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Weekly Compilation of

PresidentialDocuments

Monday, February 14, 2000Volume 36—Number 6Pages 233–289

WEEKLY COMPILATION OF

PRESIDENTIAL DOCUMENTS

Published every Monday by the Office of the Federal Reg-ister, National Archives and Records Administration, Washing-ton, DC 20408, the Weekly Compilation of Presidential Docu-ments contains statements, messages, and other Presidentialmaterials released by the White House during the precedingweek.

The Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents is pub-lished pursuant to the authority contained in the Federal Reg-ister Act (49 Stat. 500, as amended; 44 U.S.C. Ch. 15), under

regulations prescribed by the Administrative Committee of theFederal Register, approved by the President (37 FR 23607;1 CFR Part 10).

Distribution is made only by the Superintendent of Docu-ments, Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402.The Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents will befurnished by mail to domestic subscribers for $80.00 per year($137.00 for mailing first class) and to foreign subscribers for$93.75 per year, payable to the Superintendent of Documents,Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402. Thecharge for a single copy is $3.00 ($3.75 for foreign mailing).

There are no restrictions on the republication of materialappearing in the Weekly Compilation of Presidential Docu-ments.

Contents

Addresses and Remarks

Congressional Medal of Honor,presentation—247

Democratic National CommitteeDinner—252Reception—249

Democratic Unity reception—269Discrimination in Federal employment based

on genetic information, signing anExecutive order to prohibit—241

Federal budget, fiscal year 2001—234James S. Brady Press Briefing Room,

dedication—281Patients’ Bill of Rights—255Radio address—233Texas

Departure for McAllen—255Democratic National Committee dinner in

Dallas—265Democratic National Committee luncheon

in McAllen—256Luncheon honoring Representative Ruben

Hinojosa in McAllen—261

Communications to Congress

Albania, message transmitting report on theextension of normal trade relations status—264

Egypt-U.S. mutual legal assistance in criminalmatters treaty with documentation, messagetransmitting—233

Middle East peace process, messagetransmitting report on the nationalemergency—237

Rescissions and deferrals, messagetransmitting report—264

Rotterdam Convention on the Prior InformedConsent Procedure for Certain HazardousChemicals and Pesticides in InternationalTrade with annexes, message transmittingreport—264

Russia-U.S. treaty on mutual legal assistancein criminal matters with documentation,message transmitting—273

Sudan, letter transmitting report—274

Communications to Federal Agencies

U.S. Military Activities in East Timor,memorandum—281

(Continued on the inside of the back cover.)

Editor’s Note: The Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents is also available on the Inter-net on the GPO Access service on http://www.gpo.gov/nara/nara003.html.

Contents—Continued

Executive Orders

To Prohibit Discrimination in FederalEmployment Based on GeneticInformation—244

Interviews With the News Media

Exchanges with reportersBriefing Room—281South Lawn—255

InterviewsChicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times,

and USA Today—274Willow Bay of Cable News Network’s

‘‘Moneyline News Hour’’—237

Statements by the President

Croatia, election of Stipe Mesic asPresident—249

Death of Carl B. Albert—234East Timor, peacekeeping efforts—285Embassy security initiatives—273

Supplementary Materials

Acts approved by the President—289Checklist of White House press releases—288Digest of other White House

announcements—285Nominations submitted to the Senate—286

233

Week Ending Friday, February 11, 2000

Message to the Senate Transmittingthe Egypt-United States MutualLegal Assistance in CriminalMatters Treaty With Documentation

February 2, 2000

To the Senate of the United States:With a view to receiving the advice and

consent of the Senate to ratification, I trans-mit herewith the Treaty Between the Gov-ernment of the United States of America andthe Government of the Arab Republic ofEgypt on Mutual Legal Assistance in Crimi-nal Matters, signed at Cairo on May 3, 1998.I transmit also a related exchange of diplo-matic notes for the information of the Senate.The report of the Department of State withrespect to the Treaty is enclosed.

The Treaty is one of a series of modernmutual legal assistance treaties being nego-tiated by the United States in order tocounter criminal activities more effectively.The Treaty should be an effective tool to as-sist in the prosecution of a wide variety ofcrimes, including terrorism and drug-traf-ficking offenses. The Treaty is self-executing.

The Treaty provides for a broad range ofcooperation in criminal matters. Mutual as-sistance available under the Treaty includestaking the testimony or statements of per-sons; providing documents, records anditems of evidence; locating or identifying per-sons or items; serving documents; transfer-ring persons in custody for testimony or otherpurposes; executing requests for searchesand seizures; assisting in proceedings relatedto immobilization and forfeiture of assets,restitution, and collection of fines; and anyother form of assistance not prohibited bythe laws of the Requested State.

I recommend that the Senate give earlyand favorable consideration to the Treaty andgive its advice and consent to ratification.

William J. Clinton

The White House,February 2, 2000.

NOTE: This item was not received in time for pub-lication in the appropriate issue.

The President’s Radio AddressFebruary 5, 2000

Good morning. Today I want to talk aboutwhat we can and must do to help morewomen get the lifesaving treatment theyneed to fight breast and cervical cancer.More than 180,000 American women will bediagnosed with these diseases this year. Eachof us has a sister, a daughter, a friend, orin my case, a mother, who has struggledagainst them.

These cancers can be treated and cured—if we catch them early and fight them aggres-sively. But more than 40,000 women will diefrom breast and cervical cancer this year.Many are women whose cancer was detectedor treated too late because they had no healthinsurance and no hope of paying fortreatment.

In fact, older women with breast cancerare 40 percent more likely to die from thedisease if they’re uninsured. With strongleadership from the First Lady, we’ve workedhard over the past 7 years to increase freeand low-cost cancer screenings and to helpwomen catch these diseases in time.

We’ve expanded the National Breast andCervical Cancer Early Detection Program toserve hundreds of thousands of women a yearin all 50 States. And Vice President Gore has

234 Feb. 5 / Administration of William J. Clinton, 2000

led us to make a dramatic increase in ourcommitment to cancer research and treat-ment. But still, it’s true that every year, thou-sands of women are told they have cancerand must cope without insurance.

This is especially troubling, given the stun-ning progress scientists are making in thefight against cancer. Researchers now canidentify genes that predict several kinds ofcancers. They’re experimenting with thera-pies that will shut down defective genes sothey can never multiply and grow. New drugsand new combinations of drugs will bringhope to those whose cancer has spread, orwho suffer from the side effects of chemo-therapy.

These breakthroughs will make a big dif-ference for some of our most prevalent can-cers, like breast cancer, which strikes one ineight American women over a lifetime. Butthese lifesaving new therapies can only helpif patients have insurance or other resourcesthat enable them to afford state-of-the-arttreatment or any treatment at all.

At a time when we know more about can-cer than ever and can fight it better thanever, we must not leave women to face can-cer alone. That’s why today I’m announcinga proposal to help States eliminate the bar-riers low income women face to getting treat-ment for breast or cervical cancer. The budg-et I’m sending to Congress on Monday willallow States to provide full Medicaid benefitsto uninsured women whose cancers are de-tected through federally funded screeningprograms. Too often, uninsured women facea patchwork of care, inadequate care, or nocare at all. Many are denied newer, betterforms of treatment or wait months to see adoctor.

Judy Lewis was one of the lucky ones.When a screening program detected herbreast cancer, she had no health insuranceand no money to spare. Fortunately, shefound doctors who would treat her. And 17months later, she’s cancer-free. But she andher husband are also $28,000 in debt, withnothing left for their retirement. That iswrong, and it doesn’t have to happen.

This initiative will help women get com-prehensive treatment, and get it right away.It will make state-of-the-art therapies avail-able to women who need them, not just those

who can afford them. And it will free Stateand Federal dollars to be spent on cancerscreening and outreach to women at risk.

This proposal has strong bipartisan supportin Congress, led by Senators BarbaraMikulski and Olympia Snowe and Represent-atives Anna Eshoo and Rick Lazio. It wasalso strongly supported by the late SenatorJohn Chafee of Rhode Island.

These Senators and Representatives fromboth parties have put forward legislation tomeet our goal, and my budget includes thefunds to make it happen. This is an issue thattranscends political boundaries, because ittouches all of us. Together, we can save livesand bring medical miracles of our time with-in the reach of every American. We can doit this year, and we ought to do it soon.

Thanks for listening.

NOTE: The address was recorded at 1:43 p.m. onFebruary 4 in the Oval Office at the White Housefor broadcast at 10:06 a.m. on February 5. Thetranscript was made available by the Office of thePress Secretary on February 4 but was embargoedfor release until the broadcast.

Statement on the Deathof Carl B. AlbertFebruary 5, 2000

Hillary and I were saddened today to learnof the death of Carl Albert. Carl served hiscountry in Congress through three decades,as majority whip, majority leader, and ulti-mately, Speaker of the House.

Working with President Johnson, heplayed an invaluable role crafting the greatesteffort America had ever launched againstpoverty. And as the 46th Speaker, he led theHouse during a trying time in our Nation’shistory. Through it all, he kept his gaze fo-cused on the national interest. Carl Albertwas a true statesman. Our prayers go out tofamily and friends.

Remarks on Releasing the FiscalYear 2001 Federal BudgetFebruary 7, 2000

Thank you, John. I really appreciate, inparticular, the comment about the first draft

235Administration of William J. Clinton, 2000 / Feb. 7

of the State of the Union. [Laughter] If youlook at how thick that is, you’ll have someidea of how many people, believe it or not,are still mad that I didn’t mention their pro-gram in the speech. [Laughter]

I want to thank Secretary Summers, Sec-retary Slater, Jack Lew, Gene Sperling, SylviaMathews, Martin Baily, Bruce Reed, SallyKatzen, all the people from OMB who arehere who have worked so hard to put to-gether this budget. I really do appreciatewhat you’ve done.

I still get made fun of from time to timeas a policy wonk, and that’s supposed to bea pejorative term. But I think if you look atthe last 7 years, there’s a fairly serious argu-ment for the fact that it really does matterwhat you do and what the specifics are—thatGovernment and public life are more thanrhetoric; the reality eventually makes a dif-ference. The specific decisions do count. Andthat’s what this budget is all about.

It is a balanced budget with a balancedapproach to our national priorities. It main-tains our fiscal discipline, pays down thedebt, extends the life of Social Security andMedicare, and invests in our families and ourfuture.

Seven years ago, when I took office, we’dhad 12 years of big deficits, a quadruplingof the national debt that had led to high in-terest rates and low growth. We changed thecourse with a new economic policy for thenew economy, one focused on fiscal dis-cipline, expanded trade, and investments inpeople and potential.

The new economic policy, as now we allknow, has helped to create a new economy.Almost 21 million new jobs now; a 4.0 per-cent unemployment rate last month, the low-est in 30 years; the fastest growth in 30 years;the lowest crime and welfare rates in 30years; the lowest poverty rates in 20 years;the highest homeownership ever; and thelongest economic expansion in our historythis month.

The growth has been driven by private sec-tor investment, not public sector spending,as was the case in the previous 12 years. Asa share of the economy, it is worth pointingout that Federal spending is now the smallestit has been since 1966, with the first back-to-back surpluses in 42 years. Federal deficits

are last century’s news. This year, accordingto our projections, we’ll have three in a rowfor our surpluses, coming in at about $167billion. We’re on the way to an achievementthat only a few years ago would have beeninconceivable, making America debt-free forthe first time since Andrew Jackson wasPresident in 1835.

If you look at the chart behind me, youwill see the mountain of debt that built upduring the 12 years before I took office andwhat has already been done to reverse thetrend. By the end of this year, we will havepaid down the debt by nearly $300 billion.But you can also see that the debt is stillhigh, far too high.

Now, this is the point where we have thephoto op—[laughter]—and I attempt toshow you what our budget does to the debt,eliminating it by 2013. I have practiced thisin the back. [Laughter] When I did it in theback, the paint spilled everywhere, and Icommented that in every good effort thereare still fits and starts. So let me see if I cando it. [Laughter] There is no break here.[Laughter]

There is nothing academic about thatchart. Fiscal discipline matters to every singleAmerican. When the deficits disappear, in-terest rates fall; more Americans can thenbuy homes, retire student loans, start newbusinesses, create jobs and wealth. Indeed,our economists have estimated that lower in-terest rates in the last 7 years have alreadysaved the average American about $2,000 ayear in home mortgage payments and $200a year in college loan and car payments.

Our budget ensures that the benefits ofdebt reduction will continue, and that,among other things, they will go to strength-en two of the most important guarantees wemake to every American—Social Securityand Medicare. It makes a critical downpay-ment on Social Security reform by creditingthe interest savings from debt reduction at-tributable to the Social Security taxes to theSocial Security Trust Fund. That will keepit strong, solvent, and sound for the next 50years, which will keep it alive beyond the lifeexpectancy of virtually all of the baby boomgeneration.

Today we also take in this budget signifi-cant steps to strengthen and modernize


Medicare. Our budget dedicates about halfthe non-Social Security surplus to guaranteethe soundness of Medicare, and to add a longoverdue voluntary prescription drug benefit.When I became President, Medicare wasprojected to go broke last year, 1999. Today,it’s secure until 2015, thanks to the changesthat have already been made.

This budget contains further reforms, butall the experts say, with all conceivable re-forms, more money will still be needed, be-cause the number of people over 65 will dou-ble in the next 30 years, their life expectancywill increase, we’ll have miraculous new de-velopments in medicine which will increasethe quality of life. But all these things willadd to the costs of health care.

Therefore, I think it is very important thatwe act now and say we’re going to set asidea portion of this surplus for Medicare, so thatwhen the time comes we will have alreadyprovided for the costs that we know are com-ing. We can extend the life of the MedicareTrust Fund until at least 2025 and add thevoluntary prescription drug benefit with thisamount of dedicated funds.

The budget also provides funds, as I said,to give not only a prescription drug benefit—which more than three in five American sen-iors on Medicare now lack—it also createsa reserve fund of $35 billion to protect thosewho carry the heavy burden of catastrophicdrug costs.

This is something that I did not talk aboutin the State of the Union because I did notknow for sure that we would have thismoney. But I do believe that everybodywho’s really analyzed this is concerned abouttwo problems. One is that there are a wholelot of seniors—more than half—who don’thave access to affordable prescription drugcoverage, which at normal costs, will length-en their lives and improve its quality. Andthe second big problem is, some seniors haveabsolutely enormous bills that they have noway of paying, and we believe there oughtto be some catastrophic provision, so we haveset aside some funds to cover that, too, andwill attempt to convince the Congress thatwe ought to do that as well.

The budget also helps to meet our otherpressing priorities. It makes historic invest-ments in education, from Head Start to after-

school, from school construction to more andbetter trained teachers. It provides healthcare coverage for the parents of children inthe Children’s Health Insurance Program,and allows uninsured Americans between theages of 55 and 65—the fastest growing groupof uninsured—to buy into Medicare with atax credit to help them afford it.

It makes unprecedented investments tospeed discoveries in science and technology;funds more police and tougher gun enforce-ment to keep the crime rate dropping, mov-ing toward our goal of making America thesafest big country in the world. It makes crit-ical investments to keep our military the besttrained and best equipped in the world. Itgives many more investments to what we callAmerica’s new markets, from the inner citiesto poor rural areas to Native American res-ervations.

This budget also offers tax cuts to Amer-ica’s working families to help pay for collegeor save for retirement; to health care foraging or disabled loved ones; to reduce themarriage penalty; to reward work and familywith an expanded earned income tax credit,and with an expanded—and refundable—child care tax credit.

