I was sitting at Thanksgiving dinner when an eleven year-old blurted out:
"The President is scum."
At this table, only one guest gasped.
Most of the other children smiled and nodded, the young and the aged patriarchs smiled and nodded. The matriarch looked about to see if anyone took enough offense to cause a cataclysmic eruption. Her sister smiles and nods with the others.
Two children sit quietly. One watching with a bit of tenseness, the other watching coyly behind a slice of bread that they chew with feigned interest.
My jaw fell open a bit and my face flushed red.
My thoughts stewed.
I had been firmly schooled that "good" people did not demean the person sitting in the Oval Office. In MY family, such a thing was considered undignified. It was called poor political sportsmanship and a slash against American unity.
I stewed; and said nothing.
This was not MY family. This was my brother-in-laws family; and my step-father shared the views.
I listened to the eleven and twelve year old children speak authoritatively with ridicule about The President as if they had master's degrees on the man's life.
What could they possibly really know?
I stewed. I was appalled. I continued to say nothing.
It was a holiday and I didn't want politics to make an ugly mess. Eventually, I let my anger go. The memory persists.
It was 1997; and they were talking about Bill Clinton.
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17 Apr 2007 - Bill's Spirit
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Bill's Spirit is an Artist, Writer, Poet, Philosopher currently practicing breathing in a small town in Ohio.
The works of the man behind Bill's Spirit have been published in small alternative and amateur presses since 1986. Before that, they just filled notebooks, took up space on walls and gathered dust in piles and boxes.
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Comments: 36
I see a huge difference between saying someone is 'scum' and saying they are incompetent, misguided or wrong headed.
I have heard that the CIA was involved in coccaine smuggling to help fund different operations. Supposedly, they don't do that anymore.
No matter who is chosen for President, the problems with their being human will always be there There is no one of us that is without some major sin fo one kind or another. Smuggling coccaine seems a lesser evil then starting a war with a country that had not invaded or attacked us.
Yes, when Clinton was governor of that Arkansas town, (Meno?) for years in the eighties his thugs dropped off the stuff along a railroad track just outside of town. There is a scandal about two teenage boys who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, and they had to be "snuffed" because of it, and the story was that they had just gotten "too high" along the railroad track and spaced out and got hit. I can give you a link if you want. Remember the crack epidemic in the 80's? It was the government getting rich off of that era. But yes, he has done far less to damage people than Bush has.
Adults OR kids don't have to show any respect for someone who doesn't deserve it.
As for the Coke accusations, I don't know anything about that, and will have to take y'all at your words.
Not a pervert? Paula Jones said that he dropped his trousers and, alluding to his genitals, asked her to "kiss it.". Also, he raped Juanita Broaddrick when he was Governor. He groped Kathleen Willey and put her hand on his aroused genitals. And there was Gennifer Flowers, he offered her a job in local government in exchange for sexual favours.
Some women who had affairs with him are;
Elizabeth Ward Gracen
Sally Perdue
Dolly Kyle Browning
I've considered running for office, but have consistently talked myself out of it, because I know that I'd bring too much logic to the table. Our politicians can't afford to be logical, because soon the Country would be running smoothly, efficiently, and in the black, and they'd be out of a job.
We should fire every last one of them (esp. the Congressmen who have been in office for 100 years) and start over. Then, we hire honest, family-oriented people who have been successful in the business world and have the Constitution memorized.
Sometimes it doesn't pay to keep your old beater car just because you're so used to and comfortable with it. Trash the damned thing and get a new one.
One thing Bill Clinton did; he got us into a humanitarian war (Serb/Bosnian) that didn't go very well for our troops and eventually became unpopular. So we negotiated a peace and brought our troops home.
Another thing he did was wipe out the deficit.
Another thing he did was foster an entrepreneurship that lifted many within the economy.
He fostered the Internet.
He funded all manner of educational programs that helped all kinds of struggling classers make livings.
He made FEMA into an effective agency.
The stock market thrived under his administration.
There's a few things for starters.
Bosnia cannot be compared to Iraq; Europe is as different from the Middle East as Texas is from New York. Helping Bosnia was a noble effort, but confronting the Middle East is the task of a true leader.
I'm talking about courtesy, not respect.
The Office of President always has our respect; the person in it has to earn and maintain our respect separately.
I am talking about a learned patriotic practice of courtesy and manners towards an official because of the office they occupy. Something that unfortunately seems a reversible cloak to many.
Yes, the stock market was vastly over-inflated by high-tech stocks. It wasn't Bush that smoothed the bubble's burst, it was Greenspan and the Federal Reserve.
FEMA made headlines for the excellent work they did in helping hurricane survivors along the coasts of Florida. Hurricane Andrew, wasn't it?
Bosnia and Iraq most certainly can be compared; at least on one level. They are wars waged at the pleasure of the President. No one attacked us into them.
I CHOOSE to practice various forms of courtesy to all kinds of people because I gave it a good hard think while I was sittin' on the crapper one day.
The rewards of civil discourse and civil manners totally and completely out weigh the down sides of the violent and venomous approaches.
And since no one is literally trying to bend me over and take something from me I don't feel so much need to be swinging my most vicious shots at people who aren't doing that.
No good is served by criticizing the character of a person in office.
It is solely their past history, and on-going ability to meet and execute the proper demands of their position that should be open for judgmental criticism.
BTW - I quit stickin' my head in the sand when I realized what all them cats were doing in there.
Your obsession with Clinton's sex life has me curious as to why. You seem to know WAYYY too much about it than most normal folks. Is the little woman not letting you surf legitimate porn and you're living vicariously through Bill? Jealous he's getting some? Think all sex is "dirty, nasty, sinful"? Inquiring minds want to know.
For the record, I agree that adultery is wrong, BUT, more powerful men than him have gotten laid in the Whitehouse with the first lady sleeping upstairs. Kennedy, Nixon, Truman.....and thats just the ones we are aware of. Carter "lusted in his mind". Who gives a good rats ass?
As for Clinton being responsible for 9/11....now THAT is a grade A delusion.