Clinton's Impeachment
A fake. A liar. A cheat. Is this what should be said about the President? He has committed perjury, obstructed justice, and continues to lie to America about his actions. Bill Clinton is an embarrassment to America and should be impeached. How can his actions be explained to the children? Can parents tell their children that the leader of the free world is a liar, a cheat, and a pervert? Impeachment out of office or resignation would be the best for the country. The President has been dodging everything that has been thrown at him, it is about time he is pinned with something and this affair is the best opportunity. Taking him out of office is necessary and this can not be a better time for the impeachment to take place.
Through the history of America there have been many impeachments but never a full impeachment for a president. The closest ever was Andrew Jackson who was impeached by the house but not by the senate (O,Brien 973). Clinton went through the same that he did being impeached by the house but not the senate. Andrew Jackson was impeached for high crimes against the United States. Clinton has committed several high crimes yet he is not going to be impeached. He has been given to many chances and forgiven too many times. A person can only be given so many chances before a stop has to be put on it. This is the best time to stop the lying and cheating going on in the White House.
The point that he is the President of the United States should not give the President any leeway whatsoever. The President has engaged in conduct that is against his constitutional duty to execute the laws (Starr). The President committed the crimes and just like any other common criminal he should have to pay for what he has done. If a doctor or a teacher participated in sexual activities with a patient or student would he or she not be forced to resign or be fired? How is the President's case different from this except for the fact that he is the President and he has also committed other crimes besides having sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky? All men are created equal isn't that what the constitution says, why is the Presidents case so different.
Lewinsky was an unpaid intern and later became a paid staffer at the White House. In the beginning of the case, Monica Lewinsky did deny having sexual relations with the President. Starr then found tape recordings of telephone conversations of Lewinsky describing her relationship with the president. Clinton tried to cover up the affair by having his advisor Vernon Jordan to have Lewinsky lie or having a job outside Washington.
None of this would have been much of a problem had Monica Lewinsky had not told Tripp that Bill Clinton and Vernon Jordan instructed her to lie about the affair with Clinton. Supposedly Linda Tripp has Monica alleging this on tape. These tapes if finally released to the public should prove to be quite titillating, Monica Lewinsky claims that Clinton was very fond of oral sex and that she it to him on a number of occasions. It has been alleged by various news organizations that a secret service agent actually caught Lewinsky and Clinton in the act. It has also been alleged that Monica Lewinsky has a blue semen stained dress which, if true, would be direct DNA evidence of the affair. But it still would not prove obstruction of justice. If that was ever proven it could be an impeachable offence, a sexual scandal probably would not lead to the impeachment of Bill Clinton. If not then it will simply be a source of Bill Clinton jokes.
“The view on Presidents being above the law has changed more in those four years than it has ever” (Bradford 18). America no longer views the President of the United States as above the law, and for the most part neither do the Presidents. Today a President would not even think about creating secret groups whos main purpose is to blackmail or threaten. Watergate helped form America as a better country and have better checks on Presidents.
What kind of person commits three major violations of the national law and gets away with it? Well that person is Nixon. President Richard Nixon was one of the most famous presidents in the United States. He was mainly renowned for his huge role in the Watergate scandal. The Watergate scandal was important because Nixon and his cabinet arranged to get people to spy on the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate building. After it became clear Nixon was responsible, he manages to resign before he was going to be impeached. President Nixon was involved with the Watergate scandal and should be sentenced to jail because he organized it, which then got leaked out and finally led to his resignation.
Impeachment is the ultiomate punishment for a president. It is a long and complicated rout to removing a public official from office. The Constitutional process Article II, section 4 specifies the procedures to be used to remove a public official from office(CNN/All Politics). The constitution states that and president found guilty for bribery, treason, or other high crimes and misdemeanors. There has been a long debate on what should be considered a high crime. Different people in the House share different views. Ultimately it is up to the Hose to decide to drop the charges or further the investigation. If the public official is found guilty a two thirds majority vote from the Senate is necessary. The most recent president to face an impeachment hearing was Bill Clinton. A previous case involving Richard Nixon, Watergate, was held in 1974. Rather than facing an embarrassment with impeachment Nixon chose to resign in disgrace.
