Hillary Clinton is the big winner after powerful Bill Clinton speech -- Obama forced to back her in 2016 after Bill saves his bacon - VIDEO

President Obama applauds Bill Clinton after his speech at the
Democratic National Convention on Wednesday night

Mr President Obama, meet your new best friend, Mr President Clinton.

Please also tip your hat to Mr President Clinton's spouse, Hillary Clinton who may well now be Mrs President Clinton in 2016 .

In all my years I have never heard a better Clinton speech than what he delivered to the Democratic National Convention last night.

Barack Obama owes him big time.

The payoff for Bill Clinton is obvious. If President Obama is re-elected he is now forced to back Hillary if she runs in 2016.

Hillary was the biggest winner next to Barack Obama last night.

Though she's in China on a State Department mission, her presence loomed large in the convention hall after Bill's stemwinder.

Democrats love the old dog, especially when he is let off the porch as Clinton was last night .
Clinton recently has  looked older, has lost some of his booming cadence, and sometimes sounds very weary on stage.

Last time I heard him in County Cork at the American Ireland Fund dinner there he appeared punch drunk from a long flight and gruelling schedule and I wondered if the old master was losing a step or two.

I should not have worried.

I've been listening to him and supporting him since 1990 when he was an obscure governor from Arkansas.

I always knew he could deliver a stemwinder but this DNC speech was a tsunami compared to to the minor Atlantic wave disturbances we heard from the GOP.

It hit the spot at exactly where Democrats wanted it.

For the past two years many have bemoaned the inability of leading Democrats to articulate how they feel they are being stymied and blocked at every turn by Republican extremism..

The feeling most Democrats have is that the Republicans have gone as far right as Democrats went left with George McGovern.

Most Dems I know want to cross the aisle and work together, they want to make things work, but feel that Republicans have blocked everything in sight and they are frustrated that the electorate does not see that.

Last night Clinton caught all that beautifully with his single comment that, ”We believe ‘we’re all in this together’ is a far better philosophy than ‘you’re on your own.’”

Don't just take my word for it; two battle hardened national  journalists who are the last word when it comes to cynical assessment of politicians, both told me it was the best speech by Clinton they had ever heard.

And Hillary no doubt thinks so too!

Here, courtesy of Politico.com are the 15 best lines as they saw them:

1. ”We believe ‘we’re all in this together’ is a far better philosophy than ‘you’re on your own.’”

2. “Democracy does not have to be a bloodsport. It can be an honest enterprise.”

3. “Senator, I hate to break it to you, but we’re going to keep President Obama on the job!”

4. “One reason we need to reelect President Obama is he is still committed to constructive cooperation.”

5. “So here’s another jobs score: President Obama plus 4.5 million, congressional Republicans zero.”

6. “No president, no president — not me or any of my predecessors, no one, could have repaired all the damage he found in just four years. But he has laid the foundation for a new, modern, successful economy, of shared prosperity, and if you renew the President’s contract you will feel it. You will feel it.”

7. “So are we all better off because President Obama fought for health care reform? You bet we are.”

8. “When Congressman Ryan looked into that TV camera and attacked President Obama’s Medicare savings as quote ‘biggest coldest power play,’ I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Because that 716 billion dollars is exactly, to the dollar, the same amount of Medicare savings that he has in his own budget. It takes some brass to attack a guy for doing what you did.”

9. “You won’t be laughing when I finish telling you this.”

10. “As their campaign pollster said ‘we’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact checkers.’ Now that is true. I couldn’t say it better myself.”

11. “I think this [debt] plan is way better than Gov. Romney’s plan. First, the Romney plan fails the first test of fiscal responsibility: The numbers don’t add up.”

12. “We simply cannot afford to turn the reins of government over to someone who will double down on trickle-down.”

13. “Now people ask me all the time, how we go four surplus budgets in a row. What new ideas did we bring to Washington? I always give a one word answer: Arithmetic.”

