Clinton jokes lighten up Outlook Forum

CRYSTAL CITY, Va. — When former President Bill Clinton spoke to the USDA Agricultural Outlook Forum today, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack noted that Clinton was the first president to address the meeting. But he might have said Clinton was the outlook conference's first comedian.

Clinton started off saying that when he heard that Vilsack was going to become Agriculture secretary, "I was glad to know someone in the president's cabinet I could call without a conflict of interest."

When he was growing up in Arkansas, Clinton said, his family lived briefly on a farm where he had to learn the difference between poisonous and non-poisonous snakes because your life may depend "on which one attacks your rear end" when you go to the outhouse.

After his experience on the farm, Clinton said, "I went into politics because I did not want to work that hard."

Noting that after his second heart procedure, he has adopted a largely vegetarian diet, Clinton said that just before he died Arkansas poultry magnate Don Tyson asked of Clinton "How in the hell did he become PETA's man of the year?"

"It's because they didn't ask my position on fur coats," Clinton said.