Former US President Bill Clinton and
former US President George W. Bush stand to leave after speaking during the
launch of the Presidential Leadership Scholars Program at the Newseum in
Washington on Sept. 8, 2014.
Former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush
unveiled a new leadership training program in Washington today. Clinton said
the initiative will encourage Americans to “have vigorous debate, serious
disagreements, knock-down, drag-out fights, and somehow come to ultimately a
resolution that enables the country to keep moving forward.”
“We want people from all walks of life and different
political persuasions,” Bush said. “We want people who have shown the capacity
to succeed. People who work hard, and who work with others in a good way.”
The six-month training program, which will begin in
February 2015, will be stewarded by Clinton and Bush, as well as former
President George H. W. Bush. and the library of Lyndon B. Johnson. It will
employ lectures, discussions and case studies from these four presidents’ terms
to teach core leadership skills. Joshua Bolten, Bush’s former chief of staff,
called the effort “the first collaboration ever among presidential centers in
an ongoing initiative.”
Clinton stressed the importance of assembling a diverse
class of future leaders, especially in today’s political climate. “I’d like to
get some people from dramatically different backgrounds together with the
charge to come up with something they can do together,” he said. “There’s a
skill that is beginning to atrophy in America, which is listening to people who
disagree with us.”
Though the two former presidents, both of whom are 68,
are from opposite parties, they traded good-natured jabs and jokes about the
life of ex-presidents. With mock seriousness, Bush kept touting the upcoming
November release date of his book about his relationship with his father –
which he described as “a love story.” This later prompted Clinton, who has
become famously close to Bush Sr. in recent years, to say, “I learned a lot
from him too, but I’m not making any money off it.”
George H. W. Bush wasn’t at the event, but he sent a
letter from Kennebunkport, Maine, read by Bolten, that gently mocked both his
son and Clinton: “Every former president is different. And that’s as it should
be. For example, not all of us skydive. That’s not a judgmental comment, just a
fact.” ( The former president celebrated his 90th birthday this year by
skydiving ).
Bolten began a question to the younger Bush by noting
that he had no opportunity to attend a leadership training program when he was
growing up. “Yea there was,” Bush cut in. “George H. W. Bush.”
Bolten’s final question of the morning was to Bush,
asking him to give Clinton advice for becoming a grandfather (Chelsea Clinton
is due to give birth this fall). “Be prepared to fall completely in love
again,” Bush counseled. “…And get ready also to be, like, the lowest person in
the pecking order in your family.”
( Tessa Berenson, Sebtember 8, 2014 )
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