This budget, in short, makes really strongand significant steps toward achieving thegreat goals that I believe America should pur-sue in this new century. It helps us movetoward an America where every child startsschool ready to learn and graduates ready tosucceed; where parents are able to succeedat home and work, and no child is raised inpoverty; where we meet the challenge of theaging of America; where we provide healthcare to all; where we make America the safestbig country on Earth; bring prosperity to thecommunities and people who have been leftbehind; pay off our national debt; reverse thecourse of climate change; keep America lead-ing the world in science and technology, andtoward peace and prosperity; and bring ourcountry together, at last, as one America.

This budget takes the right steps towardthose goals. I hope it will be well-receivedin Congress and by the American people.And I thank all of you who worked on it,down to the last detail. The details make thedifference, and if we can enact them, theywill make all the difference for America.


Thank you very much.

NOTE: The President spoke at 10:22 a.m. in Presi-dential Hall in the Dwight D. Eisenhower Execu-tive Office Building. In his remarks, he referredto White House Chief of Staff John D. Podesta,who introduced the President; and Martin N.Baily, Chairman, Council of Economic Advisers.

Message to the CongressTransmitting a Report on theNational Emergency With Respect toTerrorists Who Threaten To Disruptthe Middle East Peace ProcessFebruary 7, 2000

To the Congress of the United States:As required by section 401(c) of the Na-

tional Emergencies Act, 50 U.S.C. 1641(c),and section 204(c) of the International Emer-gency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), 50U.S.C. 1703(c), I transmit herewith a 6-month periodic report on the national emer-gency with respect to terrorists who threatento disrupt the Middle East peace process thatwas declared in Executive Order 12947 ofJanuary 23, 1995.

William J. Clinton


Interview With Willow Bay of CableNews Network’s ‘‘Moneyline NewsHour’’February 7, 2000

Economic ProsperityMs. Bay. Mr. President, did you ever

imagine in your most optimistic of dreamswhen you first took office, think that youwould see a prosperity like the one we havetoday?

The President. The truth, I guess I didn’t,because I never thought about it. I literallynever thought about how long the longestexpansion was in history. But what I did be-lieve is that there was this enormous, pent-up potential in the American people becauseof all the restructuring of industry that wenton in the tough years in the 1980’s, becauseof the power of technology which has only

grown exponentially since I’ve been in of-fice—because I thought the American peo-ple understood the global economy and werewilling to work hard and not make excessivewage demands and get their pay increasesas their companies grew—all that turned outto be true.

So I just thought if I could remove theGovernment-related obstacles to growth bygetting the deficit down and getting interestrates down, that good things would happen.But no, I can’t say that I even thought—itnever crossed my mind that it would happen.

Ms. Bay. So in your mind, in some ways,was it unleashing a potential that alreadyexisted?

The President. Yes. Yes. I think the mainrole of Government in a global economy likethis, and where growth has to come out ofthe private sector, is to create conditions andgive people the tools to do the best they can.And so, to me, the Deficit Reduction Act in’93, the Telecommunications Act, the Bal-anced Budget Act of ’97, saving the surplus,all these things are designed to create theconditions and give people tools.

That’s why I think all this investment inscience and technology and having a lifetimetraining system is important. And then theAmerican people will do the rest. I think wehave the highest percentage of new jobs,nearly 21 million now, since 1993 in the pri-vate sector of any government—excuse me—any economic expansion in our history.They’re almost all, way over 90 percent, pri-vate jobs.

Ms. Bay. As you have noted, we have builta new economy. What is the most importantthing, most effective thing you can do asPresident to keep that economy goingstrong?

The President. I think, stick with thepresent economic strategy first, keep payingthe debt down, keep the interest rates down,keep the confidence up, continue to investin education and training and science andtechnology, and do more to expand trade. Ithink that’s the most important thing. ThenI think we have to continue to look for anyimpediments to continued growth.

For example, I think over time the Tele-communications Act and the Financial Mod-ernization Act will help a lot. And I think


we have to look for other things. That’s whyI think this new markets proposal I’ve madeis not going to be valuable just to help poorcommunities and poor people get invest-ment; I think it will keep growth going with-out inflation, because it’s a new way to bringexpansion to areas which haven’t enjoyed it.

Ms. Bay. Do you really believe this is anew economy? Because, as you know, manyon Wall Street say this is a boom, like otherswe’ve seen, and it will come to an end. Whatin your mind distinguishes it as different,other than its length?

The President. I think there are twothings that are different here. First is the roleof technology. And let me say, I’m like thepeople on Wall Street to the extent that Idon’t pretend that we’ve repealed the lawsof supply and demand, nor do I think wehave repealed the potential for human error.So, of course, it could come to an end, andit probably will some day. But what is reallydistinguishing here is the role of this newhigh-tech world and the way it rifles throughevery sector of the economy.

The high-tech economy, itself, basicallythe Silicon Valley type companies, they ac-count for 8 percent of our employment, but30 percent of our growth. That understatestheir impact because computer technology isgoing through every kind of work, and thereason the traditional economists, includingours, didn’t anticipate this level of growth—that you could get down to 4 percent unem-ployment without any inflation—is that theyunderestimated the productivity impact oftechnology. So I think that’s the first thing.

The second thing is, keeping our marketsopen has not only given us a wider rangeof consumer choices and more competitivepressures, it’s kept inflation down, becauseif we had a more closed market, then thesebuildups would not have the outlets theyhave—whether it’s in homebuilding or what-ever.

Ms. Bay. Do you worry at all, though, withour enthusiasm about this prosperity, withour genuine excitement over the techno-logical revolution that we’re witnessing, thatwe are convincing folks that this really is aboom without end?

The President. Well, I think that’s whatChairman Greenspan is trying to caution

against. He’s trying to make sure that wedon’t go so fast we play it out prematurely.And I think that’s what he’s tried to do inthe years we’ve worked together.

I think it’s important not to over-promise,not to over-claim, but I also believe all theevidence is that there’s still a lot of creativityleft, there’s still a lot of room for new invest-ment, there’s still a lot of room for growthif we remember the fundamentals—keep in-vesting in science and technology, keep in-vesting in education and training, keep pay-ing the debt down and keep the marketsopen and keep expanding our markets. Ithink if you stay with that—obviously some-thing could go wrong, but I think if we’renot over-promising and we’re on a steadycourse, I think we’ll continue to have growth.

FY 2001 BudgetMs. Bay. Your final budget was delivered

to Congress today. On the surface, at least,it looks as if you’re loosening the reins onspending a bit, revising the spending caps.Why should Americans want their Govern-ment to spend a little bit more in 2001?

The President. Well, first of all, the lastcouple of years we’ve spent more, and lastyear the Congress just shredded the spend-ing caps. They just did it by calling certainnormal expenditures emergencies. So this isbasically a straightforward budget. I took thespending levels of last year and I said, let’snot pretend anymore that we don’t want toadd at least inflation to education, to medicalresearch, to the environment, to health care.We know we’re going to do that. So let’sproject for the next 5 years that we’ll havelast year’s spending plus inflation, and thenwe’ll argue about the categories of growth.

But I think Americans should want us toinvest more. We’ve cut spending for quitea long while. As a percentage of our econ-omy, Federal Government spending is thelowest it’s been since 1966. The size of theGovernment is the lowest it’s been in 40years. So what we should do, now that we’vetrimmed down, now that we’ve got a surplus,we should keep paying the debt down, butwe ought to invest more, I believe, in edu-cation, in science and technology, in healthcare, to help parents balance the needs athome and at work, and I think we can afford


a modest tax cut, which I also believe is im-portant.

Ms. Bay. You’ve added some revenue rais-ers, like closing some corporate tax loop-holes. Likely to be a rather tough sell in Con-gress. If you don’t accomplish those, do yournumbers still work out?

The President. Well, if all the numbersdon’t work out, we’ll have to spend less orhave a smaller tax cut. Because to me, theonly number that has to work out is we’vegot to keep paying the debt down; we’ve gotto not jeopardize our ability to take care ofSocial Security when the baby boomers re-tire; and we’ve got to hold back enoughmoney so that Medicare stays stable anddoesn’t throw the whole budget out of whackor otherwise severely hurt seniors over thenext 15 or 20 years.

So, to me, those are the key things andeverything else operates from that frame-work. So, for example, if they decide not toclose some of the corporate loopholes, so wehave however much less money that is overa 5-year period, then we’ll either have tospend less or we’ll have to have a smallertax cut.

Budget’s Reception in CongressMs. Bay. John Kasich, chairman of the

House Budget Committee, declared yourbudget dead on arrival. How tough a battleare you likely to face?

The President. Well, that’s what they saidin ’99, and we got most of it; that’s what theysaid in ’98, and we got most of it. If our crowdwill—the people that agree with me—andthey’re not confined solely to the Demo-crats—we have almost 100 percent support,I think, in our party for our budget approachbecause we believe we should invest morein education; we believe we should investmore in health care. But I think there arealso quite a number of Republicans whoagree with us. So I think if we just relax andstay tough until the end of the year, we’lldo fine, just like we have in the last severalyears.

Ms. Bay. What are likely to be the mostcontentious issues?

The President. Well, I think the contentsof any tax cut will be contentious. I don’tbelieve the Republicans this year will contest

me on the size, because I think they’ve seeneven in their own party that Americans don’twant to run the risk of going back to deficits.They know this strategy is working.

But I feel strongly that we should focusthe tax cuts on the needs of middle class fam-ilies, like to pay for college tuition, long-termcare for elderly and disabled relatives, ex-panding the earned-income tax credit forpoor people, a genuine easing of the mar-riage penalty for people in the middle andeven in lower middle income groups. But weought to focus it there. I think they havesome different ideas; we’ll fight about that.

I think that a lot of them don’t supportour efforts to put 100,000 more teachers inthe classroom, so we’re going to fight overthat for a third year. But we got it the first2 years. And of course, they’re against, byand large, they’re more against the Patients’Bill of Rights than I am. I hope they’ll raisethe minimum wage, but some of them won’twant to. So we’ll have plenty to fight about.

Tax ReformMs. Bay. Do you think it’s likely you’ll see

an easing of the marriage penalty? I knowit’s a hot topic of conversation right now.

The President. I do. Because I want tohave a genuinely constructive atmosphere, Iput a proposal to them on the marriage pen-alty because I know that’s something they’vealways thought was important, too. And allI asked them to do was to confine their billto the marriage penalty issue and to give alittle relief to people in the lower income ofthe scale, too.

Their marriage penalty bill, in addition toeasing the marriage penalty, has a whole lotof other stuff in it. So if they’ll meet me half-way, we’ll work something out. I think there’sa fair chance we’ll get that.

Debt Buybacks and the Bond MarketMs. Bay. There was an interesting situa-

tion last week, caused largely by the surplus.As you know, the Treasury announced plansto buy back some of its debt and reduce thesupply of new debt. It caused a fair amountof turmoil in the bond markets. Were yousurprised by that kind of reaction in the bondmarket?


The President. A little bit, only becausewe had made clear several weeks before thatwe might want to buy some of our debt inearly. If it had been the first time it had everbeen mentioned, I wouldn’t have been sosurprised. And there is a debate going onnow about whether it’s even a good thingfor us to pay ourselves out of debt, becausethere are some people that believe we haveto have enough publicly held debt to estab-lish the bond market, which is a, if you will,a barometer for the overall financial frame-work of the capital markets.

But my concern is, we financed this expan-sion privately. There is quite a lot of privatedebt outstanding; it doesn’t look at all trou-bling today because there is so much privatewealth outstanding. But I just don’t want torun the risk of the thing getting out of bal-ance. So I think as long as we’re growingthis way, the Government should continueto pay down the debt. And we have to buyin the bonds to do that.

Ms. Bay. Could or should the Treasuryhave done anything to manage the bond mar-ket more effectively, particularly given thatthis is unprecedented and likely to be an on-going concern?

The President. I don’t know the answerto that because, as I said, my—unless mymemory is totally out of whack here, I thinkwe announced several weeks earlier thanthat, we plan to buy the bonds in, and someof them would be brought in before term.So I think Secretary Summers is a very smartman and he understands this and he talksto people in the private sector all the time,and I think they’ll do it the best way theycan.

But just yesterday Chairman Greenspansaid again that he thought the best thing thatwe could do in the executive branch wouldbe to continue to take the debt down, andhe hoped Congress would cooperate. So Ithink we’re all—if we’re wrong, we’re allwrong together, anyway—and I don’t thinkwe are.

Information Age Entrepreneurship

Ms. Bay. On a more personal note, youare clearly a believer in this new economy.If you were starting your career today, would

you be tempted to start a career on thefrontlines of this revolution or——

The President. Oh, absolutely.Ms. Bay. You would?The President. Absolutely. It’s so exciting.

I mean, you talk to all these young peoplewho are out there and have come up withthese ideas, and they have access to capital,and they do things. And then when they—a lot of them make a phenomenal amountof money in almost no time, but they alsohire people, they’re interested in contrib-uting to the strength of society. I neverbought this generation X argument; most ofthese young people really care about theoverall health of America. And I think theidea of having an economy that really is run-ning on ideas is a very exciting prospect forthe future.

Ms. Bay. Tempted, perhaps, to run a.com?

The President. Yes, I would be. If I werestarting again, I would be. You know, I’mprobably too old to do it now. I’ll have tofind something else to do in a year, so maybeI’ll think about it then. [Laughter] But I’mnot sure I’m not too creaky around the edgesto do it.

2000 ElectionMs. Bay. Word is they could use some

experience in the .com world. [Laughter]Final question. In the middle of this cam-

paign season, Senator McCain is running asan outsider, in part, against you and your leg-acy. Yet, his economic platform looks surpris-ingly like Clinton/Gore economic policy.Does that make him a more formidable op-ponent for Al Gore?

The President. Well, first of all, I thinkthat every person in the last 30 years—in-cluding me, when I ran—you always run asan outsider, because more people live out-side Washington than inside Washington,and people always think of it as a distantplace.

But I think it’s both flattering and I thinkencouraging that Republicans generally haveturned away from tax cuts that are so bigthat they could trouble our economy. Andno matter who wins their nomination, thereare lots of other differences between our two


parties and our candidates that the Americanpeople will have a chance to think about.

I think it would be a very good thing ifwe could establish a bipartisan consensusthat we’re going to keep paying this debtdown; we’re going to save Social Security forthe baby boom generation; we’re not goingto allow Medicare to go broke. That wouldbe a good thing, and it would be worthy of—you know, in a global economy, having acommon economic policy is part of our na-tional security.

Now, that would be attractive. Then theburden would fall on both the Democratsand Republicans to clarify what the otherissues are and what the differences are. SoI think, really, it’s quite impossible to predict,this early, how this thing will change. It’s oneof the things I’ve learned watching Presi-dential politics over more than half my lifenow—that they’ll change. Once you thinkyou’ve got it figured out, the American peo-ple are still in the saddle, and they’ll changeit on you.

Hillary Clinton’s Senate CandidacyMs. Bay. Speaking of politics, congratula-

tions. Mrs. Clinton made it formal over theweekend, announcing her campaign for theU.S. Senate.

The President. She did.Ms. Bay. Are you really prepared to hit

the campaign trail again, and this time as asupportive spouse?

The President. Well, I will do whateverI can to help her. And New York has beenvery good to me and wonderful to us, to ourfamily, to our administration, to the VicePresident. But I think now what they wantto do is hear from her. Yesterday was herday. I thought she was terrific. I was so proudof her. I loved her speech and what she saidand what she’s running on. If I can help her,of course, I will.

