer money to Carter for his campaign, 564 00:38:06,500 --> 00:38:10,060 who found him sitting at a desk with, up to his knees, 565 00:38:10,060 --> 00:38:15,100 thousands and thousands and thousands of pages of the US Air Force appropriations account, 566 00:38:16,660 --> 00:38:20,300 and Carter said proudly, "I've read every page." 567 00:38:20,300 --> 00:38:22,300 That's crazy. 568 00:38:22,300 --> 00:38:25,420 Presidents should worry about whether to spend 40 billion 569 00:38:25,420 --> 00:38:29,580 on developing a new Stealth fighter or 40 billion on a few new aircraft carriers, 570 00:38:29,580 --> 00:38:32,620 not worrying about the cost of appropriating Styrofoam cups. 571 00:38:32,620 --> 00:38:37,100 They came down from the mountain with Mr Begin and Mr Sadat reconciled. 572 00:38:37,100 --> 00:38:40,980 Although for a full nine days at Camp David, 573 00:38:40,980 --> 00:38:43,780 they hadn't negotiated face-to-face at all. 574 00:38:43,780 --> 00:38:48,780 They were led by their host to the East Room of the White House for a ceremony to mark a success 575 00:38:49,700 --> 00:38:54,740 which President Carter said had answered their prayers and been beyond any expectations. 576 00:38:54,740 --> 00:38:59,820 Camp David was a great success, of course. Probably only Carter, with his amazing goodwill 577 00:39:00,180 --> 00:39:05,180 and this sense he had that there was no argument so divisive that we needed to go to war on it, 578 00:39:06,180 --> 00:39:10,380 those things which were very, very close to the heart of Jimmy Carter. 579 00:39:10,380 --> 00:39:15,380 No getting away from it, his absolute belief in justice for mankind - 580 00:39:15,980 --> 00:39:20,060 that can't be taken away from him. Decency, honesty, hard work - all true. 581 00:39:20,060 --> 00:39:24,340 In the end, they proved, A, not enough and, B, sometimes too much. 582 00:39:24,340 --> 00:39:29,340 From the bottom of my heart, I want to express to you the gratitude I feel. 583 00:39:30,260 --> 00:39:35,220 Thank you, fellow citizens, and farewell. 584 00:39:36,100 --> 00:39:39,700 # Please don't talk about me when I'm gone 585 00:39:40,940 --> 00:39:44,460 # Ooh, baby Though our friendship ceases 586 00:39:44,460 --> 00:39:46,340 # From now on... # 587 00:39:47,420 --> 00:39:51,180 It's an exhausting business being president. It takes real stamina. 588 00:39:51,180 --> 00:39:55,260 Jimmy Carter used to schedule in 16 hours of work a day. 589 00:39:55,260 --> 00:40:00,300 LBJ's press secretary said there was no limit to how hard you could push a president. 590 00:40:00,460 --> 00:40:04,300 But are the hardest workers the highest achievers? 591 00:40:04,300 --> 00:40:08,420 Ronald Reagan took a famously relaxed approach. 592 00:40:08,420 --> 00:40:13,500 They say that by five o'clock in the afternoon, you'd find him snoozing in his chair. 593 00:40:14,020 --> 00:40:16,340 It's morning again in America. 594 00:40:16,340 --> 00:40:19,300 Today, more men and women will go to work 595 00:40:19,300 --> 00:40:22,620 than ever before in our country's history. 596 00:40:22,620 --> 00:40:25,700 With interest rates and inflation down, more people are buying 597 00:40:25,700 --> 00:40:30,460 new homes, and their new families can have confidence in the future. 598 00:40:30,460 --> 00:40:35,180 America today is prouder and stronger and better. 599 00:40:35,180 --> 00:40:39,340 Why would we want to return to where we were less than four short years ago? 600 00:40:41,100 --> 00:40:45,460 Well, he was really a friend of the families. When he was governor in California, 601 00:40:45,460 --> 00:40:48,780 I got to know him that way. I was running automobile dealerships 602 00:40:48,780 --> 00:40:51,860 at the time and actually sold him a car on a couple of occasions. 603 00:40:51,860 --> 00:40:56,860 I've never felt more strongly that America's best days and democracy's best days lie ahead. 