Not a BAD top 20.....not bad at all. Deserving of a counter top 20. Mine includes probable ineligibles under your original parameters. Oh, well.
1. Churchill (can't imagine him far from top of any list)
2. FDR (a lot I didn't like, and yet.....)
3. Mao (not ALL bad for world's most populous nation)
4. John XXIII (took oldest and largest Christian religion and gave it a good shake - all dust yet to settle)
5. Ike (as post war president, NOT a military commander. Nat. Defense Highway system possible greatest construction project in history, with effects to match)
6. Reagan (reasons cited endlessly here and on feelies last few weeks)
7. Gorby (far more a passive role than Reagan, but, the dance required a partner)
8. Marshall (saved the victory)
9. MacArthur (duty, honor, country -- three wars)
10. Nimitz (talk about a come-back win)
11. Ataturk (imagine Turkey as hardcore religious state - you may want to move him up)
12. Adenauer (right guy, right time, right place)
13. Thatcher (Reagenesque in many ways, maybe ahead of him in some)
14. John Paul II (Made the Catholic church more than a "homie" outfit - firm hand on the wheel)
15. Deng (if Mao was China's great revolutionary, then Deng was China's great evolutionary)
16. Allen Dulles (hard to run the world without spies)
17. Yeltsin (no great shakes, IMO, but, the very fact he's kept other dudes out of the job may be credit enough)
18. David Sarnoff (the effect of commercial broadcasting in America can't be overlooked)
19. Salk/Sabin (because it's nice to wipe out a disease - many have forgotten what a scourge polio was)
20. Disney (Walt kept the fairy tale alive in the century and brought it to kids of all ages, all around the world) |
