pd10jy00 Remarks on Departure for Camp David, Maryland, and an Exchange With...

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    The second thing I would like to tell you is that we don't have to 
run a negative campaign this year. We can just run a campaign on the 
issues. I think for 20 years we've had too many of these really hateful 
campaigns where one candidate would be trying to convince the voters 
that his or her opponent was just one notch above a car thief. You've 
seen a lot of those, and maybe participated in a few. But this year 
we've got a gift here. We can say, look, let's assume, from the 
Presidential candidates to the Senate candidates to the House 
candidates, everybody is honorable and good. And let's just look at 
where we differ on what we should do with our future. And I'm just here 
to tell you, there are real differences, and I'll just mention a couple.
    First of all, on economic policy. The Republican--Governor Bush and 
the Republican congressional program ought to have a lot of appeal in 
New Jersey because there are a lot of wealthier people here. And 
basically, what they say is, ``Vote for me, and I'll give you a $1.5 
trillion tax cut, 3 times what the Democrats will give you--more than 3 
times. And I'll partially privatize Social Security, and you will do 
well with that.'' But you should know that when you do that, all of us 
who might take our 2 percent out, somebody's got to fill that up to keep 
this program from going broke. So, that will cost another $1 trillion 
over the next decade. But it sounds good.
    Their message is, ``You couldn't mess this economy up with a stick 
of dynamite. Nobody's going to mess it up; it's on automatic. 
Information technology is surging ahead. Biomedical technology is 
surging ahead. This thing is rocking along. Nobody can mess this economy 
up. Vote for me, and I'll give you your money back.'' That's basically 
their message.
    Our message is, we don't think that this economy happened by 
accident. We think it happened by prudence and discipline and vision, 
and we'll give a more modest tax cut, keep paying down the debt to save 
Medicare and Social Security for the baby boomers,

[[Page 1573]]

and we think we've got to invest in America--Mr. Corzine's theme. We've 
got to give all our kids a world-class education. We've got to make sure 
we can grow the economy and preserve the environment. We've got to deal 
with the health and other challenges that families face. There's a whole 
bunch of investment issues out there.
    Now, their argument is, ``Hey, I'm trying to give you money. Have 
you been listening to me? This is a good economy, I'll try to give you a 
bunch of money.'' That's their argument. Our argument is--well, I'll 
just ask you this. Don't answer out loud but think to yourself. What is 
your projected--do you have an opinion of what your projected income is 
for the next 10 years? Have you thought about that, what you think you 
will actually make in each of the next 10 years? That's what all these 
proposals are based on--you need to know that--our projected income.
    So what do you think your projected income is going to be for 10 
years? Now, what's your level of confidence that that's your projected 
income? How would you feel--let's assume all of you have a level of 
confidence over 50 percent--how would you feel if I asked you to come up 
here right now and sign a contract committing to spend all your 
projected income for the next 10 years? That's what the Republicans are 
asking you to do. And I don't believe I'd have many takers. That's what 
they're asking you to do.
    And let me just point out this: If by continuing to practice 
prudence, we keep interest rates one point lower, that's worth $250 
billion in lower home mortgages alone. That's a $250 billion tax cut--
just for home mortgages. That doesn't count student loans, car loans, 
business loans, and all the economic benefits attendant there. So that's 
a huge issue.
    I think Jon's right. I think we're right. I think--and I think we 
have certain responsibilities to people who haven't fully participated 
in this economic recovery. We've got the biggest bunch of school kids in 
our country's history. They are the most diverse group ever. They're our 
meal ticket to the future--if we can prove they can all get a world-
class education. These are big issues.
    We differ on a Patients' Bill of Rights. We differ on the Medicare 
drug benefit. We differ on the nature of environmental protection that 
we should have. We differ on so many issues. We differ on whether we 
should take extraordinary efforts to ensure equal pay for women for 
equal work--big issue for our people. The average woman is still working 
17 weeks a year longer for the same income as the average man in 
America, for all of the progress we've made. So there are real 
differences.
    And the last point I want to make is this. It would be interesting 
to see if this is true in New Jersey. Most of the Republicans don't want 
you to know what the differences are, and that's a dead giveaway about 
who would win if the people knew what the differences were.
    And so, here comes Jon, riding in on his horse. The guy has never 
run for office before--actually committing the unpardonable sin of 
saying exactly what he thinks, even when it gets him in trouble, and 
trusting the people to get it right. And what my experience is--and I 
encouraged him once I knew he was getting a little weary from the cost 
as well as the strain of the primary campaign, and I said, ``Look, what 
makes democracy work?''--this is why this campaign finance reform issue 
is important--``What makes democracy work?'' When the people have enough 
time and information--and they need both--they nearly always get it 
right. Otherwise, why would we still be around here after 200 years? 
People nearly always get it right.
    So this big election, there are real differences. If the voters know 
what they are, I think they will make the right decision. I just want to 
make two final points. I want to say a word for the Vice President; then 
I hope people may ask you about that. I just want you to know, I believe 
I know him better than anybody outside his family now after 8 years. And 
there are four things I want all of you to know about that--four reasons 
I think he should be elected.
    Number one is, our country has had Vice Presidents who have done 
great things as President--Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, Harry 
Truman. Lyndon Johnson gave us the civil rights legislation and the

