Former U.S. president Bill Clinton speaks in Ottawa on Oct. 29, 2010.
Bill Clinton made this prediction about the outcome of Tuesday's midterm elections in the United States: The Obama Democrats will hold on to the Senate and could just squeak through in the House by a couple of seats.
The former U.S. president, who has been stumping for Democratic candidates for the past two months, added that he doesn't know if he he's "made a lick of difference," but he's had fun doing it.
The 64-year-old ex-president was speaking in Ottawa on Friday.
It didn't matter that he was more than half an hour late, the crowd loved him. Made up mostly of businessmen - a few Conservative MPs were spotted, as was Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney - they gave him a standing ovation the moment he walked onto the National Arts Centre stage.
Mr. Clinton typically earns about $175,000 a speech; tickets cost as much as $1,200. On Friday, he spoke for 45 minutes_- without notes - and then spent another 25 minutes in conversation with Frank McKenna, the former New Brunswick premier and now the deputy chairman of TD Financial Group.
Looking very fit - there are reports he has lost about 24 pounds on a vegan diet - he joked he was happy to be in the capital as it is a "little respite for me because I wound up making one or two stops" on the campaign trail - make that 117 stops.
Mr. Clinton's wife, Hillary Clinton, the U.S. Secretary of State, is one of two in the cabinet whose positions prohibit them from electioneering - the other is the Defence Secretary.
And so the former president stepped into the breach. He talked, too, about stepping into the breach in other ways when it comes to being a 21st century citizen.
His message was part inspirational and part informational. He spoke about the work of his charitable foundation in Africa, his relief work in Haiti, and of the positive and negative effects of an interdependent new world.
As for stepping into the breach, Mr. Clinton urged everyone to join a non-governmental organization as a way of filling the gap between what the private sector and governments can do.
Here's what else he had to say.
On Canadian content:
The former president congratulated Canada on the health of its banks while others around the world suffered during the recession.
He noted that it was Jean Chrétien, when he was prime minister, who stepped into the breach to help Mr. Clinton's fledgling foundation work towards buying cheaper generic AIDS drug for Africans.
He recognized Canada's contribution to Afghanistan.
On Afghanistan:
He said he believes the fighting should continue. As long as the NATO troops are there, it is harder for al-Qaeda to strike elsewhere, he asserts.
And he talked about the dilemma of abandoning Afghanistan, where progress has been made, and sending people back into the "stone age."
On his midterm strategy:
The former president said when he is angry or anxious, he often makes bad decisions. And he's worried that an angry U.S. electorate will do the same on Tuesday.
So his strategy in the midterm campaign has been to try to make Americans understand their choices - "where we are" and why the government has decided to do what it is doing.
"Instead, it's been a referendum on people's anger and frustration ... and a desire to throw people out," he said.
He calls his campaign speeches "unconventional," noting that the closer people are to the grave, the more others listen to them.
"Everybody likes you when you're gone," he said.
Mr. Clinton said he wanted to get involved because he saw so many similarities to the shellacking the Democrats received when he was a progressive president in the 1994 midterm elections. He doesn't want a replay.
On Democrats and Republicans:
Democrats, he believes, are elected because Americans look to them to fix things. Jimmy Carter, he argued, came in after the Watergate scandal; both he and Barack Obama were elected when the economy was bad.
But after two years, Americans become frustrated because they don't think everything has been fixed. Mr. Clinton said that's when they start listening to the Republicans who promise to cut taxes. What they don't listen to is the fact that they have to borrow money to pay for the tax cuts, which "compromises our future."
On our interdependent world:
He sees the world as "too unequal, too unstable and too unsustainable."
While people have access to much more information than they did 30 years ago, and this is a good thing as it helps to break down barriers, it is too fractured, he said.
He is trying to build a "framework" and systems to make sense of all of these pieces of information and how they relate - the earthquake in Haiti, the cholera outbreak and the economic problems in the United States.