Americans place Lincoln at top of greatest presidents' poll, George W. Bush ahead of Reagan

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Mon Feb 18, 5:16 PM ET

WASHINGTON - Abraham Lincoln has moved to the top of the list of greatest presidents in an ABC News poll for President's Day that saw George W. Bush ease ahead of Ronald Reagan (news - web sites) in the overall survey and among Republicans.

Lincoln was chosen by 20 percent, while the current president and John F. Kennedy were essentially tied for second — with Kennedy at 14 percent and Bush at 13 percent. Reagan, Bill Clinton and Franklin Roosevelt were tied for third at 8 percent apiece.

In the same ABC poll a year ago, Reagan was at the top with 18 percent, Kennedy 16 percent and Lincoln 14 percent.

Kennedy and Lincoln were tied atop the list among Democrats this year, whereas Lincoln was the easy winner among independents, and Bush and Lincoln led among Republicans, with Reagan slightly behind them.

Lincoln was first among whites, but second among blacks, who overwhelmingly chose Clinton as the greatest president. One of Lincoln's best known achievements was freeing the slaves during the Civil War. Roosevelt was the leader among those 65 and older. (Bob's Note: This last result of a survey shows either a remarkable tolerance for criminality by the Black community at large or an astounding ignorance of Clinton's criminality. See the Clinton Criminal Pages.)

The poll was conducted Feb. 13-17 among a sample of 1,025 adults and had an error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2002 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.

Carville Disses Black Clinton Fans in Prez Poll?

NewsMax.com

Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2002 10:36 a.m. EST

Did top Democratic Party strategist James Carville really mean to suggest Tuesday morning that African-Americans rated Bill Clinton over Abraham Lincoln as America's best president ever because they "don't know who Abraham Lincoln was"?

The former top Clinton aide came perilously close to that assessment - even if only inadvertently - when asked by radioman Don Imus about yesterday's ABC News Presidents Day poll where whites rated Lincoln No. 1 while blacks picked Clinton.

IMUS: Now here's an interesting point, James. Lincoln was first among whites. But Bill Clinton was chosen as the greatest president ever overwhelmingly by blacks. And - so on one hand you have Lincoln, who freed the slaves. On the other hand you have Bill Clinton, who jumped ugly with poor old Sistah Soljah and was praying there in the White House with Jesse Jackson. How do you explain that?

CARVILLE: Well, I think ... first of all, these polls are gonna more reflect who a recent president is. I mean probably, if you stop and think of all the people in America, probably half of them don't know who Abraham Lincoln was. I mean - ah - or somebody in the past. So obviously, the more recent you are, the better you're gonna score on these things.

(End of Excerpt)

The second reason, Carville said, was that African-Americans still have an intense affection for Clinton - "as they should. He was a great president for black Americans - his appointments and everything else. So, I'm not surprised at this."

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