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Clinton to the Rescue
by Bryan Curtis
Bryan Curtis is a senior editor at The Daily Beast. He was a columnist at Play: The New York Times Sports Magazine, Slate, and Texas Monthly, and has written for GQ, Outside, and New York. Write him at bryan.curtis at thedailybeast.com.
Benjamin Sarlin is Washington correspondent for The Daily Beast. He previously covered New York City politics for The New York Sun and has worked for talkingpointsmemo.com.
Ramon Espinosa / AP Photo, FILE
The Haitian earthquake has put Bill Clinton squarely back on the world stage. And this mission is personal.
Last May, when the United Nations dispatched Bill Clinton to Haiti, it felt as if Clinton was slinking off the world stage. That changed Tuesday afternoon. Hours after an earthquake leveled Haiti’s capital, the world’s most famous U.N. envoy was manning his own multimedia situation room. He gave updates to Wolf Blitzer on CNN. He wrote an article for Time magazine assuring readers that “Haiti isn’t doomed.” In The Washington Post, Clinton sketched out a relief plan for what he called “one of the great humanitarian emergencies in the history of the Americas.”
It felt awfully… presidential. Clinton, whom Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton had assured us would be kept far from the center of American foreign policy, was, by chance events, back in the center of it.
Clinton “has the moral authority to call the world to action,” Paul Begala said.
Just as he did after the Asian tsunami in 2004, the former president has been working nonstop to raise cash and coordinate relief efforts. Clinton’s online appeal for emergency donations generated more than $3.7 million in 24 hours, his aides said. Another program would raise even more money through text-message donations. George W. Bush joined Clinton’s fundraising effort at Obama’s behest.
• Full coverage of Haiti
• John Avlon: Shameless Haiti Wingnuts It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. When Hillary Clinton accepted the secretary of State job, she was afraid that Bill would be a nuisance, whether by his speechifying-for-hire or freelance diplomacy. The new book Game Change, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, includes a scene in which Hillary Clinton tells Obama that, in the authors’ paraphrase, “You know I can’t control him, and at some point he'll be a problem.” Still, last August, Bill Clinton traveled to North Korea and helped secure the release of two American hostages.
Former aides say Clinton’s interest in Haiti is far more personal. The Clintons spent their honeymoon there in 1975.
“His attraction to Haiti and Africa is the very thing that repulses so many people—the poverty, the grinding destitution, the seeming hopelessness,” said Paul Begala, who worked as an adviser to Clinton. “This has been a long-term commitment of his.”
It also has the feel of penance for one of the Clinton presidency’s biggest foreign-policy headaches. In 1991, Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was ousted in a military coup. By 1994, Clinton was ready to invade the country and restore Aristide to power, despite the protests of many Democrats. “I’m going to do it anyway,” Clinton said at the time, according to historian Taylor Branch, who recounted the conversation in his book The Clinton Tapes. “It’s the right thing.”
Only a last-minute peace deal brokered by Jimmy Carter, Colin Powell, and Sam Nunn staved off the invasion. Aristide returned to power, and left peacefully when his term expired two years later. But much to Clinton’s embarrassment, Aristide undermined his successor and then, upon being reelected in 2000, allowed conditions to worsen until he was deposed again. Far from backing the George Washington of Haiti, Clinton had backed a man who only extended Haiti’s cycle of corruption and poverty, said Robert M. Perito, the director of the Haiti program at the United States Institute of Peace.
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padraigte
I don't care if he is a reprobate,he's purely a compassionate human being. I can't imagine any other public figure that I'd spend a few hours jawing with.
oliverckerr
I paraphrase president Obama, I have instructed "my administration." This is similar to his saying, "The buck stops with me," rephrasing president Harry S. Truman, who stated more than once, "The buck stops here."
Obama is a winner, Harvard educated, the aloof technocrat politishin sits atop giant bureaucracies, but Mr. "me me me" is not a leader by any stretch. In that sense our world is leaderless.
padraigte has got it right. Nor was Billy Clintstone anything more than a womanizing reprobate in his heyday!