[[Page 1574]]

Federal aid to education and Medicare. But our country has never, not in 
over 200 years, never had anybody who made nearly anywhere near as much 
difference in a positive way as Vice President as Al Gore. He is by far 
the most positively impactful Vice President the country ever had. It's 
not even close. And I've spent a lifetime studying the history of my 
country and the institutions of National Government.
    From breaking the tie on the economic plan in '93 to running our 
employment zone programs to bring economic opportunity to people and 
places left behind to ramming through a telecommunications provision to 
guarantee that the poorest schools in America could be hooked up to the 
Internet--something I learned coming to New Jersey when I saw the 
benefits in some of the schools here--to managing a lot of our relations 
with Russia and Egypt and South Africa, no Vice President ever had 
remotely as much responsibility or done as much good.
    The second thing I want to say to you is, he shares Jon's economic 
philosophy. We don't believe we should go to the American people and 
say, ``You guys figure out your projected net income. Now, let's sign it 
away for 10 years right now.'' Because it's all projected, you might get 
it, and you might not. And we don't want to get back into deficits and 
high interest rates and give away all the money we need to be investing 
in our future.
    The third thing I want to say is this: You need somebody in office--
another argument for Jon--you need somebody in office in 2000 that 
understands the future. Let me just give you a couple of examples. You 
see where we announced the human genome sequencing last week? I had to 
study that stuff for a year just so I'd understand what I was saying at 
the press conference last week. [Laughter] It's the most fascinating 
thing I've ever studied in my life. And I really do believe that those 
of you who are young enough to still be having kids, I think that it 
won't be 10 years before American children will be born with a life 
expectancy of somewhere around 90 years. Within 20 years, I'm confident 
American children will be born with a life expectancy of 100 years. 
Anybody who lives to be 65 today has a life expectancy of 83. It's going 
to change everything.
    But people will know that all this genetic information is somewhere 
in somebody's computer. Don't you think that you ought to have the right 
to say yes before somebody gets to it, and that people shouldn't be 
denied jobs or promotions or health insurance because of their genetic 
profile? And don't you think we ought to have somebody in the White 
House that really understands this stuff?
    Or, you take the Internet. When I became President, there were 50--
50 websites on the World Wide Web in 1993. There are now 10 million--50 
to 10 million. Now, Al Gore understands this as well as anybody in 
American life. All of our medical and economic information is going to 
be on somebody's computer. Don't you think you ought to have to say yes 
before somebody gets your financial information or your medical records, 
and don't you think somebody ought to be present who understands it?
    And the last thing I'll say--and it's the thing that I really love 
about Jon, because life's been good to him, and he didn't go around 
being sanctimonious about being successful. I can't stand these 
successful people who want you to believe they were born in a log cabin 
they built themselves. And you've all heard a lot of that.
    We need a President and we need a Congress who understand the 
future, who will keep the economic prosperity going, but who also want 
us all to go along for the ride. That's what the hate crime legislation 
is all about. That's what the employment nondiscrimination is about. 
That's what the appointments to the Supreme Court are about. Twenty 
cases decided this term by one vote. Twenty, by one vote--20. And the 
next President gets between two and four judges.
    So whichever one of them gets elected, it's going to change the 
balance of the Supreme Court. For you to pretend otherwise is to be 
living in a dream world. And I think we ought to have a President and I 
think we ought to have a Senator from New Jersey and New York, and a 
Senate and a House that think we all ought to go along for the ride. 
When you really strip it all away, that's basically why most of us are 
Democrats. We know we're lucky.

[[Page 1575]]

    Shoot, man, people ask me, in the toughest days of my Presidency, 
weren't there days that I regretted it? I said, regretted it? Are you 
kidding me? Another turn in the road and I could be home doing $200 
divorces and deeds and stuff. [Laughter] This is the cost of doing 
business. The Republicans have decided to impose a certain cost of doing 
business if you want to be a Democrat and be President. I wouldn't take 
the world for it. I've had a wonderful time.
    But I'll tell you what, on the good days and the bad days, I wanted 
everybody along for the ride. And that's another thing about this 
prosperity, we need to take everybody along. That's what Jon will do, 
and that's what Al Gore will do.
    Thank you very much.

