pd07au00 Remarks at a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Reception in Palm...

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important, than the 1992 election. Everybody knew then we had to change. 
The country was in the ditch. We were in trouble economically. We were 
divided socially. We had no clear mission of our responsibilities around 
the world that was kind of comprehensive. And the politics of 
Washington, DC, was like watching, I don't know, ``Wayne's World'' or 
something--[laughter]--to most of us who lived out here in the world, 
the real world.
     So we've been busy turning it around, and I'm very grateful for the 
shape the country's in now, that almost all social indicators are going 
in the right direction, that we've got the strongest economy in history, 
that we've been a force for peace and freedom throughout the world. I am 
grateful. But all the best stuff is still out there if we make the most 
of this moment of prosperity.
     And in order to do it, it is necessary for the American people to 
choose. That's what an election is. It's basically, democracy is handed 
back over to the bosses for a day, and you choose. And in order to 
choose wisely, you have to know what the differences are. And I've got 
this little mantra I tell everybody all the time. It says, only three 
things you really need to know about this election: One is, it's 
profoundly important; two is, there are big differences; three is, only 
the Democrats want you to know what the differences are. What does that 
tell you about who you ought to vote for?
     And it's really true. After giving us 20 years or more of the 
harshest kind of mean personal attacks--right up through this Republican 
Presidential primary, I might add, where they attempted--the people who 
won attempted to perform reverse plastic surgery on Senator McCain--they 
did that. Now all of a sudden, they want to be sweetness and light. They 
say they want a positive campaign. But what they define as a negative 
campaign is if we tell people how they voted. That's their definition of 
a negative campaign. [Laughter] Hillary has already had two ads run 
against her in New York saying, you know, ``Oh, she's being so mean. 
She's telling people how I voted. How dare her do that?'' [Laughter]
     Now, we're all laughing. But you know I'm telling the truth, don't 
you? They're trying to blur the differences. We have to clarify them. 
Why? Because that's what elections are about; they are choices. And we 
may never have another chance like this to build the future of our 
dreams for our kids.
     And there are choices. I'll just tell you what some of them are. 
I'm convinced, first of all, there is this huge economic choice. They 
have already passed a trillion dollars' worth of tax cuts, and they're 
going to Philadelphia to advocate another, what, $1.4 trillion or 
something, all of the projected surplus and then some. Now, they're 
doing it in salami tactics so you don't know this. And they've got a 
good argument. ``We've got this surplus. We're going to give it back to 
you. It's your money, and we're prosperous, and we'll give it back to 
you.''
     Our argument's more complicated. Our argument is, ``Well, we can't 
give it all back to you because, number one, we don't have it yet; the 
surplus hasn't materialized. So we want to give about 25 percent of what 
they do, but 80 percent of the people will get more money out of ours 
than theirs.'' Most of you in this room tonight wouldn't, but most of 
the American people would. And we've got to save some, because we've got 
to invest in education, in health care, in research and technology, and 
the environment. And we have responsibilities around the world that we 
have to fulfill and not just defense responsibilities--responsibilities 
to help alleviate the burdens of the poorest people around the world and 
deal with a lot of the problems around the world.
     And so we have to save some of this money, because we need to 
invest in our future because we don't have it yet. But our tax cuts are 
good. They're just smaller and better targeted toward education and 
child care and lower income working people with a lot of kids, toward 
long-term care and saving for retirement. You see, it takes me longer to 
make our side.
     But here's what I'd like to tell you about it. Did you ever get one 
of those letters from Publishers' Sweepstakes in the mail, Ed McMahon 
letters? ``You may have won $10

[[Page 1731]]

