I don't know whether it was beating MLK or Abraham Lincoln or FDR or Benjamin Franklin that did, but this confirms the sheer idiocy of so many in this country. Yes, indeed, 2.4 million people can be wrong...
"Reagan voted 'greatest American'"
Former US President Ronald Reagan has been voted the "greatest American" of all time by his fellow citizens.
Mr Reagan, who died last year aged 93, topped a list of 10 contenders, which featured six former presidents.
He edged out Abraham Lincoln, who abolished slavery, and civil rights leader Martin Luther King.
Some of the most notable names of US history such as Albert Einstein and Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the Moon, did not make the top 10.
Talk show host Oprah Winfrey is the highest ranked female contender at ninth place, making her the greatest American woman.
George Washington, the first US president who is considered the father of the nation, comes in at fourth place.
Current US President George W Bush and his predecessor Bill Clinton, whose presidency was tarnished by the Monica Lewinski sex scandal, are both in the top 10.
More than 2.4 million Americans cast their vote by phone, text or e-mail in the poll, organised by the Discovery Channel and AOL.
Some observers suggest the image of Mr Reagan, who was criticised as an intellectual lightweight during his presidency, has been enhanced following his death as millions of Americans cast a rose-tinted look back at his presidency.
His two terms in office (1981-1989) coincided with a period of economic prosperity, the crumbling of the Soviet bloc and a renewed sense of pride among Americans still reeling from the Vietnam War.
Other greats
In a similar exercise held in the UK in 2002, wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill was voted the greatest Briton.
More than one million votes were cast to select the final 10 which included inventor Brunel and scientists Darwin and Newton.
In France, where former President Charles de Gaulle finished first in April 2005, the final list also contained two scientists, Louis Pasteur and Marie Curie.
In a poll held in Germany in 2003, former Chancellor Konrad Adenauer beat Reformation monk Martin Luther and political thinker Karl Marx into second and third place in a top 10 that included Albert Einstein and the inventor of the printing press Johannes Gutenberg.
Top 10 greatest Americans, according to poll
1 Ronald Reagan
2 Abraham Lincoln
3 Martin Luther King
4 George Washington
5 Benjamin Franklin
6 George W Bush
7 Bill Clinton
8 Elvis Presley
9 Oprah Winfrey
10 Franklin D Roosevelt
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1 comment:
"Idiocy"—interesting. You know you've met someone with whom rational, open-minded discussion is not possible when the person uses such terms to describe their intellectual or idealogical opponents.
In my experience, there are two kinds of people involved in intellectual, political, ethical, and religious discussion: There are those whose pre-established personal interests determine their conception of reality, thereby justifying themselves to themselves without any serious challenge to their personal identity. And there are those who allow their personal interests to be determined by the outcome of their search for truth, whatever they happen to discover it to be. The former kind of person is the most common in the world by far, found in the most diverse forms in every political party, religious sect, and philosophical school in the world. They are recognized by their tendency to angrily denounce their opponents as "ignorant fools!"—exclamation points and all—or as idiots or some variation on the same theme.
The latter, the ones whose personal interests are determined by the truth as they find it, are rare birds indeed. They can be recognized by their complete lack of anger at their opponents, and by their willingness to transform themselves to conform to the truth, rather than forcing the truth to conform to their desires.
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