And that story is widely Apocryphal now. It wasn’t pneumonia. He died as a result of the fowl drinking water flowing into the White House, along with Zachary Taylor, Polk and Lincoln’s son.
Also I get slightly annoyed because it just reinforces the old, inaccurate idea that cold weather causes illness. Not wearing a coat does not automatically lead to pneumonia. But yeah it was a dumb call to not wear a coat.
@@NatalieJ22 Being out in the freezing cold, without any jacket, is disastrous for your health. does it mean you will automatically get sick? No. Will your immune system, and entire body be weakened? Yes.
And egregiously mispronouncing Seminole. Maybe the op made this video cuz he needed a few bucks or something because he obviously doesn't know history very well lol
I really do think the reasoning behind that is the OC doesn't know that much about history beyond a very surface level so he didn't have much to talk about if it wasn't a "major" president. Even then the points he made were often shallow and/or blatantly slanted with personal political opinion. It's just a sloppy video all around. Watch again and count the typos. Kinda sad he even gave this video more attention, to be honest.
I love how when VTH hears something he disagrees with he speaks it in a respectful way but when he hears something he agrees with he gives more context
I can't get over that the guy spent like 20 seconds criticising Lincoln and Wilson's picture was on screen barely long enough to make out it was him, jheez...
I love how this channel is slowly but surely blowing up because we are all vicariously living our failed history teacher expectations through him xD Shoutout to this channel man, loving these videos, really appreciate your level of detail and knowledge, your enthusiasm for the content rubs off, and I wish more teachers were as lively. All the best, and keep up the video game videos! love those!
Don’t blame history teachers, instead blame time restrictions and state and/or federally mandated education standards that severely limit the creativity and opportunities most history teachers would love to have given to their students.
I disagree with you on some of your takes BUT DAMN. I have never agreed with you more when you said, "Andrew Johnson was one of the worst presidents we have ever had". Literally scared my wife by yelling TRUEEEEEE. Great Video. Can't wait for your Little Bighorn Video.
I remember watching this video and was so annoyed. Completely ignored Wilson’s racism clearly because he’s a fan. A fan of Carter and bemoaning having to criticize him. And since when was calling out CNN a major flaw?
He had plenty to say about FDR and JFK though. Not sure how that serves this narrative. Now to be fair I haven't watched the end of the original video, and I didn't intend to since I wasn't very impressed with what actually got reacted to. I guess I will now since it seems like a number of people have made similar comments. I'd have no trouble finding negative things to say about any modern presidents, but I guess I can't really judge this guy without watching the end of the video.
Yeah, but I was lucky enough to good history teachers through high school. One of them even an English Citizen and when we talked about the star spangled banner and how he was gonna play it, instead he played god save the queen as a joke.
Yeah Wilson sucked he petty much made sure that the Irish war of independence and gave Britain and France more land completely disregarding his promises
Truman did not start the Korean War. It started when North Korea invaded South Korea. Truman could be criticized for mishandling the war, but unless the position is just let the North take over the South, his actions can be justified. And it was a UN war. Also, I think it a weird spin to say Ike "started" the Vietnam War. We didn't even have combat troops in Vietnam during his administration.
I’m honestly more amazed that the truly awful presidents got dismissed with some minor infraction, but he felt like he was stretching to comment more than necessary on some of the higher ranked ones. Shouldn’t that be the other way around? 😂
Regarding Johnson and Wilson I think the thinking was that their infractions, as you said, were so obvious and well known, there was no point in wasting any more time on them. Just a guess, though.
I think since we all know about the worst presidents (like Johnson), QT wanted to examine the bad things about the presidents we don't know a lot of bad things about.
When the OC's first point about Washington being that he was an unqualified bungler, I could see where this was going. Chris had his hands full with this guy's video, and did a great job as always. I will give the OC a comedy point for saying Van Buren was the inspiration for a gang in Seinfeld. Kramer held up eight fingers by accident (for the eighth president) when confronted by the VB gang, and they accepted him as a member. One of the best sitcoms ever.
“ I could entire episodes about the crap that Andrew Johnson did to screw this country up, especially for the newly freed slaves….” Sounds like some great content! I’m here for it!!!
@@VloggingThroughHistory Corrected! Thanks for elevating these videos with your commentary. Your fulsome analysis is the definition of being disagreeing without being disagreeable.
Actually, Could you do a video on Andrew Johnson's career? I know you've addressed some of it in your reconstruction videos, but I was wondering if you could also give us some insight into his pre-presidential political career.
I would love to see a video about how Andrew Johnson hurt the nation, feel like it would be good to learn since it has been mentioned a lot before as the comments above me say
My one big disagreement with the James Polk part was that Texas land was not stolen. Texas fought for its independence and won. Therefore, Texas was its own land until the United States annexed it. However, the lands won after the Mexican-American War was I guess you could say stolen, but to the victors go the spoils.
While that's a fair assessment, I would dispute your conclusion based on the fact that Texas at that point was populated largely by American settlers with the intention of seceding from Mexico so that the U.S. could annex it.
@@Operasinger0 Russia been using that strategy for years. Flood a Russian boarding country with Russians, and then annex that region. See Eastern Ukraine and Crimea for recent examples lol.
Most lists like Question Time's seem to pick out presidential traits with modern eyes. This often results in presidents being dinged for traits they shared with the vast majority of people at the time (and may not even have been as bad about as most people). I think it would it make an interesting video to look at presidential traits that AREN'T largely the result of these men being a product of their times. For example, what is a negative trait for each president that was unusual at the time? Likewise, what was a positive trait for each that was unusual at the time (perhaps being "ahead of their time" from our perspective)? To be clear, I'm not saying I think they should get a pass on negative traits just because their peers also had them, or should get no credit for positive traits that their peers shared. I just think it would make an interesting video to focus on ways (good and bad) in which they were outliers from their peers...
Totally get what you're saying and that's my view on them as well. I think we should view what would have been considered bad even by their own peers, rather than by people in 2021.
