Talk:Bill Clinton

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Alleged speech before the Joined Chiefs of Staff

Hello. At the moment I'm studying Russian history using Russian textbook "History of Russia. 1917-2004" by A.S. Barsenkov and A.I. Vdovin. Page 642 reads (it's my translation from Russian):

American strategy towards USSR during perestroika years was later sufficiently openly explained by President B. Clinton. Making a speech in October 1995 in the Joint Chiefs of Staff he said: "The policy towards USSR and its allies during the last 10 years has convincingly proved correctness of our course towards elimination of one of the mightiest world powers, and a powerful military block as well. Using mistakes of the Soviet diplomacy, excessive self-confidence of Gorbachev and his surroundings including those who's clearly accepted pro-American attitude, we've managed to do what Truman had been going to do with the Soviet Union with the use of a nuclear bomb. With a sufficient difference, however — we've got a raw-materials appendage, the state which isn't nuclearly destroyed, that would be uneasy to establish (1)... During the so-called Perestroika... by shaking ideological base of USSR we've managed to bloodlessly draw from the war for the world dominance the major counterpart of America."

After an hour of attempts to find the original Clinton's speech I've refused of an attempt. On one side, it's an authoritative Russian textbook: AFAIK it's one of base history books at the Historical Faculty of the Moscow State University. On the other side, such a powerful Clinton speech would doubtlessly leave some trace in the Net.

Would be grateful for everyone who would shed some light upon this problem. ellol (talk) 14:19, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry I have a large collection of Clinton books and speeches and I'm afraid I couldnt find it. However it might be easier if you could clarify when it was made, I assume you mean it was to the Joint Chiefs of staff but in what location, its possible you might be able to locate the source by asking the experts at the Clinton library in Arkansas, especially if its from a military briefing that hasnt recieved much academic/press/internet attention. Sorry I couldnt be of more help. LordHarris 20:32, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Russian internet is also scarce on this quote. The earliest source I found was 2000 interview with former SVR colonel Aleksandr Drozdov [1]. It specifies the date as October 24, 1995. It seems to be the whole quote. It goes as the the above text, but the difference is it's more full:

The text after first omission marks (note 1) goes as the following: "Yes, we've spent many billions dollars for that, but they are already close to what Russians call 'self-repayment': in four years we and our allies got various strategic resources amounting to 15 billions dollars, hundreds tons of gold, gems, etc. As a pretext for non existing projects, we have obtained for insignificantly low prices over 20 thousands tons of copper, almost 50 thousands tons of aluminium, 2 thousands tons of caesium, beryllium, strontium, etc. (Paragraph) In the years of so-called perestroika in USSR a lot of our military and businessmen didn't believe in success of the upcoming operations. And that was in vain. By shaking ideological base of USSR we've managed to bloodlessly draw from the war for the world dominance the major counterpart of America. Our aim and objective is further providing help to all who want to see a specimen of western freedom and democracy in us..."

That starts to look like some James Bond story! It's a pity if this information is classified in the U.S. That means we can never know truth, and couldn't regard the quote as truthworthy. Well, in fact as a Russian citizen I could try to send a public inquiry to the FSB to validate the quote. Just wonder if that worths a trouble. Will consider asking experts at the Clinton library in Arkansas, though. ellol (talk) 23:33, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

LordHarris, really, thank you for the help. ellol (talk) 16:45, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Strange foot notes

The foot notes rangeing from 133 to 152 all lead to sites at something called Ourcampaigns.com/. When you enter those sites, you are brought to a blank, blue page with a login box. Besides, as far as I can see, none of the references mentioned above is used in the actual article, the last foot note in the running text is nr. 132. Bjartewe (talk) 17:31, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

The foot notes are in a new section entitled electoral history. None of the links worked for me also. Perhaps the site is currently not working. I do not know who added it the section though; perhaps they can shed light on this? LordHarris 20:35, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Religion

Is Clinton a Baptist? I was just told that he's a Methodist. Also, I noticed that his wife is a Methodist. Emperor001 (talk) 18:47, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Early career

I have taken the liberty to remove the "This section does not cite any references or sources." in the early career, part cause it actually has plenty of references in truth. Why do so many conservative yanks hate Billy boy? Europe thinks he is quality. Bill makes people feel sympathetic to the USA, this is truth. - Yorkshirian (talk) 10:40, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Environmental Record

I noticed that the article touts his environmental achievements after leaving the Oval Office, yet not one mention is made of the fact that it was Willy, not W, who decided not to sumbit Kyoto to the Senate for ratification. Might this not manifest a pro-Clinton bias?