Obama should be standing on the tarmac in Miami on round-the-clock cable TV talking to independent truckers all over the country on his cell phone and live on the cable television with his 800 cell number crawling along the bottom of the screen,
"Get around town to every Walmart Kmart Target and supermarket. Load up your truck with sacks and sacks of rice and red beans and portable out door camping stoves with fuel and bottled water and baby food! fax me the bill at 1-800- tohaiti, then drive on down with the bill of lading also with a bill for your time and trouble and fuel for your truck and i will cut you a check on the spot!
'Everybody drinking bottled water today, take your empty, fill it brim full with tap water, seal it good and tight and drop it in a fed Ex Box. I'm making a deal with Fed Ex to automatically ship all the individual bottles of tap water in huge black double garbage bags to the air port in Port au Prince. Right this minute! Chug a lug that bottle of water, refill the bottle with good old tap, seal it up and drop it in a Fed Ex box!" And Fed Ex could use some volunteers at their main stations to get all the bottles into garbage bags, too, so we can all pitch in." "Water. Babies and old folks will die without water. We need to Fed Ex three million bottles a day!"
"Right this minute! start loading those tractor trailers with stoves, water, and rice and red beans. A little rice and red beans cures a lot of things." I need two hundred back hoes and the drivers, too, following in convoy car loads. Load the the back hoes on flat beds - pack a couple days food and water, and lets roll. We have lives to save!"
There! I wrote the president a tarmac script he can put on a teleprompter.
Hillary Clintstone has returned from Austrailia so she can be part of the show. She could have stayed right where she was and talked on the telephone with every leader world wide arranging immediate aid to be flown to Haiti, but her purpose is to look next presidential, not to save lives.
For all the thin skinned politishinz, Hill and Bill, theirs is a me me me world.
Obama talks on television about Haiti being a "Top priority," the language of bureaucrats.
Health care legislation is Obama's "top priority." Haiti is wrenching, sad, horrible, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere before this disaster. Obama could be working on this issue of saving as many Hatian lives as possible, being involved, standing all day long on a tarmac on cable TV in Miami, working a couple cell phones for all to hear, exhorting the whole country to refill their water bottles with tap and drop water bottles at every Fed EX location so Fed EX could deliver three million bottles of water to Haiti by 10:00 a.m. the next day every day, (or no charge for the delivery when late :) ) upon the presidents request, the FED EX deal, the president talking to independent truckers on where to go to load up with goods all day long!
How long would it take the lack luster best dressed president to arrange that much and hold a press conference telling the nation what the FED EX water deal is and what to do!
But Obama couldn't do that while standing all day long, on an airport tarmac, on behalf of the Hatians, and at the same time lobby his democrats over health care.
Getting the health care bill passed is Obama's "top priority." His handlers plan to make that health scare bill the reason to reelect him. His reelection, and fighting the republicans is Obama's "top priority."
Hillary could be talking to all the worlds' bureaucrat equals about making Haiti a United Nations protectorate and rebuild the whole country in six months with solar units every where, so they do not want for electricity! What a great idea!
The whole country would have rebuillding jobs earning $100 a week instead of $1.00 a year so money, a steady income would be in the hands of all the poorest people. As a United Nations protectorate we could insure every house or apartment we build would belong to the occupant!
But Hillary is heart on her sleeve getting her share of TV lime light, important if the chance to run for president again comes up. That is Hillary Clintstone's "top priority," not rebuilding the poorest country in the Western Hemishere!
The other countries started sending stuff by plane before Billy Clintstone got involved. The Chinese were there first! None of these other countries' activities are the doing of Obama.
Obama gives a speech off a teleprompter somemone else wrote and says "Haiti, the world is standing with you." Except the poor poor people of Haiti are flat on their ass, knocked out from a giant earthquake.
Obama is busy making television commercials to try to save Kennedy's seat in Massachusetts. that is his "top priority."
Obama smirks and chuckles at the idea of reversing our stupid prohibition laws against canabis but onward the slow march to full legalization is on. President Obama smoked pot in high school and had dreams of his father, but the hypocrite laughs at legalization, says that is not his idea of growing an economy.
But Haiti could be growing medical marijuana specifically for distribution throughout United states to people with cancer, and muscular dystrophy and Haiti would have a year round cash crop instead of barren soil!