And they're clearly shown to project his views. I've left some comments on his videos and he's messaged me back. He seems like a nice guy, but definitely more into politics than the overall bigger picture of history
Yeah, that was particularly egregious in the case of Hayes and Native American assimilation. At the time, offering them a way to become full and equal US citizens, even if conditioned on assimilation, was a progressive policy. The opposing position (which more often than not won out in politics) was to see them as subhumans that needed to be exterminated for the sake of Manifest Destiny.
At 19:25 he criticizes McKinley’s annexation of Puerto Rico but to be honest, as a Puerto Rican, I am very happy that McKinley annexed our island. Without McKinley I might not be an American citizen right now. Just a quick thought
Ditto. I thought the same when I heard that. As much against interventionism as I am, I can still appreciate the historical significance whenever it's been done. My existence and quality of present life being big ones for me. What if's aren't always good things.
Are they SERIOUSLY blaming Jefferson for Haiti being impoverished? It's true that Adams had a pro-Haiti policy (because of his general anti-French policy) that Jefferson reversed (because of HIS general pro-French policy), but the Haitian Revolution and Haiti's resulting impoverishment have a LOT more to do with actions in France and Haiti itself than anything to do with the USA, at least in the early days.
It seems to me the "criticisms" that are being levied towards some of the former presidents have the type of being post-hoc and president day relevancy.
Somehow two years of trade embargo is the reason the country is impoverished more than 200 years later. That has to be the most asinine thing I've ever heard.
The original video is why I definitely need to read more. I'm a self admitted layman that favors short pop-history due and your clarification on this seemed well done.
I love this video because I know next to nothing about US presidents and having you be able to talk back and even argue against the video is really refreshing than just react content. Also I actually would've loved to see you go further, but I can understand it can be tricky politically
I would love to see you react to "Why The Soviet Union's Overshadowed Atrocities of WW2 Must not be Forgotten" because as an Estonian I think it's really not talked about much even tho it was so horrible.
I watched this video... what can I say... I just hope that every mentioned atrocity have a solid facts to prove the point, otherwise it's no better then Third Reich's propaganda during the war, where all Russians were called "Asian untermensch hordes". We definitely shouldn't forget atrocities that brought "civilized Europeans" on soviet land. RIP all victims and peace to you all!
I love how much time they spent on Andrew Johnson was so small that even they forgot to change it from Jackson to Johnson. Go to 15;23 in the video it is hilarious.
Love the passion on some of the history here. Definitely its some of us watching some history vids that completely skip over certain crucial details to put things into context or just straight up missing facts.
I also feel that Eisenhower’s foreign policy failures can be more attributed to Allen Dulles. Him and J Edgar Hoover had an insane amount of power and used it to put many public officials under their thumb, including presidents. Also, the one to threaten nuclear detonation of Korea was Douglas MacArthur, not Eisenhower, and for this insubordination he was fired… by Truman.
For me personally I definitely tend to see where you're coming from better than a lot of people. I am definitely someone who is very strong and passionate in my beliefs about America and history, but it's still always good to hear people out. I think that's a big reason I enjoy your content so much. You clearly come into it with your beliefs, but you're willing to give the video a watch, you say the things you agree with and disagree with, and then give your reasoning why! Your channel is definitely very refreshing, your content is always fantastic! I never finish one of your videos feeling like it was a mundane video, while also always loving how you still stay serious about the topis while also making it fun! Now then, with regards to some of the things I would have maybe changed, for example, there are too many things I disagreed with. Obviously, he's just as entitled to think the way he does, but just my personal standpoint. I would say with at least a quarter of the Presidents I disagreed with his reasoning behind some of the things he said. Again, that's just my personal way of looking at it. I definitely tended to agree with your reasoning more than his on a lot of the Presidents when you had a disagreement or didn't think all the blame should be on a President. Oh, and fun fact, I finally just subscribed! I'm super glad to be a part of the Vlogging Through History fam!
theodore roosevelt bit made me laugh. he got that get tough attitude, at least from what i heard, was because he was incredibly frail as a child, allergic to the furniture, and had a great respect for the frontier lifestyle. Sure some of his stories come off as a bit show off like but he tried to inspire people to hone themselves like he did. EDIT: the franklin roosevelt bit was funny too. fifth cousin cousin? that is nothing. if you live in a rural small town your likely to marry a third cousin accidently.
yea 😂 5th cousin??? there is only a 10-15% chance of 5th cousins sharing significant amounts of dna, the average person has well over 10,000 5th cousins in the world. and i think everyone agrees nobody truly has that many people they would actually consider family
This Video felt very biased and not well researched. I think you did an excellent job with your inputs and made this palatable, thank you and keep up the good work!
I don’t know if you caught it or anyone else did but the 17th president of the United States name was NOT Andrew Jackson. The video shows Jackson instead of Johnson
History was my favorite subject growing up (second was Math), but then got to college and no more history classes, and now I suck at math. Now, I'm definitely gonna get back into history.
Would you ever do a music history? I think it would be so interesting to see how different events effected pop culture in America and how the Beatles and other huge artists effected the social fabric of the country.
I don't have a lot to add to what you've said but I will offer up an idea. Maybe as a new series you could do an examination of every president through Nixon in individual videos. Their successes, failures, etc. Someone with your knowledge of American history could offer a LOT of insight that many of us hadn't considered before.
Hey ! I’m half English half French but I went to an American school, so I am quite accustomed to American History but not to the depths I’ve been looking into recently. Considering you are one of the major powers in the world today and what you do has repercussions around the world, so it’s interesting to study American history to understand how Americans act today as people, and a Nation. I appreciate all your reaction videos as they give hindsight from an American point of view. Would love to meet up if you are ever in Europe/France ! Merci
I'd like to ask, what is your favorite century in history? Personally, I really like learning about the 19th century, but the 20th century is my favorite to learn about.
Definitely agree with VTH throughout this entire video reaction. The other guy seemed to oversimplify things among many other things with his assessments.
Wow, what an awful list by this guy. Spends like 5 seconds a piece of some of the worst Presidents ever, but rambles incoherent nonsense about some of our best. Given the quality of his work on this video I might skip doing the positive one.