14. “The most important question is, what kind of country do you want to live in? If you want a you’re-on-your-own, winner-take-all society, you should support the Republican ticket. If you want a country of shared prosperity and shared responsibility — a we’re-all-in-this-together society — you should vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.”

15. “Though I often disagree with Republicans, I actually never learned to hate them the way the far right that now controls their party seems to hate our president and a lot of other Democrats.”

Bill Clinton invades a tiny Irish village and the locals go gaga - A serious message for Ireland amid all the fun and celebration

Bill Clinton came to a little village in East Cork last night and the locals loved it.

It was early evening when the tiny village of Shanagarry gathered to witness the arrival of the 42nd president.

Sleepy hamlets in East Cork do not get many days like this.

Clinton was guest speaker at the Worldwide Ireland Fund dinner attended by over 200 delegates from 12 countries.

It was held at Ballymaloe House, the epicenter of the slow food revolution in Ireland where  the Darina Allen family has established a worldwide reputation for fine cuisine.

The little meeting center where the event was held was more used I’m sure, to local parish functions and the occasional wedding.

Alongside the president was Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny making it a spectacular night for the East Cork speck on the map.

Throw in Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney who accepted a lifetime achievement award and dance legend Michael Flatley and you have a perfect alignment of stars.

The buzz all day at the Ireland Fund event was the decision by Sinn Fein’s Martin McGuinness  to meet with Queen Elizabeth in Belfast next week.

Bill Clinton called it a “terrific” moment in his speech and there is no question that we may witness the last great historic moment of the Irish peace process next week.

As Ireland Funds CE0 Kieran McLaughlin noted, the process that has become so mundane would never have happened without Clinton’s intervention.

As he is wont to, Clinton’ s remarks weaved across many tapestries, his time in office, the upcoming election, but mostly the Irish economy and how to get out of the mess they are in.

“Creative cooperation” is Clinton’s buzzword these days and he points to the US states that are doing best as examples of it, where opposing parties get together for the good of the state.

Unspoken was the reality that there is no creative cooperation in Europe at the present over the Euro which has led to the mess to begin with.

Come to think of it it was exactly creative cooperation which got Queen Elizabeth and Martin McGuiness to agree to meet next week. As Clinton noted, Elizabeth is long enough on the throne to make her own decisions and obviously she wants it as part of her legacy.

Enda Kenny was also in rare form. Clinton gets every politician alive to up their game, though as Kenny remarked appearing after Clinton and before a
Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney, is a tough business indeed.

Heaney was introduced by Ireland Fund chairman Loretta Brennan Glucksman who recited a wonderful poem Heaney had written for her after her husband’s passing.

Heaney got the largest ovation of the day and deservedly so. He is one of Ireland’s greatest national treasures, one of a handful who bestrides the world with no equal.

Once he wrote “no glass of mine was ever raised to toast a British queen.”
I’d bet he, like so many Irish these days, would say that is in the past now.

And indeed it is. As he flew out from Ireland last night, Bill Clinton knows that his work on Ireland is the gift that keeps on giving, as peace continues to break out and a former top IRA commander meets a British queen.

As a Shanagarry local has likely never said “Who wudda thunk it”?

Thanks for the memories - 25-years of the Irish Voice

Where did the 25 years go? Is there a thief of time who has accordioned all the years together so that 25 years ago really seems like five?

Is it really 25 years ago that the pressmen at the Evergreen Printing plant in Belmar, New Jersey pressed the button and started the presses on Volume 1 Number 1 of the Irish Voice?

I remember my mother and brother were there, and my best friend Eddie Holt and a bottle of champagne and a very late night....

I remember the first issue with its bold headline "We’ll Never Return” based on a survey of young Irish undocumented who had washed up on America’s shores.

Some things never change, even after 25 years.

In that issue we featured little Kathleen Flannelly, daughter of a great friend, Adrian Flannelly, sitting in the Sam Maguire Cup, the trophy for the All-Ireland football champions.

Now she’s an accomplished lawyer, a woman of the world. Was that really 25 years ago?

