pd04oc99 Memorandum on Measures Regarding Certain Liberians in the United States...

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    The success of that strategy now is clearer than ever. By balancing 
the budget, we put in motion a virtuous cycle of budget surpluses, low 
interest rates, and low unemployment. For business, this makes it easier 
to

[[Page 1826]]

invest, to create jobs, wealth, and opportunity. And for working people, 
lower interest rates makes it easier to own a home, afford a car, send a 
child to college.
    Today we received more good news that our strategy is working. 
According to the Office of Management and Budget, this year's budget 
surplus will be at least--I'm going to write this in; enjoy it--at least 
$115 billion. This triple-digit surplus is larger than projected, larger 
than last year's, and larger, in fact, than any dollar surplus in the 
history of the United States. It is a landmark achievement for our 
economy. And when you consider where we were just 7 years ago, it's as 
great an American comeback as the Ryder Cup was yesterday. It is further 
proof that we're on the right road to prosperity.
    Our Nation has come a long way in a short time. In 1992 the budget 
deficit was $290 billion, projected to rise above $400 billion this 
year. Instead, as you can see, we have posted back-to-back surpluses for 
2 years in a row and, believe it or not, that's the first time this has 
happened since 1957. Now, in 1957, well, that was the year John Lennon 
first met Paul McCartney, and the Braves won the World Series--not the 
Atlanta Braves, the Milwaukee Braves.
    Our prosperity now gives us an unprecedented opportunity and an 
unprecedented responsibility to shape America's future by putting first 
things first, by moving forward with an economic strategy that is 
successful and sound, and by meeting America's long-term challenges. In 
that spirit, I have asked the Republicans in Congress not to throw in 
the towel, but to work with me and congressional Democrats to do the 
work the people elected us to do--to save Social Security with a lockbox 
that extends in solvency until 2050, to strengthen and modernize 
Medicare with a long-overdue prescription drug benefit, to invest in 
world-class education for our children, and to protect important 
priorities, from national security to the environment and agriculture, 
to medical research and modern technology, to investment incentives for 
rural and urban areas that have not yet been touched by our prosperity.
    We can do all that and still have an affordable tax cut for the 
middle class and pay down our debt so that by 2015, we are debt-free for 
the first time since 1835 when Andrew Jackson was President. I will work 
with members of both parties to fulfill these fundamental obligations to 
our people and to our future. I hope they will work with me.
    Thank you very much.

Appropriations Legislation Veto

    Q. Mr. President----
    Q. Will you veto Republican spending bills if they exceed the caps?
    The President. Well, I gave them a budget, of course, that did not 
break the caps, but it would require them to raise some revenues from 
tobacco. But the main thing that I would say is, I want them to work 
with me to meet our fundamental priorities. We can give the American 
people an honest, credible budget that extends the life of Social 
Security and Medicare, meets our responsibilities in education and other 
important areas, and leaves us free to pay down that debt and to put 
America on a target to be debt-free in the next 15 years. I hope they 
will work with me in that spirit.
    We have to come together and work together to get anything done, and 
we can do that. I cite these examples over and over again, but the 
Welfare Reform Act in 1996, coming on top of the initiatives we had 
taken in the previous 3 years has now given us the lowest welfare rolls 
in 32 years. And the Balanced Budget Act completed the work of the 
economic package of 1993, and we now have this $115 billion surplus. So 
the American people know we can do things together, and that's how we're 
going to have to do this.

Social Security

    Q. Do you still plan to offer a plan to reform Social Security? The 
White House had promised more than a year ago that there would be one 
after the last election.
    The President. We have met several times, as you probably know, at 
various levels with Members in the House, and we have tried to get close 
to an agreement on that. The reason I said what I said today is that if 
they would just agree to my plan on paying down the debt and then 
dedicating a few years of the interest savings by locking up the Social 
Security taxes, which would happen a few years in the future, but if 
they

[[Page 1827]]

would agree to do that, then that, alone, would extend the life of 
Social Security to 2050, which would take us out beyond the life 
expectancy of all but the most fortunate baby boomers. So I would hope 
that at least we could do that.
    Obviously, I would like to do more, and we're still working on that. 
But at the minimum, we could do this.

Working With Congress

    Q. Sir, there's every indication Republicans will not work with you. 
But in the meantime, where does the American taxpayer stand in this 
battle between your rock and their hard place?
    The President. Oh, I think if the past is any measure, one way or 
the other, the taxpayers are going to be all right, because we can do 
pretty well by conflict, I suppose, and eventually drag this out to 
where we've at least got a decent education budget and we're still 
paying down the debt. But they have to work with me if we're going to 
extend the life of Medicare and Social Security and do some of these 
other very important things.
    I'm not pessimistic; we've still got plenty of time. I know it's 
almost the end of the fiscal year, but they know how to extend that; 
they've done that several times by passing a continuing resolution, and 
there's still plenty of time to do this, and I hope they'll do it with 
me.

