B4 & B5

B4: Formal vs Informal Qualifications of the President (47)

• On your own piece of paper: 
• Create list of the most important "informal qualifications" of the president based on what the presidents have actually been (Link to the document to come later)
• Answer this question: Why are informal qualifications to be president so important? What is negative about these qualifications?  

B5: Reagan v Clinton (48)

• Teacher intro comments:

Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton were each two term presidents, and yet despite their electoral success each have a number of controversies that surround them.  Reagan had the Iran-Contra Affair revealed by the press which led to a congressional investigation about Reagan's Administration (but not him specifically) selling weapons to Iran illegally and give the proceeds to Nicaragua rebels illegally.  Bill Clinton was impeached but not removed from office for lying under oath about his relationship with Monica Lewinski.  Each of these are the two major scandals but they had controversial decisions and successful actions that lead to vastly different evaluations of the success of their presidencies. 

• On your own piece of paper:
• Choose one of the two presidential Pro/Con documents below (we got into partnerships in class):
• Ronald Reagan
• Bill Clinton
• Read about your president & decide what your basic evaluation was of that president: Was he a success overall?  There will be nuance in your answer (some good some bad) but you should come to a general conclusion and write a paragraph about it.
• Share your conclusion and details about your president with someone assigned to the other one.
• When you are complete write a paragraph about which president you think that was the most successful citing specifics from each reading.