But my instinct is that the people of NewYork want to hear from her directly, and thatif I can help her, it will be later in the cam-paign, when we get down to the—longer to-ward the end and there’s fundamental deci-sions to be made by a relatively small numberof voters who might be willing to listen tomy arguments—not because it’s me, but justbecause I have a microphone.

But people are pretty independent in thiscountry, and they like to make their own de-cisions, and they’re not going to vote for herjust because she’s my wife; but they mightvote for her because we share some valuesand some approaches to the issues. And theywant to make their own judgment about her.I thought she was terrific when she an-nounced. I was so proud of her. And I’ll behappy to be a member of the Senate spouses’club. I hope I get to be. [Laughter]

Ms. Bay. President Clinton, thank youvery much for joining us tonight.

The President. Thank you.

NOTE: The interview began at 5:20 p.m. in theRoosevelt Room at the White House, but the tran-script was embargoed for release by the Officeof the Press Secretary until 7:30 p.m. A tape wasnot available for verification of the content of thisinterview.

Remarks on Signing an ExecutiveOrder To Prohibit Discrimination inFederal Employment Based onGenetic InformationFebruary 8, 2000

Thank you very much, and good afternoon.I want to begin by thanking all the peopleat AAAS for having us here today—my long-time friend Dr. Shirley Malcolm, thank you.And thank you, Dr. Richard Nicholson. Ithank Dr. Francis Collins—what a remark-able statement he made.

I was thinking when he said that line thatI’m beating to death now that we’re all ge-netically 99.9 percent the same, that the one-tenth of one percent difference between himand me is all the intellectual capacity for thesciences—[laughter]—regrettably. That’s agreat thing for people who care about thefuture of the human genome.

I’m delighted to be joined here by severalmembers of our administration and by threeMembers of Congress, showing that this isa bipartisan issue; it’s an American issue. Ithank Representative Louise Slaughter fromNew York, who was with me yesterday talk-ing to me about this, and RepresentativeFred Upton from Michigan, and Representa-tive and Dr. Greg Ganske from Iowa. Thank


you all for being here. We appreciate youvery much and your concern for this.

I thank again all the people in the adminis-tration who worked on this—my Science Ad-viser, Dr. Neal Lane, and all the people fromOPM and the EEOC and others.

This is really a happy day for me. Foryears, in our administration, I was a sort ofpolitical front person, and now we’ve got thefirst election in a quarter-century that I can’tbe a part of. And people are always comingto me saying, ‘‘Oh, this must be a real downerfor you, you know, that the Vice Presidentand Hillary, they’re out there 7 o’clock inthe morning hitting all these coffee shops,you must be’’—[laughter]—‘‘how are youdealing with this terrible deprivation?’’[Laughter]

And I went out to Caltech the other dayto talk about my science and technologybudget, and I said, ‘‘Well, I’m using this op-portunity to get in touch with my innernerd’’—[laughter]—‘‘and to really sort ofdeal with these things that I have repressedall these years, that I’m really, really tryingto get into this.’’ We’re laughing about this.But, you know, it is truly astonishing that weare all privileged enough to be alive at thismoment in history, and to be, some of us,even a small part of this remarkable explosionin human discovery; to contemplate not onlywhat it might mean for us and our contem-poraries, in terms of lengthening our livesand improving the quality of them, and im-proving the reach of our understanding ofwhat is going on, both within our bodies andin the far reaches of space, but what particu-larly it will mean for the whole structure oflife for our children and grandchildren.

And I am profoundly grateful to all of youwho have been involved, and who will be in-volved, in that march of human advance inany way. That quest for knowledge has de-fined what the AAAS has done for, now,more than 150 years.

We are here today, as the previous speak-ers have said, to recognize that this extraor-dinary march of human understanding im-poses on us profound responsibilities, tomake sure that the age of discovery can con-tinue to reflect our most cherished values.And I want to talk just a little about that

in somewhat more detail than Dr. Collinsdid.

First and foremost, we must protect ourcitizens’ privacy—the bulwark of personalliberty, the safeguard of individual creativity.More than 100 years ago now, JusticeBrandeis recognized that technological ad-vances would require us to be ever-vigilantin protecting what he said was civilization’smost valued right, the fundamental right toprivacy. ‘‘New conditions,’’ he said, ‘‘wouldoften require us to define anew the exact na-ture and extent of such protection.’’ And in-deed, much of the 20th century jurispru-dence of the Supreme Court has dealt withthat continuing challenge in various contexts.So, once again, Justice Brandeis has provedprophetic for a new century.

Today, powerful ways of technologicalchange threaten to erode our sacred wallsof privacy in ways we could not have envi-sioned a generation ago—not just the ways,by the way, we’re discussing here today. Willyou ever have a private telephone conversa-tion on a cell phone again? Can you evengo in your own home and know that the con-versation is private if you become importantenough for people to put devices on yourwalls? What is the nature of privacy in the21st century, and how can we continue toprotect it?

But clearly, people’s medical records, theirfinancial records, and their genetic recordsare among the most important things that wehave to protect. Last year we proposed rulesto protect the sanctity of medical records;we’ll finalize them this year. Soon I will sendlegislation to complete the job we started inprotecting citizen’s financial records. Todaywe move forward to try to make sure we dowhat we can to protect, in an important way,genetic privacy.

Clearly, there is no more exciting frontierin modern scientific research than genomeresearch. Dr. Collins did a good job of tellingus why. And when this human genomeproject is completed, we can now only barelyimagine, I believe, the full implications ofwhat we will learn for the detection, treat-ment, and prevention of serious diseases. Itwill transform medical care more profoundly


than anything since the discovery of anti-biotics and the polio vaccine, I believe, farmore profoundly than that.

But it will also impose upon us new re-sponsibilities and, I would argue, only someof which we now know—only some of whichwe now know—to ensure that the new dis-coveries do not pry open the protective doorsof privacy.

The fear of misuse of private genetic infor-mation is already very widespread in our Na-tion. Americans are genuinely worried thattheir genetic information will not be kept se-cret, that this information will be used againstthem. As a result, they’re often reluctant totake advantage of new breakthroughs in ge-netic testing—making a point, I think, wecannot make too often—if we do not protectthe right to privacy, we may actually impedethe reach of these breakthroughs in the livesof ordinary people, which would be a pro-found tragedy.

A Pennsylvania study, for example, showedthat nearly a third of women at high risk forinherited forms of breast cancer refused tobe tested to determine whether they carryeither of the two known breast cancer genesbecause they feared discrimination based onthe results. That is simply wrong. We mustnot allow advances in genetics to become thebasis of discrimination against any individualor any group. We must never allow these dis-coveries to change the basic belief uponwhich our Government, our society, our sys-tem of ethics is founded, that all of us arecreated equal, entitled to equal treatmentunder the law.

The Executive order I will sign in just acouple of minutes will be the first Executiveorder of the 21st century to help meet thisgreat 21st century challenge. It prohibits theFederal Government and its agencies fromusing genetic testing in any employment de-cision. It prevents Federal employers fromrequesting or requiring that employees un-dergo genetic tests of any kind. It strictly for-bids employers from using genetic informa-tion to classify employees in such a way thatdeprives them of advancement opportunities,such as promotion for overseas posts.

By signing this Executive order, my goalis to set an example and pose a challengefor every employer in America, because I be-

lieve no employer should ever review yourgenetic records along with your resume.

Because, by Executive order, I can onlydo so much, we also need congressional ac-tion this year. In 1996 the Congress passed,and I signed, the Kassebaum-Kennedy bill,the health insurance portability law, whichmade it illegal for group health insurers todeny coverage to any individual based on ge-netic information. That was an important firststep, but we must go further.

Now I ask Congress to pass the ‘‘GeneticNon-Discrimination in Health Insurance andEmployment Act’’ introduced in the Senateby Senator Daschle and in the House byCongresswoman Louise Slaughter, who iswith us today. What this legislation does isto extend the employment protections con-tained in the Executive order that I will signtoday to all private sector employees as well,and to ensure that people in all health plans,not just group plans, will have the full con-fidence that the fruits of genetic research willbe used solely to improve their care andnever to deny them care.

There is something else we should do rightaway. We must make absolutely sure that wedo not allow the race for genetic cures toundermine vital patient protections. Likemany Americans, I have been extremely con-cerned about reports that some families in-volved in trials of experimental gene thera-pies have not been fully informed of the risksand that some scientists have failed to reportserious side effects from these trials. I sup-port the recent action by FDA and NIH toenforce reporting in patient safety require-ments.

Today I’m asking Secretary Shalala to in-struct FDA and NIH to accelerate their re-view of gene therapy guidelines and regula-tions. I want to know how we can better en-sure that this information about the trials isshared with the public. I want to knowwhether we need to strengthen requirementson informed consent. If we don’t have fullconfidence in these trials, people won’t par-ticipate, and then the true promise of geneticmedicine will be put on hold. We cannotallow our remarkable progress in genomic re-search to be undermined by concerns overthe privacy of genetic data or the safety of


gene therapies. Instead, we must do what-ever it takes to address these legitimate con-cerns. We know if we do, the positive possi-bilities are absolutely endless.

I said this the other day, but I would liketo reiterate—I think maybe I am so excitedabout this because of my age. I was in thegeneration of children who were the firsttreated with the polio vaccine. And for thoseof you who are much younger than me, youcan’t imagine what it was like for our parentsto see the literal terror in our parents’ eyeswhen we were children, paralyzed with fearthat somehow we would be afflicted by whatwas then called infantile paralysis; and thesense of hope, the eagerness, the sort of nail-biting anticipation, when we learned of theSalk vaccine, and all of us were lined up toget our shots. Unless you were in our genera-tion, you cannot imagine.

And the thought that every other problemthat could affect the generation of my grand-children could be visited with that level ofrelief and hope and exhilaration by the par-ents of our children’s generation is somethingthat is almost inexpressible.

We have to make the most of this. Andwe know, we have learned from over 200years of experience as a nation, knockingdown physical and intellectual frontiers, thatwe can only spread the benefits of new dis-coveries when we proceed in a manner thatis consistent with our most ancient and cher-ished values. That is what this day is all about.So to all of you who have contributed to it,I thank you very, very much.

Now I would like to ask the Members ofCongress who are here and members of theadministration who are here, who have beeninvolved in this to come up with me. Andall I have to do is write my name. [Laughter]That’s a pretty good deal. You can write thehuman genome code, and I’ll write myname—[laughter]—and that takes full ac-count of the one-tenth of one percent dif-ference in our genetic makeup. [Laughter]


NOTE: The President spoke at 12:40 p.m. in theauditorium at the American Association for theAdvancement of Science (AAAS). In his remarks,he referred to Shirley Malcolm, head of the direc-torate for education and human resources pro-grams, and Richard S. Nicholson, member, board

of directors, and executive officer, AAAS; andFrancis S. Collins, Director, National Human Ge-nome Research Institute, National Institutes ofHealth.

Executive Order 13145—To ProhibitDiscrimination in FederalEmployment Based on GeneticInformationFebruary 8, 2000

By the authority vested in me as Presidentof the United States by the Constitution andthe laws of the United States of America, itis ordered as follows:

Section 1. Nondiscrimination in FederalEmployment on the Basis of Protected Ge-netic Information.

1–101. It is the policy of the Governmentof the United States to provide equal em-ployment opportunity in Federal employ-ment for all qualified persons and to prohibitdiscrimination against employees based onprotected genetic information, or informa-tion about a request for or the receipt of ge-netic services. This policy of equal oppor-tunity applies to every aspect of Federal em-ployment.

1–102. The head of each Executive depart-ment and agency shall extend the policy setforth in section 1–101 to all its employeescovered by section 717 of Title VII of theCivil Rights Act of 1964, as amended (42U.S.C. 2000e–16).

1–103. Executive departments and agen-cies shall carry out the provisions of thisorder to the extent permitted by law and con-sistent with their statutory and regulatory au-thorities, and their enforcement mecha-nisms. The Equal Employment OpportunityCommission shall be responsible for coordi-nating the policy of the Government of theUnited States to prohibit discriminationagainst employees in Federal employmentbased on protected genetic information, orinformation about a request for or the receiptof genetic services.

Sec. 2. Requirements Applicable to Em-ploying Departments and Agencies.

1–201. Definitions.(a) The term ‘‘employee’’ shall include an

employee, applicant for employment, orformer employee covered by section 717 of


the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended (42U.S.C. 2000e–16).

(b) Genetic monitoring means the periodicexamination of employees to evaluate ac-quired modifications to their genetic mate-rial, such as chromosomal damage or evi-dence of increased occurrence of mutations,that may have developed in the course of em-ployment due to exposure to toxic substancesin the workplace, in order to identify, evalu-ate, respond to the effects of, or control ad-verse environmental exposures in the work-place.

(c) Genetic services means health services,including genetic tests, provided to obtain,assess, or interpret genetic information fordiagnostic or therapeutic purposes, or for ge-netic education or counseling.

(d) Genetic test means the analysis ofhuman DNA, RNA, chromosomes, proteins,or certain metabolites in order to detect dis-ease-related genotypes or mutations. Testsfor metabolites fall within the definition of‘‘genetic tests’’ when an excess or deficiencyof the metabolites indicates the presence ofa mutation or mutations. The conducting ofmetabolic tests by a department or agencythat are not intended to reveal the presenceof a mutation shall not be considered a viola-tion of this order, regardless of the resultsof the tests. Test results revealing a mutationshall, however, be subject to the provisionsof this order.

(e) Protected genetic information.(1) In general, protected genetic infor-

mation means:(A) information about an individual’s ge-

netic tests;(B) information about the genetic tests of

an individual’s family members; or(C) information about the occurrence of

a disease, or medical condition or dis-order in family members of the indi-vidual.

(2) Information about an individual’s cur-rent health status (including informa-tion about sex, age, physical exams,and chemical, blood, or urine anal-yses) is not protected genetic infor-mation unless it is described in sub-paragraph (1).

1–202. In discharging their responsibilitiesunder this order, departments and agencies

shall implement the following nondiscrimina-tion requirements.

(a) The employing department or agencyshall not discharge, fail or refuse to hire, orotherwise discriminate against any employeewith respect to the compensation, terms,conditions, or privileges of employment ofthat employee, because of protected geneticinformation with respect to the employee, orbecause of information about a request foror the receipt of genetic services by suchemployee.

(b) The employing department or agencyshall not limit, segregate, or classify employ-ees in any way that would deprive or tendto deprive any employee of employment op-portunities or otherwise adversely affect thatemployee’s status, because of protected ge-netic information with respect to the em-ployee or because of information about a re-quest for or the receipt of genetic servicesby such employee.

(c) The employing department or agencyshall not request, require, collect, or pur-chase protected genetic information with re-spect to an employee, or information abouta request for or the receipt of genetic servicesby such employee.

(d) The employing department or agencyshall not disclose protected genetic informa-tion with respect to an employee, or informa-tion about a request for or the receipt of ge-netic services by an employee except:

(1) to the employee who is the subjectof the information, at his or her re-quest;

(2) to an occupational or other health re-searcher, if the research conductedcomplies with the regulations andprotections provided for under part46 of title 45, of the Code of FederalRegulations;

(3) if required by a Federal statute, con-gressional subpoena, or an orderissued by a court of competent juris-diction, except that if the subpoenaor court order was secured withoutthe knowledge of the individual towhom the information refers, the em-ployer shall provide the individualwith adequate notice to challenge thesubpoena or court order, unless the


subpoena or court order also imposesconfidentiality requirements; or

(4) to executive branch officials inves-tigating compliance with this order, ifthe information is relevant to theinvestigation.

(e) The employing department or agencyshall not maintain protected genetic informa-tion or information about a request for orthe receipt of genetic services in general per-sonnel files; such information shall be treatedas confidential medical records and kept sep-arate from personnel files.