Agreed. The original creator's content seemed biased and amateurish. I could see Chris struggling with the content but he maintained his professionalism and responded with restraint. This is one of my favorite channels...he does a great job.
When they talked about Eisenhower I was hoping he would mention the crimes committed in Guatemala in 1954 after they ousted a democratically elected Jacobo Árbenz in a coup and how it started the devastating civil war where many natives were killed and caused extreme poverty. I’m from Guatemala and learning about that broke my heart because I used to have a positive look on the United States but they ignored what was happening in Guatemala completely and so much could have been prevented by the U.S.
The fact that he stated that he was finding something bad about each president is the one thing that I agree with. The fact that he had to dig ridiculous deep in many cases only shows that while our presidents weren't perfect they,but weren't altogether horrendous either. You gave A much more accurate assessment of the presidents. Great video.
Re: Jackson and the Trail of Tears, you said, was "all on him," but I don't see how you can say that. The legislation happened during his presidency and he rejected the supreme court ruling, but the forced relocation of the Cherokee happened after he left office. He left office in March of 1837. From Wikipedia, "By 1838, about 2,000 Cherokee had voluntarily relocated from Georgia to Indian Territory (present day Oklahoma). Forcible removals began in May 1838 when General Winfield Scott received a final order from President Martin Van Buren to relocate the remaining Cherokees." People always talk about it like it happened during Jackson's presidency. I'm not trying to downplay his guilt, but the way the policy was carried out falls on Van Buren as well.
Great Video and I really appreciated all your comments. Only criticism I have is that Fitch sweatshirt. I was born and raised in Boardman. Austintown Fitch and Cardinal Mooney were always our biggest rivals. However, it is good to see someone else from that Valley that has the same love of history that I have. Keep up the good work.
I’m surprised you never talk much about Martin Van Buren. For one, he is the only U.S. President whose native language was not English but Dutch. Before he was President, he shaped the development of our political system and popularized the word “O.K” referring to his nickname, Old Kinderhook.
There's no way o.k. caught on the way we use it, even across the glove, because of an obscure president's obscure nicknames lol. Like, that wouldn't even make sense that an abbreviation of his nickname would end up as a synonym for "got it's or 'not bad" etc. Like what? So in the 1800s a conversation would go, "how was your food?" "It was old kinderhook"......
It was HORRIBLE... using today's principles to judge the past?! What nonsense. I got to Lincoln and bailed just for Chris's addendums which were more than surface window dressing. The note about Calendar and Jefferson... I had not heard that... it is that depth of knowledge that has me watching.
After a break, I wanted to hear the worst on the 2 worst presidents... Johnson and Wilson. I figured it out, this was shallow research (if any) and goes of the current Cliff notes from a politically slanted background. Chris, you saved this video... whomever suggested it to you... unless it was to show how horrible it was... a shame Chris's time was wasted.
@@sumsarsiranen Outright wrong. You can criticize slavery & racism as general concepts in the past, but you can't just go "This guy had slaves, so he was bad" because EVERYONE back then considered it normal to have slaves. Do you really expect them to somehow grow a conscience about how slavery is bad when back then it was normal? And A LOT of other points were biased too. Lincoln aided much more the slavery effort than what he says, the nuclear bombs were necessary because Japan was absolutely insane, and he directly attributed things like the Stock Market Crash to the president rather than understand that these things are a mixture of problems. As a non-american who, as such, isn't biased on how great some presidents are, the video REEKS of cringy modern opinions applied in a historical context where they don't fit.
Definite congrats to your son. Also, love your input here. Actually fills some holes in my own perspectives on the past presidents Tho on the note of William Henry Harrison, he might've actually died from an illness related to contaminated drinking water.
not to mention the fact being cold doesnt actually give you the cold or pneumonia, though it can weaken your immune system to make you more susceptible to things like contaminated water and sickness so i still get the reasoning
watched the rest of the video, the OC showed his political leanings really, really hard. It discredits it for me simply because you have to be impartial when talking about politics in this nature. I feel if you did an original video like this, it would come off more informational vs. an opinion piece.
False impartiality is useless to a conversation. The person ahs the bias regardless. him being honest about that doesn't make the piece worse. Also it is clear that the OC doesn't like imperialism or racism but you didn't mention that. It shows your own bias and unwillingness to listen to contrary opinions.
@@GageEakins This is such a bad take and it has crept int discussions in the last years. Impartiality isn't the same as 100% objectivity. The fact that humans are flawed, everyone has a bias doesn't mean they shouldn't at least try to reach an impartial conclusion. Basically all social sciences would be obsolete if there was no method of being impartial, because there is no absolute truth here and everyone would just say what fits their own agenda. But being aware of your own bias and acknowledging how it may influence your opinion is the real way. In fact this mindset you describe leads to useless conversations, because then only people with the same bias talk to each other, ignoring facts, when they don't fit their agenda. So basically what happens in social media the last few years and your argument is exactly what ends all meaningful discussions.
If I recall correctly, in McCullough's biography of Adams, Washington got a lot of criticism as president, even to the extant being called a traitor. by some.
My x3 great grandfather was a minor Cherokee cheif of a tribe in western North Carolina. They were moved on the trail of tears near the panhandle of Oklahoma but he choose to leave the res and was giving a small plot of land and a donkey. My family stayed there until 1970s when they moved to California then Oregon in the 80s
As soon as I saw that Woodrow Wilson's part was 3 seconds long, I started laughing hysterically because I know of VTH's opinion on the man. I knew there was a rant incoming hahaha
I Very much enjoy the facts you've shared. Even as a history major I'm still learning new things. I believe this video that you reacted to definitely had a millennial/genZ left view on things, so it was nice to hear what you agreed and disagreed on, knowing that you would of. American history is my favorite and I love studying it and the presidents who have led our country
8:00 I did not know this about Andrew Jackson. Thank you, this is actually a big deal in my opinion to disregard the supreme court. Perhaps the country would look a lot different if Jackson hadn't taken power into his own hands.
