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Bill Clinton Comes Through!
In the "Whoâda thunk it" category, in an article written for the NY Post, Ralph Peters sounds positively stunned by a performance Bill Clinton gave before (not necessarily friendly audience at) a "Conference on the future of the Middle Eastâs relations with America". Major emphasis on "positive" and "stunned"."Our former president gave the most perfectly pitched, precisely targeted speech Iâve ever heard to a hall filled with Muslim intellectuals and officials. And they listened. Clintonâs lecture closed a worthwhile, if often exasperating, conference on the future of the Middle Eastâs relations with America. Sponsored by the Emir of Qatar and organized by the Brookings Institution, the event brought together a combination of the usual suspects and outside ringers for vigorous, open discussions. A few of the sessions did manage to move a fragile half-step beyond the "everything that isnât Israelâs fault is Americaâs fault" mantras that sedate Middle Eastern societies. Still, by the closing luncheon, Iâd had about enough of Muslim "authorities" whose versions of their own history had collapsed into easy myths and for whom the Koran had become a document to be used as selectively as the phone book. Enter Bill Clinton. Now, after serving in Washington during the Clinton administration and hearing our former president chatter for checks more recently, my expectations were that he would do no harm, but little good. I was wrong. As soon as he took the podium, Clinton began taking stands as brave as they were necessary. With virtuoso skill, he led the audience where they needed to go - while convincing them it was where they had wanted to end up all along. His sense not only of what required saying, but of how best to express it to that complex, contrary audience was almost supernatural. We all know that Bill Clinton can speak persuasively, of course. But in this case the message mattered. Clinton just may have been the only American who could have reached that unforgiving crowd. He didnât pander. He made Americaâs case and made it well. Beginning with a sometimes-rueful look at the progress his administration had failed to make and noting that the wars that plague the world are begun by men his own age or older, but paid for in blood by the young, he refused to direct one syllable of blame at the Bush administration. Accepted as a citizen of the world, he spoke as a convinced American." An article worth reading. Not a fan of Bill, I am happy to read that he seems to be doing good by us (US). Unexpected; like finding something youâd lost and thought gone forever. Iâll take good news where I can find it. Posted by: Whiskey Mike 2004-01-19 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=24656 |