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Thursday, Feb 17, 2011 9:40 PM UTC

Bill Clinton sent emails while president — 2 of them!

Our 42nd president jumped on the internet wagon with the rest of us but didn't ride it for very long

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Topics: Bill Clinton, Internet Culture,

Bill Clinton sent emails while president -- 2 of them!Former President Bill Clinton speaks during the funeral mass for R. Sargent Shriver at Our Lady of Mercy Parish in Potomac, Md., Saturday, Jan. 22, 2011. Shriver, an in-law of the Kennedys, and the first director of the Peace Corps, died Tuesday. He was 95. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen/Pool)(Credit: AP)

Bill Clinton did many things while president. He enacted the North American Free Trade Agreement. He reformed the nation’s welfare policy. He got impeached. He created a budget surplus. And then he left office with a higher approval rating than any president since World War II.

Bill Clinton did not send many emails during this period of time. In fact he sent only two, according to a surprise talk he gave at today’s Wired for Change conference at the Ford Foundation in New York:

I sent a grand total of two emails as president: one to our troops in the Adriatic, and one to John Glenn when he was 77 years old in outer space. I figured it was OK if Congress subpoenaed those.

Here’s the “electronic message” Bubba sent to John Glenn. It’s now printed in a book.

Adam Clark Estes blogs the news for Salon. Email him at ace@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @adamclarkestes More Adam Clark Estes.

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