It's an interesting parallel Theodore Roosevelt saw Lincoln's casket ( if I remember correctly ) being carried as a kid, he became a great president, a man who busted monopolies and worked to conserve the nature and probably not very racist for his time Woodrow Wilson saw Jefferson Davis as a kid, he was one of the most racist presidents, not the best presidency too One saw a great man ( even if the said great man was dead ) and became a great man, not always the good man but someone you can call great The other saw a racist man and became a racist prick as well
James Madison didn't have the authority to adequately prepare the military, he did the best he could but as government was seen at that time, that's on Congress.
The guy who made the original video sounds like he knows very little about history. Your comment “eh come on” really sums up the historical accuracy of the video. I always learn more from you than the videos you react to
Actually some people do know who Hayes is, just they arnt American, in Paraguay there’s an entire province named after Hayes, because Hayes favored Paraguay during a peace treaty between Paraguay and another South American country
"I mean if you're going to criticize Truman, that's about all you got." True! The man was born in Missouri, openly racist, and still desegregated the armed forces, because while he didn't want to, he knew it was his duty as President.
My HS history teacher was a University of Michigan summa com laude graduate who was teaching history when my father was in high school. The only President she ever spoke ill of was Harding. I had forgotten he was from Ohio. Just made me smile because it’s about 13 hours before The Game (2022 version) as I watched this! 😂 Go Blue! 💙💛💙
If there is a consistent pattern of wrongness here, it is that people have a tendency to blame any president who oversees an avoidable (or even sometimes an unavoidable) crisis as the CAUSE of that crisis, even if that crisis has been decades in the making. As an economics enthusiast its nice to see how little things change over time.
I thought he (you?) might have said more about Martin van Buren. I would love to hear more, but when the video talks about his "incompetence" in dealing with the depression, I would have thought our historian commenter might say something noting about the build up of Jacksonian policies. It is hard to lay the depression all on MVB. Would love to come back to read a response!
4:31 the reason why Thomas Jefferson had many slaves as far as I am aware was because of the debts he had and all of the slaves were tied to those debts so he physically couldn’t free them and besides that the houses for his slaves were nicer than a poor free person at the time
I think you're a bit hard on Washington for his military abilities. He pursued a War of Posts strategy in the revolution which didn't prioritize winning in the field and was eminently successful. Almost a Miracle by John Ferling is excellent reading on it
I think even if Washington didn't have political experience, which he did, military experience can often be just as good if not better for the Presidency. Just look at Grant and Eisenhower.
I like how nearly every president has some sort of deep moral flaw that is addressed and William Henry Harrison's is that he didn't wear a coat.
First like let's go.
And that story is widely Apocryphal now. It wasn’t pneumonia. He died as a result of the fowl drinking water flowing into the White House, along with Zachary Taylor, Polk and Lincoln’s son.
@@nickschulte3915 yep. I've seen the recent articles on that subject and the evidence is pretty strong.
Also I get slightly annoyed because it just reinforces the old, inaccurate idea that cold weather causes illness. Not wearing a coat does not automatically lead to pneumonia. But yeah it was a dumb call to not wear a coat.
@@NatalieJ22 Being out in the freezing cold, without any jacket, is disastrous for your health.
does it mean you will automatically get sick? No. Will your immune system, and entire body be weakened? Yes.
Guy called Theodore Roosevelt an aggro racist but then barely even mentioned Woodrow Wilson 😂😂 what planet am I living on
Not only did Andrew Johnson only get 5 seconds of critique, he’s even listed as Andrew Jackson lol
And egregiously mispronouncing Seminole. Maybe the op made this video cuz he needed a few bucks or something because he obviously doesn't know history very well lol
I really do think the reasoning behind that is the OC doesn't know that much about history beyond a very surface level so he didn't have much to talk about if it wasn't a "major" president. Even then the points he made were often shallow and/or blatantly slanted with personal political opinion. It's just a sloppy video all around. Watch again and count the typos. Kinda sad he even gave this video more attention, to be honest.
I didn’t even notice that 😂
Lol, if you count it out it's only 3 seconds. xD
He also misspelled “disdain” earlier in the video.
I love how when VTH hears something he disagrees with he speaks it in a respectful way but when he hears something he agrees with he gives more context
noticed that as well, he has that ability to switch instantly in order to focus on what's being said on the exact moment
Great comment and I completely agree, VTH is one of the best, if not the best history channel, in my opinion.
I can't get over that the guy spent like 20 seconds criticising Lincoln and Wilson's picture was on screen barely long enough to make out it was him, jheez...
Woodrow wilson was the wrorst president we ever had and you cant change my mind.
I love how this channel is slowly but surely blowing up because we are all vicariously living our failed history teacher expectations through him xD Shoutout to this channel man, loving these videos, really appreciate your level of detail and knowledge, your enthusiasm for the content rubs off, and I wish more teachers were as lively.
All the best, and keep up the video game videos! love those!
Appreciate the kind words, Evan! Glad you're here.
I’m here honestly because you remind of of my old high school world history teacher. Just one gold teacher is all is takes, I appreciate what ya do
Don’t blame history teachers, instead blame time restrictions and state and/or federally mandated education standards that severely limit the creativity and opportunities most history teachers would love to have given to their students.
I disagree with you on some of your takes BUT DAMN. I have never agreed with you more when you said, "Andrew Johnson was one of the worst presidents we have ever had". Literally scared my wife by yelling TRUEEEEEE. Great Video. Can't wait for your Little Bighorn Video.
I remember watching this video and was so annoyed. Completely ignored Wilson’s racism clearly because he’s a fan. A fan of Carter and bemoaning having to criticize him. And since when was calling out CNN a major flaw?
He had plenty to say about FDR and JFK though. Not sure how that serves this narrative. Now to be fair I haven't watched the end of the original video, and I didn't intend to since I wasn't very impressed with what actually got reacted to. I guess I will now since it seems like a number of people have made similar comments. I'd have no trouble finding negative things to say about any modern presidents, but I guess I can't really judge this guy without watching the end of the video.