604 00:40:59,740 --> 00:41:01,860 He was called the Great Communicator. 605 00:41:01,860 --> 00:41:06,860 He had the idea to make very complex issues understandable to the public. 606 00:41:07,300 --> 00:41:12,340 We will carry on a tradition of a good and worthy people who brought light where there was darkness, 607 00:41:13,180 --> 00:41:17,060 warmth where there was cold, medicine where there was disease, 608 00:41:17,060 --> 00:41:21,700 food where there was hunger and peace where there was only bloodshed. 609 00:41:21,700 --> 00:41:24,900 Remember, he'd been doing it for 40 or 50 years, 610 00:41:24,900 --> 00:41:29,020 started as a radio commentator, became a film actor and then did 611 00:41:29,020 --> 00:41:33,780 GE Theatre, so he had thousands and thousands of hours on TV communicating. 612 00:41:33,780 --> 00:41:36,780 I would like to have a crusade today, 613 00:41:36,780 --> 00:41:40,060 and it would be one to take government off the backs 614 00:41:40,060 --> 00:41:43,860 of the great people of this country and turn you loose again. 615 00:41:43,860 --> 00:41:45,980 Sure he was a master on TV. 616 00:41:45,980 --> 00:41:50,980 He was an optimistic person, he was a fun person to be around, he was an easy person to be around. 617 00:41:51,940 --> 00:41:54,060 He made you feel good about yourself. 618 00:41:54,060 --> 00:41:59,100 I Will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, 619 00:41:59,260 --> 00:42:04,060 for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience. 620 00:42:06,300 --> 00:42:08,620 I think if there was ever a crisis, he'd say, 621 00:42:08,620 --> 00:42:12,100 "How are we going to fix this? How will we handle it?" He was not a person 622 00:42:12,100 --> 00:42:16,900 to brood, he was a person to say, "How are we gonna do better?" "How are we gonna do better tomorrow?" 623 00:42:16,900 --> 00:42:19,900 That was a key to his leadership. 624 00:42:19,900 --> 00:42:24,860 The story was an American and a Russian arguing about their two countries, and the American said, 625 00:42:24,860 --> 00:42:28,300 "I can walk into the Oval office, pound the President's desk 626 00:42:28,300 --> 00:42:32,180 "and say, 'Mr President, I don't like the way you run the country.'" 627 00:42:32,180 --> 00:42:36,740 And the Russian said, "I can do that." The American says, "You can?" 628 00:42:36,740 --> 00:42:40,780 And he says, "Yes. I can go into the Kremlin, to the General Secretary's office, 629 00:42:40,780 --> 00:42:45,820 "pound his desk and say, 'Mr General Secretary, I don't like the way President Reagan runs his country.'" 630 00:42:48,820 --> 00:42:53,820 I think that he contributed greatly to ending the Cold War without a shot being fired. 631 00:42:54,220 --> 00:42:59,300 He saw that the Soviet Union, really, truly he did believe it was the evil empire, 632 00:43:00,460 --> 00:43:05,300 because he thought that freedom was something innate, that if you gave human beings a chance, 633 00:43:05,300 --> 00:43:09,300 what they would like is freedom of speech, free enterprise, freedom to vote, 634 00:43:09,300 --> 00:43:13,780 and so he saw that the Soviet Union had really enslaved millions of people. 635 00:43:13,780 --> 00:43:16,500 Let us be aware that while they preach the supremacy 636 00:43:16,500 --> 00:43:20,180 of the state, declare its omnipotence over individual man 637 00:43:20,180 --> 00:43:24,460 and predict its eventual domination over all peoples on the Earth, 638 00:43:24,460 --> 00:43:27,140 they are the focus of evil in the modern world. 639 00:43:27,140 --> 00:43:31,100 I think history has been very kind to Ronald Reagan 640 00:43:31,100 --> 00:43:34,100 and people have seen how he helped change the world. 