There was John Spain and Cormac MacConnell, and they are still there all these years later charting the goings on in Ireland, urban and rural, and they too must feel that déjà vu moment with Ireland in bad shape again and the political class failing the people.

A strange memory, shortly before our first issue when a new fangled machine arrived in the office. It was a fax machine, and we all gaped in wonderment as the front page of The Irish Times came crackling over the wires. The Internet was still a pipedream.

Good and bad moments crowd in. The day Debbie McGoldrick, an Irish Echo refugee, took over as editor of Irish Voice and whipped the paper into shape for once and for all is among the best.

Among the worst, the suicide of a young Irish construction worker in the Bronx who hung himself after being mercilessly exploited by his own.

The best -- Merrifield Madness, when thousands of Irish descended on a Virginia post office in October of 1991 to mail their Morrison visa applications in a night to remember.

Best again -- sitting in the stands at Giants Stadium as Ireland beat Italy in a World Cup shocker in 1994.

Worst -- the news story that someone had placed an innocuous classified ad with us looking for a few strong men. It turned out he wanted them in order to murder his wife. Incredible but true.

Best -- waking up on a freezing morning one January to learn that the Clinton White House, over the objections of the British State Department, CIA, FBI, etc. had given a visa to the U.S. for Gerry Adams.

Best -- standing in the center of Belfast as hundreds of thousands chanted the name of Bill Clinton as the American president, unbelievably, visited the city.

Worst -- reading of the incredible tragedy of Phoebe Prince, a little Irish girl bullied to death when she moved to Massachusetts.  She took her own life in 2010.

Best -- President Clinton attending our event at the Plaza Hotel as Irish American of the Year. Standing at the traveling White House podium introducing him was a surreal experience. At times like that you really do feel you have made it in America.

Worst -- writing my toughest ever column on the tragic death of my beautiful nephew Rory Staunton, who died needlessly of a bacterial infection at age 12 in April. It does not come tougher than that.

Best -- getting to meet you, the Irish Voice readers in so many places over so many years and hearing your feedback, good and bad, on what we do.

And to all those advertisers who have supported us over the years – thanks again. You made this Irish emigrant’s dreams come true.

Obama and Clinton attack on Romney on Bin Laden a master stroke? Forcing Romney, GOP, onto back foot on issue of terrorism, defense

Barack Obama certainly has the gloves off after the new advertisement questioning Mitt Romney on whether he would have gone after Osama Bin Laden.

It is a classic judo trick to use your opponent’s perceived strength against him.

Republicans did it brilliantly when they questioned John Kerry’s war hero status back in 2004 against George Bush.

Now the Democrats are taking one of the GOP’s perceived strengths, tough on defense and terrorism, and using it against Romney.

It is based on a Romney statement in 2007 when he essentially stated it was a waste of money chasing after Bin Laden.

The fact that the Obama camp rolled out Bill Clinton to make the attack shows how important a move it is. Only Clinton or another living ex-president can make the compelling argument about how lonely it is at the top.

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Indeed, Clinton quotes George W. Bush approvingly on his remark that the president is the “decider in chief."

Clinton raises the question about Romney is ready brilliantly in the ad.

He asks what the consequences for Obama would have been if he had not made the call or had got it wrong.

Actually, we all know. Jimmy Carter’s failed rescue attempt of the US hostages in Iran was the final nail in his race against Ronald Reagan.

By moving so quickly to blunt a usual GOP advantage, Obama has shown he will be ruthless and direct in this campaign.

It will be interesting to see Romney’s response.

Here is the ad:

The Celtic Comeback begins as President Clinton leads an Irish charge --Powerful Fortune 500 leaders show way forward for Irish economy

Bill Clinton pictured alongside Irish leaders yesterday in New York

Mark February 9th as the day the Celtic Comeback began.

That was the day in New York that former President Bill Clinton gathered the rich and powerful in American business and delivered them on a silver platter for the Irish government leaders including Prime Minister Enda Kenny and Foreign Minster Eamon Gilmore as well as Jobs Minister Richard Bruton.

