It’s been widely documented that Richard Gere has an innate ability to peer into a person’s soul and find their hidden redemptive qualities, be they fickle brides or sassy prostitutes. But Gere’s passionate support for Tibetan rights may be messing with his finely tuned instruments in the case of Hillary Clinton. He was on The Situation Room yesterday talking to Wolf Blitzer about Clinton’s recent trip to China, during which she remarked that disputes over human-rights issues “can’t interfere with the global economic crisis, the global climate-change crisis, and the security crisis.” Gere once again tried to find the rosiest explanation:
I think she probably, I’m guessing, misspoke in the moment. And I can’t imagine that she would think human rights is ever going to be on the back burner.
Hmmm. Clinton’s quote was part of a much longer explanation in which she made it clear that, considering all the other things going on, human-rights issues weren’t an overarching priority. Furthermore, in all the time we’ve followed her, Clinton has, for the most part, shown a robotic ability to avoid saying things she doesn’t mean. No, unfortunately for Richard Gere, there is no fairy-tale ending to this story. This is more like the final scene of Primal Fear, with Gere walking away in a stunned, silent daze.
Gere: Clinton ‘misspoke in the moment’ [Political Ticker/CNN]
