So were these America’s worst presidents? Or does this list merely prove that rankings are valuable to the extent they spark debate, unhelpful to the extent they foreclose it? A look at the rankings of several historians we approached individually yields a provocative contrast to the poll results—and suggests how some of the more interesting choices often get averaged out in the wash.

For all the efforts of some polls to offset liberal bias, for example, there are no scholarly polls that show where the weight of conservative opinion might rank the worst chief executives. Forrest McDonald, a noted University of Alabama historian of distinct conservative leanings, has contributed to some of the large polls over the years, but many of his choices for the worst have clearly been cancelled out. On his own list, McDonald awards Lyndon Johnson the No. 1 spot “for pushing government.

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Poll Results: The 10 Worst Presidents

Occasionally, I throw in an interesting article that’s a little different.

A Booming Panama City Awaits Noriega’s Return

How American retirees — and a canal makeover — are transforming the capital.

PANAMA CITY, Panama — When Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega gets back to this lush tropical city after a 17-year absence, the former Panamanian strongman will scarcely recognize his old haunts. I barely did.

The news that Mr. Noriega plans to come back to Panama in September after spending nearly two decades in a U.S. prison since being deposed in a 1989 invasion, is the talk of the town. His return has momentarily eclipsed the other omnipresent subject of conversation here — the real-estate boom fueled in part by American retirees, which has turned this once laid-back city, known as a refuge for spies, arms dealers and out-of-work dictators, into an enormous building site with a Manhattan-like skyline in the making.

Good times are expected to keep rolling: The country’s famous canal is about to get a multibillion-dollar makeover, and a chunk of its down-and-out colonial city center is getting a facelift.

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