641 00:43:34,100 --> 00:43:37,060 # I can change the world 642 00:43:37,060 --> 00:43:40,420 # With my own two hands... # 643 00:43:40,420 --> 00:43:44,340 How can we not believe in the greatness of America? 644 00:43:44,340 --> 00:43:49,340 How can we not do what is right and needed to preserve this last, best hope of men on earth? 645 00:43:50,900 --> 00:43:54,660 I think if you went around Eastern Europe, that he is great hero. 646 00:43:54,660 --> 00:43:59,340 I think that the time that he was President, when he talked about the evil empire 647 00:43:59,340 --> 00:44:03,620 and when he put the missile, intermediate-range missiles into Germany, 648 00:44:03,620 --> 00:44:08,580 there was lots of disturbances and lots of people angry, but I think even people today 649 00:44:08,580 --> 00:44:11,580 who maybe still wouldn't vote for him have grudgingly seen 650 00:44:11,580 --> 00:44:14,580 what a difference he made and how many people are free today 651 00:44:14,580 --> 00:44:17,140 because of the ideals, and the strengths, 652 00:44:17,140 --> 00:44:20,980 and the ability to communicate and the policies of Ronald Reagan. 653 00:44:20,980 --> 00:44:23,260 How could we do less? 654 00:44:23,260 --> 00:44:27,100 We're Americans. APPLAUSE 655 00:44:27,100 --> 00:44:32,060 When it comes to winning the top job, it helps to have been number two. 656 00:44:32,060 --> 00:44:37,140 The office of vice-president has historically been ceremonial and often frustrating. 657 00:44:37,740 --> 00:44:41,260 Dan Quayle warned Dick Cheney 658 00:44:41,260 --> 00:44:46,300 that he wouldn't have much to do. Cheney replied, "I have a different understanding with the President." 659 00:44:46,460 --> 00:44:51,500 Whether or not it's a proper job, being vice-president is a pretty reliable route to the presidency. 660 00:44:54,020 --> 00:44:56,580 It worked for Theodore Roosevelt, Harry Truman, 661 00:44:56,580 --> 00:44:59,580 Gerald Ford, Richard Nixon, LBJ 662 00:44:59,580 --> 00:45:03,460 and, of course, George Bush Senior. 663 00:45:03,460 --> 00:45:08,500 I've had more experience. I'd be more stable at the helm of the United States of America. 664 00:45:08,500 --> 00:45:12,700 I'd know how better to deal with the United Kingdom and the rest of our NATO allies. 665 00:45:12,700 --> 00:45:16,260 I've been there, I've seen the presidential decisions. 666 00:45:16,260 --> 00:45:21,260 Bush came with an impressive CV. He'd been Ambassador to the UN, 667 00:45:21,580 --> 00:45:25,140 Envoy to China and Director of the CIA. 668 00:45:25,140 --> 00:45:29,300 And in the White House, foreign policy experience can only help. 669 00:45:29,300 --> 00:45:32,020 I don't think I met George Bush before he was president, 670 00:45:32,020 --> 00:45:34,020 but once he was president 671 00:45:34,020 --> 00:45:35,980 I saw him reasonably often. 672 00:45:35,980 --> 00:45:39,100 The kind of leadership we got from the United States 673 00:45:39,100 --> 00:45:43,500 when he was its president was, I think, just about ideal. 674 00:45:43,500 --> 00:45:46,580 It's what we wanted and what we need now, too. 675 00:45:46,580 --> 00:45:50,780 He just had the right way of getting people onside, 676 00:45:50,780 --> 00:45:55,500 getting people to trust him and respond to the leadership he gave. 677 00:45:55,500 --> 00:45:59,140 Iraq will not be permitted to annexe Kuwait. 678 00:45:59,140 --> 00:46:04,220 And that's not a threat, it's not a boast, that's just the way it's going to be. 679 00:46:04,900 --> 00:46:09,900 Maybe that came from his past experience at China, at the UN, in foreign affairs. 680 00:46:11,740 --> 00:46:14,500 But in foreign affairs, he had THE touch, the touch 681 00:46:14,500 --> 00:46:18,300 which we British needed, the touch which the world needed. 682 00:46:18,300 --> 00:46:22,860 Two thirds of Kuwait's oil wells are still burning. 