Sec. 3. Exceptions.1–301. The following exceptions shall

apply to the nondiscrimination requirementsset forth in section 1–202.

(a) The employing department or agencymay request or require information definedin section 1–201(e)(1)(C) with respect to anapplicant who has been given a conditionaloffer of employment or to an employee if:

(1) the request or requirement is con-sistent with the Rehabilitation Actand other applicable law;

(2) the information obtained is to be usedexclusively to assess whether furthermedical evaluation is needed to diag-nose a current disease, or medicalcondition or disorder, or under theterms of section 1–301(b) of thisorder;

(3) such current disease, or medical con-dition or disorder could prevent theapplicant or employee from per-forming the essential functions of theposition held or desired; and

(4) the information defined in section 1–201(e)(1)(C) of this order will not bedisclosed to persons other than med-ical personnel involved in or respon-sible for assessing whether furthermedical evaluation is needed to diag-nose a current disease, or medicalcondition or disorder, or under theterms of section 1–301(b) of thisorder.

(b) The employing department or agencymay request, collect, or purchase protectedgenetic information with respect to an em-ployee, or any information about a requestfor or receipt of genetic services by such em-ployee if:

(1) the employee uses genetic or healthcare services provided by the em-ployer (other than use pursuant tosection 1–301(a) of this order);

(2) the employee who uses the geneticor health care services has providedprior knowing, voluntary, and writtenauthorization to the employer to col-lect protected genetic information;

(3) the person who performs the geneticor health care services does not dis-close protected genetic information toanyone except to the employee whouses the services for treatment of theindividual; pursuant to section 1–202(d) of this order; for program eval-uation or assessment; for compilingand analyzing information in anticipa-tion of or for use in a civil or criminallegal proceeding; or for payment oraccounting purposes, to verify thatthe service was performed (but insuch cases the genetic informationitself cannot be disclosed);

(4) such information is not used in viola-tion of sections 1–202(a) or 1–202(b)of this order.

(c) The employing department or agencymay collect protected genetic informationwith respect to an employee if the require-ments of part 46 of title 45 of the Code ofFederal Regulations are met.

(d) Genetic monitoring of biological ef-fects of toxic substances in the workplaceshall be permitted if all of the following con-ditions are met:

(1) the employee has provided prior,knowing, voluntary, and written au-thorization;

(2) the employee is notified when the re-sults of the monitoring are availableand, at that time, the employer makesany protected genetic informationthat may have been acquired duringthe monitoring available to the em-ployee and informs the employee howto obtain such information;

(3) the monitoring conforms to any ge-netic monitoring regulations that may


be promulgated by the Secretary ofLabor; and

(4) the employer, excluding any licensedhealth care professionals that are in-volved in the genetic monitoring pro-gram, receives results of the moni-toring only in aggregate terms that donot disclose the identity of specificemployees.

(e) This order does not limit the statutoryauthority of a Federal department or agencyto:

(1) promulgate or enforce workplacesafety and health laws and regula-tions;

(2) conduct or sponsor occupational orother health research that is con-ducted in compliance with regulationsat part 46 of title 45, of the Code ofFederal Regulations; or

(3) collect protected genetic informationas a part of a lawful program, the pri-mary purpose of which is to carry outidentification purposes.

Sec. 4. Miscellaneous.1–401. The head of each department and

agency shall take appropriate action to dis-seminate this policy and, to this end, shalldesignate a high level official responsible forcarrying out its responsibilities under thisorder.

1–402. Nothing in this order shall be con-strued to:

(a) limit the rights or protections of an in-dividual under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973(29 U.S.C. 701, et seq.), the Privacy Act of1974 (5 U.S.C. 552a), or other applicable law;or

(b) require specific benefits for an em-ployee or dependent under the Federal Em-ployees Health Benefits Program or similarprogram.

1–403. This order clarifies and makes uni-form Administration policy and does not cre-ate any right or benefit, substantive or proce-dural, enforceable at law by a party againstthe United States, its officers or employees,or any other person.

William J. Clinton


[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register,8:45 a.m., February 9, 2000]

NOTE: This Executive order was published in theFederal Register on February 10.

Remarks on Presenting theCongressional Medal of Honorto Alfred RasconFebruary 8, 2000

The President. Colonel, thank you forthat prayer. General Hicks, Secretary Cohen,Secretary West, Secretary Richardson, Sec-retary Caldera, General Shelton, GeneralRalston, members of the Joint Chiefs, all theMembers of Congress who are here—and wehave quite a distinguished array of them. Wethank them all for coming. I’d like to ask theMembers of Congress who are here to standso you’ll see how many we have. We’re verygrateful to you for your presence here. Thankyou.

When the Medal of Honor was conceivedin 1861, some Americans actually worriedthat it might be a bad thing, that the medalswould be seen as somehow too aristocratic,and that there was no need for them in agenuinely democratic society. Today, weaward the Medal of Honor, secure in theknowledge that people like Alfred Rasconhave kept our democracy alive all these years.

We bestow the medal knowing that Amer-ica would not have survived were it not forpeople like him, who, generation after gen-eration, have always renewed the extraor-dinary gift of freedom for their fellowcitizens.

Under any circumstances, a Medal ofHonor ceremony is an event of great impor-tance. Today it is especially so: for the rarequality of heroism on display that long-agoday in 1966; for the long, patient wait forrecognition; for Alfred’s decision to devotehis life both before and after 1966 to a nationhe was not born in.

Alfred Rascon was born in Mexico on Sep-tember 10, 1945, just 8 days after the formalsurrender ending World War II. When hewas very young, his parents came to Americafor a better chance. They ended up inOxnard, north of Los Angeles. And whenAlfred started grade school, he still spoke not


a word of English. He grew up near threemilitary bases and fell in love with the ArmedForces. At the advanced age of 7, wantingto do his part to defend America, he builta homemade parachute and jumped off theroof of his house. [Laughter] Unfortunately,in his own words, the chute had a ‘‘total mal-function’’—[laughter]—and he broke hiswrist.

But as usual, he was undeterred. Soon hegraduated from high school and enlisted inthe United States Army. Appropriately, hebecame a medic for a platoon of para-troopers, the first of the 503d Airborne Bat-talion of the 173d Airborne Brigade. He ex-plained, ‘‘I wanted to give back somethingto this country and its citizens for the oppor-tunities it had given me and my parents.Those paratroopers who served with me inthe reconnaissance platoon knew nothing ofmy immigrant status. It was never an issue.They simply knew me as Doc.’’

Alfred’s platoon was sent to Vietnam inMay of 1965, part of the first Army combatunit there. On March 16th, 1966, they werein Long Khanh Province, helping anotherplatoon that was pinned down by the enemy.In his words, it was ‘‘10 minutes of pure hell.’’

In the middle of an intense firefight,Alfred was everywhere. While attending toa fatally wounded machine gunner, PrivateWilliam Thompson, he was hit with shrapneland shot in the hip. The bullet went parallelto his spine and came out by his shoulder.Ignoring his own wounds, he then broughtdesperately needed ammo to another ma-chine gunner, Private Larry Gibson. Severalgrenades then landed nearby. One of themripped his mouth open. When he saw an-other land near Private Neil Haffey, he cov-ered him with his body, absorbing the bruntof the blast. Yet another grenade landed nearSergeant Ray Compton, and Alfred coveredhim, too. Then, barely able to walk, bleedingfrom his ears and nose, he ran to recovera machine gun that the enemy was about tocapture. The extra firepower kept the enemyfrom advancing, and Alfred Rascon saved hisplatoon.

Through this extraordinary succession ofcourageous acts, he never gave a singlethought to himself, except, he admits, for theinstant when the grenade exploded near his

face and he thought, ‘‘Oh, God, my goodlooks are gone.’’ [Laughter] I’m not muchof an expert, but I would say you were wrongabout that, Captain. [Laughter] You look justfine here today.

On that distant day, in that faraway place,this man gave everything he had, utterly andselflessly, to protect his platoon mates andthe Nation he was still not yet a citizen of.Later he said with characteristic modesty, ‘‘Idid it because I had to do it, and that’s allthere is to it.’’ He said, ‘‘I don’t consider my-self a hero. Anybody in combat would do thesame thing for their buddies and friends. Wewere all colorblind. We were all different na-tionalities. The important thing is that wewere Americans fighting for America.’’

I want to stop just for a moment to saluteall the other Americans who did that in Viet-nam. We want to honor you today, along withAlfred. Many of you were there with him.And I’d like for all of you to stand or, if youcan’t stand, lift your arms and be recognized.We want to acknowledge you today, please.[Applause]

Alfred Rascon was so badly wounded thatday he was actually given last rites. After along convalescence, he pulled through, andhe continued to serve his country. He be-came a citizen in 1967. He rejoined the Armyas an officer. In 1972 he volunteered for asecond tour in Vietnam. And in 1983 hebegan working for the Justice Department.Today, he is the Inspector General of theSelective Service System, helping to makesure that others will be there to defendAmerica as he did.

Looking at his lifetime of service to ourNation, it would be hard to imagine a betterdefinition of citizenship. So I would like toalso take a moment, sir, to thank your par-ents, Alfredo and Andrea, for teaching theirson the values of good citizenship. And wewould all like to welcome your wife, Carol,and your children, Amanda and Alan. Theymust be so very proud of you today. We wel-come you here.

Now, here’s a story of how we all camehere. Alfred Rascon was given a Silver Starfor his valor that day in 1966. But the requestfor his Medal of Honor somehow got lostin a thicket of redtape. His platoon matespersisted, showing as much loyalty to him as


he had shown to them. Thanks to them, after34 years, I am proud to present you withour Nation’s highest honor.

Since the creation of the Medal of Honor,roughly one in five of them have been award-ed to immigrants. Today, there are over60,000 immigrants protecting the UnitedStates in our military.

Alfred was once asked why he volunteeredto join and to go to Vietnam when he wasnot even a citizen. And he said, ‘‘I was alwaysan American in my heart.’’

Alfred Rascon, today we honor you as youhave honored us, by your choice to becomean American and your courage in reflectingthe best of America. You said that you sum-moned your courage for your platoon be-cause ‘‘you’ve got to take care of your peo-ple.’’ That’s a pretty good credo for all therest of us, as well.

On behalf of all Americans, and especiallyon behalf of your platoon members who arehere today, I thank you for what you meanto our country. Thank you for what you gavethat day and what you have given every daysince. Thank you for reminding us that beingAmerican has nothing to do with the placeof your birth, the color of your skin, the lan-guage of your parents, or the way you wor-ship God. Thank you for living the enduringAmerican values every day. Thank you fordoing something that was hard because noone else was there to do it. Thank you forlooking out for people when no one elsecould be there for them.

You have taught us once again that beingAmerican has nothing to do with the placeof birth, racial, ethnic origin, or religiousfaith. It comes straight from the heart. Andyour heart, sir, is an extraordinary gift to yourcountry.

Commander, please read the citation.

[At this point, Comdr. Michael M. Gilday,USN, Navy Aide to the President, read thecitations, and the President presented themedal. Alfred Rascon made brief remarks.]

The President. I want to thank you allagain for being here today and invite you tojoin our honoree and his family in a receptionin the State Dining Room at the end of thehall. Thank you very much, and welcome.

But don’t leave until we have the bene-diction. [Laughter]

General Hicks.

NOTE: The President spoke at 2:35 p.m. in theEast Room at the White House. In his remarks,he referred to Lt. Col. Frank Vavrin, USA (Ret.),Chaplain Corps, 503d Airborne Battalion, whogave the invocation; and Brig. Gen. David Hicks,USA, Deputy Chief of Chaplains. The transcriptreleased by the Office of the Press Secretary alsoincluded the remarks of Alfred Rascon.

Statement on the Election of StipeMesic as President of CroatiaFebruary 8, 2000

I congratulate President-elect Stipe Mesicon his victory in Monday’s elections in Cro-atia. Mr. Mesic’s victory is a turning pointfor Croatia. It brings with it the promise ofgenuine democracy and a normal life forCroatia’s people, stronger ties between ourtwo nations, and greater stability throughoutsoutheast Europe. The people of Croatiahave clearly demonstrated their desire to seetheir country take its rightful place in Eu-rope. The United States will do everythingit can to help them reach their destination.And together we will send a clear messageto all the people of the Balkans that a bright-er future is within their grasp.

I look forward to working closely withPresident-elect Mesic, Prime MinisterRacan, and the new government in Zagreb.

NOTE: In the statement, the President referredto Prime Minister Ivica Racan of Croatia.

Remarks at a Democratic NationalCommittee ReceptionFebruary 8, 2000

Thank you very much. Thank you, John.Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for beinghere tonight and for your support for ourparty. I wanted to just say a few words, andthen we’ll visit a little.

I did put out the budget yesterday. AndI’ve had a great week. We had the State ofthe Union, and then I went to Switzerland,to Davos, to the International Economic


Forum, to talk about what I believe our pol-icy ought to be on trade in the 21st century.And before I issued my budget I got to hearmy wife make a great speech on Sundaywhen she announced for the Senate in NewYork. I was very proud of her. I thought shedid a wonderful job.

Today I took action on another item I dis-cussed in the State of the Union over at theAmerican Academy of Sciences. I signed thefirst Executive order of the 21st century, pro-tecting the genetic privacy of all Federal em-ployees and asking Congress to do that forall employees throughout the country. I thinkthat this a very important issue. We’re goingto have all this huge explosion of knowledgewhen we finish demapping the human ge-nome. And we want people to participate tothe maximum possible degree and all bene-fits that will flow out of that.

And if we expect that, then we’re goingto have to make sure that they don’t lose theright to a job, lose the right to get insurance,lose the right to be considered for promotionbecause their genetic map shows that theymight have some propensity to some prob-lem. We want people to participate in everyconceivable way in learning about it so thatwe can develop blocking gene therapies forall the problems people have.

So this is a very, very exciting time for ourcountry. For me, it’s actually rather inter-esting. For the first time in probably 24 yearsto see an election season come and go whenI’m not on anybody’s ballot anywhere—[laughter]—it’s rather interesting. I’m havinga good time. [Laughter] I feel like the catthat ate the canary some days.

But one of the things I would like to sayto all of you, that I hope you will keep inmind throughout this year—as you supportus, as you talk to your friends, as you makearguments for our candidates, from theWhite House to the Senate and the Houseand the governorships—is that the Demo-cratic Party now has had 7 years of testingour dominant philosophy. And I think it’spretty clear, number one, that it works, andnumber two, that it’s shared by a majorityof the American people.

Seven years ago when we began, we justhad a roadmap for the future. We said,‘‘Look, we believe that there is a reason the

country is suffering from economic stagna-tion and social division and political gridlockand that governments didn’t discredit it, thatwe were operating under a philosophy thatsaid Government was the problem, that pit-ted people against one another and that wasvery good about talking about problems likethe deficit but not very good about doinganything about it.’’

And we came to this town—our whole ad-ministration did, beginning with the VicePresident and me—with a philosophy thatsaid we were going to unify this country, thatwe were going to try to create opportunityfor everybody, challenge everyone to be re-sponsible, and bring everybody together inone community. And we were actually goingto try to bring Washington together—I mustsay, we’ve had more success in the countrythan we have in Washington. [Laughter] Butstill, it’s been an exhilarating effort here, andstill a challenge every day.

So now we’ve had 7 years of these results.And I just want to say what I said in theState of the Union Address. I think it is im-perative that we not squander this momentunder the illusion that because things aregoing well for this country there are no con-sequences to what we say, what we do, andwhat we advocate. We live in a very dynamicworld. Things are changing very rapidly. Wehave never had this kind of opportunity toshape the future.

