BREIQUINGUE NIUZ: o texano tóxico, segundo Bono

«You went from friend of Bill Clinton to flashing a peace sign in a photo op with George W Bush.

I was in a photo with President Bush because he’d put $10 billion over three years on the table in a breakthrough increase in foreign assistance called the Millennium Challenge. I had just got back from accompanying the president as he announced this at the Inter-American Development Bank.

I kept my face straight as we passed the press corps, but the peace sign was pretty funny. He thought so, too. Keeping his face straight, he whispered, “There goes a front page somewhere: Irish rock star with the Toxic Texan.”

I think the swagger and the cowboy boots come with some humour. He is a funny guy. Even on the way to the bank he was taking the piss. The bulletproof motorcade is speeding through the streets of the capital with people waving at the leader of the free world, and him waving back.

I say: “You’re pretty popular here!”

He goes: “It wasn’t always so . . .” — Oh really? — “Yeah. When I first came to this town, people used to wave at me with one finger. Now, they found another three fingers and a thumb.”

So you liked this man?

Yes. As a man, I believed him when he said he was moved to also do something about the Aids pandemic. I believed him. Listen, I couldn’t come from a more different place, politically, socially,geographically. I had to make a leap of faith to sit there. He didn’t have to have me there at all. But you don’t have to be harmonious on everything — just one thing — to get along with someone.»

(entrevista, já com barbas, de Bono ao Sunday Times - via ¡No Pasarán!)

Já aqui escrevi que, não sofrendo de bushfobia, também não sou exactamente um admirador de George Bush, quer da pessoa quer do político. Apenas sinto «uma simpatia mitigada, como contrapartida ao ódio doentio que lhe devotam os crentes do politicamente correcto e a esquerdalhada em geral.»

Ao ler a entrevista de Bono, personagem que me deixa indiferente quando o ouço e me irrita ligeiramente quando o vejo, concluí que ficava a dever-lhe uma (ao Bono, não ao Bush): afinal o homem existe por trás daqueles chapeuzinhos e daqueles óculos ridículos e foi capaz de olhar o George W. por trás do estereotipo que os seus compagnons de route inventaram.

In dubio pro Bono.