Clinton was delivering on a commitment made in September when he attended the Irish Diaspora Economic Forum in Dublin and promised to pull out the stops in an effort to help out Ireland's foundering economy.

On Thursday he delivered, filling a meeting hall at New York University with 25 top executives eager to hear about investing in Ireland .

The president was eager to share his insights that Ireland, like the US, has one of the youngest demographics in the western world and that the educational level is among the highest. People are investing not just for the present but for the future he stated. Many companies were now looking overseas again and Ireland had to get on their radar.

Robert Rubin, his former Treasury Secretary, was there and made a valuable contribution.

Rubin stated he had not really studied the Irish situation until a few weeks ago but he believed the country was dealing with its problems in an admirable manner.

Also there were top executives from Merck, Dow Chemical, Bank of America.

The morning meeting on the 8th floor at NYU university bore the hallmarks of a well-rehearsed sales job.

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First up were CEO's from companies with operations in Ireland telling those thinking of investing there how well they had done.

Leading that charge was Donald Keough, the legendary former president of Coca Cola, who pioneered the multinational invasion in Ireland back in the 1970s.

When Keough talks people listen. These days he is Chairman of Allen and Company, the powerful investment bank, and no one does more to promote his beloved Ireland.

Wilbur Ross the billionaire investor and turnaround specialist seemingly believes in the Irish mission also, as he was vocal in his support of what the Irish government has done to combat the tide of negative news.

After the meeting the three Irish government leaders repaired down one flight of stairs to address 100 leaders in the Irish American community on the Irish economy.

There were joined by Clinton who offered a reprise of the remarks he had made upstairs.

Loretta Brennan Glucksman of the American Ireland Fund praised the IDA, the Irish industrial development agency for the amazing work they continued to do attracting jobs and also the government's emphasis on the importance of philanthropy.

Not coincidentally, IDA news of 485 new jobs in various parts of Ireland was made public on Thursday.

I asked the Irish leader and his colleagues what was the best advice they had heard and the most common criticism at their meeting.

Enda Kenny stated that telling the truth about the financial morass, not gilding the lily and telling it straight was the best advice and one he was adhering to.

Foreign Minister Gilmore stated that the most common criticism was not focusing enough on the skill of the workers themselves who got very high marks from the multinational leaders for their commitment to the job.

Kieran McLaughlin, CEO of the Ireland Funds, summed it up when he stated that what he was hearing was the beginning of what he called the "Celtic Comeback."

And not before time we all thought. Enough of the doom and gloom and more of the American can-do.

Top ten stories for 2011 - what a year it was

Barack Obama

Here are my top ten stories for 2011. It was quite a year, both good and bad, with many indelible memories.

1. Queen’s visit to Ireland:

It was an incredible occasion which ended centuries of mutual loathing and dislike. The Queen’s words of Gaelic at the Dublin Castle State Dinner were my personal highlight. It was an amazing occasion for the Irish and British people and a tribute to the effect of the peace process.

Read more: President McAleese says Queen Elizabeth’s visit was 'happy and healing'

2. President Obama’s visit to Ireland:

It had to be a stellar event to overtake the visit of an American president to Ireland but the Queen’s visit did that.

Obama was also deeply impressive, loose and relaxed in Moneygall with his ancestral relatives and flowing and on his game during his remarks outside Trinity College.

Read more: Obama visit to Ireland a good political move

3. Irish presidential election:

It was the election that had everything from a last second October surprise that utterly upended the expected result, to allegations of attempted murder, incest, boy pedophilia, IRA involvement. The final TV debate where Martin McGuinness finished Sean Gallagher’s campaign was an extraordinary live moment.

Read more: Dana Rosemary Scallon’s brother accused of molesting sister’s child

4. Fianna Fail collapse in Irish general election vote:

Blamed for the Irish recession. they went from the longest party in government in Europe to being practically wiped out. Enda Kenny’s Fine Gael party cruised to victory and Irish politics will never be the same again.

Read more: All changed utterly in Ireland after this utterly dramatic election

5. Enda Kenny speech on child abuse:

Seeing an Irish leader stand up and take on the dreadful wrongdoing in the Catholic Church on child sex abuse was a remarkable moment for the country and the world.

Read more: NY Times Maureen Dowd calls Irish leader's speech ‘breathtaking’

6. Bill Clinton speech at Irish America Magazine Hall of Fame awards:

A remarkable speech on the origins of his interests in Ireland and where he felt Irish America and Ireland needed to go next from the most important Irish American political figure ever.

Read more: Former President Clinton worries about Irish suicide numbers - VIDEO

7. Second Irish Diaspora conference in Ireland:

A gathering of the far flung tribe featuring 300 business leaders from all over the world discussing the way forward for Ireland. At last the Irish government seems to get the power and potential of the Diaspora

Read more: Bill Clinton's warning about Irish economic prospects

8. The winter from hell:

US East Coast and Ireland suffered bitter winters, the worst in Ireland for over sixty years while the Christmas to New Year storm in New York was the worst on record

Read more: Further heavy snowfall expected as big freeze continues in Ireland- SEE PHOTOS & VIDEO

9. Green Card moves by China, India, Mexico and Filipinos:

Once upon a time there was an agreement that it was comprehensive immigration reform or nothing. The Irish were especially criticized for even suggesting anything else. Then a group of countries broke away and are currently trying to get their own deal. Lesson learned I hope.

Read more: Irish frozen out of a new green card bill in Congress

10. Lennox the condemned dog:

I know it’s a weird one but on out website out readers could not get enough of the pit-bull called Lennox condemned to death in Belfast for being a pit bull.

Read more: Frantic efforts continue to ‘Save Lennox’ the Death Row dog in Belfast

Bill Clinton's warning about Irish economic prospects -- says country needs to forgive mortgage debt much quicker

Bill Clinton

Former president Bill Clinton worries that Ireland will take too long to recover from its economic difficulties and that it needs to institute emergency measures such as mortgage relief far quicker.

I met the former president at a small midtown charity event last night in New York and Ireland was very much on his mind.

As always he stopped to chat when he meets a small Irish group and his affection and indeed love for the country is very evident.

He had to be dragged away as always when speaking to Irish issues which clearly energize him.

He remarked that Prime Minister Enda Kenny may not have been completely pleased with his advice during his recent visit to Ireland where he was the keynote speaker at the Irish Diaspora conference.

He pointed out that historically, the best way to move on from a recession was to start over and forgive debt as quickly as possible.

That was not the formula being followed in Europe at the present time and he believes that Ireland as well needed to learn that lesson.

Studying the history of previous recessions is the great teacher in these circumstances he suggested.

And that history was clear, that where debt relief was allowed, the recovery comes far quicker he pointed out.

It was sage advice from a former president who most Americans would pick in heartbeat to re-occupy the Oval Office if they got the chance.

Clinton is continuing to help Ireland.

In 2012 he will host an economic summit to bring together multinational business leaders to talk about investment there.

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Read More:
More news from Ireland on IrishCentral

More Bill Clinton related stories here

Bill Clinton says Ireland ‘doing an unbelievable job’
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His message will be clear. If companies are locating subsidiaries overseas, Ireland should be on top of the list

The Clinton era is looking better and better in the rear view mirror as we survey the economic morass today.

Little wonder his new book 'Back to Work' is getting rave reviews.

Here is what The New York Times said.

"It’s a lucid one-man rebuttal of the Tea Party’s anti-government agenda. A series of shrewd talking points for Democrats trying to hold on to the White House and battling for control of Congress in the midst of a sour economy and growing voter discontent. A self-serving reminder of the prosperity the country enjoyed during Mr. Clinton’s tenure in the White House, meant to burnish his legacy. And a practical set of proposals — some borrowed and some new, some innovative and some highly sketchy — for restoring economic growth and creating jobs."

As usual in a crisis it seems Bill Clinton is talking the most sense.