There can only be one person at a time holding the office “President.” There can be up to 50 people at a time holding the title “Governor.” The former is a “unique” title within the meaning of the quote. The latter is not.
I agree that would have been a very lively election. You’re forgetting though, that Clinton was a relative nobody when he entered the race (Governor of what?), and that Bush was considered to be a shoo-in. Clinton worked hard, made connections, all that good stuff, and by the time the big names realized Bush was turning out to be beatable, it was too late. I think Clinton would have run even if it was Reagan in 1992.
Update: I can’t speak for all the courts, but we spent the whole day on the phone trying to call people to tell them not to come on Friday and rescheduling their appearances. We couldn’t get all of them, as phone numbers aren’t available for everyone by any wild stretch of the imagination, but we gave it our best shot.
Three cheers for us! We really DO try harder! (Even if a lot of people think we’re “Number Two.”)
Thanks to everyone who has posted, by the way. This is my first thread that got more than a half dozen replies.
There was an official day of mourning when Nixon died as well.
This Friday I will do the same thing I did back then - ENJOY THE FUCK OUT OF MY DAY OFF! I am certainly not going to sit around bitching about it. Hell, I would take the entire week if they would let us.
That’s not correct. There are several reasons.
First, FDR broke the understood and previously adhered to tradition that, just as George Washington did, Presidents should limit themselves to two terms. The law codified that tradition. In FDR’s defense, there was a war on in Europe at that time, but all the same he made the decision to break with tradition, and tradition, especially those that started with the Founding Fathers, is something that the United States holds dear.
Second, it puts new blood into the position after a specified period of time. That’s a good thing, even if it causes good people to lose their jobs in favor of schlubs. As the SDMB is all about diversity, I’d think that that point would be intuitively understood.
Third, it removes the perception of the US haing some sort of King or Emperor. That is counterintuitive to our brand of democracy.
Fourth, it gives the Democrats a chance at the big seat, since there’s been only one Democrat President since Carter, and only four since 1948 for a grand total of 20 years. They need every chance they can get, and the artificiality of the term limit gives them that chance. 
As an aside, what makes you think that Reagan would have won again? If I recall, there were rumors about him being old and senile well before his second term ended. Also, what makes you think that Clinton could have won again? His Vice President didn’t win, and my perception has always been that Clinton was more of an anchor than a help. I think Clinton would have lost, although I think it would have been nice to see him run again and win so you Clinton supporters could have seen what a pretender he really was when the economy tanked.
FWIW, I don’t credit Clinton with the economic boom, any more than I credit Reagan with the fall of the Berlin Wall. A president can do a lot of harm, and possibly a lot of good (though I am enough of a pessimist to doubt it), but he can’t take credit for every positive event that happened to coincide with his term of office.
Apropos of nothing – the idea of Hillary becoming president makes my skin crawl right off my body.
Actually I got one of those calls this morning to reschedule an order to show cause we had on for hearing Friday. Yesterday we were wondering whether the New York state courts would be open (we knew the Federal courts would be closed), and what would happen to our OSC. Picking up the message on my voice-mail this morning answered the question. You should know that at least one of the lawyers out there appreciates it.
By the way, you’re not Mrs. Mumblemumble from New York County Supreme who left me the message, are you?
Nope. I’m Ms. Mumblemumble from Suffolk County Family Court. (Hope nobody there reads this.) I will happily accept appreciation by proxy, though.
You make good points, though I disagree with point the second.
I don’t think Reagan would have run again. I believe he had a strong enough sense of tradition that he would have kept to the tradition. (Leaving to the side the discussion of whether he would have wanted to.) Had he run again, he would have won. I really don’t think there’s anything to argue about there. Yes, his age and health may have been an issue, but it was an issue in 1980 too, and looking in my history book, he appears to have been elected anyway.
In re Clinton: I honestly don’t have a feel for whether he would have run again or not. He does not strike me as the bound by tradition type. I do believe that one of Gore’s biggest mistakes was distancing himself from Clinton. Clinton was more popular than a lot of people like to believe, an astonishingly good campaigner, and I think he could have done Gore good. And, yes, the economy would still have tanked.
