Every Day Is Special: Clinton

Showing posts with label Clinton. Show all posts

August 19 - Happy Birthday, President Clinton

Posted on August 19, 2017

Some people talk about impeaching a president as if that means removing him. And it doesn't.

"Impeachment" is part of a process by which Congress can remove a president from power. The House of Representatives has the sole power to impeach, and a simple majority of representatives is all that's necessary to do so.

The representatives would draw up articles of impeachment, with each article being a specific charge against the president.

If the House impeaches the president, the matter then goes to the Senate, where a trial is held. The judge in the trial is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and two-thirds of the Senators must vote to convict the president on any one charge - and, if that happens, the president is removed.

In the whole history of the United States, no president has ever been removed from office in this way.* But two presidents - Andrew Johnson and today's birthday honoree, Bill Clinton - have been impeached. But neither was convicted by the Senate. Johnson was acquitted by the slimmest of margins (only one vote), but Clinton was easily acquitted.

Bill Clinton wasn't just one of only two presidents who were impeached. He was also the president who had the highest end-of-office approval rating of any president since WWII - yep, that's right, higher than Eisenhower and Reagan!

Here are just a few of his other accomplishments:

Rhodes Scholar

Playing the saxophone

Governor of Arkansas:

Overhauled school system in Arkansas

While U.S. president:

Welfare reform

Children's health insurance program

Changed a budge deficit into a budget surplus

Post presidency:

Established Clinton Foundation, a global charity

Raised money for research on new vaccines/medicines

Helped bring down cost of medicines

Provided medical care for millions and millions

Of course, Clinton is the husband of 2016 Democratic presidential candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

* NOTE:

(By the way, the only president who resigned from office - Richard Nixon - did so when facing almost-certain impeachment and conviction.)

Also on this date:

World Photo Day

Wooden-clock-maker Seth Thomas's birthday

National Aviation Day

Root beer entrepreneur Charles Hires's birthday

Apple Spas in Russia

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May 12 – Anniversary of Clinton Defeating Lincoln

Posted May 12, 2015

When we are talking about American history, and someone says “Lincoln,” everyone flashes on the bearded-and-top-hatted President Abraham Lincoln. But in this case I am talking about Benjamin Lincoln, a Major General in the American army (in the American Revolutionary War).

And “Clinton” doesn't refer to former President Bill Clinton, nor to former Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, but instead Sir Henry Clinton, a Lieutenant General in the British army.

We're talking about this date in 1780, when Lincoln gave his unconditional surrender of his 5,000 troops, after a siege that had lasted more than a month. Clinton had used his army of 10,000 soldiers to surround Charleston, South Carolina, and therefore cut the population off from fresh food and other supplies.

This was considered the biggest American surrender of the war. However, the other two surrenders that Lincoln was associated with during the Revolutionary War were British surrenders to American forces:

Earlier in the war, Lincoln had helped ensure a British surrender after the Battles of Saratoga, and it was Lincoln who formally accepted the Big Surrender – the one that decided the war – when the British surrendered at Yorktown.

It turns out that, by the end of the war, Lincoln was second in command under George Washington. And when the defeated British general, Lord Cornwallis, decided to skip the ceremony of surrender—he claimed he was sick—Cornwallis sent his second in command, Brigadier General Charles O'Hara. O'Hara did the traditional thing, presenting “the sword of surrender.” But he didn't offer it to George Washington, he offered it to the Compte de Rochambeau, who was the head of French troops who fought on the Americans' side. Rochambeau shook his head and pointed to Washington. But when O'Hara presented the sword to Washington, he too refused to accept it; he motioned to Benjamin Lincoln, who had been humiliated by the British during the Charleston surrender, to accept it.

I'm thinking that Washington was at least partly motivated by a desire to make Lincoln feel better about the events of today's anniversary?

Anyway, the next time you hear someone casually mention “Washington and Lincoln,” in one breath, take a moment to wonder if that is Abe or Benjamin Lincoln!

Also on this date: