Posted on 07/18/2007 12:39:00 PM PDT by kddid
Nelson Mandela marked his 89th birthday on Wednesday by launching an international group of elder statesmen, including fellow Nobel peace laureates Desmond Tutu and Jimmy Carter, to tackle the world's problems.
As birthday tributes poured in, Mandela said the group of "elders" would use almost 1,000 years of collective experience to dream up solutions for seemingly insurmountable problems like climate change, HIV/AIDS and poverty.
The leaders, who include former Irish President Mary Robinson and former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, would also use their political independence to help resolve some of the world's most intractable conflicts.
"Using their collective experience, their moral courage and their ability to rise above nation, race and creed, they can make our planet a more peaceful and equitable place to live," said Mandela, wearing his trademark silk African-style shirt.
The leaders heaped praise on Mandela, South Africa's best-loved citizen and global icon for justice and reconciliation, and guests at the launch sang Happy Birthday to "Madiba" -- the clan name by which he is affectionately known.
"How God must love South Africa to have given us such a priceless gift," Mandela's friend and one-time fellow activist Tutu said of the country's former president.
British entrepreneur Richard Branson and singer Peter Gabriel -- who performed an a capella version of his anti-apartheid protest song 'Biko' at the launch -- came up with idea of launching a braintrust of world leaders seven years ago.
They asked Mandela, who has officially retired from public life and will not play a major role, to launch the group and select its members.
The group did not give specific details on the problems the group will seek to address and how. When asked about the political crisis in South Africa's neighbor Zimbabwe, Tutu said the group may achieve more by working behind the scenes.
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said governments had frequently failed to tackle the world's big issues and conflicts because they were beholden to voters, inhibited by their own political agenda and beset with domestic problems. "We will be able to risk failure ... and we will not need to claim credit for any success," he said.
Aides say Mandela is in good physical health for his age, and that he is spending his retirement quietly devoting time to his large family and wife Graca Machel, whom he married on his 80th birthday in 1998.
South African newspapers were full of birthday wishes for the man who won the first all-race elections that buried apartheid in 1994.
"Madiba takes the cake" Johannesburg's Star newspaper said, running page after page of tributes and congratulatory messages from its readers.
Mandela's birthday was also to be marked in Cape Town on Wednesday with a special soccer game between African football stars and a selection of great world players.
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said governments had frequently failed to tackle the world's big issues and conflicts because they were beholden to voters,...
That statement tells us alot about good 'ole Jimmy.
Carter must have his brain locked up in some kind of a “trust” because he certainly doesn’t use it too often!
Wow!
This does seem to be where we are heading.
B.L.O.A.T.
Once a Commie, always a Commie.
That statement right there pretty much sizes up Carter in a nutshell nowadays...
Fixed it.
Hey Mandela enjoy your birthday celebration all you want you don’t have much work to do. Your group of elder statesmen will ultimately come up with the same soulution for everyone of these problems.....Blame the US for failure to act and to share their wealth with the worlds poor....come up with some gobbledygook words to couch your commie/socialist/one world solutions......organize a bunch of aging hippie rockers to have a concert/benefit.....makes tons of money that will never make its way to the folks in need but will line your pockets and those of your “think tank”.....go back to partying and repeat as necessary!
Hey, that’s great. Is jimmy moving to Africa?
“Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said governments had frequently failed to tackle the world’s big issues and conflicts because they were beholden to voters, inhibited by their own political agenda and beset with domestic problems.”
Yes, too much flack from the “little people” who don’t have Jimmah’s cosmic view of things. The Democrats have become aristocrats, with “aristo” defined as “agreeing with our globalist agenda”.
Make that the “brainless mistrust” and it will be properly labeled.
How about calling it the “dementia trust.”
BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Everytime Carter opens up his mouth I wonder how this tired old political hack ever got elected to the White House. Carter is a liberal, socalist/commie barring none. He is at the top of the list that wants to GET EVEN with America because they stopped his madness after four years. He has done a LOT of damage to America and if he had his way, he would burn the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence!
I bet they can't even find their own pee-pee in the morning.
Imagine that!
Power derived from the consent of the governed.
Not only is this poor excuse for a man a misguided disgrace, but he has also come out and said that he is opposed to the one of the very ideas on which this country was founded.
Is this group sponsored by Depends? Jeez!
Granted it's hard to get much worse than Carter and Kofi, but Mary Robinson is no prize either. You may remember she extended her stay as U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights by a year just so she could personaly preside over the anti-semitism laced 2001 World Conference against Racism, Yada, Yada, Yada in Durban, South Africa.
This trust is deeply in debt . . .
Carter feels that the stupid arrogant American people escaped without finishing their punishment. His whole presidency was dedicated to putting America in its place and making Americans learn what it is to suffer like the rest of the world.
When he got fired by the American people, it just fueled his pathological resolve to make them learn; to make them take their due punishment.
Carter has dedicated his life to the premise that no one has the right to be too successful or too comfortable. That is why he loves despots and tyrants. Because, unlike America, they keep their people 'in-line'.
Big time liberal circle jerk bump.
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