Out of all of the current presidents in our time the most interesting president to explore was President Richard Nixon and out of all of them he was the only one in term to resign. That Richard M. Nixon, President of the United States, is impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, and that the following articles of impeachment to be executed to the fullest extent of their nature. His poor choices and decisions led to his resignation. Although he did have some good qualities in helping the U.S. the bad however override the good. In the CRS (Congressional Research Service) It states: “ Obstruction of justice is the impediment of governmental activities. There are a host of federal criminal laws that prohibit obstructions of justice. The six most general outlaw obstruction of judicial proceedings (18 U.S.C. 1503), witness tampering (18 U.S.C. 1512), witness retaliation (18 U.S.C. 1513), obstruction of Congressional or administrative proceedings (18 U.S.C. 1505), conspiracy to defraud The United States (18 U.S.C. 371), and contempt (a creature of statute, rule and common law). Simple perjury in a federal investigation or judicial proceedings carries an extensive fine and up to 5 years in prison.” This was the first article president Richard M. Nixon was charged with by the House of Judiciary Committee. The vote was 27 to 1 for Nixon to be charged with the first article of impeachment, which was Obstruction of Justice. In denial of his liability in part taking in the Watergate scandal by saying he wasn't involved in the scandal He pointed finger at others that were involved in the break-in. However, tapes were found of conversations that proved his involvement and he was going to be impeached. Before he was charged, he made a resignat...
Before Clinton was elected President he had an encounter with Paula Jones in a hotel room. After Clinton took office Paula Jones then sued Clinton for sexual harassment. A short time later Monica Lewinsky began her intern at the White House. Clinton and Lewinsky began a sexual relationship. Judge Kenneth Starr was the investigator of Whitewater. President Clinton denied any sexual relations with Lewinsky. On October 8, 1998, the House would vote to have an impeachment and won. Clinton was charged with perjury and obstruction to justice. Bill Clinton would end up not getting kicked out of office by senate.
Hillary Clinton is an important character in the impeachment process and the sex scandal in general. As Bill Clinton’s wife, she is the most personally involved with the President, as well as the most personally involved in the subject matter involved with the impeachment. Since Bill Clinton’s wrong-doings stem from sexual misconduct, as his wife, Hillary Clinton has an extremely great involvement. Due to her great involvement in this personal matter, the public audience seems to associate their thoughts with her own (34% of the public thought that the scandal was a personal matter as long as Hillary Clinton was fine with it [U.S. News]). Meaning, the public feels that if Bill Clinton’s sexual affairs are accepted by Hillary, then they should be accepted by the country as well. It is important to look at how Clinton gets her points, what her motives are in doing so, and where her motives stem from because she is so influential regarding the President’s image. It is also important to look at the sexual misconduct between the President and Ms Lewinsky, as well as Hillary’s decision to support her husband, from the First Lady’s situation since women and their concerns are often forgotten when analyzing political discourse.
Impeachment is “ a criminal proceeding instituted against a public official by a legislative body.” (Impeachment). This does not mean automatic removal from office, which is a common misconception. the article goes on to explain how in the United States, the reason impeachment is so rare at the presidential level is because it is quite a long process and keep the Congress occupied for months; due to this impeachment in only employed in the gravest of circumstances. Furthermore, it is not just presidents or federal officials who can be impeached, as 49 states (all but Oregon) have an impeachment procedure in place. Impeachment is considered to be an important part of the checks and balances that make the US government unique, however due to the complicated and time consuming process it is.
