Bill Clinton jokes at Gridiron about spring - "known to Al Gore as proof of global warming"

Former President Bill Clinton made a return to Washington’s public life, speaking to the annual Gridiron Dinner as a stand-in for President Barack Obama and poking some fun at himself, his Oval Office successors and the press corps before getting in pitches for passage of health legislation and aid to Haiti.

Mr. Clinton, known to friend and foe alike as a gifted political orator, showed he hasn’t lost much in that category in the nine years since he left the White House. Presidential speeches to the Gridiron—an organization of Washington journalists—are supposed to be humorous, and Mr. Clinton knew the drill well from his time as a regular dinner guest during his term.

So he got loosened up at Saturday night’s white-tie dinner with a joke at his own expense: “I have been waiting to stand in for President Obama for a long time,” he said, “ and since they turned me down for Dancing with the Stars, I had nothing better to do.”

He said President Obama called to asked him to fill in because the current president was busy in the White House “polishing up his Nobel Peace Prize.” Obama, he said, asked: “You’ve got one of these, don’t you?”–a joke rooted in reports Mr. Clinton is unhappy that the current president got a Nobel Prize after only months in office while Mr. Clinton failed to be awarded one after long efforts to bring peace to the former Yugoslavia and the Middle East.