By Elaine Donnelly
Extending sexual misconduct to combat units
Independent voices from the TWT Communities
Who is the only president buried in Washington, D.C.? How many presidents served in the military? Here's the answers and more about America's commander in chief.
Paul Dickson, a noted author, commentator and lexicographer, warms up the audience by opening this entertaining and informative book with a list of 44 presidential firsts, in no real way related to the subject of presidential neologisms or phrases, but guaranteed to grab our attention.
Abe Lincoln was born in a log cabin, but his son built himself a mansion. Robert Todd Lincoln, the president's only child to survive to adulthood, built the Georgian Revival home, called Hildene, as a seasonal dream home for his wife, Mary Harlan Lincoln, and their children.
Robert Todd Lincoln was the oldest of President Abraham Lincoln's four sons and the only one to live to maturity. In contrast to his self-educated father, he graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy and then Harvard. After the Civil War, he became one of the most prominent lawyers in Chicago, and by virtue of his name became a factor in Republican politics.
The 2012 presidential election is exactly a year away, and there's still no clear frontrunner for the Republican nomination. Despite all the chatter about dark-horse candidates coming out of nowhere to win the race, surprises are rare in the stodgy Republican Party's 150-year history.
Writing about interesting, though not major, historical figures can be a challenge for even the most talented of authors. For example, it takes a gifted writer to prompt a reader to spend a lot of time with a book in which James Garfield is the main character. Candice Millard has done that.
The hot new question in the Republican primary is whether Rep. Michele Bachmann, a three-term congresswoman who has rapidly leapfrogged from legislative back-bencher to tea party superstar, now can make the jump from the U.S. House to the White House — a gap that hasn't been cleared since 1880.
Recent events in Wisconsin and Ohio show that "public servants" are threatening to become our masters. In 1959, by being the first state to grant public-sector employees the right to unionize, Wisconsin entrenched a powerful political class. In order to overcome bloated pension plans and waste-encouraging workplace policies, we must now fight a class war, but it's not the "rich vs. poor" one that most people think we're fighting. To whom shall the spoils of this war go?
