Barbara Follows Bush’s Lead, Rips Up Her Speech in Paris
First Lady Barbara Bush, following her husband’s example, ripped up a speech at a hospital dedication today and spoke from “the heart.”
On her first day in Paris after four emotion-packed days in Eastern Europe, Mrs. Bush told 400 guests at a new wing of the American Hospital:
“I want to show you that I learned something from my husband in Hungary,” where he discarded a prepared text Tuesday and spoke ad lib to a rain-soaked crowd welcoming him to Budapest.
“I’m going to give up my speech and just tell you that speaking from the heart, as he did,” said Mrs. Bush, moved by a personal honor included in the dedication ceremony, “this is one of the nicest things that ever could happen to me and selfishly I feel like you’ve stretched my life a little bit because now I’m on a plaque.”
The plaque notes that the Florence Gould Pavilion and the C. V. Starr International Center for Medical Exchange were inaugurated by Mrs. Bush on the occasion of the President’s visit.
Bush is in Paris for the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution and the 15th annual seven-nation economic summit.
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