WASHINGTON: Polit­ical opposites turned friends, former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush launched a new scholars programme at four presidential centers with an opening act that might have been mistaken for a comedy routine.

The two former presidents — one a Democrat, the other a Republican — shared laughs and a buddy-like banter on stage on Monday, talking about presidential leadership while trading stories about their famous families and life after the White House.

Bill Clinton said he and Bush laughed backstage about people coming up to them at restaurants and asking to take “selfie” photos.

Quipped Bush: “At least they’re still asking.” With Hillary Rodham Clinton seated in the fourth row, Bush noted that many people ask him about the possibility of another Bush-Clinton White House campaign.

His father, President George H.W. Bush, lost to Clinton in 1992, and his brother, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, may seek the Republican nomination in a race that could pair him against Hillary Clinton.

“The first one didn’t turn out too good,” Bush quipped.

The 42nd and 43rd presidents joined together to announce the Presidential Leadership Scholars programme, a partnership between the Clinton, Bush, George H.W. Bush and Lyndon B. Johnson presidential centres.

At a time of partisanship and gridlock, both presidents said they hoped the scholars programe would attract people in business, public service and the military interested in learning about presidential decision-making and applying it to their own careers.

Clinton revealed that he and Bush would speak twice a year during Bush’s second term, 30-to-45 minute conversations about policy and politics.

While they didn’t always agree, Clinton said he never talked about their discussions and said the talks “meant a lot to me”. Clinton said the test of any democracy is finding ways of having a vigorous debate and still reaching resolution to the nation’s problems. If you read the Constitution, it ought to be subtitled: ‘Let’s make a deal’, Clinton said.

The elder Bush got in the act from afar, writing in a letter read aloud that every former president displays different qualities, “for example, not all of us skydive”.

Published in Dawn, September 9th, 2014