Bro if this guy was my history teacher, *History would be fun and understanding*
Here here.
Yeah, but I was lucky enough to good history teachers through high school. One of them even an English Citizen and when we talked about the star spangled banner and how he was gonna play it, instead he played god save the queen as a joke.
Johnson and Wilson 5 seconds each yeah this video needs to be reevaluated.
Yeah Wilson sucked he petty much made sure that the Irish war of independence and gave Britain and France more land completely disregarding his promises
Truman did not start the Korean War. It started when North Korea invaded South Korea. Truman could be criticized for mishandling the war, but unless the position is just let the North take over the South, his actions can be justified. And it was a UN war. Also, I think it a weird spin to say Ike "started" the Vietnam War. We didn't even have combat troops in Vietnam during his administration.
I’m honestly more amazed that the truly awful presidents got dismissed with some minor infraction, but he felt like he was stretching to comment more than necessary on some of the higher ranked ones.
Shouldn’t that be the other way around? 😂
Regarding Johnson and Wilson I think the thinking was that their infractions, as you said, were so obvious and well known, there was no point in wasting any more time on them. Just a guess, though.
@@vahurjoa210 He went for the obvious with Jackson, though, people nowadays know him far more for the Trail of Tears than anything else.
@@MrMike855 Still, my point stands. Why waste time with anything else?
I mean supporting eugenics isn’t just some minor Infraction.
I think since we all know about the worst presidents (like Johnson), QT wanted to examine the bad things about the presidents we don't know a lot of bad things about.
This is why I love your channel. You add so much more to a video and correct points the video gets wrong. Keep up the good work 👍
When the OC's first point about Washington being that he was an unqualified bungler, I could see where this was going. Chris had his hands full with this guy's video, and did a great job as always. I will give the OC a comedy point for saying Van Buren was the inspiration for a gang in Seinfeld. Kramer held up eight fingers by accident (for the eighth president) when confronted by the VB gang, and they accepted him as a member. One of the best sitcoms ever.
“ I could entire episodes about the crap that Andrew Johnson did to screw this country up, especially for the newly freed slaves….”
Sounds like some great content! I’m here for it!!!
Johnson. But yeah.
@@VloggingThroughHistory Corrected! Thanks for elevating these videos with your commentary. Your fulsome analysis is the definition of being disagreeing without being disagreeable.
@@netizensarrest4241disagreeing agreeably.
Actually, Could you do a video on Andrew Johnson's career? I know you've addressed some of it in your reconstruction videos, but I was wondering if you could also give us some insight into his pre-presidential political career.
This - lots of videos it is mentioned how terrible he was and has to just bite his tongue and move on. I would love to dive into it.
Commenting to increase visibility
I would love to see a video about how Andrew Johnson hurt the nation, feel like it would be good to learn since it has been mentioned a lot before as the comments above me say
Ill throw my hat in this idea!
My one big disagreement with the James Polk part was that Texas land was not stolen. Texas fought for its independence and won. Therefore, Texas was its own land until the United States annexed it. However, the lands won after the Mexican-American War was I guess you could say stolen, but to the victors go the spoils.
While that's a fair assessment, I would dispute your conclusion based on the fact that Texas at that point was populated largely by American settlers with the intention of seceding from Mexico so that the U.S. could annex it.
yuck
@@Operasinger0 Russia been using that strategy for years. Flood a Russian boarding country with Russians, and then annex that region. See Eastern Ukraine and Crimea for recent examples lol.
Most lists like Question Time's seem to pick out presidential traits with modern eyes. This often results in presidents being dinged for traits they shared with the vast majority of people at the time (and may not even have been as bad about as most people).
I think it would it make an interesting video to look at presidential traits that AREN'T largely the result of these men being a product of their times. For example, what is a negative trait for each president that was unusual at the time? Likewise, what was a positive trait for each that was unusual at the time (perhaps being "ahead of their time" from our perspective)?
To be clear, I'm not saying I think they should get a pass on negative traits just because their peers also had them, or should get no credit for positive traits that their peers shared. I just think it would make an interesting video to focus on ways (good and bad) in which they were outliers from their peers...
Totally get what you're saying and that's my view on them as well. I think we should view what would have been considered bad even by their own peers, rather than by people in 2021.
@@VloggingThroughHistory agreed. If you go by today’s standards, a guy like Lincoln could be considered a white supremacist
And they're clearly shown to project his views.
I've left some comments on his videos and he's messaged me back. He seems like a nice guy, but definitely more into politics than the overall bigger picture of history
Yeah, that was particularly egregious in the case of Hayes and Native American assimilation. At the time, offering them a way to become full and equal US citizens, even if conditioned on assimilation, was a progressive policy. The opposing position (which more often than not won out in politics) was to see them as subhumans that needed to be exterminated for the sake of Manifest Destiny.
Congrats to your son! I just started playing high school soccer as well, I hope he succeeds, I wish him all the best!!
Wish you the best as well, Omar. Thank you!
At 19:25 he criticizes McKinley’s annexation of Puerto Rico but to be honest, as a Puerto Rican, I am very happy that McKinley annexed our island. Without McKinley I might not be an American citizen right now. Just a quick thought
The sentence he said right after "instead of freeing them" actually shows his beliefs quite clearly.
An american colonial*
Ditto. I thought the same when I heard that. As much against interventionism as I am, I can still appreciate the historical significance whenever it's been done. My existence and quality of present life being big ones for me. What if's aren't always good things.
@@dinamosflams Puerto Ricans are U.S Citizens
@@kadenwolf7465 yes they are but they cant vote for president which sucks
Are they SERIOUSLY blaming Jefferson for Haiti being impoverished?
It's true that Adams had a pro-Haiti policy (because of his general anti-French policy) that Jefferson reversed (because of HIS general pro-French policy), but the Haitian Revolution and Haiti's resulting impoverishment have a LOT more to do with actions in France and Haiti itself than anything to do with the USA, at least in the early days.
It seems to me the "criticisms" that are being levied towards some of the former presidents have the type of being post-hoc and president day relevancy.