Don't hold your breath waiting for Billy Clintstone to talk about that!
michaelslevinson.com
leftygoleft
Obama Sucks, Bush Sucks....whatever. Our whole world society will never be just until we ditch the monetary system and find a more symbiotic way to co-exist. I don't pretend to have the answer because on a personal level I know it doesn't matter. I can't change the world. I can only change the way I perceive it and what my real place in the universe actually is.
For me it is about self actualization and recognizing my journey back to the oneness that we are all a part of. The illusion of separateness that is the root of ignorance and judgement leads away from enlightenment and you can judge and hate others all you want but ultimately you are only hurting yourself.
I think Bill Clinton is following in the foot steps of Jimmy Carter who did more for the world in a humanitarian role after his presidency than he could accomplish with the rigors and distractions of being the president. Clinton is hardly a perfect human being but he is doing positive things with the power of being an ex-president.
oliverckerr
I hold the view Bill is for Bill. The cameras are a draw. But he is more a people person than the technocrat Obama who refers to haiti as a "top priority."
Obama's, (and Bill's) "top priority" is Massachusetts' coming election for Senate. Obama is "administering the Haiti "top priority" through his administration - bureaucracy.
I like Obama, but less and less, like all the rest.
michaelslevinson.com
camfield
Even in this time of massive misery and suffering, there are conservative jerks who leap upon this major crisis as just one more opportunity to denigrate Bill Clinton and Barack Obama--both of whom jumped in immediately to organize aid efforts and fund same. These critics immediately drag the discussion off topic into petty alleyways.
Both Barack and Bill will be continuing to make Haiti an urgent priority, as will Hillary Clinton, to whatever extent possible via her office.
Meanwhile, I see that Rush Limbaugh's contribution has been: "We're already helping Haiti. It's called the U. S. Income Tax."
Those of us who want to actually do something constructive on behalf of Haitians may do so by going to http://www.clintonfoundation.org/haitiearthquake/
SanFranLive
Shut up, shut up shut up
raykeith7
Michaelslevinson, do u write a daily & what is the address?
tgefilms
You know, oliverckerr, it would be nice if you didn't copy and paste your nonsensical ramblings into every thread about Haiti.
oliverckerr
tgefilms: Lots of times I am rewriting, improving so the piece is not just a cut and paste. But sometimes it is. I want to reach as many people as possible.
raykieth7 : I post here on a daily basis and I am soon to have a blog on every page of my web site for visitors to write commentary, and for a few hours a day, chat with me should someone want to. That seems a great way to campaign fopr president. Visit
michaelslevinson.com
Here is a free copy of "New World Hors D'oeuvres."
michaelslevinson.com/newworld.pdf
Sajwert
I've always wondered what New Orleans would have been like during Katrina if he instead of Bush had been president. I seriously doubt Bill would have just taken a fly-over to see the damage, and NEVER would he have waited as long as Bush to even get involved.
Bill's private life is none of our affair any more than mine our yours is. However, his public life is far superior to that of many who badmouth him every opportunity.
thetone
Haiti and New Orleans. Two major disaster areas, and that was before the hurricane and the quake. Both simply models of complete crooked liberal governance, both totally dependant on the government for their every need, the ability and the desire to take care of themselves totally non existent. Of course Clinton would not miss an opportunity to be on the world stage, even though his policies and actions during his presidency did little besides contribute to the further corruption and helplessness of this pitiful country.
Carole65
Ever wonder what New Orleans would have been like if money allocated for the Army Corps of Engineers to update the levy years earlier hadn't been diverted to a bridge to nowhere across Lake Pontchatrain and lined the pockets of the politicians? Ever wonder how many people would have gotten out had Mayor Nagin not gone into hiding. Why did Gov. Blanco not act sooner than the day before landfall to get people evacuated?
Hindsight is a beautiful thing, but it usually in the eye of the political holder.
democracyforall
Bill Clinton was president for 8 years. He helped to prepare New Orleans for disasters during that time.
wfleet
Prez Bill is an inspiration in both tireless effort and extraordinary, practical vision.
Glenda1976
Oh Puleese. Mr. Coffee is so loving this. Give me a break.
Quietplease
Glenda--can you explain "Mr. Coffee"? I can't wait to hear your mind.
Johnnyappleseed
He loves the limelight and photo op's.
