Who the hell would pay $50 to see Bill Clinton speak? This is the man who ended "welfare as we know it" in the USA by drastically cutting social assistance and won election with racist attacks on black "welfare queens". He interrupted his first campaign run to return to his state of Arkansas, in order to execute a black man who was seriously mentally impaired - in order to not seem soft on crime. He backed up his "hard" stance during his time as president by expanding the number of crimes punishable by death - including serious drug offences. I have a lot of respect for African-American author Toni Morrison but I have to say that her description of Bill Clinton in 1998 as "The first Black president" was about the dumbest thing I ever heard.Clinton was also responsible for killing 800 Somalis in the Battle of Mogadishu, he ordered the bombing of a medicine factory in the Sudan, bombed Iraq relentlessly (and illegally) while enforcing child-killing sanctions, and, of course, he bombed Afghanistan - all of which played an important role in creating the anger that found an expression in 9/11.
That's why it warms my heart that the CNE had to scale back its plans to have Clinton speak in a 25,000 seat stadium and to drop the prices of the tickets for the smaller, 10,000 seat venue. Now, don't get me wrong, I think humanity still has some way to go if there's 10,000 fools in Toronto willing to shell out even $25 to see this racist, imperialist, ruling-class blowhard. But it's a start.
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