million''? Well, if you ever got one of those letters and you went out 
the very next day and spent that $10 million, you should support the 
Republicans. [Laughter] But if you didn't, you had better help Dick 
Gephardt and the Democrats and stick with us, and we'll keep this 
economy going. [Applause] Thank you.
     Now, we're all laughing. This is a profoundly serious issue. It's 
not like we hadn't had any experience. We tried it their way for 12 
years; we tried it our way for 8 years. We had the lowest minority 
unemployment rate in history, the lowest female unemployment rate in 40 
years, the lowest rate of poverty among single-parent households in 45 
years, the highest homeownership in history, 22 million jobs. Look, this 
is not rocket science. We tried it their way.
     And in a very nice way, a little slice here, a little slice there, 
they're saying, ``Let's try it again. Remember when we told you the 
Government was bad; it was your money; and we're going to give it all 
back to you? Let's try it again.'' The country has been in good shape so 
long that a lot of voters have forgotten what it was like when we 
started here. This is very important.
     The second thing you need to know is that we just have a totally 
different philosophy about how society ought to work. We believe that we 
are interdependent, that we have mutual responsibilities to one another. 
That's why we're for the Brady bill, and the previous Republican 
President vetoed it. That's why we were for the family and medical leave 
bill, and the previous Republican President vetoed it.
     That's why we want to--right now--that's why we wanted to ban 
assault weapons and the congressional majority now, they were all 
against that. It's why we're for a Patients' Bill of Rights, and they're 
against it. Why we're for Medicare prescription drugs for all the people 
in the country, the seniors that need it, and they're not for that kind 
of program. It's why we believe we can grow the economy and improve the 
environment. And basically, they don't believe that. They don't approve 
of a lot of the environmental things that I've done. And their nominee 
promised that one of the things he'd do if he got elected President is 
to reverse my order creating 43 million roadless acres in the national 
forests. So these are important issues.
     Now, if you want to reverse our environmental policy and if you 
want to go in that direction, then you should do it. But you shouldn't 
let a single soul you know anywhere in America--I know I'm in 
Massachusetts now, but you have got a lot of friends around the 
country--you shouldn't let anybody that you know cast an unknowing vote. 
If the American people--my objective in every race I ever ran--and I 
guess I've run all the ones I'm going to now--[laughter]--but my 
objective in every race I ever ran was to make sure everyone who voted 
against me knew exactly what he or she was doing, because I figured if 
everyone who voted against me knew exactly what he or she was doing, I 
could have no complaint. That's democracy. If I lost, then the people 
had made a wise and considered choice, and I just lost. And if I won, I 
knew I had a mandate to act. Their objective in this election is to 
obscure the differences so that people do not understand the 
implications of the choice.
     You never hear them talking about what they said in the primary, do 
you? You never hear any of that again. You never hear them explaining 
that, yes, we're going to give you this big tax cut, but it's going to 
take away all the projected surplus.
     But you must understand that there are choices here and 
consequences to those choices. The next President is going to have 
between two and four appointments to the United States Supreme Court. 
Both candidates on the Republican ticket believe  Roe  v.  Wade  should 
be repealed. If you think it should be repealed, you should vote for 
them. If you don't, you should think about it.
     But you shouldn't listen to all this sort of syrupy talk about how 
somehow they will--listen, I'm not saying bad things about them, 
personally. I think their convictions are there. I think this is an 
honest disagreement. I don't believe in the kind of politics they 
spawned for 20 years trying to convince people your opponents are just 
one step above car thieves. I don't believe that. I think these are 
honest differences. But do not be abused. When people get this job I 
just had for 8 years, they pretty much do what they say

[[Page 1732]]

they're going to do in the campaign, and they try to do what they think 
is right.
     Now, just because they're not talking about it doesn't mean they've 
changed. So you have to consider these things.
     The Republican Senate defeated the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. I 
was the first world leader to sign it, and they beat it. The first 
treaty that's been beat since the treaty taking America into the League 
of Nations at the end of World War I--unbelievable. Everybody in the 
world thought we had slipped a gasket. And a lot of the pundits said, 
``Well, they just didn't want to give Bill Clinton the victory.'' It's 
not my victory to protect our children from the dangers of nuclear war, 
number one. And number two, I'm telling you, a lot of those people don't 
believe in arms control. I'm not saying anything bad about them. They're 
good people. They honestly don't believe in it. But they won't be out 
there telling you about it. I bet you won't hear a speech at the 
Republican National Convention about how terrible the Comprehensive Test 
Ban Treaty is. But they beat it.
     So what you have to decide is what you want America to be like. I 
know you're all here supporting these folks, but frankly, your support 
is not good enough. You've got to go out and talk to everybody you can 
reach between now and November and not just in Massachusetts but in 
States we might win or we might not win and congressional districts we 
might win or we might not win, and tell them this.
     And the last thing I want to say is this, the most important thing 
of all. The longer I live, the more convinced I am that the most 
important thing in any great society is the sense of community, of 
interdependence that people have, the sense of mutual responsibility 
they have. I don't think it's possible to enjoy real freedom without 
responsibilities to the people in your community and without a sense of 
responsibility to the larger world community, increasingly.
     We're for the hate crimes legislation. Their leadership isn't. 
We're for the employment nondiscrimination legislation. Most of them are 
opposed to it. We want stronger civil rights enforcement. Most of them 
don't.
     The Federal appellate court district with the most African-
Americans in the entire country is the fourth circuit, comprising North 
and South Carolina. There has never been an African-American on that 
court, ever. I have tried for 7\1/2\ years to appoint one. Jesse Helms 
said no, and all the Republicans said, ``It's fine with me.'' It's never 
happened. We are different.
     We don't have to have a bad campaign. I think we should posit it 
that Governor Bush and Mr. Cheney and all of their candidates are fine, 
good, decent people who just differ with us. But we should not let them 
get away with having this sort of smokescreen to try to play on this era 
of good feelings to convince people that there are no consequences to 
this election. They are big. They are deep, and they are profound.
     And I can tell you, we lost our majority because we did what was 
right for America. There are Republican Congressmen now who will go out 
and campaign for reelection in their districts bragging on all the 
highway money they got or the things they voted for, for the schools or 
this, that, and the other thing. They could have done none of that if 
Democrats alone hadn't passed the economic plan of 1993, which turned 
this whole thing around.
     These people deserve to be in the majority. It will happen if 
people understand it's a big election, there are real differences, and 
they understand what the differences are. We owe that to the kids. We 
owe that to the future. We may never have another time in our lifetime 
when America is in this good a shape. We cannot squander it. And if we 
build on it, the best is still out there.
     Thank you, and God bless you.