Somehow two years of trade embargo is the reason the country is impoverished more than 200 years later. That has to be the most asinine thing I've ever heard.
Reeks of a leftist world view that never gets more complex than "white bad blame white"
The original video is why I definitely need to read more. I'm a self admitted layman that favors short pop-history due and your clarification on this seemed well done.
I’m finally revisiting your channel after my vacation
Welcome back
I love this video because I know next to nothing about US presidents and having you be able to talk back and even argue against the video is really refreshing than just react content. Also I actually would've loved to see you go further, but I can understand it can be tricky politically
I would love to see you react to "Why The Soviet Union's Overshadowed Atrocities of WW2 Must not be Forgotten" because as an Estonian I think it's really not talked about much even tho it was so horrible.
That's a great idea.
Great idea! I am also from Estonia and the atrocities they committed and covered up are very disturbing.
I watched this video... what can I say... I just hope that every mentioned atrocity have a solid facts to prove the point, otherwise it's no better then Third Reich's propaganda during the war, where all Russians were called "Asian untermensch hordes". We definitely shouldn't forget atrocities that brought "civilized Europeans" on soviet land. RIP all victims and peace to you all!
Yap, Stalin is worse than Hitler, western world just does not know about that
I believe it my Russian aunt lived during the Soviet Union and Talks a lot about the stuff that was considered normal during that time
I love how much time they spent on Andrew Johnson was so small that even they forgot to change it from Jackson to Johnson. Go to 15;23 in the video it is hilarious.
Love the passion on some of the history here. Definitely its some of us watching some history vids that completely skip over certain crucial details to put things into context or just straight up missing facts.
I super respect your restrain I could tell there was a little bit of frustration in your voice Great video man you’re super professional
I also feel that Eisenhower’s foreign policy failures can be more attributed to Allen Dulles. Him and J Edgar Hoover had an insane amount of power and used it to put many public officials under their thumb, including presidents. Also, the one to threaten nuclear detonation of Korea was Douglas MacArthur, not Eisenhower, and for this insubordination he was fired… by Truman.
For me personally I definitely tend to see where you're coming from better than a lot of people. I am definitely someone who is very strong and passionate in my beliefs about America and history, but it's still always good to hear people out. I think that's a big reason I enjoy your content so much. You clearly come into it with your beliefs, but you're willing to give the video a watch, you say the things you agree with and disagree with, and then give your reasoning why! Your channel is definitely very refreshing, your content is always fantastic! I never finish one of your videos feeling like it was a mundane video, while also always loving how you still stay serious about the topis while also making it fun!
Now then, with regards to some of the things I would have maybe changed, for example, there are too many things I disagreed with. Obviously, he's just as entitled to think the way he does, but just my personal standpoint. I would say with at least a quarter of the Presidents I disagreed with his reasoning behind some of the things he said. Again, that's just my personal way of looking at it. I definitely tended to agree with your reasoning more than his on a lot of the Presidents when you had a disagreement or didn't think all the blame should be on a President.
Oh, and fun fact, I finally just subscribed! I'm super glad to be a part of the Vlogging Through History fam!
Welcome! Glad to have you as a sub
@@VloggingThroughHistory I'm glad to be here!
theodore roosevelt bit made me laugh. he got that get tough attitude, at least from what i heard, was because he was incredibly frail as a child, allergic to the furniture, and had a great respect for the frontier lifestyle. Sure some of his stories come off as a bit show off like but he tried to inspire people to hone themselves like he did.
EDIT: the franklin roosevelt bit was funny too. fifth cousin cousin? that is nothing. if you live in a rural small town your likely to marry a third cousin accidently.
yea 😂 5th cousin??? there is only a 10-15% chance of 5th cousins sharing significant amounts of dna, the average person has well over 10,000 5th cousins in the world. and i think everyone agrees nobody truly has that many people they would actually consider family
Congratulations to your son! Can’t get enough of these videos
This Video felt very biased and not well researched. I think you did an excellent job with your inputs and made this palatable, thank you and keep up the good work!
The moment that he listed “fat” as a “major flaw” for Taft, I knew that he probably was just being biased
I don’t know if you caught it or anyone else did but the 17th president of the United States name was NOT Andrew Jackson. The video shows Jackson instead of Johnson
yeah nobody brought it up in the original video either haha
Happy birthday and awesome team playing! I'm sure you're very proud.
History was my favorite subject growing up (second was Math), but then got to college and no more history classes, and now I suck at math. Now, I'm definitely gonna get back into history.
Absolutely love your videos!
Would you ever do a music history? I think it would be so interesting to see how different events effected pop culture in America and how the Beatles and other huge artists effected the social fabric of the country.
I don't have a lot to add to what you've said but I will offer up an idea. Maybe as a new series you could do an examination of every president through Nixon in individual videos. Their successes, failures, etc. Someone with your knowledge of American history could offer a LOT of insight that many of us hadn't considered before.
The worst thing Abraham Lincoln did was making Andrew Johnson his vice president 😂
Hey ! I’m half English half French but I went to an American school, so I am quite accustomed to American History but not to the depths I’ve been looking into recently.
Considering you are one of the major powers in the world today and what you do has repercussions around the world, so it’s interesting to study American history to understand how Americans act today as people, and a Nation.
I appreciate all your reaction videos as they give hindsight from an American point of view.
Would love to meet up if you are ever in Europe/France !
Merci
1:21 Your face and my thoughts were so in sync at that moment that i started laughing for a good bit.
Aye! I was a Fitch Falcon. Didn't do sports, but looking back Fitch was awesome.
I'd like to ask, what is your favorite century in history? Personally, I really like learning about the 19th century, but the 20th century is my favorite to learn about.
Me too! Also great question.
Yeah 20th century probably, although I'd divide the last part of the 19th to merge it with the first part of the 20th, that would be my favourite.
That's a hard one. I could never pick an absolute favorite century. All of history is so damned interesting.
14th century all the way
20th century is the best century because of all the wars lol the worst century is 21st century
Definitely agree with VTH throughout this entire video reaction. The other guy seemed to oversimplify things among many other things with his assessments.