A few of you in this room are as old asI am. I was telling somebody the other daythat when we passed the milestone to havingthe longest economic expansion in history,the last one that was this long—the next tolongest one now—was the one that occurredin the decade of the sixties. And you probablyall remember that it played out under theinflationary pressures of what was thenknown as guns and butter, the Vietnam war,and our obligations at home.

When I graduated from high school in1964, even though the country was still hurt-ing over President Kennedy’s assassination,we had actually come together and lifted our-selves up out of that. And there was thissense that there was nothing we couldn’t do.Within 2 years, we had riots in the streets;the country was deeply divided over the war


in Vietnam; we had over a half a million peo-ple there. Within a couple more years, theeconomy was in terrible shape. And the poli-tics of division, basically, began to rule ournational campaigns.

As an American citizen, I have waited nowabout 35 years for my country once againto be in a position to basically be a nationof builders and dreamers, where we couldshape the future. That’s why in the State ofthe Union Address I said we’ve got to, num-ber one, remember what brought us to thedance here. We’ve got to stay with an eco-nomic policy that has given us the ability todeal with these things. And I know I’m beingcriticized somewhat from the right and theleft for paying the debt down. But we’ve gotto keep this economy going. To do that, we’vegot to keep interest rates down and con-fidence sky high. And if you want businessesand individuals to be able to borrow more,then the Government should borrow less.And it will generally tend to be more efficientborrowing.

Number two, we’ve got to invest in edu-cation; we’ve got to expand health care; we’vegot to help families balance their roles athome and at work; and we’ve got to continueto stay in the forefront of science and tech-nology and meeting the new security chal-lenges of the 21st century, especially thechallenges of terrorism and biological andchemical weapons. We have to do thesethings.

But it is within our grasp to shape a futurethat would have been undreamed of just afew years ago. I believe that the DemocraticParty is the right party to lead this country.Even though it’s flattering to see the Repub-licans sort of edging more and more towardour economic policy—I think that’s a goodthing. I think it would be a great thing forour country if we had a bipartisan economicpolicy. It’s an important part of our nationalsecurity in the 21st century.

But we still have radically different ap-proaches to things like sensible efforts tokeep guns out of the hands of criminals andaway from children to matters like makingeducational opportunity real and available toall, matters like our obligation to make avail-able the access to health care. We pro-vided—because of the provision that Hillary

and I and others fought so hard for in the1997 Balanced Budget Act, we got 2 millionmore children in poor working families withhealth insurance today than we had just 2years ago—2 million more. I made a pro-posal—and we got funding already, you’vealready paid for this, you don’t have to—wehave funding already for 3 million more. ButI think now if we bring those children’s par-ents into the program, we could take careof 25 percent of the uninsured people inAmerica and they’re the 25 neediest percent.

The second fastest big group of people be-tween the ages of 55 and 65 who leave thework force, lose their health care, aren’t oldenough for Medicare. And you’d be amazedhow many people that I grew up with in Ar-kansas—we’re all moving into this agegroup—who are affected by this. You’re talk-ing about a very large number of people. Ithink we ought to just buy them into Medi-care—pay the cost, whatever the real costis, give them a modest tax credit so it’s moreaffordable.

These are big issues. We’ve got to keeppeople coming together, meeting these basicneeds if we want to keep people focused onthe future. People stop focusing on the fu-ture when they have to worry about howthey’re going to keep body and soul togetheror when they feel threatened.

So we have to keep the momentum up.And believe me, no matter what we do—and as I said, I would be elated if we woundup with a bipartisan consensus on our eco-nomic policy this year—there are going tobe profound differences in our responsibil-ities to each other to build a strong society.And I cannot tell you how strongly I believethat a big part of our economic success hascome because we were also doubling our in-vestment in education and training and mak-ing it clear to ordinary people, through in-creases in the minimum wage, the Familyand Medical Leave Act, things like this, thatwe cared about what happened to them, andwe thought they ought to be a part of Amer-ica’s future.

So you stay with us. Stay with us as wetry to pass the Patients’ Bill of Rights andthe other things we’ve got on the plate now.And tell people the story, that we had a setof ideas, we had a core philosophy, and it


has worked. And we do need to keep chang-ing America, but we don’t need to forgetwhat brought us to this point; we need tobuild on it. With your help, we will.


NOTE: The President spoke at 7:10 p.m. in theJohn Hay Room at the Hay Adams Hotel. In hisremarks, he referred to John Merrigan, chair,Democratic Business Council.

Remarks at a Democratic NationalCommittee DinnerFebruary 8, 2000

Thank you so much. I am delighted to beback in this wonderful, wonderful old housethat contains a lot of good ghosts. I want tothank Jim and Joe for hosting this event. Ithank all of you for coming. Joe, I want tothank you for having my mother out to thetrack. My mother was convinced that heavenwas a racetrack—[laughter]—where shewould not have to run. [Laughter] And I amdelighted to be here with you today.

I want to thank all my friends from Mary-land for being here, particularly LieutenantGovernor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend andSenator Miller, Speaker Taylor, party chairWayne Rogers, and all the others who arehere. Maryland has been very good to me,to Hillary and Al and Tipper Gore. It’s beenone of our best States in both ’92 and ’96,and also, thanks to truly outstanding leader-ship, a genuine laboratory for virtually everyreform I have advocated for 7 years.

You know, one of the things that you haveto constantly reconcile when you’re Presidentis, how do you apportion the President’stime? And if I just—after a while, if I keepmaking announcements in the Rose Gardenor in the Oval Office or in the White House,there’s no picture there, or it’s the same pic-ture. So you want to go out, but you don’twant to go too far, because otherwise youspend all day going to and from someplace,and you miss a day’s work. Well, it was mygreat good fortune that I happened to bePresident at a time when Maryland was sosuperbly led that every good thing in Americathat was going on anywhere was also goingon in Maryland. And I thank all of you forthat.

I want to thank Ed Rendell and Joe An-drew and my longtime friend Andy Tobiasfor their willingness to come in and lead ourparty and try to get us through a very chal-lenging election year, when we expect to beoutspent but not outworked. And we knowif we have enough money to get our messageout, it won’t matter if they have a little more.And I want to thank all of you for makingthem look a little more successful tonight.We’re very grateful to you for that.

And I want to thank Donna Shalala forbeing here. She is the longest serving and,I believe, by far the most effective Secretaryof the Department of Health and HumanServices. Today we dealt with one ofDonna’s issues. I went out to the AmericanAcademy of Sciences and signed the firstPresidential Executive order of the 21st cen-tury, banning genetic discrimination in em-ployment and insurance of Federal employ-ees, and endorsing legislation introduced bySenator Daschle in the Senate and Congress-woman Louise Slaughter from New York inthe House to ban genetic discrimination inemployment and insurance practices for allemployees.

I sort of would like to take that as a littlemetaphor. That’s a future issue, and it’s thrill-ing to me. Why do we even have to worryabout that? Because in just a little bit, we’llhave an entire map of the sequencing of thehuman genome. We already know that bro-ken genes and what they look like—that arehigh predictors of breast cancer. The goodnews about that is, pretty soon we’ll have di-agnostic techniques that will either be ableto head off the cancer ever developing, withgene therapies that block the destructive de-velopment or diagnose the cancer when it’sjust a few cells and not after it has, as it didto my mother and so many others, gone toofar.

So we’re thinking about this incredible to-morrow. Reminiscent of, I might say, my ’92campaign song, the old Fleetwood Mac song‘‘Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow,’’ weactually have the luxury of thinking aboutthese things. And it seems well within reach.

I just today, I ran into the chairman ofGeneral Motors at a nonpolitical event—Idon’t want to get him roped into our busi-ness—anyway, but I complimented him on


the Detroit auto show and on the work thatour administration has done under the lead-ership of the Vice President with the autocompanies and the auto workers over the last7 years in what we call the Partnership fora New Generation of Vehicles. We now haveautomobiles shown at the Detroit autoshow—not small two-seaters; big, roomyfour-seaters—that will get 70 to 80 or moremiles a gallon, with fuel injection technologythat also obviously dramatically reducesharmful emissions, including greenhouse gasemissions.

And we were talking about that, and I wasexplaining to him the work we’re doing withscientists associated with the Department ofAgriculture to increase the efficiency of cre-ating ethanol or other fuels from biomass,not just corn but rice hulls, weeds, hay, any-thing. Right now, the real problem with thatis that the conversion ratio is inefficient. AndI don’t want to get down into the weeds here,but I think you should understand it. [Laugh-ter] In other words, the reason that it’s a po-litical issue—if you saw Iowa and you sawour candidates, the Vice President and Sen-ator Bradley, arguing about who loved eth-anol more—[laughter]—the reason that’s apolitical issue is that ethanol really is an envi-ronmental net plus, but costs more. And it’snot a huge net plus yet; that is, it takes about7 gallons of gasoline to produce 8 gallons ofethanol.

The scientists there are working on thesame sort of chemical discovery that led tothe conversion of crude oil and gasoline.When that happens, they estimate that we’llbe able to make 8 gallons of ethanol withone gallon of gasoline. And when you putthat with a 70-mile-a-gallon car, you’re get-ting 500 miles to the gallon of gasoline, andthe whole future of the planet is changed.The whole future of our ability to deal withclimate change and global warming ischanged. Everything will change.

So we’re dealing with all these real excitingthings. And I think that’s very good. But whatI want to say to you, which has already beensaid by previous speakers, starting withMayor Rendell, is the framework withinwhich we will really, seriously pursue thesegreat opportunities will be set by how theAmerican people vote or, if they stay home,

how they don’t vote in the 2000 elections:Who will be President; who will be in theSenate; who will be in the House; who willbe the Governor; what will be the shape ofour decision? And it is a hugely importantelection.

I have spent the last 7 years trying to turnthis country around, away from the difficultcircumstances we face and the sort of defeat-ism and political gridlock and negative atti-tudes about Government that existed at thattime. And we are on a roll. But what I wantto say to you is, one of the most dangeroustimes for a great people can be when we’reon a roll. Anybody in this room tonight whois over 30 years old can recall at least onetime in your life when you got in trouble be-cause you thought things were going so wellthat it didn’t matter whether you con-centrated or whether you worked, whetheryou took on a big challenge you had beenmeaning to take on; you could just sort ofindulge yourself in the moment; there werereally no consequences; everything’s rockingalong fine.

And what I want to say to you is, eventhough I’m immensely proud of the recordthat the Vice President and Hillary and Tip-per and I, Donna Shalala, our whole adminis-tration has been a part of establishing, thewhole purpose of it was to bring us to thismoment so we could really deal with the bigchallenges of America in the new century.And a time like this maybe comes along oncein a lifetime. And if people make the wrongdecisions, or events intervene before theygrab hold of their potential, everything canchange.

So it really matters whether you havesomeone who is committed to maintainingour prosperity and bringing economic oppor-tunity to poor people, poor places thathaven’t had it.

It really matters that—whether we electpeople who understand that there are enor-mous pressures on working parents today tofulfill their responsibilities to their childrenand their responsibilities at work. And of allthe advanced countries in the world, of allthe things we do well, we do that less wellthan nearly any other place. We need to domore to help people succeed at home andat work.


It really matters whether, now that we’vegotten the crime rate down for 7 years ina row, we have someone as President andin the Congress who believes we can makeAmerica the safest big country in the worldand is willing to keep working to keep gunsout of the hands of criminals and away fromchildren.

It matters whether we have someone whobelieves we can grow the economy and im-prove the environment. It matters whetherwe have someone who is committed to keep-ing America on the forefront of science andtechnology and to do it in a way that pre-serves our values by protecting our privacy.These things matter.

And if I might say, two things that we havedone which were really different—quiteapart from the fact that we had a specificeconomic policy, a specific crime policy, aspecific welfare policy—they were differentfrom previous administrations: We said, ‘‘Wedon’t believe Government is the enemy any-more; we tried that for 12 years and it gotus in one big ditch. But we don’t believe Gov-ernment is the solution to all our problems.We favor a Government of empowermentand enterprise that establishes the conditionsand gives people the tools to solve their ownproblems.’’ In other words, we had a positiveand unifying notion of what our Governmentcould be.

The second thing was that we said, ‘‘Wedon’t want to demonize our opponents any-more, and we don’t want them demonizingus.’’ We are—we think the biggest problemin the world is that people are still unableto get along with those who are differentfrom them. And they turn their differencesinto demonization, principally in racial, in re-ligious, tribal ways, religious ways in theUnited States, in terms of hate crimes andall those ways and also against people be-cause they’re gay and in this town becausepeople are of different political parties orhave different philosophies. Differences ofopinion are good; demonization is bad. Ouradministration knew the difference, and ithas made a difference all over the world.

So now, we come to this moment in thishouse, so I want to tell you a story. It wasmy great good fortune to be friends withAverell Harriman and with Pamela

Harriman. When she died at 77 in Paris bya swimming pool, she was our Ambassadorto France, where she had gone as a youngwoman after World War II. When he wasalmost 90, I was spending the night with himone night in the residence next door. Andhe actually got up—Hillary was there, too—and he got up at 11:45 p.m.—he had alreadygone to bed—because we were up talking,and he was jealous that we were still up talk-ing. He was 89 years old. So we got him intoa conversation about what it was like rep-resenting President Roosevelt with Churchilland Stalin. And then, about that time, theyalso had hired a professor at Georgetown towork with Governor Harriman who hadtaught me international affairs when I wasa student there. So this house has a lot ofhistory to me.

I’d like you to think about this. You’vetalked about the first time I was around herewas when I was in college, the last time wehad an economic expansion this robust—thatis, the one we just lapped—we just lappedthe economic expansion from 1961 to 1969.When I graduated from high school in 1964,President Kennedy had been killed. But thecountry really had—contrary to all these peo-ple who now look back and say that’s thebeginning of America’s long drift into cyni-cism—that’s not true. The American peoplewere heartbroken, but they united as I havenever seen them, and they tried to rise aboveit. And they tried to support PresidentJohnson, and they got—there was a wholenew energy behind the civil rights movementand all the things we believe in.

So when I finished high school in ’64, wehad 3 percent unemployment, big growth, noinflation. Everybody thought we were goingto be able to legally resolve our civil rightschallenges through the Congress; we’d all doit in a peaceful, positive way. Vietnam wasa distant place that we thought would bemanaged some way or another, and we knewwe were standing up against communism. Itwas the right thing to do.

Four years later, when I graduated fromGeorgetown, in my last semester, MartinLuther King was killed; Senator Kennedywas killed; President Johnson announced hewouldn’t run for reelection; Washingtonburned; and a politically divisive message


called the Silent Majority, but really—thefirst time, getting into America—‘‘America isdivided between us and them,’’ carried theday.

I want you to know something. I’m notrunning for anything, but as an American,I have waited more than 30 years for mycountry once again to be in the position thatwe lost because of the tragedies that hap-pened in 1968, because of the riots in thestreets, because of the breakdown of theeconomy, because we squandered our mo-ment. And every one of you that’s anywherenear my age who was moved to believe thatwe could make a difference by the heroeswe lost 30 years ago, you must believe thatthis election—not ’92, not ’96—this electionis the moment when America is back wherewe were when we lost our way.

Most people don’t get a second chance inlife as a people. And most of us who are stillhere are here only because we did get a fewsecond chances. America cannot let this go.That’s why you ought to be here and be herefor our crowd all the way to November. Andif somebody asks you why you’re doing it,you tell them what I just told you: This isthe chance of a lifetime, and we better makethe most of it.

