George Clooney: To meet with Obama

George Clooney: To meet with Obama

The biggest stars of Hollywood will be rubbing shoulders at the Academy Awards this weekend, but next week, George Clooney will be spending time with an even more famous face - President Barack Obama.

As NBC's "Today" show on Friday informs, the actor and United Nations messenger of peace will be meeting with the President next week to discuss the crisis in Darfur, long a Clooney cause.

"We want him to appoint a high-level, full-time diplomat to negotiate and work hard every day for a peace treaty," George told Ann Curry, who, along with New York Times reporter Nicholas Kristof, is accompanying him on his current trip through the region.

Although he admits the situation is dire, George and Ann found the message of hope alive in Darfur when they encountered a school named after Obama.

"I think it's a completely different definition of hope," George told Ann as they spoke on the border of Chad and Sudan. "I think the bar is considerably lower here. I think that 'Hope' here means hoping to get through the night or hoping to get through the week."

"I was here three years ago and in some ways there's not a whole lot of difference," he added. "It's sort of status quo. The problem is that the status quo is unacceptable."

While George's star status has drawn attention to the Darfur crisis this week, Ann noted that to the children they've met, it's his actions which speak loudest.

On Wednesday, Curry wrote on her Twitter page, "Darfurian children in Chad's refugee camps don't know George Clooney is a movie star. But they like him for treating them like stars."