Wow, what an awful list by this guy. Spends like 5 seconds a piece of some of the worst Presidents ever, but rambles incoherent nonsense about some of our best. Given the quality of his work on this video I might skip doing the positive one.
Agreed. The original creator's content seemed biased and amateurish. I could see Chris struggling with the content but he maintained his professionalism and responded with restraint. This is one of my favorite channels...he does a great job.
I'm guessing it's just an attempt to increase engagement by causing controversy leading to wars in the comment section.
Your commentary on this video really saved it from being horrible. This guys opinions are all over the place.
When they talked about Eisenhower I was hoping he would mention the crimes committed in Guatemala in 1954 after they ousted a democratically elected Jacobo Árbenz in a coup and how it started the devastating civil war where many natives were killed and caused extreme poverty. I’m from Guatemala and learning about that broke my heart because I used to have a positive look on the United States but they ignored what was happening in Guatemala completely and so much could have been prevented by the U.S.
I mean you shouldn't let one historical event change your outlook on a country. Nobody here in the U.S. denies this happened.
Very rarely can you look into any country's history and not find some level of corruption or wrong doing. Just the way it is with people in power.
I subscribed at 10k, your now at almost 230k, Amazing job man, keep it up, great content.
Thanks for the long time support!
Nice video! Hope your son’s game went well!
The fact that he stated that he was finding something bad about each president is the one thing that I agree with. The fact that he had to dig ridiculous deep in many cases only shows that while our presidents weren't perfect they,but weren't altogether horrendous either. You gave A much more accurate assessment of the presidents. Great video.
Re: Jackson and the Trail of Tears, you said, was "all on him," but I don't see how you can say that. The legislation happened during his presidency and he rejected the supreme court ruling, but the forced relocation of the Cherokee happened after he left office. He left office in March of 1837. From Wikipedia, "By 1838, about 2,000 Cherokee had voluntarily relocated from Georgia to Indian Territory (present day Oklahoma). Forcible removals began in May 1838 when General Winfield Scott received a final order from President Martin Van Buren to relocate the remaining Cherokees." People always talk about it like it happened during Jackson's presidency. I'm not trying to downplay his guilt, but the way the policy was carried out falls on Van Buren as well.
4:38
It should also be noted that Jefferson himself was well aware of the hypocrisy.
Great Video and I really appreciated all your comments. Only criticism I have is that Fitch sweatshirt. I was born and raised in Boardman. Austintown Fitch and Cardinal Mooney were always our biggest rivals. However, it is good to see someone else from that Valley that has the same love of history that I have. Keep up the good work.
I grew up in Mineral Ridge but my kids go to Fitch.
I’m surprised you never talk much about Martin Van Buren. For one, he is the only U.S. President whose native language was not English but Dutch. Before he was President, he shaped the development of our political system and popularized the word “O.K” referring to his nickname, Old Kinderhook.
Everyone be out here ignoring Maarten like this.
There's no way o.k. caught on the way we use it, even across the glove, because of an obscure president's obscure nicknames lol. Like, that wouldn't even make sense that an abbreviation of his nickname would end up as a synonym for "got it's or 'not bad" etc. Like what? So in the 1800s a conversation would go, "how was your food?" "It was old kinderhook"......
This guy seems to have a really poor understanding of the things he's talking about. Not you, Chris, the video you reacted to.
It was HORRIBLE... using today's principles to judge the past?! What nonsense. I got to Lincoln and bailed just for Chris's addendums which were more than surface window dressing. The note about Calendar and Jefferson... I had not heard that... it is that depth of knowledge that has me watching.
After a break, I wanted to hear the worst on the 2 worst presidents... Johnson and Wilson. I figured it out, this was shallow research (if any) and goes of the current Cliff notes from a politically slanted background. Chris, you saved this video... whomever suggested it to you... unless it was to show how horrible it was... a shame Chris's time was wasted.
He has such a disgusted look throughout the whole video. That should tell you everything.
@@vuchaser99 Using today's principles to judge people in the past isn't wrong.
@@sumsarsiranen Outright wrong. You can criticize slavery & racism as general concepts in the past, but you can't just go "This guy had slaves, so he was bad" because EVERYONE back then considered it normal to have slaves. Do you really expect them to somehow grow a conscience about how slavery is bad when back then it was normal?
And A LOT of other points were biased too. Lincoln aided much more the slavery effort than what he says, the nuclear bombs were necessary because Japan was absolutely insane, and he directly attributed things like the Stock Market Crash to the president rather than understand that these things are a mixture of problems. As a non-american who, as such, isn't biased on how great some presidents are, the video REEKS of cringy modern opinions applied in a historical context where they don't fit.
Definite congrats to your son.
Also, love your input here. Actually fills some holes in my own perspectives on the past presidents
Tho on the note of William Henry Harrison, he might've actually died from an illness related to contaminated drinking water.
not to mention the fact being cold doesnt actually give you the cold or pneumonia, though it can weaken your immune system to make you more susceptible to things like contaminated water and sickness so i still get the reasoning
I think you made some pretty valid criticisms of the original video here - And I actually want to see you do a video of this topic 😂
watched the rest of the video, the OC showed his political leanings really, really hard. It discredits it for me simply because you have to be impartial when talking about politics in this nature. I feel if you did an original video like this, it would come off more informational vs. an opinion piece.
False impartiality is useless to a conversation. The person ahs the bias regardless. him being honest about that doesn't make the piece worse. Also it is clear that the OC doesn't like imperialism or racism but you didn't mention that. It shows your own bias and unwillingness to listen to contrary opinions.
History is past politics; and politics present history
@@GageEakins This is such a bad take and it has crept int discussions in the last years. Impartiality isn't the same as 100% objectivity. The fact that humans are flawed, everyone has a bias doesn't mean they shouldn't at least try to reach an impartial conclusion. Basically all social sciences would be obsolete if there was no method of being impartial, because there is no absolute truth here and everyone would just say what fits their own agenda. But being aware of your own bias and acknowledging how it may influence your opinion is the real way. In fact this mindset you describe leads to useless conversations, because then only people with the same bias talk to each other, ignoring facts, when they don't fit their agenda. So basically what happens in social media the last few years and your argument is exactly what ends all meaningful discussions.
