So, what does Bill Clinton think of Kazakh dictator Nursultan Nazarbayev?

If you haven't done so yet, please read After Mining Deal, Financier Donated to Clinton, By JO BECKER and DON VAN NATTA Jr., in yesterday's The New York Times. In September 2005, Clinton accompanied a Canadian businessman named Frank Giustra to a meeting with Nursultan Nazarbayev, Kazakhstan's president-for-life. Nazarbayev's brutal suppression of dissent notwithstanding, Bill was positively effusive, according to the article, in his praise for his dinner host:

Mr. Nazarbayev walked away from the table with a propaganda coup, after Mr. Clinton expressed enthusiastic support for the Kazakh leader’s bid to head an international organization that monitors elections and supports democracy [the OSCE].

Within forty-eight hours, Frank Giustra got the lucrative rights to a Kazakh uranium mine. Later, out of the goodness of his heart, Giustra donated $130 million to Clinton's charitable foundation.

As I was working my way through the article, I felt a certain pressure on the back of my neck, as if a few blood vessels back there were about to explode. Luckily, I then came upon the following passage:

After Mr. Nazarbayev won [another elcetion in December 2005] with 91 percent of the vote, Mr. Clinton sent his congratulations. “Recognizing that your work has received an excellent grade is one of the most important rewards in life,” Mr. Clinton wrote in a letter released by the Kazakh embassy. Last September, just weeks after Kazakhstan held an election that once again failed to meet international standards, Mr. Clinton honored Mr. Nazarbayev by inviting him to his annual philanthropic conference.

Laughter had once again been proved to be the best medicine, in this case, for high blood pressure.