Indonesia-U.S. Relations

    Q. Mr. President, will our relations with Indonesia remain the same 
while they're torturing the villages?
    The President. Will their what?
    Q. Will relations with Indonesia remain the same as the villages are 
being tortured--torched, torched, sorry.
    The President. They've already been somewhat altered, as you know, 
by the cessation of military cooperation, and obviously, our 
relationships with them will have to be dictated by the course of their 
conduct. As you know, they have a somewhat unusual system where they 
have elections. They had elections several weeks ago, but they still 
haven't settled on who the new leader of the country will be.
    This is a time of great instability and uncertainty for them. We 
should stand against those actions which violate human rights and which 
are wrong, but we should also hope that both stability and humane 
policies will be returned to Indonesia as soon as possible. It is a very 
large country with 200 million people, the largest Muslim country in the 
world and capable, as we have seen periodically over the last few years, 
of enormous progress and capable of playing an important, positive role 
in the future of Asia, and that's what I hope and pray will happen. But 
it will require responsible leadership from Indonesia, as well as 
appropriate responses from the United States and others.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 8:11 a.m. in the Rose Garden at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to former Beatles Paul McCartney and 
the late John Lennon.


<DOC>
[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents]
 [frwais.access.gpo.gov]
                         

[Page 1827-1829]
 
Monday, October 4, 1999
 
Volume 35--Number 39
Pages 1821-1886
 
Week Ending Friday, October 1, 1999
 
Remarks at Sophie B. Wright Middle School in New Orleans, Louisiana

September 27, 1999

    Thank you. Thank you so very much. My good friend Congressman 
Jefferson--I want to say more about him in a minute--and to his 
wonderful wife, Dr. Andrea Jefferson. Senator Landrieu, thank you for 
your friendship and support. Mayor Morial, you were very kind to talk 
about the role that we play in helping to lower the crime rate in New 
Orleans, but it never could have happened if we hadn't had a visionary 
mayor down here who made the most of the policies that were there.
    Colonel Davis, thank you for taking on the challenge of educating 
the children of this parish. To Gail Glapion, thank you very much for 
what you said. And Scott Shea, thank you. And Brenda Mitchell, the 
leader of our teachers, and especially to our principal, Charlotte 
Matthew, thank you for leading this school and for making me feel so 
welcome here.
    And I want to say a special word of thanks to all the people of 
Louisiana. As Congressman Jefferson said, in 1992 and 1996 you gave your 
electoral votes to Bill Clinton and

[[Page 1828]]

Al Gore, and we are profoundly grateful, and we've tried to be worthy of 
them.
    I also want to thank the McDonogh High School Band. I want to thank 
them for being here. The rest of you are hot--they're in those band 
uniforms. I used to be in one, and I know how hot they are. And I want 
to thank them for being here.
    One other thing I'd like to say about this school, I want to 
compliment this school on your school uniforms. I like them, and I'm 
glad so many schools in this parish have them. I've been trying to 
promote them all across America for years now, and I thank you for that.
    You know, folks, I may have visited more schools than any President 
in history. I've certainly tried to. And I have never met a child that 
couldn't learn or a school that couldn't do better and be turned around. 
There is a student standing behind me, and I don't want to embarrass 
her, but I want her to raise her hand--named Nonya Grove, who scored at 
the 95th percentile on the science portion of the Iowa basic skills 
test. Good for you.
    Let me tell you, too, I have been in schools in all kinds of 
places--I've been in schools--I went to a junior high school in Chicago 
in a neighborhood with the highest murder rate in the city, which was, 
therefore, the highest murder rate in the State. But there was no 
violence in the school; there were no weapons; there were no problems. 
Hundreds of parents came to the school every week, and there were no 
dropouts, and almost all the kids went on to college. Why? Because they 
had a good plan, and they worked it hard. And they believe that all kids 
could learn.
    Now, the Federal Government does have an obligation to help you. And 
I want to thank Senator Landrieu and Congressman Jefferson and Senator 
Breaux and the others in your delegation and our party who have 
supported what we have tried to do to help the States, to help the 
States adopt higher academic standards in the Goals 2000 program, to 
help them crack down on drugs and gangs and violence. And last fall we 
fought to get a downpayment on 100,000 new highly trained teachers to 
lower those class sizes in the early grades, as Congressman Jefferson 
wants to do.
    Already 108 more teachers have been hired in this parish. And your 
parish got $12 million under the E-rate program that the Vice President 
developed--have cut the cost of hooking up every classroom in America to 
the Internet by the year 2000.
    Now, what we've done in education is a part of an overall strategy 
to bring America back. We balanced the Federal budget and have a surplus 
of $115 billion this year.
    When I took office, we were deep in debt 7 years ago, and we had 
high unemployment rates, high welfare rates, and high crime rates. We 
were committed to economic reform, welfare reform, reform of the 
criminal justice system, and education reform. Now we've got the longest 
peacetime expansion in history, over 19 million new jobs, the lowest 
unemployment rate in 29 years, the lowest welfare rolls in 32 years, the 
lowest crime rate in 26 years, the first time we've had two budget 
surpluses in a row in 42 years, when I was young enough to be in this 
school.
    The question is, what are we going to do with our prosperity? You 
know we've got a lot of challenges out there. And you know as well as I 
do that the modern economy requires more education from all people. 
We've got the largest student population in the history of our country, 
and we will never do what America ought to do until every child in 
America can live up to his or her God-given potential.
    Last week the congressional majority in the other party in the House 
unveiled an education budget that was $3 billion below what I asked 
for--no money to finish hiring the 100,000 teachers; no money to help 
modernize or build 6,000 schools--I know you need that now. We need--it 
can be hot out here, but every school ought to be air-conditioned in 
Louisiana, and I know they're not. It would deny access to hundreds of 
thousands of children to after-school programs, so important to 
improving learning and keeping that juvenile crime rate down--keep kids 
in school, off the street, and out of trouble--that's very important--
and many other programs.
    Now, Congressman Jefferson had it right. We have to demand more of 
our schools and

