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Bill Clinton urges Knox graduates to embrace their similarities
GALESBURG, Ill. - Former President Bill Clinton told graduating seniors at a small Illinois college Saturday that the world's divisions can be bridged if people embrace their similarities rather than their differences.
Clinton pointed to human genome research aimed at unlocking cures for diseases that he said shows all human beings share 99.9 percent of the same genetic makeup.
But people still spend their time dwelling on political, religious and cultural differences that spawn terrorism, wars and other divides, Clinton said during a commencement address at Knox College.
"The only way you can give up your malice, your anger, your division is if you believe that our common humanity is more important than our interesting differences," Clinton said.
Clinton delivered his commencement address in the shadows of Knox's Old Main, a national historic landmark where Abraham Lincoln spoke out against slavery during a Lincoln-Douglas debate in 1858.
Clinton said the world's political, religious and even psychological differences boil down to a divide between "those who need an enemy and those who are trying to make a friend."
He challenged Knox's 240 graduates to begin the healing once they leave campus, saying their first decision "must be into which camp you will plant your banner."
Clinton cited his friendship with former President George Bush, forged as they led tsunami and hurricane relief efforts. He said they have differences of opinion, but Clinton believes Bush "is a good human being ... and I do not need to look down on him to feel better about my party, my politics or my life."
Clinton joked that he nearly tested his theory about mankind's similarities when he met conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh for the first time recently, while both were eating at a New York restaurant.
"I was so tempted, after all the terrible things that he said about me, to tell him that he and I were exactly 99.9 percent the same," Clinton said. "I thought if I had, the poor man would run weeping from the table and not even get his dessert, so I let it go."
Clinton was the third straight big-name graduation speaker at the 1,350-student liberal arts college. He followed satirist and Comedy Central host Stephen Colbert and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, now making his own bid for the White House in a crowded field of Democrats that includes Clinton's wife, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Knox, located about 150 miles southwest of Chicago, does not pay fees to its commencement speakers, but has at least one well-placed alum. John Podesta, who graduated from Knox in 1971 and served as Clinton's chief of staff, had a hand in lining up all three speakers.
The school awarded Clinton an honorary doctorate of laws for his achievements in public service. The only other U.S. president to receive an honorary degree from Knox was Lincoln, who was honored in 1860 prior to taking office.
Clinton has also spoken at several other college graduation ceremonies this year, including Middlebury College in Vermont, the University of New Hampshire and the University of Michigan.
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