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

in. It was the same after he delivered his speech. That sent a strong message as to what the world thinks on this matter. . . . If you judge from the reaction of the General Assembly, the United States is completely isolated on this question.” News outlets across the world quickly reported Mandela’s provocative remarks, with several stories noting that Clinton appeared to wipe away a tear as he listened.
    In Johannesburg three years later, again standing beside Mandela, Clinton’s mission involved more than delivering a speech on civil society. Among those joining him on the trip was Eli Segal, the longtime Democratic activist and successful corporate entrepreneur who had served as chief of staff of Clinton’s 1992 campaign—and who had later organized and directed AmeriCorps, Clinton’s signature domestic Peace Corps program. The former president still considered its creation to be among his proudest achievements.
    At Mandela’s urging, Clinton had brought over Segal and a group of twenty enthusiastic alumni from AmeriCorps and its largest affiliate, City Year, which pays young men and women a small stipend to live and work in urban and rural communities on every variety of local problem, from disaster relief, housing for the homeless, and improving schools to delivering food and services for poor HIV/AIDS patients. They had all come to encourage South African political and community leaders to consider the possibility of starting a South African affiliate of City Year, with promises of American assistance and funding.
    “Just before I left to come to South Africa,” Clinton explained to the hundreds of civic leaders and students at the conference, “I saw television coverage of the terrible flooding along the Mississippi River in the United States, and there were pictures of people in a small community in Iowa packing sandbags against the rising waters, and in the midst of them were young people with AmeriCorps emblems on their shirts, working with people who formerly would have been strangers to them, to build the bonds of community.
    “These young people embody the vision that drove me to run for president and serve. I wanted to build a country where there was opportunity for every responsible citizen, a national community that celebrates our incredible diversity while reaffirming our common humanity.” Gesturing toward the AmeriCorps and City Year veterans, he said, “That’s what they do every day.”
    The second leg of his Africa trip took Clinton to Abuja, the Nigerian capital, where he was invited to address a major three-day conference on HIV/AIDS called by the Organization of African Unity (soon to be reorganized and renamed the African Union)—the largest event of its kind in the continent’s history. At the “Extraordinary OAU Summit,” as it was billed, he would share the spotlight with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, as a high-ranking audience of African heads of state, health ministers, officials from donor countries and medical NGOs, including the American mega-philanthropist Bill Gates, grappled with the worsening health crisis.
    Only eight months earlier, in August 2001, Clinton had visited Nigeria as president, shaking up the country with a televised appearance during which he physically embraced several AIDS patients—an act that violated taboos and elicited “a very powerful response in Nigeria and the rest of Africa,” according to a local AIDS activist. Among the country’s 110 million people, an estimated 15 million were infected, driven into hiding by the pervasive stigma. Discrimination and fear were so strong that a judge suspended the trial of a woman with HIV/AIDS because he viewed her presence in his courtroom as a threat to public health.
    “In every country, in any culture, it is difficult, painful, at the very least embarrassing to talk about the issues involved with AIDS,” he had told the Nigerians. “But is it harder to talk about these things than to watch