683 00:46:22,860 --> 00:46:26,140 But he was not a visionary, 684 00:46:26,140 --> 00:46:27,780 he wasn't really a strategist. 685 00:46:27,780 --> 00:46:31,260 He said, I remember, "I'm not very good at this vision thing." 686 00:46:31,260 --> 00:46:34,500 What he was very good at was handling the actual situations, 687 00:46:34,500 --> 00:46:39,540 handling a Soviet Union in decay, handling German unification but above all handling the Gulf War, 688 00:46:41,780 --> 00:46:46,780 when Saddam Hussain - in a clear act of aggression - just swallowed up Kuwait, a small country. 689 00:46:48,100 --> 00:46:50,900 Let no-one doubt our staying power. 690 00:46:50,900 --> 00:46:53,420 We will stand by our friends. 691 00:46:53,420 --> 00:46:58,500 One way or another, the leader of Iraq must learn this fundamental truth. 692 00:46:59,740 --> 00:47:04,780 He got the US Congress onside with difficulty, he got all the Europeans onside, with our help, 693 00:47:05,700 --> 00:47:10,700 he got the UN Security Council onside in a way which we failed to do in the second Iraq war. 694 00:47:12,020 --> 00:47:13,860 And he got most of the world onside. 695 00:47:13,860 --> 00:47:18,900 It was a formidable act of leadership by a quiet, determined man. 696 00:47:22,020 --> 00:47:25,540 for the economic package with which he hopes to strangle Iraq. 697 00:47:25,540 --> 00:47:29,740 As it happened, I was in the White House the day the war ended, and I was actually there 698 00:47:29,740 --> 00:47:33,620 when he consulted informally the commander-in-chief, vice-president, 699 00:47:33,620 --> 00:47:36,740 the secretaries of state, of defence, the State Department, 700 00:47:36,740 --> 00:47:40,380 as to whether we'd won and whether the war should come to an end, 701 00:47:40,380 --> 00:47:44,540 and I was very impressed as a fly on the wall in the way he did that - 702 00:47:44,540 --> 00:47:48,420 a mixture of firmness and humanity which I thought was excellent. 703 00:47:48,420 --> 00:47:53,460 The Bush team thanked Mr Hurd for Britain's contribution and for the special relationship. 704 00:47:54,500 --> 00:47:58,220 It's deep and it's profound and it's a manifestation 705 00:47:58,220 --> 00:48:02,340 of a relationship that all of us in this country treasure. 706 00:48:02,340 --> 00:48:03,860 He wasn't posturing, 707 00:48:03,860 --> 00:48:07,740 he wasn't always worrying about the media. 708 00:48:07,740 --> 00:48:12,780 If he was engaged in something, he wanted it to succeed, and this fact showed itself to other people, 709 00:48:13,780 --> 00:48:17,060 created an atmosphere of trust. That was his strength. 710 00:48:17,060 --> 00:48:21,140 He wasn't a great strategic thinker, he wasn't a visionary, 711 00:48:21,140 --> 00:48:25,500 as he admitted himself, but because he created this atmosphere of trust, 712 00:48:25,500 --> 00:48:30,100 he could do things which a lot of people with great vision simply can't manage. 713 00:48:30,100 --> 00:48:33,740 # People all over the world join in... # 714 00:48:33,740 --> 00:48:37,900 George Herbert Walker Bush came from a wealthy and influential family. 715 00:48:37,900 --> 00:48:42,940 In fact, the majority of post-War presidents were millionaires before they took office. 716 00:48:43,340 --> 00:48:48,260 Still, a humble start can be a great asset. 717 00:48:48,260 --> 00:48:53,340 # Love, love to love you, baby... # 718 00:48:55,300 --> 00:49:00,340 The great American narrative is of the guy 719 00:49:00,580 --> 00:49:03,700 who's a really poor kid and he makes it, he makes it big. 720 00:49:03,700 --> 00:49:06,340 And he makes it big because of education, 721 00:49:06,340 --> 00:49:08,940 because of the great land of opportunities 722 00:49:08,940 --> 00:49:13,940 that America is, and Bill Clinton's story really personifies this. 723 00:49:14,180 --> 00:49:18,940 You know, here is a young boy who is born in one of the poorest states, 724 00:49:18,940 --> 00:49:22,540 and because he's so bright, by golly, he's going to make it, and he does. 725 00:49:22,540 --> 00:49:24,700 On this day, 726 00:49:24,700 --> 00:49:28,980 with high hopes and brave hearts, 727 00:49:28,980 --> 00:49:31,100 in massive numbers, 728 00:49:31,100 --> 00:49:35,340 the American people have voted to make a new beginning. 