George W. Bush subs for busy Laura at Dallas luncheon featuring Condoleezza Rice
04:46 PM CDT on Friday, May 7, 2010 By KIM HORNER / The Dallas Morning News
Former first lady Laura Bush couldn't attend a "Mother's Day Luncheon" today to benefit Genesis Women's Shelter, as expected. So she sent someone who called himself a "poor substitute": her husband.
George W. Bush kept the sellout crowd of 2,000 at the Hilton Anatole in Dallas laughing as he explained why his wife, the event's honorary chair, could not be there.
"She is selling her book," the former president told the crowd dining on gazpacho and salads in the ballroom.
"I have read her book, which will come as a shock to a lot of people," Bush said.
"I don't want to cross-pollinate this meeting, but they'd make wonderful Mother's Day gifts."
Spoken from the Heart, a memoir by the former first lady, hit the stores this week.
Bush introduced the luncheon's keynote speaker, his former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice. Rice, who now teaches political science at Stanford University, spoke about the importance of protecting freedoms for women around the world.
This year's luncheon celebrated the 25th anniversary of Genesis, a shelter that serves at least 1,500 clients a year. The annual luncheon is a major fund-raiser for the nonprofit shelter, which receives no government funding.
"The former first lady's memoir is beautifully written, unselfconscious and hasn't an iota of political mean-spiritedness."
"One of Laura Bush's best qualities as a memoirist — and she is a particularly fine, lyrical one — is her ability to speak the language of feelings without recourse to cant or contemporary psychobabble."
"Indeed, part of what makes former First Lady Laura Bush's open, deeply felt and engrossing memoir "Spoken From the Heart" genuinely memorable is its portrait of her marriage to George W. Bush. Whatever one thinks of his presidency, anyone who reads this rather remarkable book will count him fortunate in his choice of wives."
Yeah, and here’s a blog post with a pic of the President!
http://frontburner.dmagazine.com/2010/05/07/former-president-bush-replaces-laura/