President Clinton did an evening keynote at the HCL Unstructure event (I wrote about Malcolm Gladwell’s this morning).
I expected a bunch of economic talk – about US deficits and even the Euro. With a recent book and his track record as the last President with a budget surplus and as Governor of Arkansas he can certainly relate to Greek/EU federalism issues.
I expected international talk – his charitable work over the last few years and pillow talk with the Secretary of State certainly qualifies him. He touched on interesting nuances. Like how Brazilian cane whose demand keeps growing with its very successful ethanol initiative for decades now, does not threaten rain forests. But it is pushing cattle and soy farmers for land and they could threaten rain forests. How India’s lack of physical infrastructure is not allowing the poorest 65% to enjoy the prosperity the middle class has enjoyed in major urban areas.
But what startled me was his science talk. No, mundane iPhone or cloud talk for him. He talked about the recent CERN results which show neutrinos traveling faster than light. He joked about the implications of the decoding of Neanderthal genome sequence. He talked about Gliese 581g, a newly discovered planet with earth like properties.
He effortlessly glided from one topic to next – it almost looked unrehearsed. Like one of the must-see TED talks, I hope HCL posts a video of the entire talk.
Then I would like to see the Republican candidates debate the nuances. That should raise the quality of those sessions!
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