729 00:49:35,340 --> 00:49:39,260 CHEERING 730 00:49:39,260 --> 00:49:42,940 Here is a man who manages to double the economy. 731 00:49:42,940 --> 00:49:47,940 Under his watch, the stock exchange grows three fold. 732 00:49:50,100 --> 00:49:52,860 Unemployment is halved to 4%. 733 00:49:52,860 --> 00:49:57,220 He goes from deficit to surplus in the federal budget. 734 00:49:57,220 --> 00:50:01,100 You know, here is a man who really knew his onions when it came to economics. 735 00:50:01,100 --> 00:50:06,140 We must now break the habits of both political parties and say there can be no more something for nothing. 736 00:50:08,180 --> 00:50:11,660 And admit frankly we are all in this together. 737 00:50:11,660 --> 00:50:16,660 I think that when we say that he was a superb political manipulator, 738 00:50:18,380 --> 00:50:22,460 we should also add a superb emotional manipulator. 739 00:50:22,460 --> 00:50:27,100 I mean, this man knew how to play people's hearts like a violin. 740 00:50:27,100 --> 00:50:31,660 He guessed where you were coming from. 741 00:50:31,660 --> 00:50:35,300 He guessed what you were feeling, what you wanted, and gave it to you. 742 00:50:35,300 --> 00:50:40,260 And he might not deliver, but boy could he promise you that that is what he was going to give you. 743 00:50:41,020 --> 00:50:45,420 All of our efforts to strengthen the economy will fail... 744 00:50:46,980 --> 00:50:49,300 Let me say this again. 745 00:50:49,300 --> 00:50:51,260 I feel so strongly about this. 746 00:50:51,260 --> 00:50:54,540 All of our efforts to strengthen the economy will fail 747 00:50:54,540 --> 00:50:59,580 unless we also take this year, not next year, not five years from now, 748 00:51:00,220 --> 00:51:05,220 but this year, bold steps to reform our healthcare system. 749 00:51:07,300 --> 00:51:11,580 He had immense cross-party, cross-gender appeal 750 00:51:11,580 --> 00:51:13,180 and he managed it. 751 00:51:13,180 --> 00:51:18,260 Of course he had to manage it, because, guess what, his Senate, his Congress was Republican. 752 00:51:18,660 --> 00:51:22,300 So he had to deal with the enemy at all times. 753 00:51:22,300 --> 00:51:27,260 I defy anybody to come up with another political figure, 754 00:51:29,660 --> 00:51:34,020 certainly in this century, who could have managed the enemy 755 00:51:34,020 --> 00:51:37,500 the way that Bill Clinton managed his enemies. 756 00:51:45,900 --> 00:51:50,420 It's incredible to think that a 21-year-old intern, 757 00:51:50,420 --> 00:51:54,700 a girl with, you know, lots of hair and very little else in her head, 758 00:51:54,700 --> 00:51:59,700 should have ruined a man and a presidency, 759 00:51:59,780 --> 00:52:01,580 but that is exactly what she did. 760 00:52:01,580 --> 00:52:06,620 And no matter how sophisticated and Continental people on this side of the Atlantic were about the scandal, 761 00:52:08,500 --> 00:52:11,500 in America, people were ashamed. 762 00:52:11,500 --> 00:52:16,380 It was shameful because here was their president having to testify in court. 763 00:52:16,380 --> 00:52:20,060 I mean, they'd never had this before. It had never happened. 764 00:52:20,060 --> 00:52:25,100 I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. 765 00:52:26,260 --> 00:52:31,340 Here was a president having to, well, first lie, and then admit to having lied. 766 00:52:32,500 --> 00:52:37,500 I know that my public comments and my silence about this matter gave a false impression. 