Man of the World: The Further Endeavors of Bill Clinton by Joe Conason Page A

relations firm handling Clinton’s speech. “Unfortunately that didn’t work.” Leo van der Kant, director of the Assemblee Speakers Bureau that brought the former president to the Netherlands, explained frankly that the speech had been closed to the press due to the “uproar over Clinton’s pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich.”
    Apart from the squall over press access, however—which didn’t at all trouble Clinton or his staff, who tended to hold journalists in dim regard—the three-day European tour was a success, setting a pattern for his peripatetic career as the world’s best-paid public speaker. Don Walker, president of the legendary Harry Walker Agency that booked all his speeches, would tell any reporter who asked: “This is our 55th year in business, and Clinton is the most sought-after speaker ever in the lecture industry.”
    In The Hague, he sat down for lunch before the speech with a groupof a dozen or so high-rolling businessmen, each of whom had reportedly paid as much as $10,000 for the privilege. (A ticket for the speech itself, held in the auditorium of the capital’s Crowne Plaza hotel, was priced at a mere $1,000.) Relaxed and casual, he chatted about life after the presidency—he was getting much more sleep, he confided—as well as U.S. relations with Europe, his disapproval of Bush’s tax cuts, and the future condition of the American economy. After lunch, he posed for a photograph with each guest.
    Somewhat predictably, perhaps, Clinton’s speech betokened a bright future for the West, with the rapid development of the Internet and electronic commerce. But he went on to remind several hundred well-heeled listeners that in the rest of the world, most people still could not afford reliable electric power. Unless Western firms invested in developing countries, acknowledging both a moral duty and economic necessity, he warned, the promise of the twenty-first century would never be fulfilled. If the content sounded slightly bland, the force of Clinton’s personality and intellect left his paying audiences gratified.
    “He’s certainly very charismatic,” said the founder of the discount European airline Easyjet, who attended the speech, “and his knowledge of foreign policy is formidable.”
    From the hotel, he went on to an afternoon tea with Queen Beatrix, then to a brief, cordial meeting with another old Social Democratic ally and friend, the Dutch prime minister Wim Kok. That night, Clinton flew to Baden-Baden, the famed German spa town, where his speech was scheduled at lunchtime the following day. His last visit to the Federal Republic had occurred less than a year earlier, in June 2000, when Schroeder had given him the Charlemagne Prize for promoting “European unity and values” at the ancient cathedral in the city of Aachen.
    When he arrived at the awards luncheon in Baden-Baden, the Germans had arranged a musical greeting by a band of high school saxophonists, playing Elvis Presley’s “Don’t Be Cruel.” Touched by this gesture, Clinton quickly wiped away a tear. On this occasion reporters were present, and he opened his remarks with a joking jab at the press.
    “I really wanted to come here because everyone in America found it astonishing that anyone in the media anywhere would give me a prize for anything,” he said as the audience laughed. “Although at home they might give me a prize for having survived them.”
    The remainder of the speech outlined the opportunities and perils of globalization, again appealing to the Europeans to provide more aid and investment to developing nations. Such an admonition might have offended any listener who understood that Europe provides far more in foreign aid per capita than the United States, but somehow Clinton could say it without provoking any complaint. Walking back to his hotel along the resort town’s streets, he was “mobbed by people wanting to get close to him,” according to Myron Cherry, a Chicago lawyer and