Thank you, and God bless you.

NOTE: The President spoke at 8:29 p.m. at a pri-vate residence. In his remarks, he referred toJames D’Orta and Joseph A. DeFrancis, dinnerhosts; Speaker Casper R. Taylor, Jr., MarylandHouse of Delegates; Wayne L. Rogers, chairman,Maryland Democratic Party; and Edward G.Rendell, general chair, Joseph J. Andrew, nationalchair, and Andrew Tobias, treasurer, DemocraticNational Committee. A tape was not available forverification of the content of these remarks.

Remarks on Departure for McAllen,Texas, and an Exchange WithReportersFebruary 9, 2000

Patients’ Bill of RightsThe President. Good morning. Before I

leave, I’d like to say just a few words aboutthe Patients’ Bill of Rights legislation. AHouse and Senate conference will take it upbeginning tomorrow. My message is simple

and straightforward. Congress should seizethis moment of opportunity to do what isright for the health of the American family,to seize this moment to stand with doctors,nurses, and patients, to restore trust and ac-countability in our health care system.

Last fall the House of Representativespassed by a large margin a strong, enforce-able Patients’ Bill of Rights. The legislation,sponsored by Congressmen Norwood andDingell, says you have a right to the nearestemergency room care, the right to see a spe-cialist, the right to know you can’t be forcedto switch doctors in the middle of treatment,the right to hold your health care plan ac-countable if it causes you or a loved one greatharm, and it covers all Americans in all healthplans.

Now this bill is in the hands of House andSenate conferees. It reflects the beliefs andrepresents the needs of the overwhelmingmajority of the American people without re-gard to party. It has the endorsement of over300 health care and consumer groups. It hasthe votes of 275 Members of the House ofRepresentatives, including 68 Republicans.Although I remain concerned that the con-ferees on the bill do not share the majority’sview, I believe, nevertheless, they have aclear responsibility to ratify these funda-mental rights, to put politics aside and passa strong, enforceable Patients’ Bill of Rights.

Americans who are battling illnessesshouldn’t have to battle insurance companiesfor the coverage they need. Passing a realPatients’ Bill of Rights for all Americans inall health plans is a crucial step toward meet-ing our goal in the 21st century of assuringquality, affordable health care to all our citi-zens. I ask the House and Senate confereesto take the next vital step.

Thank you.

Middle East Peace ProcessQ. Mr. President, what are you doing

about the daily bombing of Lebanon?The President. Well, let me say, we are

doing our best to get the peace process backon track. I think it is clear that the bombingis a reaction to the deaths, in two separateinstances, of Israeli soldiers. What we needto do is to stop the violence and start thepeace process again. We’re doing our best


to get it started. And we’re working very, veryhard on it.

Disruption on the InternetQ. Mr. President, are you monitoring the

situation with the hackers who have been dis-rupting some of the main websites aroundthe country the past few days? Are you moni-toring that situation? Is there anything thatWashington could possibly do about this?

The President. I don’t know the answerto that. But I have asked people who knowmore about it than I do whether there is any-thing we can do about it.

Patients’ Bill of RightsQ. Mr. President, on the Patients’ Bill of

Rights, Republicans are considering addingthe right to sue in Federal court, just notdistrict court, would that be sufficient, sir,in your opinion?

Q. I couldn’t hear that question.The President. I honestly don’t know the

answer to that because I haven’t ever consid-ered it, and I haven’t discussed it. I’d liketo have a chance to discuss it. I think anyindication that there is movement and thatthey’re trying to get together is hopeful. ButI don’t want to commit to something I’m notsure I understand the full implications of yet.

Possible Visit to PakistanQ. Have you decided whether to go to

Pakistan yet?The President. We haven’t made a deci-

sion on the final itinerary yet. I want to makea trip which maximizes the possibilities, notonly for constructive partnerships for theUnited States in the years ahead but, evenmore urgently, for peace in that troubled partof the world. It has enormous implicationsfor people in the United States and through-out the world, more I suspect, than most peo-ple know. I hope in the time that I have herethat we can make some progress because itis something that I remain profoundly con-cerned about for years and years into the fu-ture.

Northern Ireland Peace ProcessQ. Any telephone calls from Northern Ire-

land—[inaudible]—can you give us an up-date, sir?

The President. Well, it’s correct thatwe’re working very hard on it. I have somehope that we may find a way through thiswhich would enable every aspect of the GoodFriday accord to be realized. That’s after all,what the people of Northern Ireland votedfor overwhelmingly and that could achievethat objective without interrupting theprogress so far.

But I have nothing else to report to youexcept to say that I’m working very hard; theBritish and Irish Governments are; and Ithink that the leaders of all the political fac-tions are. I think everyone understands thatwe’re at a very important moment, and we’retrying to keep it going. And we have achance. And I just hope everyone will—ev-eryone—will belly up to the bar and do theirpart so that we don’t have any kind of back-sliding or reversal here. We’ve come too far.

I was quite encouraged that there was uni-versal condemnation of the explosion inNorthern Ireland last week. That’s a goodfirst step. We just need to keep at it.

Thank you.

Patients’ Bill of RightsQ. Is the law suit provision still the major

stumbling block, at least with the Senate ne-gotiators there in terms of the Patients’ Billof Rights? You may have asked that, but Icouldn’t hear.

The President. He did in a different way.I think so. You’re following it so you knowthere are a few other differences of opinion,but we want universal—first we want to coverall Americans, that’s a very important thing.And there has to be some way of enforcinga right, or it’s not a right. Otherwise it’s justa suggestion.

Thank you.

NOTE: The President spoke at 8:46 a.m. on theSouth Lawn at the White House.

Remarks at a Democratic NationalCommittee Luncheon in McAllenFebruary 9, 2000

Thank you very much. I want to say, firstof all, how very grateful I am to Jesus andElvia for having us in their beautiful home;


to Alonzo Cantu and, of course, to my goodfriend Congressman Hinojosa.

I thought it was interesting that he quotedthat line from ‘‘Casablanca’’—[laughter]—my second favorite movie of all time. I likeyou very much, but I must say I’ve neverthought of you in the same breath as IngridBergman before. [Laughter] I’ll have to thinkabout that one.

Let me say to all of you, I—Ben talkedabout how I have been here, now I guessthree times since I’ve been President. It isn’ta hard sell. If it were up to me, I’d comeonce a month. If you’ve been following theweather between Washington and New York,where I’m spending most of my time now,you know that it’s a little better down here.I saw the first golf course without snow onit I’ve seen in 3 weeks, today coming in fromthe airport.

I will be brief because I want to get aroundand visit with all of you and then speak aboutwhat you wish to speak about, but I wouldlike to make a couple of general points. Firstof all, I came to the valley and to McAllenon the last night of my campaign in 1992;some of you were there. We had a marvelous24-hour affair. We stopped in nine differentcommunities, and I really wanted to comehere. And I said then I wanted the Americanpeople to give me a chance to put the peopleof this country first again over the politicsof Washington, which was, I thought, entirelytoo divisive and too mired in the past. Andwe brought a new philosophy to try to bringthe people together, to try to change the wayGovernment works to empower people tosolve their own problems, to try to bring op-portunity to every responsible citizen, and tomake a genuine attempt to build a commu-nity of all Americans, and our country isgrowing increasingly diverse with every pass-ing day. In just a decade, for example, therewill be no majority race in the entire Stateof California, our biggest State.

So all these things are important. Wetalked about how we sent people from theGovernment down here to try to help. I thinkthat’s important. I think if we’re going tohave one America, we can’t pretend thatwe’re building one if we only go to the largestplaces or to the wealthiest places or to theplaces with the most influence or even to the

places where I won the electoral votes. Wehave to try to bring everybody into the familyof America and go forward.

In 1992, when I stopped here, we had highunemployment. Today, we have the longesteconomic expansion in history and the lowestunemployment rate in 30 years, and the low-est Hispanic- and African-American unem-ployment rates ever recorded.

We had a great deal of social division interms of race and income and other ways,and a lot of social problems. Today, we havethe lowest welfare rolls in 30 years, almost7 million fewer people on welfare, 2 million-plus children lifted out of poverty, the lowestcrime rates in 30 years, the lowest povertyrates in over 20 years. The college-going rateis up by about 10 percent. And we’ve putempowerment zones all across America, in-cluding one in south Texas, to try to give peo-ple a better chance to be a part of this newenterprise economy.

So the country, in general, is in the bestshape perhaps it’s ever been. And the greatquestion in this election season, which I thinkI can comment on because for the first timein over two decades I’m not on a ballot any-where, is after we have done all this workto turn our country around, to get it movingin the right direction, what are we going todo with this opportunity?

And all of you can remember times in yourown life—at least all of you that are over 30—when you made a mistake because youthought things were going so well there wereno consequences to breaking your concentra-tion, to not thinking ahead, to putting off thetough decisions that you knew were outthere. That’s the great challenge to Americatoday: How are we going to make the mostof what is truly a magic moment in our Na-tion’s history?

And as I argued a little more than a weekago in the State of the Union Address, I thinkthe only thing to do is to keep pushing ahead,to bear down, to keep changing along thelines that have brought us this far; to ask our-selves what are the big challenges still outthere, and do our best to meet them. AndI just want to emphasize, if I might verybriefly, six of those that I think have par-ticular impact on the people of the RioGrande Valley.


First of all, the number of people over 65will double in the next 30 years, and we haveto be prepared for that. That means we haveto save Social Security; we have to strengthenMedicare; and we ought to add a prescriptiondrug benefit that our seniors can buy at aprice they can afford, because over 60 per-cent of the seniors in America today cannotafford the prescription drugs they need tolengthen and improve the quality of theirlives.

Secondly, we have to realize that only inone respect has our social fabric been morestrained since 1993: There are more peoplewithout health insurance today than therewere in 1993. I remember when all the inter-est groups were arrayed against me and theFirst Lady when we tried to provide healthcare coverage for all. They told all those Con-gressmen that if they voted for my healthcare plan, the number of uninsured peoplewould go up. Well, every Congressman whovoted for it can say ‘‘That’s right. I voted forClinton’s plan. It didn’t pass, and the numberof uninsured people went up.’’

So I’m trying to do something about that.In 1997 we passed the Children’s Health In-surance Program. And we got it off theground, and it was a little slow starting. Butlast year we doubled the number of peoplein CHIP, and there are now 2 million chil-dren who have health insurance. But thereare 3 million more who are eligible, and whatI want you to understand—a lot of them arein the Rio Grande Valley—and the thing Iwant to emphasize is, we appropriated themoney, the money is there, and we have toget these children enrolled.

And I also asked the Congress this yearto cover the parents of these children, almostall of them working people but on very lim-ited incomes. Cover them. If we covered theparents and children that are income-eligiblefor the health insurance program for chil-dren, we could literally cover 25 percent ofall the uninsured people in the United States,and they’re the 25 percent that need the cov-erage the worst. So I ask you to help mepass that.

In addition to that—and I’ll bet there area lot of these people in the valley, as well—the fastest growing group of people withouthealth insurance are people between the ages

of 55 and 65 who take early retirement orchange jobs, and their new job doesn’t havehealth insurance for people their age, or theytake early retirement, and they don’t haveany health insurance until they’re old enoughto get on Medicare.

I have proposed to let them buy into Medi-care and to give them a tax credit to makeit affordable. This will not in any way weakenMedicare. If anything, it will strengthenMedicare, because we’re not taking moneyout of the Medicare Trust Fund. But if youthink about the hundreds and hundreds ofthousands of people out there today who are,because they’re in an age group that I’m rap-idly approaching, are not exactly attractivefor insurance but are, on average, healthierthan people over 65, we need to providesome way for them to get health care andfor the health care providers to be reim-bursed if they give them health care. Andthe simplest, easiest thing is to let them buyinto the Medicare program.

Let me say a word about education. In thecountry as a whole, test scores are up; highschool graduation rates are up; college-goingrates are up. That’s the good news. The badnews is there is still a differential in the highschool dropout rate that is breathtaking be-tween Hispanic-Americans and the rest ofAmerica. And the dropout rate from college,once people go, is very high.

So I have proposed a budget that puts abillion dollars more into Head Start, the big-gest increase in a generation, that would pro-vide after-school programs and summerschool programs in every troubled school inAmerica where there’s a high dropout rate,and we know that makes a big difference.And we passed in ’97 the HOPE scholarship,which gives a $1,500 tax credit for peoplefor the first 2 years of college, and furthertax relief for later years, which has effectivelyopened the doors of college to all Americans,at least to community college.

I have asked the Congress to add to thata tax deduction for up to $10,000 of collegetuition and to make it at the 28 percent rate,even for people in the 15 percent incometax bracket. That would effectively open thedoors of 4 years of college to every personin this country. It could change the future


of the Rio Grande Valley. And I hope youwill help me pass that in this coming session.

I also have made proposals that would en-able us to have the funds to help prepare5,000 schools every year and to do major re-pairs or build 6,000 more schools. We havea lot of kids that are in overcrowded class-rooms, a lot of kids that are in classroomsso broken down they can’t even be wired forthe Internet. So I hope you will support theeducation agenda.

In the area of families, I believe that oneof the biggest unresolved problems we havetoday, or just daily challenges, is the chal-lenge that families face when they have towork, particularly when both parents workor when there’s a single-parent householdand they have children, school-aged children,or even preschool children.

So I recommended an expansion in thechild care tax credit. I recommended makingit refundable for low income people whosometimes spend as much as 25 percent oftheir income on child care. I recommendeda $3,000 tax credit—that’s $3,000 off yourtax bill—to pay for the long-term care costsof people who are caring for elderly or dis-abled relatives. I think that is a very impor-tant thing, and I hope the Congress will fi-nally agree to go on and raise the minimumwage.

The last point I want to make on familiesand health care is what I made today—wehave finally gotten a conference to begin to-morrow on the Patients’ Bill of Rights, whichI think is very important, to guarantee peoplethe right to see a specialist, the right not tolose their health care coverage, or to be re-quired to change doctors in the middle ofa treatment, a pregnancy or a cancer treat-ment, for example. And I think it’s importantthat we pass that.

The last economic point I want to makeis that we now have an opportunity that wedidn’t have in ’92, and that is to focus evenmore sharply on the people and the commu-nities who are still mired in poverty and ahigh unemployment rate, the people whohave not fully participated in this economicrecovery.

Now, the empowerment zone program,which is very well known in south Texas be-cause of the leadership of the Vice Presi-

dent—we’ve had our big, national empower-ment zone conference down here in the val-ley not very long ago last year. But I thinkit’s time to both increase the number of thesezones and increase the financial incentivesto invest in them. I know you want to gethigh-tech business in here.

You know, if there is some extra risk orsome extra cost by going further away, weought to help to defray that, because we willnever have a better opportunity—ever—toprove what I believe: that we can bring freeenterprise to people and places that havebeen left behind and that this is a way notonly to help the people in those categories,the high unemployment areas in south Texas,this is a way to keep the American economicexpansion going with no inflation, becausewe’ll be adding new businesses, new workers,new taxpayers, and new consumers all at thesame time.

I’m also, as I’m sure you’ve noticed fromthe emphasis I’ve given it for the last yearor so, trying to get Congress to pass sweepinglegislation that would cover every area ofhigh unemployment in the country, to givepeople the same incentives to invest to bringnew businesses to these areas we now givepeople to invest to bring new businesses toSouth America or Asia or Africa. I’m notagainst helping poor countries overseas. I justthink we ought to have the same incentivesto invest in poor areas here at home in Amer-ica. I hope you’ll help me pass that new mar-kets legislation.

