Word: legalism
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Regardless of legal issues, credibility is the basic issue," he said. "When he failed to tell the truth under oath, and didn't come forward when asked to come forward, it poses an issue of credibility...
While President Clinton and his legal team continue to make their case in the growing crisis, his supporters are left with few arguments in his defense. Their latest refrain is that now that the President has sincerely apologized, asked forgiveness and taken responsibility for the scandal, the American people and their Congress should move on, recognizing his contrition and appreciating his effort to heal the nation...
...President asks us to forgive him. He speaks to the nation with tears in his eyes, admitting that he has caused pain to his family and to the American people. Yet at the same time, he sends his lawyers into both the legal and political arenas with an argument so tenuous and so precise in their hair-splitting that he draws criticism even from the Democratic leadership in Congress...
...contribution that the president has displayed rings false when contradicted by his legalistic official defense. The attitude that influenced his August 17th speech is still apparent in the disrespect that he shows the nation with his double-barreled offensive of personal apology and legal denial. The President still operates under the assumption that he can dupe the country, convincing us that he is willing to pay the consequences for his actions while simultaneously attempting to evade responsibility with his legal defense...
...that I knew was that it was a system that kept white people in power and black people in jail. I knew that it involved disenfranchisement and loss of civil and political rights. I knew that black people were beaten and sometimes killed, but as to any sort of legal or conceptual understanding, I was completely lost...