"As long as the job gets done, I don't care who get's the credit"....Reagen
rtwyatt3
I applaud Clinton and Bush for getting involved in this effort. Can't some of you put politics aside for even a minute? I'm sure the people suffering there won't require a copy of someones voter registration card to be sent along with the money and aid that's being are provided.
thetone
Whaddaya mean Clinton and Bush. Don't you know it's all Clinton all the time? The world loves a rockstar.
SanFranLive
While Clinton in on the ground in Haiti Bush, Jr. is probably at society parties passing around the hat for the devil worshippers.
Where's Jr.?
OldCrow
Clinton isn't in Haiti, he's in MA trying to rescue a failed campaign.
siegeljja
Oh please - Clinton's honeymoon connection? Get real. Begala still has his head so far up Clinton's ass his brain is suffering from oxygen deprivation.
Johnnyappleseed
You noticed.
egw7777
Curtis & Sarlin - Should not you have titled this Clinton & George W. Bush to the Rescue? Both of you must be Liberal?
OldCrow
They ignored the fact that Clinton is responsible for much of the incompetent government in Haiti - by supporting the crooked Aristide regime.
Clinton's "help" pushed the country back into darkness. Clinton's failed vision, his support for a ruler who exploited Haitians and watched them die of disease while he entertained guests in his palace. Bill Clinton is no hero of Haiti.
So perhaps is just as well that Clinton isn't anywhere near Haiti - he's in MA trying to rescue a failed democrat campaign.
Another failed initiative of the existential man - living with absolute sincerity in the passing moment.
Johnnyappleseed
Liberals tend to pick real poor choices for sure, Ariside is a prime example.
spacialist
Your comment would suggest that you believe compassion to be another liberal value?
OldCrow
compassion is not a liberal value, it is a Christian value.
Of course compassion is not limited just to Christians, there are many compassionate people of all religions as well as compassionate agnostics.
But compassion is an integral part of Christian belief.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
ndspinelli
This is Bill Clinton, and in his narcissistic world, it's alway about Bill Clinton. I'm sure he has empathy, but that's after himself. It's Bill Clinton #1-5, and then everyone else.
oliverckerr
Correct!
For all of the thin skinned politishinz (I spell the word politician the way i do to show that neither you or I would want to grow up to be one) it's a me me me world.
Michelle Obama made a speech on thursday. She interjected the prepared speech to say, "Let me take a moment to express my profound heartbreak."
Her "heartbreak" is "profound." Yours is just heartbreak. They bore. Elenor Roosevelt would be in Haiti since Wednesday night, setting an example, grappling with rocks to uncover the living.
michaelslevinson.com
Sajwert
Eleanor Roosevelt refused Secret Service protection, and went about the country without it. That was then, and this is now. Although ER was threatened by the KKK with assasination, she still went into the South without the SS.
Things are very, very different today. Michelle Obama cannot for excellent reasons, do the same. She cannot go unattended by the SS, and going to Haiti to "grapple with rocks" is out of the question.
If all you have to carp about is her use of the word "profound" then you are looking for ways to disrespect the president's wife, not because you give a damn about the word.
This tragedy should be above the nasty, hateful, rotten tempered attitudes of politics as usual. We should all be, and most of us are, profoundly sad and profoundly heartbroken for the families that have lost their members and their friends and all that they had.
oliverckerr
From one of my dictionarys:
profound relief heartfelt, intense, keen, great, extreme, acute, severe, sincere, earnest, deep, deep-seated, overpowering, overwhelming, fervent, ardent.
You write: most of us are, profoundly sad and profoundly heartbroken for the families.
She says, "Let me take a moment to express my profound heartbreak."
The "diff rinse" : Her's is a "me" yours is an "us." I was pointing out the "me, me, me element of egocentric politicians. She is, and is married to one.
Michelle Obama does not hold a candle to Elenore Roosevelt who was in a class by herself. I am old enough to remember E.R. when I was four years old.
I was not am not carping about or disrespecting the president's bossy wife, merely pointing out she is her own best subject, for the rest of "us," the object, the poor Hatians are more important.
To "me" ironic that you say "that was then / This is now"
"This is the promised land
That was then
This is now
Each land show its promise
Pow wow to the pea pull
Up with the folks" c.1971
The phrase appeared in the hand lettered Television Scripture I was inspired with in 1969 and wrote down in 1970 and published 1971. A kid who bought a copy said he was going to show it to his father who worked for an ad agency on Madison Avenue.
