Jan 27, 2009
Wendy, on seeing President Obama write:
(This post will not accept comments made in reference to Obama's political leanings. Aim a little higher. That joke is too obvious.) #politics
"Ugh, he's a lefty?"It's funny because people who write left-handed are weird.
(This post will not accept comments made in reference to Obama's political leanings. Aim a little higher. That joke is too obvious.) #politics
Rus, your reliable source sucks. Mr. Internet says 8 of the 44 presidents have been lefties, which is 18%. But people only started paying attention to this trait in the early 1900s. So since then, of the 14 presidents we've kept track of, 8 of them have been lefties or ambidextrous, which equates to 57%. Also, 10% of the population is left-handed.
But I suppose since my claim was exaggerated, you felt the need to same? The first two sentences of your "source" says, "The handedness of Presidents of the United States is difficult to establish with any certainty before recent times. In the 18th and 19th centuries, left-handedness was considered a disability, and teachers would make efforts to suppress it in their students." And then you claim 18% is the correct answer which implies that all presidents prior to Hoover were righties. Then there is the fact that there were only 43 Presidents, thanks to Cleveland not serving consecutive terms. Oh, and if you were using Wikipedia for the true count of LH and Ambi, it was actually 7, not 8. Of course with Wikipedia, it could have changed since you last looked at it. Of course...I could have actually been the one to change it. :-)
Looks like you and I both need to double check our sources. (But Wikipedia and my wife still rock!) :-)
Oh, and it still bodes well for us Southpaws which you also point out...thank you. :-D
You're right, I suck. Wikipedia says 7 of the last 14, which is 50%. Other sites say 8 of the last 24, which is 33%. I'll make the assumption that the rest were probably righties, since lefties were considered disabled. That makes the unofficial count 8 of 43, which is 19%.
And as for 43/44 thing, there have been 43 different presidents serving in 44 nonconsecutive terms. My mistake.