767 00:52:38,900 --> 00:52:42,100 It was like Oprah Winfrey gone mad. 768 00:52:42,100 --> 00:52:44,580 It was really tasteless. 769 00:52:44,580 --> 00:52:48,460 You know, the office of the President, 770 00:52:48,460 --> 00:52:52,380 to an American, is a very sacred thing. 771 00:52:52,380 --> 00:52:57,380 I mean, you've got God, the flag, and then the office of the President. 772 00:52:58,020 --> 00:52:59,500 And he besmirched it. 773 00:53:00,620 --> 00:53:04,380 It was a real betrayal of public trust. 774 00:53:04,380 --> 00:53:08,220 He had been caught out and he no longer had the confidence of the people, 775 00:53:08,220 --> 00:53:11,900 the confidence of the Congress. He no longer had his self-confidence. 776 00:53:20,860 --> 00:53:23,780 If we hadn't had the Monica Lewinsky scandal, 777 00:53:23,780 --> 00:53:27,260 this man would have gone down in history as a great president, 778 00:53:27,260 --> 00:53:31,140 because he connected with people 779 00:53:31,140 --> 00:53:36,020 in such a way that I believe that the whole of the political, um... 780 00:53:36,020 --> 00:53:38,740 agenda would have changed. 781 00:53:39,420 --> 00:53:44,460 If it hadn't been for that scandal, for the belittling 782 00:53:44,940 --> 00:53:47,740 of him and of his office, 783 00:53:47,740 --> 00:53:52,700 I think that Clinton would have come away as a huge president, 784 00:53:53,460 --> 00:53:55,260 as one of the greats. 785 00:53:56,100 --> 00:54:00,100 Perhaps Clinton should have taken up poker. 786 00:54:00,100 --> 00:54:04,700 An essential requirement of the job is an ability to read other people. 787 00:54:04,700 --> 00:54:06,460 It helps if you can bluff, 788 00:54:06,460 --> 00:54:11,180 hanging tough even when fate or politics has dealt you a rough hand. 789 00:54:11,180 --> 00:54:16,220 Little wonder then, that some of the great presidents have also been pretty accomplished poker players. 790 00:54:16,500 --> 00:54:21,500 Theodore Roosevelt, FDR, Eisenhower and LBJ among them. 791 00:54:21,900 --> 00:54:25,220 Harry Truman used to host poker games at the White House, 792 00:54:25,220 --> 00:54:29,300 often with all three branches of the federal government represented. 793 00:54:29,300 --> 00:54:33,660 They'd play with chips embossed with the presidential seal. 794 00:54:33,660 --> 00:54:37,420 Recent candidates have avoided any connection with gambling, 795 00:54:37,420 --> 00:54:42,460 although Barack Obama has confessed to a talent at the poker table. 796 00:54:42,460 --> 00:54:45,260 It's said he's got a good poker face. 797 00:54:45,260 --> 00:54:48,540 That would be a useful asset for any president, 798 00:54:48,540 --> 00:54:53,140 but it's one of only dozens of qualities on the presidential checklist. 799 00:54:53,140 --> 00:54:57,100 A great president needs to be pragmatic and yet have vision. 800 00:54:57,100 --> 00:55:01,100 He needs great cunning, but must stay on the right side of the ethical line. 801 00:55:01,100 --> 00:55:04,820 A mastery of foreign policy, yet never neglecting the American people. 802 00:55:04,820 --> 00:55:09,420 A good war helps, but so does keeping the peace. 803 00:55:11,100 --> 00:55:15,740 And of course, you should learn from your predecessors. The question is - which ones? 804 00:55:15,740 --> 00:55:20,300 If you're going to try to make a judgement about the best president of the 20th century, 805 00:55:20,300 --> 00:55:25,340 you're dealing partly with character, with, um... 806 00:55:25,540 --> 00:55:30,540 honesty, but also with the way you handle the cards you're dealt, 807 00:55:31,460 --> 00:55:35,660 the world that confronts you and how you deal with it. 808 00:55:35,660 --> 00:55:40,700 And by those criteria, I think you've got to turn to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 809 00:55:42,180 --> 00:55:46,580 who seems to me to be, all things considered, 810 00:55:46,580 --> 00:55:49,540 the biggest president of the 20th century. 