[Bono]'s turn. Stops signing autographs, each of which seem to involve
covering an entire page with rock-star calligraphy. Goes to the microphone,
tells a story about Sen. Jesse Helms. Apparently Bono visited the senator,
whose virulent anticommunism he once denounced in a song about El Salvador.

(Bullet the Blue Sky - one of the best ever.)

Bono and Helms got to talking about the vast gulf between American prosperity
and African misery. And then, right there in his office, the crusty old
cold warrior broke down and cried. Then he blessed Bono.
 

   Bono notices Sen. Orrin Hatch, who's come to take part in the news conference
even though he only heard about it the previous evening. (Hatch has a CD
out: "Heal our Land." Does Bono know that?) Bono says he'll give Hatch
free tickets to the next U2 concert, and it'll be exciting to see Hatch
in the mosh pit. Those who remember the Republican primary debates start
giggling. The remarkable thing is that Bono seems to have watched them.
 

   Bono sees ideas like melody lines: They're all about timing. And this
is the millennium year, a religious festival that should be marked by something
truly memorable. Bono went to Clinton and asked how he planned to celebrate.
When the president seemed stumped, Bono pressed debt relief, "a big idea
that actually fills the shoes of the date," as he puts it.
Copyright The Washington Post Company Sep 25, 2000
 

Full Text:
 

   Phone rings Wednesday. Bono available for interview. Bono, the lead
guy from U2. (Irish rock group, sold gazillions.) Used to write songs like
"Sunday Bloody Sunday," "Bullet the Blue Sky" and "I Threw a Brick Through
a Window." Now spends time advocating debt relief for developing countries.
Fine. Let's do it.
 

   Phone rings a bit later. Rep. John Kasich wants to come with Bono. Kasich,
wannabe lead guy from GOP. (Failed White House bid, presides over gazillions
as chairman of House Budget Committee.) Kasich's not the kind of guy who
needs Bono to get in the door. Whatever. He's welcome.
 

   Thursday on Capitol Hill. Brilliant blue sky; hurts to look at that
gleaming white marble. Bunch of people holding an open air news conference:
the Treasury secretary, the head of the president's National Economic Council,
several members of Congress and Bono. Most wear dark suits. Bono looks
dark too: dark boots, dark cargo pants, dark shirt, dark wraparound glasses,
dark stubble.
 

   Suits take turns at microphone. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers,
probably brilliant, gets buried by the wail of some distant police siren.
NEC's Gene Sperling, who has something of a rock star's fiery stare, speaks
out loud and passionate about the debt burden's impact on poverty-stricken
children. Kasich jumps up, says he's a longtime Bono fan, and the money
for debt relief mustn't disappear down rat holes.
 

   Bono's turn. Stops signing autographs, each of which seem to involve
covering an entire page with rock-star calligraphy. Goes to the microphone,
tells a story about Sen. Jesse Helms. Apparently Bono visited the senator,
whose virulent anticommunism he once denounced in a song about El Salvador.
Bono and Helms got to talking about the vast gulf between American prosperity
and African misery. And then, right there in his office, the crusty old
cold warrior broke down and cried. Then he blessed Bono.
 

   Bono notices Sen. Orrin Hatch, who's come to take part in the news conference
even though he only heard about it the previous evening. (Hatch has a CD
out: "Heal our Land." Does Bono know that?) Bono says he'll give Hatch
free tickets to the next U2 concert, and it'll be exciting to see Hatch
in the mosh pit. Those who remember the Republican primary debates start
giggling. The remarkable thing is that Bono seems to have watched them.
 

   Thursday afternoon. Bono arrives in Post's editorial conference room.
Some there are beside themselves and wish they could take photographs.
Budget committee chairman has decided not to show up after all. Instead
Bobby Shriver, an improbably tall Kennedy, comes along and pours the rock
star's coffee.
 

   Bono is concerned about the world's poor children. He is a father himself:
two daughters and a son named Elijah Bob Patricius Guggi Q. He got started
on debt relief after playing in the Live Aid concert to raise money for
the Ethiopian famine. The concert netted $200 million, Bono recalls, but
then he heard that Africa pays out the same sum each month to service loans
from rich countries. "Forty thousand people are dying every day," he says,
"and we're here debating it."
 

   Bono sees ideas like melody lines: They're all about timing. And this
is the millennium year, a religious festival that should be marked by something
truly memorable. Bono went to Clinton and asked how he planned to celebrate.
When the president seemed stumped, Bono pressed debt relief, "a big idea
that actually fills the shoes of the date," as he puts it.
 

   So then Bono made the rounds. He visited the president's national security
adviser, Samuel Berger, and remembers him looking bleary- eyed and coffee-stained
after staying up all night to cope with Kosovo. He visited Summers at the
Treasury, and felt as though he was getting the "hairy eyeball" until Summers
expressed sympathy. And he tramped the corridors of the Capitol until names
like Connie Mack and Jim Leach tripped off his tongue quite naturally.
 

   It's pretty clear that Bono and the alliance of nongovernmental advocates
he represents, make debt relief more likely. At last year's gathering of
the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, the rich countries promised
to hurry the process along; this year's meeting, now underway in Prague,
will yield further acceleration. You can debate how far this is going to
reduce poverty: Maybe the relief won't be generous enough to help; maybe
it will be given carelessly to lousy governments and so be mostly wasted.
But in some cases at least, it doubtless will be positive. And the rock
star with the black glasses will be entitled to some credit.