[[Page 1829]]

invest more in them. Our balanced budget calls for spending $200 million 
to help schools turn around if they're not performing well or shut them 
down and let parents choose other public schools if they don't turn 
around. But it is wrong to blame the kid, and it's wrong not to give the 
schools a chance. And we know these schools can be turned around if they 
have the resources and a good plan and they work the plan.
    We've got to do better in Washington, and that's my job. But I was, 
12 years, Governor of your neighboring State of Arkansas. And I know--I 
know--how important education is. You know, as President, the future of 
our children is the most important thing of all. But I have to pursue it 
in many ways. I have to preserve the national security. I have to work 
on making sure that we have Social Security and Medicare in a solid way, 
so that when the baby boomers retire, it doesn't bankrupt our kids and 
their ability to raise our grandkids. But if you're the Governor, the 
most important thing you ever have to do is see to the education of our 
children.
    Now, here's why I know Bill Jefferson cares about that. He was too 
modest to say this, but he was born very poor in a small town, and his 
parents and his teachers and his school helped him work his way all the 
way to Harvard University. Then he married a wonderful woman who is even 
smarter than he is. [Laughter] And they have had five magnificent 
daughters who have all had brilliant academic careers, four of them 
already gone through Harvard. Why? Because they had a good plan. They 
believed in education. They had parents and teachers and schools and 
students, and they worked at it steadily.
    So, no matter what I do as your President, you still need in 
Louisiana a Governor you know will fight for more teachers, for better 
teacher training, for better pay, for smaller classes, and for modern 
school buildings, for high standards and strong support.
    I can tell you, he's fought with me every step of the way in 
Washington. When we had to vote in 1993 to bring down the deficit and 
increase spending in education, and I said we had to balance the budget, 
but we weren't going to cut education. We were going to do more, all the 
members of the other party were against me. The bill carried by one 
vote. To a major extent, the economic prosperity America enjoys today 
belongs to one vote, and it carried in one vote. If Bill Jefferson 
hadn't been in Congress and voted the right way, we might not be 
standing here today.
    So let me say, I don't want him to leave, especially while I'm still 
in Washington. [Laughter] But he really can do even more good in Baton 
Rouge. And remember, twice he was voted the Outstanding State Legislator 
in the Louisiana Legislature. He's fought for you in Washington; he'll 
fight for you and our children's education in Baton Rouge. And I am 
honored to be here with him today at this wonderful school.
    Thank you, and God bless you.

Note: The President spoke at 11:45 a.m. in the courtyard. In his 
remarks, he referred to Mayor Marc H. Morial of New Orleans; Col. A.G. 
Davis, USMC, (Ret.), New Orleans superintendent of schools; Gail M. 
Glapion, president, and Scott P. Shea, vice president, New Orleans 
Parish School Board; Brenda Mitchell, president, United Teachers of New 
Orleans, and Representative
Jefferson's daughters: Jamila, Jalila, Jelani, Nailah, and Akilah.

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