 Note:  The President spoke at 2:47 p.m. at a private residence. In his 
remarks, he referred to U.S. Senatorial candidate Jon Corzine and his 
wife, Joanne; luncheon hosts Hilary Bollon and Orin Kramer; Hudson 
County Executive Robert C. Janiszewski; State Senators Raymond J. 
Lesniak and Byron M. Baer; State Assemblyman Charles (Ken) Zisa; State 
Assemblywoman Loretta Weinberg and Mayor Sharpe James of Newark, NJ, 
cochairs, Corzine campaign; Rev. Calvin McKinney, president, General 
Baptist Convention of New Jersey; Mayor Paul Fader of Englewood; Senator 
Robert G. Torricelli, chair, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee; 
luncheon cochair Deborah Lynch; and Gov. George W. Bush of Texas. This 
item was not received in time for publication in the appropriate issue.


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

[Page 1575-1576]
 
Monday, July 10, 2000
 
Volume 36--Number 27
Pages 1567-1604
 
Week Ending Friday, July 7, 2000
 
Statement on the Senate Vote on Appropriations Legislation

June 30, 2000

    I am deeply disappointed that today the Senate passed a Departments 
of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies 
appropriations bill that fails to make crucial investments in our 
Nation's future. While the Senate bill provides more acceptable funding 
for some programs than the House version, it relies on unacceptable 
spending cuts and falls short on critical funding for education, health 
care, and worker training. The Senate bill invests too little in 
improving our schools and demands too little from them; fails to provide 
funds to reduce class size and repair aging schools; includes a fatally 
flawed so-called patient protection provision that excludes over 110 
million Americans from protections and actually eliminates some of the 
limited accountability provisions now in State law; bankrupts the Social 
Services Block Grant, drastically reducing services to abused children, 
the elderly, and the disabled; and shifts funds from the State 
Children's Health Insurance Program, undermining the bipartisan 
agreement passed by Congress in 1997 to insure millions of low income 
children.
    This bill also shortchanges vital health care programs, including 
domestic and global HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment, mental health and 
substance abuse services, family planning, health care access for the 
uninsured, training for health professionals in children's hospitals, 
nursing home quality, and oversight of Medicare contractors. The bill 
fails to guarantee funding for critical education priorities such as 
reducing class size and making urgent repairs to our schools, including 
Native American schools. It underfunds programs that would strengthen 
accountability and turn around failing schools, expand before-school and 
after-school opportunities, assist low income students in preparing for 
college, help bridge the digital divide, improve teacher quality, and 
expand English language/civics education programs for adults. The bill 
also denies adequate resources for training programs to help unemployed 
workers and low income youth train for and find jobs, assistance to help 
more low income fathers work and support their children, efforts to 
ensure workplace safety and enforce domestic labor laws, and initiatives 
to address illegal and abusive child labor practices abroad.
    Finally, I am deeply disappointed that the Senate chose to follow 
the House's imprudent action to block the Department of Labor's standard 
to protect our Nation's workers from ergonomic injuries. After more than 
a decade of experience and scientific study and millions of unnecessary 
injuries, it is clearly time to finalize this standard.
    For these reasons, as well as for others, this bill is unacceptable. 
I will veto this bill and any other bill that fails to provide necessary 
resources for education, health care,

[[Page 1576]]

worker training, and other vital initiatives. We need to work on a 
bipartisan basis to develop a bill that strengthens our schools, 
adequately funds public health priorities, addresses the needs of our 
Nations' workers, and provides for other important national priorities 
while honoring our commitment to fiscal discipline.

 Note:  This item was not received in time for publication in the 
appropriate issue.


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

[Page 1576]
 
Monday, July 10, 2000
 
Volume 36--Number 27
Pages 1567-1604
 
Week Ending Friday, July 7, 2000
 
Statement on Funding To Hire Highly Qualified Teachers

June 30, 2000

    Today Secretary Riley announced the award of $1.3 billion to 
continue on the path to hiring 100,000 new, highly qualified teachers as 
part of my class size reduction program. These funds will allow States 
to place more high-quality teachers in smaller classes in the early 
grades, so that approximately 1.7 million children can receive the 
personal and academic support they need. The Vice President and I have a 
longstanding commitment to ensure that all children have access to a 
first-class education, and these grants provide support to State and 
local communities to work toward this goal by investing in what works. 
Unfortunately, Republicans in Congress are rejecting this proven 
strategy of investing in what works and insisting on accountability for 

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