  Note:  The President spoke at 6:20 p.m. at a private residence. In his 
remarks, he referred to dinner hosts Robert and Elaine Sager and their 
children, Tess and Shane; Alan D. Solomont, former national finance 
chair, Democratic National Committee; Gerald Schuster, former president, 
and his wife, Elaine, director of issues, Continental Wingate Company; 
and Republican Presidential candidate Gov. George W. Bush of Texas and 
Vice Presidential candidate Dick Cheney. This item was not received in 
time for publication in the appropriate issue.

[[Page 1733]]


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

[Page 1733-1739]
 
Monday, August 7, 2000
 
Volume 36--Number 31
Pages 1721-1786
 
Week Ending Friday, August 4, 2000
 
Remarks at a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Dinner in 
Cambridge, Massachusetts

July 28, 2000

    Well, Swanee, if I had a bell right now, I would certainly ring it. 
[Laughter] You've been ringing my bell for years now. [Laughter] She's 
been very great for my personal maturity, Swanee has, because I know 
every time I see her coming, she's going to tell me about something else 
I haven't done. [Laughter] And it takes a certain amount of grown-upness 
to welcome that sort of message--[laughter]--with the consistency with 
which she has delivered it over the years. [Laughter] Actually, I love 
it. You know, I mean, I sort of hired on to work, so somebody has to 
tell me what to do from time to time. It's great.
    Let me say, first I want to thank Swanee, and thank you, Charles, 
for welcoming us in your home, for the work you did in Austria, the work 
you did in the Balkans. And Swanee, I want to thank you especially for 
the work you've done to mobilize women in the cause of peace in the 
Balkans and the work you've done with Hillary, with women all over the 
world in trouble spots. That's one of the things I think that Hillary is 
the proudest of, that she's done in the 8 years we've been in 
Washington, trying to mobilize women who are not part of political 
factions but interested in human beings and how they treat each other 
and how they raise their children to try to be forces for peace in the 
Balkans, in Northern Ireland and lots of other places, and I thank you 
for that.
    Even though I was in a hurry to go to Chelsea's ballet that night, 
you might like to know that that little piece of rock from St. John 
Mountain in Croatia, where Ron Brown's plane crashed, along with a 
couple of screws and a piece of metal from that airplane, is one of my 
most precious possessions, because I loved him like a brother. And it's 
on my little table in my private office in the White House, next to a 
miniature painting of my mother done by the famous Russian artist 
Tsereteli, that Boris Yeltsin gave me when I flew to Russia on the night 
that I buried my mother.
    I say that not to be morbid but to kind of get into what I am doing 
here tonight. For one thing, I want to say, Congressman Gephardt and 
Congressman Kennedy and all the Massachusetts Members that are here are 
taking a big chance on me tonight because I haven't been to bed in 16 
days--[laughter]--and I, frankly, don't know what I'm saying. [Laughter] 
And tomorrow I won't remember it.
    And the only thing I can think of that they allowed me to come here, 
after being up--you know, I've been up in the Middle East peace talks, 
and then I flew to Okinawa for 3 days and came back, over there and back 
in 3 days--and then I said, ``Well, surely, you're going to let me 
rest.'' And they said, ``No, you missed 2 weeks of work, and the 
Congress is fixing to leave, and we've got a big vote, and you've got to 
do this, that, and the other thing.''
    So the last 2 days I stayed up until about 2 o'clock at night 
working, too. So I'm not quite sure where I'm at. I think the only 
reason they're doing it is, I know Joe Moakley will call me next Monday 
and say, ``I am so glad you committed another $50 million to the Boston 
Harbor.'' [Laughter] Capuano will call with a commitment; Markey will 
call--Lord knows what Ed will tell me I committed to. [Laughter]
    So I'm honored to be here, even though I'm a little tired. And I'm 
here because I think these people ought to be in the majority. I'm here 
because, in a larger sense, I think that everything I have done this 
last 8 years, in a way, has been preparing America for this moment. And 
now we're all dressed up, and as a country we haven't decided where to 
go.
    What do I mean by that? Eight years ago you didn't have to be a 
genius to know that we needed to make a change. I mean, the previous 
policies had quadrupled the debt of the country in 12 years and reduced 
our investment in our people and our future at the same time--that's 
pretty hard to do--increased interest rates to the point that the 
economy was stagnant and the political debate was sterile and hostile. 
The governing party in the White House had basically followed the 
politics of division.

[[Page 1734]]

    So the American people took a chance on me. In the words of my 
predecessor, I was, after all, just the Governor of a small southern 

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