One big part of that that I’m going to em-phasize in a couple of months is closing theso-called digital divide, which would reallybe helped if you were able to recruit somehigh-tech companies down here and trainpeople to work in them. Because one thingwe know is that when people have access tocomputers, not just children in the schoolsbut their parents at home or in a communitycenter, and I’ve proposed establishing a thou-sand of them across America to give all adultsaccess to the Internet, we know that innova-tive people find new ways to improve theirlot in life.

For example, probably some of you herehave bought or sold something on thewebsite eBay, which is a great trading center.There are now over 20,000 Americans, many


of whom were once on welfare, who are nowactually making a living—it’s their full-timejob trading on eBay. No one would have everthought of this as a possible opportunity forpoor people, as a way to create small busi-nesses.

I’ve established all these community devel-opment financial institutions around thecountry since I’ve been President. We’remaking a lot of microcredit loans. Thinkabout that. Think about being able to loansomebody enough money just to buy a com-puter with good capacity. They could be fullyconnected to the Internet, and they figureout how to make their own living. There areall kinds of options out there, and we oughtto leave no stone unturned in trying to getat the heart of this poverty problem and em-power every person who has not yet beena part of this prosperity to do well.

Now, here’s the last point I want to make.If you were to ask me to put in a sentencewhat has been behind the change I tried tobring to America the last 7 years, what is be-hind the philosophy that governs everythingI do, it is my belief that everyone counts andeveryone ought to have a chance, and we alldo better when we help each other, that wereally have to build one America, and thatthe Government isn’t the source or the solu-tion to all the problems but is an absolutelyimperative partner. We have to create condi-tions and empower people to make the mostof their own lives.

And in that connection, I have to tell youthat one of the things that continues to both-er me in my efforts to build one Americais the problem that I continue to have in theUnited States Senate in getting judges con-firmed—you want to talk to me aboutjudges—particularly judges who come fromdiverse backgrounds. And there’s always apolitical element in the appointment ofjudges, and sometimes when the Presidentis of one party and the Senate is of anotherparty, they don’t confirm as many of thePresident’s appointees. But there has neverbeen an example like what we’ve seen of thedeliberate slow walk and refusal to have hear-ings, refusal to vote up or down on judges.

I appointed an El Paso lawyer namedEnrique Moreno to serve on the fifth circuit.He graduated from Harvard and HarvardLaw School. He’d come a long way from ElPaso. The American Bar Association said hewas well-qualified to be a judge. I had thehighest percentage of judges recommendedwell-qualified by the ABA of any Presidentsince they’ve been doing the ratings, eventhough I’ve appointed more Hispanic, moreAfrican-Americans, more female, and a morediverse judiciary in history. And everybodyconcedes they’re less political than my twopredecessors. They just show up for work,by and large, and do their job. And I cannoteven get a hearing because your Senatorswon’t support it.

I have appointed—I nominated a judgenamed Julio Fuentes for the third circuit andRichard Paez in California. They’re supposedto give me a vote on him in March, but that’sanother thing I wish you would commu-nicate, particularly if you’re not a lawyer. Youcould have more influence in a way if you’renot a lawyer. Tell your Senators that whenthe President appoints a person who workedhimself all the way through Harvard LawSchool out of El Paso, and the ABA says he’swell-qualified, and Texas needs the judge,give the man a hearing, and give him a vote.And if they’re not for him, have the courageto vote against him. Don’t keep killing thesethings.

I keep telling people in Washington, ‘‘Wecan do our business. We can show up forwork. We can make progress, and we canstill have elections. There will still be thingswe honestly disagree about. But we owe itto the American people, without regard toour party or our philosophy, to believe thateverybody counts, everybody ought to havea chance, and we’ll all do better when wehelp each other.’’


NOTE: The President spoke at 12:05 p.m. at a pri-vate residence. In his remarks, he referred toJesus and Elvia Saenz, luncheon hosts; and AlonzoCantu, member, board of directors, CongressionalHispanic Caucus Institute.


Remarks at a Luncheon HonoringRepresentative Ruben Hinojosa inMcAllenFebruary 9, 2000

Thank you so much. Well, Congressman,I’m afraid now that this meeting has beenopened to the press, if the list you just readis widely published, every other Member ofCongress will be angry at me for not doingas well. [Laughter] I want to say a specialthanks to your Congressman Ruben Hinojosaand Marty, and a happy birthday to his littledaughter, Karen. He has really done a won-derful job for you. And he makes it easy tobe helpful.

I want to thank Zeke and Livia Reyna fortheir cohosting this event. And I want tothank Alonzo and Yoli for having me backin their beautiful little home here. [Laughter]I want you to know I agreed to come to southTexas—the first time I wanted to come tothe valley before I had seen this place. Sothe first time I came out of the goodnessof my heart. The second time I came becauseI wanted to come to this place again.[Laughter]

This is my third trip to the valley as Presi-dent. And as the Congressman said, the VicePresident has been here twice; Hillary washere recently; for all of you who were hereI want to thank you, and thank you for givingher such a good hand. We had a great send-off on Sunday when she formally declaredher campaign. And I think she’s doing verywell. I talked to her today, and if you canmeasure how well you’re doing by how hardthey attack you, which I’ve always thoughtwas a pretty good measure—[laughter]—she’s a cinch.

So I wanted to say to all of you seriously,there are many friends I have in this crowdtoday—the country judges, Senator Truan,others—that I have known for a long time.I first came to south Texas and then to theRio Grande Valley, where I literally fell inlove with this place almost 30 years ago now,before a lot of you in this crowd were evenborn. When I was a very young man, I real-ized that special quality of the people here,the special quality of the community. AndI always thought if I ever had a chance tohelp, I would do it. You have given me a

chance to help, and it’s been an honor todo so.

I just want to say a few words as the onlypolitician you’ll hear from this year who isnot running for anything. [Laughter] I wantto talk to you not just as a President but asa citizen of this country. When I came hereto this community on the last night of mycampaign in 1992, some of you were there,and there was a great feeling of excitement.And we had a huge voter turnout the nextday, and the Vice President and I were givena strong victory and a mandate to go in andchange the direction of our country. We saidthen, we wanted to put the American peoplefirst, not Washington politics. We wanted op-portunity for every responsible citizen. Wewanted a community of all Americans, andwe believed that Government was not theproblem or the solution, but Government be-longed to the people, and it was the job ofGovernment to create the conditions andgive people the tools that they need to solvetheir own problems and live their owndreams. And we’ve worked hard on that for7 years now.

When I was here on that night in 1992,we had a stagnant economy and high unem-ployment. Today, we have the longest eco-nomic expansion in history, the lowest unem-ployment rate in 30 years, the lowestHispanic- and African-American unemploy-ment rates ever recorded, and the lowestpoverty rates in more than 20 years, the low-est female unemployment rate in over 40years. We have tried to do what we said wewould do.

Our society was deeply divided. There wasa riot in Los Angeles that year and great dis-content everywhere. Today, we have the low-est crime rates in 30 years, the lowest welfarerolls in 30 years, over 2 million children liftedout of poverty, almost 7 million people offthe welfare rolls. We have created empower-ment zones around the country in places likethe Rio Grande Valley to give people thechance to attract economic investment. Thecollege-going rate is up by about 10 percent.The country is moving in the right direction.

And as I said, as the person you’ll hearfrom this year who is not running for office,the great question that the American peoplehave to answer when they vote for Congress,


for Senator, for President, is: Now, what?Now, what? What are we going to do withthis truly magic moment? Every person inthis audience today who is over 30 years oldcan remember some time in your life whenyou made a mistake because you thoughtthings were going so well, you didn’t haveto think; you didn’t have to work; you didn’thave to plan; and there was no consequencefor slacking up.

Every person here who has lived longenough can remember when you made a per-sonal, a family, or a business mistake becausethings seemed to be so good that you reallydidn’t have to do what we should all be doingevery day with our lives, trying to get better,trying to do more, trying always to thinkabout tomorrow.

Now, what I want to say to you is the lasttime America had these conditions was in thelongest economic expansion in history beforethis one, between 1961 and 1969. When Igraduated from high school in 1964, we hadhigh growth, low unemployment; we were onthe way to passing civil rights legislation; ev-erybody thought we would be able to resolvea lot of those difficult issues in the Congressin debate. The country had been heartbrokenby President Kennedy’s assassination, but wehad united behind President Johnson, andhe had done a masterful job of leading usand trying to pass legislation through theCongress, and everybody thought it wasgoing to go on forever.

Within 4 years, we had riots in the streets;the country was deeply divided over Viet-nam; President Johnson announced hewouldn’t run for reelection; and MartinLuther King and Robert Kennedy werekilled. And in the Presidential election of1968, a deeply troubled and divided peoplevoted for someone who said he representedthe silent majority, which is another way ofsaying, this country is divided between us andthem. I’m with us, and you don’t want them.

And we have labored under that for 30years. And for 7 years, I’ve been trying toturn this around. And I feel now, the countryis moving in the right direction. But I wantto tell you this: I’m not running for anything.As an American, I have been waiting formore than 30 years for my country to havethe ability for all of us to join together hand

in hand and build the future of our dreamsfor our children. That’s what this is about.And we dare not blow this opportunity.

You know, some people in life don’t geta second chance, and those of us who do haveto be grateful for it. Now, our whole countryhas been given a second chance, under evenbetter conditions than existed more than 30years ago before all the wheels ran off.

So I say to you, when I come down hereand talk to people about how we can makethe Rio Grande Valley an oasis of oppor-tunity, to me that’s part of the long-termchallenge of America. We should look atevery place in America where there is toomuch poverty and too much unemploymentand say, ‘‘If we can’t bring economic oppor-tunity to these places now, when will we everbe able to do it?’’

So every place in America that has not fullyparticipated in this recovery should have dra-matic incentives for people to invest there,to create jobs there, to put people to workthere, to give people a chance to live theirdreams there. Every place in America andall the people in America that don’t have ac-cess to health care—we should do more toprovide more people access to health care,until everybody has it.

That’s why I said in the State of the UnionI wanted to see another 3 million childrenenrolled in our health insurance program andover 5 million parents included in it. I wantpeople, who are over 55 but not old enoughto be on Medicare, who lose their health in-surance, to be able to buy into Medicare. AndI think they ought to have a tax credit sothey can afford to do it, because we haveto keep moving forward in health care. Wehave to keep moving forward in education.That’s why I asked the Congress to put an-other billion dollars in Head Start and to pro-vide enough funds for every troubled schoolin this country to give after-school or summerschool programs to the kids who need it.That’s why I want the Congress to provideenough money to repair 5,000 schools a yearfor the next 5 years and to build and mod-ernize 6,000 more so all of our kids will havea chance to get a world-class education.

And that’s why I have worked so hard tohelp people balance the demands of raisingtheir children and doing their work. That’s


why I want to increase the child care taxcredit, why I want to pass an increase in theminimum wage, why I want to give familiesa $3,000 tax credit to care for an aging parentor a disabled member of the family—one ofthe biggest problems in America today—whyI think we ought to be proud of the fact thatwe’ve opened at least 2 years of college toeverybody with these HOPE scholarship taxcredits. But I have asked the Congress to givethe American people a tax deduction for col-lege tuition at a 28 percent rate, even ifyou’re in the 15 percent income tax bracket,up to $10,000. That would guarantee that ev-erybody in America could afford to go to 4years of college if they did the work andlearned the things they need to learn to go.

These are important things that will bringus together. Now, let me just say one thingin closing. If you asked me to summarizewhat it is we did that was different over thelast 7 years that worked, I could talk aboutour economic policy, which was different.We got rid of the deficit, and now I wantto pay us out of debt for the first time since1835, and if we do that, all the kids herewill have low interest rates and a strong econ-omy. We had a different welfare reform pol-icy. We said, ‘‘Able-bodied people have towork, but we’re going to take care of the kids.We’re not going to punish them.’’ We hada different crime policy. We said we oughtto take—put more police on the street andtake guns out of the hands of criminals.

But the most important thing we did wasto say, ‘‘We’ve got a different philosophy. Wedon’t want to divide the American peopleanymore. We believe everybody counts; ev-erybody should have a chance; we’ll all dobetter individually if we try to help eachother do better together.’’

So if someone came to me tonight andsaid, ‘‘I am the angel sent from the goodLord, and even though you’re having a goodtime being President, you can’t finish yourterm. This is your last day, but I’ll be a genie,you can have one wish,’’ it would not be forall the things I talked to you about. It wouldbe to create one America. It would be tocreate a climate in America where we genu-inely respected one another, where we weregenuinely committed to giving one anothera chance.

I see our former attorney general, Mr. Mo-rales, back there. Is there life after politics,Dan? [Laughter] I hope that in my lifetimewe will see a Hispanic-American Governorof Texas, President of the United States, onthe Supreme Court, doing all these things.I hope that will be true of all the ethnicgroups that are coming into our country andenriching us.

But more important than that, even, Ihope that all of our children will have achance to define and live their dreams, what-ever they are. Your Congressman is an unbe-lievably effective public servant. And it’s notjust because he can worry me to death untilI finally say yes; it’s because he proceedsfrom the right philosophy. Everybody counts.Everybody should have a chance. We’ll alldo better when we help each other. It’sworked pretty well for America.

I just want to ask you from the bottomof my heart—you know how I feel about VicePresident Gore, you know what he’s donehere in the empowerment zone and otherthings—but the main thing I want you tothink about, for all of us, what happens tous individually is not as important as the di-rection the country takes. And I have foughtvery, very hard to keep the poison and thedivision and the animosity and the Wash-ington political games to a minimum in termsof their ability to impact you and interferewith what we were all trying to do together.

Now it’s up to you again. And all theseelections, from the Presidency to the Senateand Congress races, the governorships, allthese elections, they’re like giant job inter-views. And you have to decide not only whoto hire but what are they going to do. Andjust remember, as they used to tell me whenI was a kid growing up in Arkansas: Whenyou see a turtle on a fencepost, chances areit didn’t get there by accident. [Laughter]

Here we are. It didn’t happen by accident.And we will never forgive ourselves if weblow this opportunity. So instead of relaxing,we should bear down and lift our sights andopen our hearts and hands and make thiselection a time when we seize our deepest,fondest hopes and our biggest dreams for ourchildren.



NOTE: The President spoke at 2:35 p.m. at a pri-vate residence. In his remarks, he referred to Rep-resentative Hinojosa’s wife, Martha LopezHinojosa, and their daughter Karen; Zeke andLivia Reyna and Alonzo and Yoli Cantu, luncheonhosts; Texas State Senator Carlos Truan; andformer Texas State Attorney General DanMorales.

Message to the CongressTransmitting a Report on theExtension of Normal TradeRelations Status With AlbaniaFebruary 9, 2000

To the Congress of the United States:I am submitting an updated report to the

Congress concerning the emigration laws andpolicies of Albania. The report indicates con-tinued Albanian compliance with U.S. andinternational standards in the area of emigra-tion. In fact, Albania has imposed no emigra-tion restrictions, including exit visa require-ments, on its population since 1991.

On December 5, 1997, I determined andreported to the Congress that Albania wasnot in violation of paragraphs (1), (2), or (3)of subsection 402(a) of the Trade Act of 1974or paragraphs (1), (2), or (3) of subsection409(a) of that Act. That action allowed forthe continuation of normal trade relations(NTR) status for Albania and certain otheractivities without the requirement of an an-nual waiver. This semiannual report is sub-mitted as required by law pursuant to thedetermination of December 5, 1997.

William J. Clinton


Message to Congress Reporting onRescissions and DeferralsFebruary 9, 2000

To the Congress of the United States:In accordance with the Congressional

Budget and Impoundment Control Act of1974, I herewith report three rescissions ofbudget authority, totaling $128 million, andtwo deferrals of budget authority, totaling$1.6 million.

