things kevin hates

You’ve probably heard that Barack Obama is our 44th president, or heard people in the media refer to the George Bushes as “Bush 41″ and “Bush 43″ to tell them apart. This is silly, because 43 different men have been President of the United States. The confusion arises from Grover Cleveland, who was president for two non-consecutive terms, from 1885-1889 and 1893-1897, so he is usually counted as both the 22nd and 24th president. Our system of presidential elections makes it unusual for someone to be elected to non-consecutive terms, but in countries with a prime minister or premier, offices which are typically controlled by the party leader of whichever party holds the legislature, this happens frequently. Consider Wikipedia’s list of Canada’s prime ministers. In eminently sensible fashion, those who served at separate times are simply numbered in accordance with when they first served, regardless of however many separate terms they had. So Stephen Harper actually is the 22nd Prime Minister of Canada. If the Canadians followed our approach, they’d call him the 27th prime minister.

Why does this misconception arise? I really have no idea. My copy of the World Almanac says that Grover Cleveland is considered the 22nd and 24th president due to a ruling by the State department, but a search of their website turns up nothing of the sort. And even if the State department says so, that’s not a very good reason. I’ll certainly grant that there have been 44 presidencies, but definitely not 44 presidents.* I call on Americans, and upon people of good sense everywhere, to take matters into their own hands and refuse to submit to the nonsense perpetrated by, well, whoever the hell is perpetrating this nonsense–I really have no idea who they are. But next time you hear people call Obama the 44th president, confront them. Tell them only 43 men have been president. Explain how silly it is to count Grover Cleveland twice–was he two different people? Of course he wasn’t. In time, I fervently hope we can overcome this idiocy and prove to the rest of the world that we Americans actually can count to 43 and 44 without screwing up.

* Note for the terribly pedantic: under the 25th Amendment, George W. Bush temporarily relinquished his authority as President because he had to be sedated for colonoscopies, once in 2002 and once in 2007. But Dick Cheney was only the “Acting President of the United States,” so don’t try to claim there have been 44 Presidents that way. Also, George H.W. Bush served as Acting President of the United States during a surgery performed on Ronald Reagan in 1985, but that’s irrelevant since he became the next president anyway.