Bill Clinton to debate George W. Bush
By Eric Zimmermann - 11/03/09 05:42 PM ET
Former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush will face off in a debate that organizers are calling "the hottest ticket in political history."
The event is scheduled for February 2010 at Radio City Music Hall in New York, according to the NY Post.
Tickets will cost anywhere between $60 to $1250.
The New York Post:
The event is part of MSG Entertainment's third annual "Minds That Move The World" speakers series.
[snip]
"We hope that [the debate] will not only provide guests with an informative and empowering experience that will help them make educated political decisions, but also encourage people to engage in continued dialogue surrounding the most significant current events of our day," said Melissa Miller Ormond, who serves as COO of MSG Entertainment.
Lincoln-Douglas, I'm happy for you and imma let you finish but Clinton-Bush will have one of the greatest political debates of all time!
Tracer Bullet
11-04-09, 09:56 AM
Lincoln-Douglas, I'm happy for you and imma let you finish but Clinton-Bush will have one of the greatest political debates of all time!
Okay, this is officially over. No more.
pinata242
11-04-09, 10:01 AM
Okay, this is officially over. No more.
Agreed. That shit has nuked the fridge.
JasonF
11-04-09, 10:22 AM
Agreed. That shit has nuked the fridge.
"Nuked the fridge", Imma let you finish but "jumped the shark" had one of the greatest cliches about something getting stupid of all time!
Groucho
11-04-09, 10:34 AM
How does the capitalization on that work? Is it "imma" or "Imma"? Because I've seen it both ways.
pinata242
11-04-09, 10:35 AM
I believe "I'm'a" is the correct spelling.
Mabuse
11-04-09, 07:51 PM
"the hottest ticket in political history."
rotfl
Yeah no shit. It's like having a horse race in the parking lot of the glue factory. These two old goats won't say anything relevant, how can that be political history?
mosquitobite
11-04-09, 08:25 PM
Gotta keep the dynasties. I mean Hillary wants to eventually be President and don't forget 'ole Jeb!
MinLShaw
11-04-09, 09:29 PM
If nothing else, it's interesting because for the longest time the post-presidency wasn't particularly relevant for most of our chief executives. Clinton and Bush are young enough to be in a position to help re-define the ways in which a past president can continue to be a relevant voice in our political discussion. I personally think it's a good thing for these guys to keep getting out there and aligning their star power with their individual causes and such. The Clinton Foundation has done a lot of good things overseas from what I've read, and I'm very interested to see what role Bush plays in the national and global scenes, going forward. The debate itself will, of course, be all show and pomp and circumstance, but I think there's potential to add a new dynamic to our dialog about issues.
dork
11-04-09, 09:40 PM
If nothing else, it's interesting because for the longest time the post-presidency wasn't particularly relevant for most of our chief executives. Clinton and Bush are young enough to be in a position to help re-define the ways in which a past president can continue to be a relevant voice in our political discussion. I personally think it's a good thing for these guys to keep getting out there and aligning their star power with their individual causes and such. The Clinton Foundation has done a lot of good things overseas from what I've read, and I'm very interested to see what role Bush plays in the national and global scenes, going forward. The debate itself will, of course, be all show and pomp and circumstance, but I think there's potential to add a new dynamic to our dialog about issues.
Please tell me you're a girl so I can feel less ashamed for what I just did.
MinLShaw
11-04-09, 09:42 PM
Please tell me you're a girl so I can feel less ashamed for what I just did.
Tell me what you did and I'll tell you how ashamed you should feel.
X
11-04-09, 11:08 PM
Not gonna happen.
Clinton, Bush Radio City debate called off
By MAGGIE HABERMAN
Last Updated: 3:40 PM, November 4, 2009
Posted: 1:31 PM, November 4, 2009
A "debate" between former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush has been nixed because the promoter overhyped it as a death-match faceoff between the men, The Post has learned.
Clinton spokesman Matt McKenna said the appearance was never slated to be a "debate" and was actually a moderated panel discussion with the 42nd and 43rd leaders of the free world.
