Just as the Marshall Plan symbolized practicality and generosity at the end of the greatest war in human history, debt relief stands at the end of the second millennium after the birth of Christ as a critical moral response to social challenges in parts of the world where poverty is endemic and governments have proven unable or unwilling to serve well their people. The passage by Congress of debt relief legislation represents the most seminally sympathetic endeavor ever undertaken by the United States for the developing world. The poorest of the poor are now able to enter the next century unburdened by debt, capable, in many cases for the first time, of seeking support in private credit markets. Let me amplify. America has never been better led than it is today in the fields of business, the arts and the sciences.
Government is a different story.
On the elected side, we have had imperfect individuals in leadership positions at virtually all levels of government. Yet our system is so strong that it tolerates imperfections. This is the case because government, while essential, is only one part of our society. While these are three extraordinary public figures, they do not in my view qualify as the Person of the Century. Rather, Time should look to other fields than statecraft.