I remember there being some serious rumblings about senility at the end of President Reagen’s second term.
If I recall correctly, President Kennedy was laid to rest three days after the assasination. That was a sitting President. Mrs. Kennedy made the arrangements.
I can’t believe that some of you are complaining about civil servants getting an unscheduled day off as if it’s a monumental waste of taxpayer money from which we will never recover.
I work for DoD, and can only speak for Federal Employees. We get only 11 single days off a year by law. The majority of these–such as Christmas and Labor Day-- are days most everyone gets off anyway. Only a couple–Washington’s Birthday and Columbus Day–are semi-unique to government (and banks for some reason). We’ll add on a half day, since it’s tradition for the president to give federal employees the afternoon of Christmas Eve off. It’s not on the official calendar, but it is tradition.
Contrast this holiday schedule to that of the the people at one of our contractors, say Boeing. Those guys get something like 8 paid days surrounding Christmas and New Year’s Day. That’s nearly as many days in two weeks as the federal employees get off all year. That’s where you should really be worried. You do realize, don’t you, that the money that goes to Boeing employees is still mostly tax dollars? We in the government just send them checks to build our planes. So if you want to bitch about workers getting some of your tax dollars without working for it, why aren’t you complaining about thse sectors of private industry? These are the same contractors that often take business class when they travel for Government programs. You should be all over that misappropriation of tax money! I’ve never seen anything but a cozy coach seat in all the official trips the Government has sent me on, and I never will.
But, in general, Americans are an overworked bunch. The average American worker doesn’t take enough time off for his own good. Hell, the average American worker isn’t given the vacation time necessary to do this. Euopean workers average about 25 paid vacation days a year, compared to the American employee’s 10. In general we are an overworked society which has lost the notion of free time. And some of you want to say that it’s unfair to let us have 8 hours away from our desks?
Only once have I taken more than two consecutive days of vacation time in the last two years. And that was a single week so that I could go on my honeymoon. In general, I can’t afford to take a vacation, both professionally and financially. I’m always too wrapped up in work to consider getting away from it for a week or two. And since I’m a Federal employee, I’m broke. For equal work, the typical government worker is considerably undercompensated (I make 20% less than my peers in industry with similar longevity).
You act like so mush money is going to be wasted by this impromptu holiday. But the fact is, the things I have to do at work don’t care what day it is. And they don’t care that I didn’t go to work yesterday. When I go in on Monday, all those deadlines and reqponsibilities will still be waiting for me, along with all the new ones. I’ll just end up working twice as hard on Monday to play catch up. So sleep well tonight, taxpayer. Now you can rest assured that you’re still getting all the work out of this wage slave that you’ve paid for. It must have been scary to think that maybe the government workers were going to have a little unexpected relief.
And if that doesn’t make you feel better, maybe the fact that I was in bed sick all day yesterday will. So you see, I couldn’t even enjoy it. Must have been a higher power making sure that this fat-cat government worker didn’t get any undeserved breaks. Whew! That was a close one.
Not to dampen your ire too much, but as a guy working for one of those big-name government contractors (who recently pulled 20 months subcontracted to Boeing), I’ll just mention that we get a whole whopping twelve days off a year by law. And since 6-8 of those days come in the last week of the year, that means the rest of our paid days off must be spread very thinly across the other eleven months. The start of the year is especially strenuous, since we effectively work from January 2nd through Memorial Day without any days off. Well, not counting paid vacations and sick leave, but I’m sure you get those, as well.
Yay, one extra day for us.
Twelve paid days off a year? Heaven! My last job we got New Year’s Day, Memorial Day, July 4, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. That’s six.
I know, but like I said, the bulk of them are in the last week of the year; barring that, we only get 4-6 as well.
I think it’s so they can shut down the company at the end of the year for accounting purposes, similar to how they no longer allow us to carry more than five days’ off from one year to the next.
Well fine, not counting the ones at the end of the year we only got three.
Sheesh.
Reagan was senile in sixty eight… he died the painful, tortuous death that he deserved! Nancy is next to receive her punishment! Flame me if you want…
I
DON’T
GIVE
A
FUCK
!!!
DNFTT, people.
Especially since he posted to the wrong thread.