Obama just missed making the top 10 Presidents

   C-Span has been doing a survey of historians since around 2000 on how they would rank our presidents.  While there is a positive bias toward more recent presidents it is interesting to see where the recently retired Barack Obama came in the most recent poll.  Obama came in at number 12 out of 44 past presidents isn't a bad place in your first poll.  When you look at how many of the past presidents who left office unpopular and are now ranked high it wouldn't be surprising to have Obama move into the top 10 in a few years.  An example of this is Harry Truman.  He left office with a 22% approval rating and is now ranked as the 6 best president.  Lyndon Johnson was so unpopular that he chose to not run for reelection but is now ranked at number 10.   In fact the period from Franklin Roosevelt to Lyndon Johnson has been called the "golden age of the American presidency" with all five presidents in the top 10--- FDR (3), Harry Truman (6), Dwight Eisenhower (5), John F. Kennedy (8) and Lyndon Johnson (10).