I believe that since Watergate was a huge scandal, and Nixon was in the wrong for certain things dealing with it, that he should have been impeached. Nixon broke the law while handling with this scandal which is something I think a president should be impeached for. In the end, Nixon got impeached because of the articles posted by the House of Representatives. These articles stated what Nixon did that broke the law and they gave three reasons which were: obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress. This happened after the tapes that Nixon was trying to hide were revealed. One of the tapes called, “smoking gun,” reavealed evidence that Nixon did take part in covering up Watergate. On this tape, it showed that Nixon had ordered
He served as President from 1993-2001. During the time of his presidency America saw many changes. Some changes were good and some changes were bad. In 1994 NAFTA was passed which allowed free trade between Mexico, the United States and Canada. One change that shocked the American people was a change of morals. On the days of November 1995 Clinton began an affair with Monica Lewinsky, a 21-year-old unpaid intern (History Staff 2). In January 1998 the Monica Lewinsky scandal begins. The scandal begins when President Clinton says he did not have an affair with her. That statement turns out to be a lie. Clinton is put on trial for the charge of prudery. On December 11, 1999 the House impeaches President Clinton (History 2). Five weeks later the senate votes on removing Clinton from office, but the vote falls in favor of Clinton and he remains in office until the end of his presidency. Clinton gets to stay president after lying to the American people and having an affair in the white house and the consequences are the loss of morals for the American people which had been held to a high standard up until that
Despite the national attention the Watergate scandal had gained President Nixon, he won the second term presidency. The major problem for Nixon would come later. The investigations of the Watergate scandal lead to the discovery of other criminal acts by officials including Nixon. During the investigation many things begin to surface. It was discovered that documents had been destroyed that may have made a link between Nixon and the Watergate scandal. These documents may have shown that he had some acknowledgement in what had happened. There was evidence that people involved in the Nixon campaign had been wire tapping phones illegally for a long time according to “dummies.com”. The greatest issue would come to light during the 1973 Watergate hearings. During testimonies it came to light that every conversation was recorded in the Oval office according to “study.com”. It was demanded that these tapes be reviewed to learn how much involvement President Nixon had in the Watergate burglary. The President felt that he had the right to withhold these tapes through what he referred to as executive privilege. This means that if it is the best interest of the public the president has the right to keep information from the
On August 17, 1998, exactly one year after making the statement above, President Bill Clinton prepared to deliver a speech concerning a scandal that had gripped the nation for months. It is needless to say that this was an important moment during the Clinton administration. After accusations of sexual harassment, Clinton addressed the nation and admitted to having a relationship with Monica Lewinsky. In this critical speech Clinton set out to admit to wrong-doings, provide a few reasons for his action, and ultimately persuade the audience into moving on and forgetting the scandal. This essay will break down his speech into sections and examine the most and least effective strategies that Clinton employed and how well he executed those strategies. This is an interesting speech given under rare circumstances. Not since Watergate had an American president been under such harsh moral criticism from the public. By looking critically at this speech we are able to gain valuable insight into Clinton's motives.
Lately, the top story in the news day after day, months after months have been about William Jefferson Clinton, also known as Bill. Who could blame them, there is nothing better than a story out of the ordinary, especially one with presidential status. For the past months he has been the most talked about figure, being the essential topic for news, talk shows, late night comedy and even going as far as the big screen. Talk about 'Primary Colors' and 'Wag the Dog.' What has gotten to me the most however, were the constant flow of Republicans, along with a few Democrats, who just want to say how shocked and embarrassed they are along with the people of the United States.The president had not just become the most talked about figure, but also one history had ever seen, so far that is, breaking the record and becoming a topic of conversation and debate 'twenty-four seven.' The people, who I think were most affected by this crisis and feel very sad for, are the Republicans, since they had lost severe amount of sleep over the president's bedroom crisis. They had to perform their republican duties by shocking our brains with the president's affair with Monica Lewinsky. We had to ignore the rest of the world news and its issues while they plough through the valley of lies, abuse of power and something they called high crimes and misdemeanors.
Before stepping into the critical analysis of the speech, it is important to understand the historical setting from which the speech arose. The context can be briefly summarized as the following. In 1995 Clinton had a sexual relationship with one of his White House interns by the name of Monica Lewinsky. On January 17, 1998, a sexual misconduct lawsuit against him was filed. Clinton then quickly delivered a forceful public statement that he did not have a sexual relationship with the woman. However, unknown to President Clinton, Linda Tripp, one of Lewinsky’s associates, had recorded several conversations of Lewinsky describing her affair with the President. In the seven months afterwards, Kenneth W. Starr, the StarWhitewater independent counsel, had began collecting evidence of the affair and carrying out investigation about Clinton’s obstruction of justice. Evidence of Clinton lying under oath would be grounds for impeachment. On August 17, 1998, Clinton decided to a...