@@BoredMarcus this 100%
the only thing I want to add to to that is that opinions are not information. Like the sky being blue is not the same as the sky being beautiful.
Never been this early!! So excited for a new video
I think it would be interesting to react to the Woodrow Wilson videos from The Cynical Historian
I actually kind of like the amount of disagreement vth had on this one, good reaction
Hope that game went well and is still kickin butt!!
If I recall correctly, in McCullough's biography of Adams, Washington got a lot of criticism as president, even to the extant being called a traitor. by some.
I like that you looked up "Stupid" based off the google chrome search thing in the top right corner for the first few minutes of the video lol
I was trying to find another video someone had suggested on a particular page. Lol
My x3 great grandfather was a minor Cherokee cheif of a tribe in western North Carolina. They were moved on the trail of tears near the panhandle of Oklahoma but he choose to leave the res and was giving a small plot of land and a donkey. My family stayed there until 1970s when they moved to California then Oregon in the 80s
As soon as I saw that Woodrow Wilson's part was 3 seconds long, I started laughing hysterically because I know of VTH's opinion on the man. I knew there was a rant incoming hahaha
lol the washington one made me laugh knowing you would rip through that
I Very much enjoy the facts you've shared. Even as a history major I'm still learning new things. I believe this video that you reacted to definitely had a millennial/genZ left view on things, so it was nice to hear what you agreed and disagreed on, knowing that you would of. American history is my favorite and I love studying it and the presidents who have led our country
This is one of your best videos! Excellent job!!!
As a 14 year old boy , and your fan from India congratulations to your son.
Harrison also didn’t catch pneumonia until 3 weeks after his speech, so even though most credit it to that, it was actually afterwards!
No long comment just wanted to say great content, well spoken and best of luck in your future.
These are my favorite! Where he shows you how the person who made the original video really didn’t do their homework.
8:00 I did not know this about Andrew Jackson. Thank you, this is actually a big deal in my opinion to disregard the supreme court. Perhaps the country would look a lot different if Jackson hadn't taken power into his own hands.
As someone from Youngstown, I wanted to congratulate you and your son :-)
Last weekend I had just visited the Battle of Tippecanoe which is near Purdue University. It was a great experience
Some of these seem like the original video is equating actions of congress during a presidency as actions of the president
It's an interesting parallel
Theodore Roosevelt saw Lincoln's casket ( if I remember correctly ) being carried as a kid, he became a great president, a man who busted monopolies and worked to conserve the nature and probably not very racist for his time
Woodrow Wilson saw Jefferson Davis as a kid, he was one of the most racist presidents, not the best presidency too
One saw a great man ( even if the said great man was dead ) and became a great man, not always the good man but someone you can call great
The other saw a racist man and became a racist prick as well
Yes there’s a photo of Roosevelt and his brother watching Lincoln’s funeral procession in NYC.
You should make a live reaction stream when viewers can choose what videos to react to
Great idea! We will do that
James Madison didn't have the authority to adequately prepare the military, he did the best he could but as government was seen at that time, that's on Congress.
Its really informative to have u react! Ur so goddam smart. Usually u just watch these history vids and take them for granted! Keep it up!
The guy who made the original video sounds like he knows very little about history. Your comment “eh come on” really sums up the historical accuracy of the video. I always learn more from you than the videos you react to
Whats even worse about the skip-over of Andrew Johnson is that they caption him as Andrew Jackson.
VTH uploading great content is the most reliable thing in the world
Actually some people do know who Hayes is, just they arnt American, in Paraguay there’s an entire province named after Hayes, because Hayes favored Paraguay during a peace treaty between Paraguay and another South American country
"I mean if you're going to criticize Truman, that's about all you got."
True! The man was born in Missouri, openly racist, and still desegregated the armed forces, because while he didn't want to, he knew it was his duty as President.
My HS history teacher was a University of Michigan summa com laude graduate who was teaching history when my father was in high school. The only President she ever spoke ill of was Harding. I had forgotten he was from Ohio. Just made me smile because it’s about 13 hours before The Game (2022 version) as I watched this! 😂 Go Blue! 💙💛💙
The fact the for Chester Arthur he says “he wasn’t notable” instead of the mentioning the Chinese Exclusion Act
I think I learned more from u then actually watching the video
If there is a consistent pattern of wrongness here, it is that people have a tendency to blame any president who oversees an avoidable (or even sometimes an unavoidable) crisis as the CAUSE of that crisis, even if that crisis has been decades in the making. As an economics enthusiast its nice to see how little things change over time.
I thought he (you?) might have said more about Martin van Buren. I would love to hear more, but when the video talks about his "incompetence" in dealing with the depression, I would have thought our historian commenter might say something noting about the build up of Jacksonian policies. It is hard to lay the depression all on MVB. Would love to come back to read a response!
4:31 the reason why Thomas Jefferson had many slaves as far as I am aware was because of the debts he had and all of the slaves were tied to those debts so he physically couldn’t free them and besides that the houses for his slaves were nicer than a poor free person at the time
Great call on ending it early man, I couldn’t stop laughing when you gave your reasoning why
Love your videos keep up the good work !
17:06 There were actually 3 states whose EC votes were in doubt: South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana.
I think you're a bit hard on Washington for his military abilities. He pursued a War of Posts strategy in the revolution which didn't prioritize winning in the field and was eminently successful. Almost a Miracle by John Ferling is excellent reading on it
I think even if Washington didn't have political experience, which he did, military experience can often be just as good if not better for the Presidency. Just look at Grant and Eisenhower.
There is a reason half of the Presidents are veterans
“Glosses over Andrew Johnson and Woodrow Wilson…”
*grabs popcorn to await reaction*
Hope the game went well. Also dang i didn't know Jefferson was the original Mafioso hahaha