Republican U.S. President Gerald R. Ford and his famed Secretary of State Henry Kissinger graciously granted a 45-minute private meeting in the Oval Office to Canada’s new Tory Leader of the Opposition, Joe Clark, on this date in 1976. The rookie Canadian leader had been elected leader by party members only a few months before.What Clark could not have known were the comments about him and Pierre Trudeau made by Kissinger in a meeting with Ford only minutes before the Canadian PM’s arrival at the White House.President Ford asked about Clark and Kissinger responded. “He is a new, dynamic guy,” the US Secretary of State said. “He may be the next Prime Minister. Trudeau made a disastrous mistake on wage and price controls. You could say that we worry about Canada defining its identity in anti-American terms. But don't give him anything to use against Trudeau.”Minutes later Clark arrived. You can read the transcript of their talks, courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library website, at this link. And, photos of the meeting are also available at this link.And of course, history proves that Kissinger was correct. Three years later, in 1979, almost to the day, Joe Clark became Canada’s next Prime Minister.[caption id="attachment_558403" align="alignleft" width="510"] Joe Clark in victory, 1979[/caption]Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist.  He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy.  A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.