811 00:55:49,540 --> 00:55:54,460 If I had a mountain onto which I was carving those American Presidents 812 00:55:54,460 --> 00:55:56,900 who did leave the world a better place, 813 00:55:56,900 --> 00:55:59,100 and I don't just mean the United States, 814 00:55:59,100 --> 00:56:01,860 then Johnson would have to be there. 815 00:56:01,860 --> 00:56:05,380 The 20th century presidents, for me it's Theodore Roosevelt, 816 00:56:05,380 --> 00:56:08,620 because Theodore Roosevelt saved the forests of America, 817 00:56:08,620 --> 00:56:10,780 loved and appreciated the beauty, 818 00:56:10,780 --> 00:56:15,780 and had this balance of power appreciation of foreign policy. 819 00:56:17,300 --> 00:56:20,220 Franklin Roosevelt, pretty obviously, 820 00:56:20,220 --> 00:56:24,660 the greatest figure of the 20th century in the political world. 821 00:56:24,660 --> 00:56:27,940 I think overall one has to say that this president, Roosevelt, 822 00:56:27,940 --> 00:56:31,820 faced both an international and a national catastrophe on a huge scale 823 00:56:31,820 --> 00:56:33,820 and managed to overcome them both. 824 00:56:33,820 --> 00:56:38,860 For me, the best president of the 20th century is FDR. He was an inspiring president. 825 00:56:39,340 --> 00:56:44,340 He made you think that there was this thing called America that was actually worth being a part of. 826 00:56:45,940 --> 00:56:50,220 I know people say Ronald Reagan made you feel that, but Ronald Reagan was an actor. 827 00:56:50,220 --> 00:56:54,020 This guy was for real, a real statesman. 828 00:56:54,020 --> 00:56:58,020 I suppose in terms of sheer delivery, 829 00:56:58,020 --> 00:56:59,780 FDR, Roosevelt. 830 00:56:59,780 --> 00:57:04,820 I would put my money on George Bush Senior in terms of actual quality and achievement. 831 00:57:06,300 --> 00:57:11,340 I think FDR achieved the most, but Clinton could have. 832 00:57:12,180 --> 00:57:17,180 And I think he's not so much the Comeback Kid as the What If Kid. 833 00:57:17,220 --> 00:57:19,100 This may sound crazy, but... 834 00:57:19,740 --> 00:57:21,340 Bill Clinton. 835 00:57:21,340 --> 00:57:24,820 Made some terrible mistakes but he left the world 836 00:57:24,820 --> 00:57:26,900 more or less at peace, 837 00:57:26,900 --> 00:57:31,900 and he left the American budget more or less in the black. 838 00:57:32,260 --> 00:57:35,900 And since then, everything's gone to hell in a handcart. 839 00:57:50,260 --> 00:57:52,740 If today's commentators were ranking him, 840 00:57:52,740 --> 00:57:57,180 they'd doubtless score him low on our list of presidential qualities. 841 00:57:57,180 --> 00:58:02,180 Harry Truman is a textbook example of a president who got the thumbs down as he left office, 842 00:58:02,580 --> 00:58:05,980 only for history later to revise its verdict. 843 00:58:05,980 --> 00:58:11,020 If the past is any guide, Bush may well look rather better in future than he does today. 844 00:58:11,620 --> 00:58:16,620 What does that depend on? Well, a big factor is the fate of the president who succeeds him. 845 00:58:17,420 --> 00:58:22,060 # And so I made it to Iraq In time for one more snake attack 846 00:58:22,060 --> 00:58:25,700 # And to my old battalion I was sent 847 00:58:25,700 --> 00:58:28,500 # We'd drive around in our Humvees 848 00:58:28,500 --> 00:58:30,500 # Listening to the Black Eyed Peas 849 00:58:30,500 --> 00:58:34,060 # And speaking fondly of our President 850 00:58:34,740 --> 00:58:38,860 # George W told the nation, this is not an escalation 851 00:58:38,860 --> 00:58:42,900 # This is just a surge t'ward victory 852 00:58:42,900 --> 00:58:46,780 # Just to win my little war I'm sending 20,000 more 853 00:58:46,780 --> 00:58:51,100 # To help me save Iraq from Iraqis. #