"This event ... was supposed to be a discussion between the two former presidents, and has been cancelled because it was not being billed as such by an overeager promoter," McKenna siad.
The event was slated for Feb. 25 at Radio City Hall, with whom the two men had a contract. But MSG hired its own promoter to hype the event.
An aide to Bush and officials at MSG couldn't immediately be reached.
It'd be kind of fun if they started serious, but then turned it into a Bugs Bunny routine "is, is not, is, is not, is, is not....is not, is! Doh!"
General Zod
11-05-09, 12:45 AM
It'd be kind of fun if they started serious, but then turned it into a Bugs Bunny routine "is, is not, is, is not, is, is not....is not, is! Doh!"
Depending on what their definition of is is - Yes it could have been!
Mabuse
11-05-09, 02:51 PM
Sounds like Don King was promoting this.
wishbone
11-05-09, 03:09 PM
http://i35.tinypic.com/dza26p.jpg
Jack Straw
11-07-09, 04:55 PM
I understand Clinton doing this with no difficulty. Bush however has wisely kept a low profile. I guess he feels like America can't think any worse of him, so why not go for the payday.
G.W.B: "Suck It!, America"
TLwizard
11-07-09, 06:07 PM
They should do it somewhere a little more biased towards Bush. Like Europe.
MinLShaw
11-07-09, 08:00 PM
I understand Clinton doing this with no difficulty. Bush however has wisely kept a low profile. I guess he feels like America can't think any worse of him, so why not go for the payday.
G.W.B: "Suck It!, America"
I gather there's some confusion; the event has been canceled. As for Mr. Bush's willingness to participate, I too was surprised. Generally, presidents go into a sort of memoir-writing public hibernation after leaving office. As I indicated above, even though I disagreed with many of his policies, I am hopeful that he will continue to contribute to our political dialog in the coming years. Of course both presidents would have received renumeration for this now-canceled event; why shouldn't they? They would have been using their star power to draw attention to issues. Surely that shouldn't devalue the thoughts and experiences either man would have to offer.
I can't think of anything like this event having happened since the correspondence of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. I hope they can reschedule with a different promotional campaign, because I for one would love to hear the differing perspectives these two charismatic (if polarizing) former chief executives have on our world's affairs.
JasonF
11-07-09, 08:17 PM
I gather there's some confusion; the event has been canceled. As for Mr. Bush's willingness to participate, I too was surprised. Generally, presidents go into a sort of memoir-writing public hibernation after leaving office.
President Bush has already done one speaking engagement a few weeks ago. He spoke as part of the "Get Motivated!" seminar series, in which a crowd of thousands of audience members are exhorted to buy overpriced books and tapes from Peter and Tamara Lowe. To be fair, President Clinton has spoken at this seminar series at least once.
MinLShaw
11-07-09, 08:52 PM
President Bush has already done one speaking engagement a few weeks ago. He spoke as part of the "Get Motivated!" seminar series, in which a crowd of thousands of audience members are exhorted to buy overpriced books and tapes from Peter and Tamara Lowe. To be fair, President Clinton has spoken at this seminar series at least once.
Yeah, I forgot to include "hitting the speaking circuit" as part of the post-presidency transitional period back into a private life.
Incidentally, back in 2002 a friend of mine and I got tickets through a professor of mine to go see President Bush speak. Despite the temptation on some people's part to dismiss him as "Cheney's puppet" or some kind of moron, I found him to be a very engaging and charismatic speaker. He and I do the same math, but reach different solutions on a number of issues, but I would encourage citizens to go listen to him speak if he comes to town. I firmly believe that even a broken clock is right twice a day, and that applies to presidents, too.
classicman2
11-07-09, 09:24 PM
Cheney's puppet - no.
I think Cheney had a lot of influence on Bush - especially the first couple of years. I believe his influence became less & less as time wore on.
DeputyDave
11-07-09, 09:58 PM
Yeah, I forgot to include "hitting the speaking circuit" as part of the post-presidency transitional period back into a private life.