The agency, Weiden and Kennedy, lifted imagry to produce the famous frying pan anti drug ad. This is your brain. This is your brain on drugs (scrambled).
They also lifted the lines "That was then / This is now" for another commercial, and other stuff, too. There isn't anyway you could know that they ripped "me" off and my own word order was made part of our speech.
michaelslevinson.com
MrMommy
i think it would be good for her weight loss goals to do a little manual labor.
amapola101
This is Bill Cintons at his finest He is a man with emotions, feelings caring .Ex Pres Bush,deserves also credit.So many years, no one paid attention, we should have worked with the Haitian familes, set up facotories, spend our money with them.Not over Afghan, Well I do not want to be political today. Again,It is good the world community is responding..
democracyforall
it is good to see organizations and individuals heeding the call to help.
The Caribbean earthquake zone is where several plates intersect. This will produce much more disaster as these plates collide. The earth is still shaking there. Unless they have excellent building codes, protected sources of food and water, they will have many more disasters, even this one will take years for them to recover.
IDubious
Please, please, please...do not let Barbara Bush comment.
unCOBOL
I just wish all you clever comment junkies sent money to the Red Cross, or somebody, before you posted your sage political observations here. I wish... I doubt... but, I am dumb enough to be proud I did!
George Washington lead the beginning of the biggest public rip off in the history of mankind. But, we may have forgotten some previous great greed jockies, over the years. Humans only like fresh gossip ;)
Why don't we just give the Haitians Texas? That might improve the public schools... ours, not theirs.
elseanna
wonderful idea!!
Annie57
I think it's a mighty good thing for Haiti that Bill Clinton is its U.N. Ambassador, especially at this heartbreaking time.
Sajwert
I could not agree with you more. I believe that he can not only do concrete things to move this along, but his very presence will make a difference to many of the Haitians as they are quite fond of him and hold him in respect.
dulaurence
There were two items, side by side, in the St. Pete Times this morning that blew me totally away.
The blurb on the left mentioned that Obama was calling on both Clinton and George Bush to assist in the U.S. relief efforts. I thought to myself, "Does he mean the same George 'You're-doing-a-great-job, Brownie" Bush that was so responsive during Katrina?" Many have said Haiti is so impoverished that this disaster is the worst possible thing that can happen and life couldn't be made any worse for them. Check that: Sending Bush to help would bring them even lower! How about settling for a fly-over?
The second blurb was about Rush Limbaugh's appeal yesterday for people NOT to donate to the effort, because a) we can't trust Washington to get the money to the right people, and b) we already are donating through taxes. This has to be the low of all lows on the Republican's obstructionist agenda.
democracyforall
everybody's help is needed, this is not time for political bashing.
speekup
It seems to me most of the posters here bitching about the self-serving egos of politicians are doing nothing but expressing their own narrow-minded egos (NB: Mr. Levinson). Instead of more and more cynical mud slinging, how about doing something helpful yourself in this sad, weary world? I'm sure you'd tell Obama that it's not what you say, but what you do, so--as another poster said--Shut up.
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Johnnyappleseed
Yellowsheet, how much have you donated?
Sajwert
JS, what business is it of your's or anyone else's what anyone donates?
If you are so interested in the amount donated by us commenters, then by all means start the ball rolling by not only telling us how much you donated, but show us absolute proof that you actually did donate.
Quietplease
Johnnyaps--Why are you asking?
MrMommy
My wife and her office donate $20,000 a year to docs without borders. every year
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amapola101
Beautiful post square.It is also great,to see the whole world responding.with us
kjsmithjd
You don't know what the fuck you are talking about. If you knew the truth about 200 plus years of American treatment of Haiti, and ESPECIALLY the actions and policies of GHWB and Bill Clinton, you would be shocked. You have no reason whatsoever to be "proud to be an American" --- not since the liberation of the Nazi camps. Educate yourself. Accept reality. It's hard, it's shocking, I know. Believe me, you won't be sending notes of gratitude. Try "An Unbroken Agony" by Randall Robinson. Or just look it up on Amazon and get some information.
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