And yet Bono remained overwhelmingly positive about the progress made so far, citing 29 million African children now in school and 2.5 million with access to AIDS medications because of increases in aid. He praised governments for their recent promises to eradicate malaria by 2015.
This is an effective strategy that the ONE Campaign has consistently followed. Instead of lamenting about pervasive failure, they direct our attention to the concrete (if smaller) successes that foreign aid can accomplish. Instead of playing to our collective fear or guilt, they play to our hope and faith in ourselves.
I wonder how much of this is ONE's strategy, and how much of it is Bono's own personal approach? I'm just guessing, but I think it has a lot to do with Bono's philosophy. As U2 sings,
Of science and the human heart, there is no limit;
There is no failure here sweetheart, just when you quit....
I'm not giving up on a miracle drug.
2 comments:
you will never go wrong blogging bono. It became a phone call rather than meeting, correct? On Bono's Financial Times blog I recall he said 3/4 pres candidates took ONE pledge. Must be McCain or Palin who has not, correct? Agreed-hope is beautiful strategy (see, I don't always have to be a heckler).
McCain, Obama, and Biden have all been On the Record with ONE since the primaries. Palin is new so this would have been her first meeting with Bono. Yes, it did turn into a phone meeting because of gridlock in the city and scheduling difficulties Bono said, but his tone led me to think maybe it had more to do with the fact that there would have been no photo op per Bono's stipulation. Since the whole reason Palin was even there was to get her photo with all those dignitaries, no photo op makes a face to face less of a priority for the campaign so a phone call would do. Might just be the cynic in me though.
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