Incidentally, back in 2002 a friend of mine and I got tickets through a professor of mine to go see President Bush speak. Despite the temptation to dismiss him as "Cheney's puppet" or some kind of moron, I found him to be a very engaging and charismatic speaker. He and I do the same math, but reach different solutions on a number of issues, but I would encourage citizens to go listen to him speak if he comes to town. I firmly believe that even a broken clock is right twice a day, and that applies to presidents, too.
I may have disagreed with a lot of his policies but to call him a moron is simply lazy and dishonest. Just the same old song that has been sung since I've been paying attention to politics, everyone on the right gets painted as stupid. (BTW, I am not saying you are doing this here).
I've pretty much made it a rule that anyone who seriously suggests that Bush had a below average intelligence should have anything out of their mouths discounted. I know he wasn't our most skilled public speaker but Obama himself looks like a stammering fool when going off the teleprompter
.
JasonF
11-07-09, 10:46 PM
I may have disagreed with a lot of his policies but to call him a moron is simply lazy and dishonest. Just the same old song that has been sung since I've been paying attention to politics, everyone on the right gets painted as stupid. (BTW, I am not saying you are doing this here).
I've pretty much made it a rule that anyone who seriously suggests that Bush had a below average intelligence should have anything out of their mouths discounted. I know he wasn't our most skilled public speaker but Obama himself looks like a stammering fool when going off the teleprompter
.
One does not get to the presidency without being extremely intelligent. President Bush's folksy demeanor made it easy to pigeon-hole him as a moron, but I agree -- it's lazy and dishonest to do so.
I disagree with your assessment of President Obama speaking off teleprompter. He's a very cautious speaker, but to call him a stammering fool is as lazy and dishonest as calling President Bush a moron.
MinLShaw
11-07-09, 10:57 PM
I may have disagreed with a lot of his policies but to call him a moron is simply lazy and dishonest. Just the same old song that has been sung since I've been paying attention to politics, everyone on the right gets painted as stupid. (BTW, I am not saying you are doing this here).
I've pretty much made it a rule that anyone who seriously suggests that Bush had a below average intelligence should have anything out of their mouths discounted. I know he wasn't our most skilled public speaker but Obama himself looks like a stammering fool when going off the teleprompter
.
I fixed my original post to clarify the point that I did not, myself, dismiss Mr. Bush as unintelligent or easily manipulated. I will say, as someone who earned his degree in history (though obviously not at an Ivy League school such as the former president), I would seriously love to read some of his student work. I suspect in some ways we could trace the evolution of his ideology, and yet I would also expect to find much of his perspective and voice there all along. I think this is why I was so excited to hear him exchange thoughts with Mr. Clinton on these serious issues, and why I am so disappointed that the aggressive promotion has (apparently) caused it to be canceled.
DeputyDave
11-07-09, 11:30 PM
I disagree with your assessment of President Obama speaking off teleprompter. He's a very cautious speaker, but to call him a stammering fool is as lazy and dishonest as calling President Bush a moron.
I didn't say he was, I only said he looked like one. This is my opinion based on my experience. With his stuttering and "uhs" I can barely listen to the man speaking off the cuff. As a former Toastmaster I am very aware of how people speak and give speeches. Obama is fair when reading the lines but it's the "uhs" that make me wince.
creekdipper
11-08-09, 03:49 AM
So now we don't get to see the Ron Howard film version. :(
MinLShaw
11-16-09, 01:41 PM
Well, the New York "debate" is off, but the two former presidents have agreed to appear together and field questions in Chicago next May at the BIO International Convention. Article here (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2009/11/ny_debate_is_off_but_bill_clin.html?ft=1&f=103943429/).
wendersfan
11-16-09, 01:54 PM
So now we don't get to see the Ron Howard film version. :(Having President Bush lean over to President Clinton, just before the event begins, and ask him if he did "any fornicatin' over the weekend?" would be about ten different kinds of awesome.
Buy: