[Mb-civic] Bill Clinton, Beyond the White House - Tina Brown - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

Bill Clinton, Beyond the White House

By Tina Brown
Thursday, September 22, 2005; Page C01

The big surprise of Bill Clinton's Global Initiative conference at the 
Sheraton Hotel in New York last week was how strangely calming it was. 
You would expect to emerge begging for mercy from a three-day talkathon 
on the world's most intractable problems emceed by history's most 
garrulous president -- especially if you were a survivor of one of his 
book tour gigs.

To be sure, Clinton, the big intellectual showoff, had never been less 
than brilliant on his feet, but he never knew when to stop. And all that 
promiscuous lateral thinking ended up sucking the air out of the room. 
We got so tired of his lack of discipline that by 2000 we thought we 
were ready for a presidency that operated by assertion. Five years later 
we see what that's brought.

Maybe it's the effect of his brush with death. He's pared himself down 
to the essentials, symbolized by the slimmed physique and the paternal 
reading glasses. His style was always inclusive even when he was on the 
attack. But now you feel he's shed the psychic baggage of the 
impeachment years and with it the toxic rock and roll of his constantly 
roiling reputation.

The new, honed Clinton on the rostrum made sure that any earnest 
hand-wringing grappled with the raw brutality of irreconcilables. He 
even saw to it that the panels he moderated actually ran on time.

Every session began with a stroll to the podium to announce a big-bucks 
pledge for some imaginative initiative ($1.25 billion by the 
conference's close).

"Now here's something else in my hot little hand," the former prez would 
say, dangling his glasses, with his best "doggone" smile. "My old friend 
Carlos Slim Helu here has just said he's willing to develop a cell phone 
network for Gaza and link it to Jordan's network! Why, thanks, Carlos. 
Come up here and be recognized." A big hand for Carlos, who turns out to 
be the richest man in Latin America.

This wasn't just the usual FOBs from Park Avenue and Hollywood (though 
there were plenty of those cruising around). With so many world policy 
chiefs present -- Tony Blair, King Abdullah II of Jordan, Condi Rice, 
President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, even Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams, for 
heaven's sake -- the conference was a tour d'horizon of Clinton's life, 
and head, since the White House. (So that's what he's been doing on all 
those far-flung speaking gigs -- scarfing down public policy from the 
global minibar.) No one has figured out before how to leverage a 
post-presidency like this. Jimmy Carter's version has been about the 
power of example. Clinton's is about the power of power. He's been 
everywhere, met everyone (my favorite Clintonian aside: "As someone who 
went to Nigeria to plead for the life of a woman condemned under sharia 
law, I thank you for doing this."). Now he's putting that Rolodex to 
work for something bigger than the next campaign.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/21/AR2005092102036.html
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