The proposed rescissions affect the pro-grams of the Department of Energy and theDepartment of Housing and Urban Develop-ment. The proposed deferrals affect pro-grams of the Department of State and Inter-national Assistance Programs.

William J. Clinton


Message to the Senate Transmittingthe Rotterdam Convention on thePrior Informed Consent Procedurefor Certain Hazardous Chemicalsand Pesticides in International TradeWith AnnexesFebruary 9, 2000

To the Senate of the United States:I transmit herewith, for the advice and

consent of the Senate to ratification, the Rot-terdam Convention on the Prior InformedConsent Procedure for Certain HazardousChemicals and Pesticides in InternationalTrade, with Annexes, done at Rotterdam,September 10, 1998. The report of the De-partment of State is enclosed for the informa-tion of the Senate.

The Convention, which was negotiatedunder the auspices of the United Nations En-vironment Program and the United NationsFood and Agriculture Organization, with theactive participation of the United States, pro-vides a significant and valuable internationaltool to promote sound risk-based decision-making in the trade of certain hazardouschemicals. Building on a successful voluntaryprocedure, the Convention requires Partiesto exchange information about these chemi-cals, to communicate national decisionsabout their import, and to require that ex-ports from their territories comply with theimport decisions of other Parties.

The United States, with the assistance andcooperation of industry and nongovern-mental organization, plays an importantinternational leadership role in the safe man-agement of hazardous chemicals and pes-ticides. This Convention, which assists devel-oping countries in evaluating risks and en-forcing their regulatory decisions regarding


trade in such chemicals, advances and pro-motes U.S. objectives in this regard. All rel-evant Federal agencies support early ratifica-tion of the Convention for this reason, andwe understand that the affected industriesand interest groups share this view.

I recommend that the Senate give earlyand favorable consideration to the Conven-tion and give its advice and consent to ratifi-cation, subject to the understanding de-scribed in the accompanying report of theSecretary of State.

William J. Clinton


Remarks at a Democratic NationalCommittee Dinner in Dallas, TexasFebruary 9, 2000

Thank you. First of all, Fred, thank youfor what you said, and I thank you and Lisafor being wonderful friends to me and Hillaryand to Al and Tipper Gore and to our party.I thank Jess and Betty Jo for being here to-night. I can’t help but say, Betty Jo is theniece of former Speaker Carl Albert, whopassed away in the last couple of days, a greatDemocrat. And I had a wonderful talk withhis wife today, and it reminded me of whyI have been a Democrat all my life. And ourthoughts and prayers are with your family.

I thank ‘‘B’’ and Audre Rapoport andGarry Mauro for their work here. And Iwanted to acknowledge not only the mayor,who I think has done a superb job, and Sen-ator Cain, thank you for being here, andSally, thank you for being here and for beingour regional Department of Education per-son, for all the good work you do. But I alsowant to introduce a former very importantperson on my White House staff, ReginaMontoya, who is now a candidate for theHouse, who is here. I want you all to helpher get elected to Congress. We need to winthis seat. [Applause] Thank you. She’s here,I think.

I got tickled—I started laughing all overagain when Ed Rendell was up here talkingabout the rap that the Republican chairmanlaid on him after the New Hampshire pri-mary. He said, we were the candidate of spe-

cial interests, and he mentioned—what didhe say—trial lawyers, labor, gays, and Holly-wood. [Laughter]

Let me take you back to 1992. In 1991,I was having the time of my life living inArkansas in the 11th year of my governor-ship. I had had a new lease on life. I lovedmy job. I could have done it now to kingdomcome. But I was really worried about mycountry, because that’s the kind of stuff thateverybody in Washington said, what Ed justsaid. And there was a Republican line anda Democratic line. There was a liberal lineand a Republican line. And everybody wasstruggling to be politically correct and to beas confrontational as possible, because thatis the only way you would get your 15 sec-onds on the evening news.

I suppose it was perfectly good for the peo-ple who got on the talk shows all the timeand the people who could raise funds fortheir reelection and stay in, but the countrywas in the ditch. Even when we were nomi-nally in a recovery, we couldn’t generate anyjobs. And we had quadrupled the debt in 12years, and we didn’t have much to show forit, because we were spending less in realterms on things that we needed, likeeducation.

The reason I ran for President is that Ihad been working on all this stuff for a longtime, and it became clear to me there werelimits to what any Governor or any peoplecould do, or people in their private livescould do to turn America around until wehad a National Government that had itright—that had the right philosophy that wasdynamic and change-oriented and was inter-ested in bringing people together and wascommitted to creating the conditions and giv-ing people the tools to succeed in a very dif-ferent world.

So I admit that what the chairman of theRepublican Party said is right, but I don’tthink he got it right. That is, I’m not ashamedof the fact we’ve got a lot of trial lawyershere. I’m not ashamed of the fact that I think,if people have been shafted, they ought tobe able to go to court and pursue their rem-edy. I also want to say this: I’m also proudof the fact that we’ve had a real relationship.This has not been a political deal. We haven’t100 percent agreed on everything. We’ve had


a relationship. It’s like being in a family oran organization or anything else. It’s realhere.

You know, I hear all these—our friendsin the other party talk about how terrible thetrial lawyers are. All I want to know is, ifyou guys are so destructive, why do we have21 million jobs and the best economy we’veever had? And the same thing about the laborunions. Labor enrollments went up last yearfor the first time in many years. I think that’sa good thing for people to be organized, tobe able to not only vent their grievances but,more importantly, build partnerships for thefuture. And if it’s so bad, why do we havethe lowest unemployment rate in 30 years?And why do we have the highest productivitythat we can ever remember?

I plead guilty to believing that we shouldnot deprive people of jobs or subject themto violence just because they’re gay. I’mguilty of that; I believe that. I think anybodythat shows up for work and pays their taxesand are willing to do whatever it takes to bea good citizen of their country ought to betreated with the same amount of respect asanybody else. That’s what I believe. And Ithink the evidence is that that’s right.

In terms of Hollywood, that’s sort of thelast refuge of the rightwing arsenal there.[Laughter] I was the first person, not a mem-ber of the Republican Party, I was the firstpolitical leader, in 1993, to go to Hollywoodand ask them to give me a ratings systemfor television for children and to reduce theamount of inappropriate material our chil-dren were exposed to. And not everybodyagreed with it, but again, we’re in—I havea relationship with a lot of people out there,and we got a rating system. I wish it workedbetter now because it’s kind of—practically,it’s difficult because you’ve got to worry—if you’re a parent, you’ve got to worry aboutthe video games and the TV and the moviesand all that. And we’re trying to work throughthat.

But the point I want to make is, my wholeidea about politics is that we ought to runit the way we—our country—the way wewould run—we would sensibly run a familyor a business or any other common enter-prise if you were part of a big charitable en-deavor here in Dallas. I just think that if you

look at the way the world works and howit’s changing, all these trends towardglobalization, all the threats that are out therefrom people who are trying to take advantageof globalization for their own ends—if youlook at all the opportunities that are out therethrough scientific and technological ad-vances, it does not make sense for us in thisyear to revert to the patterns that I havespent 7 years trying to break.

Everybody has got—we’re going to divideup sides now, and if you’re a liberal, you’vegot to be over here; and if you’re a conserv-ative, you’ve got to be over here. And here’syour line attacking them, and here’s your lineattacking the other. And let’s don’t worryabout whether we ever get anything done ornot. I think this is nuts. None of you livelike this, and none of you have any role atall like this, except when you vote, we’re sup-posed be like this.

I have worked for 7 long years, with thehelp of people in my administration, peoplelike you, to prove that we could have a uni-fying vision that would bring this country to-gether, not in the middle of the road butin a dynamic movement forward.

And look, 7 years ago we had a terribleeconomy, and now we’ve got the longest eco-nomic expansion in history. Seven years agowe had worsening social problems, and nowwe’ve got the lowest welfare and crime ratesin 30 years and the lowest poverty rates in20 years. This works, and it’s not rocketscience.

And if somebody asked me, ‘‘Well, whatis the difference? What did you really do thatwas different as President,’’ and you only geta sentence or two, I would not say our eco-nomic policy, although we have a good one,I think, and it’s different; or our crime policy,although we have a good one, and it’s dif-ferent; or our welfare policy, although wehave a good one, and it’s different; or evenour education policy, which is profoundly dif-ferent from what was done before. I wouldsay, I believe that everybody counts; every-body deserves a chance; and we all do betterwhen we try to help each other. And I believethat we don’t get anywhere by denying thechallenges that are before us so that we cancontinue the comfortable arguments thatwe’ve been making in the past, instead of


taking the uncomfortable but exhilaratingmarch into the future.

That’s what this whole deal has beenabout, and that’s what I tried to say in theState of the Union Address. Anybody that’sover 30 years old—we’ve got a few peoplewho aren’t in this room, so they will haveto learn this—but anybody that’s over 30years old can remember at least one time,if not more, in your life when you made areal bad mistake, not because times weretough but because times were so good, youdidn’t think anything could go wrong. Andso you just didn’t want to do what you knewthat you ought to do, keep planning, keepthinking about the future, make the toughdecisions now. Better to be diverted. Betterto lay down and rest. Better to just indulgeyourself for the moment. Anybody who haslived any length of time has made a mistakeunder those circumstances.

That is the question that is facing theUnited States today. And the consequencesare far greater for the Nation than they arefor any of us in our personal lives, becausewe have never had this kind of chance before.So what I tried to say at the State of theUnion, what I want to say again to you, Ihope you will hammer home to everyone youcan talk about this year is that if there wasever a time when we ought to have an elec-tion that was a unifying referendum on ourcommon future, it is this one, because theeconomy is in good shape, the society is ingood shape, we’ve got a lot of confidence,we have relatively few internal crises or exter-nal threats. There is nothing to prevent usfrom saying, ‘‘Okay, what’s out there that’sa big problem or a big opportunity, and let’sgo deal with it.’’

And if we do both, we will be able to lit-erally make the future of our dreams for ourchildren. That’s what I think the Democratsought to be saying this year. And that is whatwe represent. We shouldn’t be denying thatwe ought to change. If somebody who wasrunning for President said, ‘‘Vote for me. I’lldo just what Bill Clinton did,’’ I’d vote againstthat person because we live in a dynamictime. But if somebody says, ‘‘Vote for me.I’d like to go back to the way it was in 1992and before,’’ I would certainly vote againstthat person. [Laughter]

So the question is not whether we’re goingto change; it is how. So I think if you knowthe number of people over 65 is going todouble, you have to meet the challenge ofthe aging of America. Putting it off will onlymake it more expensive and more painful.Today we can save Social Security for thebaby boom generation, extend the life ofMedicare, and add a prescription drug ben-efit for the 60 percent of the seniors thatdon’t have access to one. We can do it today.We have the money, and we have the reformsto save money, and we ought to do it.

If we know that education is more impor-tant than ever before and we’ve got morekids from more diverse backgrounds, weshould act today to make sure all our kidsstart school ready to learn and graduate readyto succeed: Head Start, after-school pro-grams, school repairs and building and mod-ernizing schools, hooking them all up to theInternet, training the teachers better, thewhole nine yards. There is no excuse for usnot doing this.

Test scores are up; graduation rates areup; college-going rates are up, but not nearwhere they ought to be but enough so thatwe know what to do. It would be differentif we didn’t know what to do. We know whatto do now. We don’t have an excuse. So tosquander this moment in education would bea great error.

In health care, I was always—one of myfriends in the Congress came up to me theother day, and they said, ‘‘You know, theytold me, the insurance companies did, if Ivoted for your health care plan back in 1994,the number of uninsured people would actu-ally go up.’’ And he said, ‘‘They were abso-lutely right. I voted for it, and there’s moreuninsured people today than there was whenI voted for it.’’ [Laughter] So we had to finda different approach.

The only social indicator, just about, that’sworse today than it was in ’93 when I tookoffice, is that there are more Americans whowork for a living without health insurance.So we got this program, and I wish you wouldlook at this. Some of you, by the way, whowork with the agencies in Texas, we’ve gotthis program that will enroll 5 million kidsin the Children’s Health Insurance Programof lower income working people who can’t


get health insurance on the job. We’ve got2 million enrolled now. We’ve got money for3 million more. A lot of the ones who aren’tenrolled are still in Texas—for a lot of goodreasons. I’m not criticizing anybody, but wejust need to go out there and get those kidsin there.

And I’d like the Congress to say their par-ents can be enrolled, too, and I’d like theCongress to let people between 55 and 65who don’t have insurance—it’s the fastestgrowing group of uninsured people—peoplewho take early retirement. They’re not oldenough for Medicare. They don’t have insur-ance. I think they ought to be able to buyinto Medicare, and we ought to give thema modest tax credit so it’s affordable.

Now, this is a big issue. We know thatmore and more parents will work. Eitherthey will be single parents working, or two-parent households where both people will beworking. If we know that and we know rightnow that for all of our success, America doesless to support work and family—that is, tohelp working parents succeed as childrearers,which is the most important job anybody canhave—if we know we don’t do enough, weshould do more.

We know more and more families, as peo-ple live longer, are going to be taking careof aging or disabled relatives. We should domore. So I recommended to the Congressto increase our support for the child care taxcredit, to give families a long-term care creditfor caring for elderly or disabled loved ones,to give parents a tax deduction for collegetuition, up to $10,000 a year so we can openthe doors of 4 years of college to all Ameri-cans. These are big things. Why? Becausewe know there will be big problems 10 or20 or 30 years from now if we don’t dealwith them right now.

And I could go on and on. I don’t wantto give you the whole State of the Union Ad-dress, but the point I’m trying to make is,the Democratic Party is now in a positionto say, we have the resources. We’ve workedvery hard to get rid of this deficit. We’veworked very hard to pay the debt down. Andwe’ve now got the resources to deal with theaging of America, the challenge of the chil-dren and their education, the challenge ofhealth care, the challenge of balancing work

and family. We can do it and still get thiscountry out of debt in 13 years and still pro-vide extra incentives to places like where Iwas this morning, in the Rio Grande Valley,to give people extra incentives to invest inurban neighborhoods, rural areas, Indian res-ervations, where our prosperity hasn’treached.

And why do we do all that? Because webelieve everybody counts; everybody oughtto have a chance; and we all do better whenwe help each other. That’s what I believe.Nobody believes the Democrats anymore areweak on the budget, weak on the economy,weak on welfare, weak on crime. But we dobelieve that if somebody is trying, we oughtto help them make the most of their lives.And we now have 7 years of evidence thatthat’s not only a morally defensible thing todo, it not only makes us feel better, it actuallyworks.

So I will close with this, and I don’t wantto be maudlin, but I can pretty well say whatI want to because I’m not running for any-thing. [Laughter] First time in over two dec-ades I haven’t been on the ballot for any-thing. Some of those guys on the other sidemay write me out just to—[laughter]—theymay feel deprived that they’re being cut outof one more chance to vote against me, butI’m not on the ballot. So I’m just telling youthis as a citizen.

Once before in my lifetime, I thought wehad a chance to build the future of ourdreams. In the last economic expansion—that was until this month the longest one inhistory; it ran from 1961 to 1969—I grad-uated from high school in 1964. And I thinkit’s appropriate that I say this here. Most ofthe people who now look back at that perioddate the onset of American cynicism to theassassination of President Kennedy. That isdead wrong. That is wrong. The country washeartbroken, but they rallied. They united.They tried to lift themselves up. LyndonJohnson did a good job of moving the countryforward.

And we believed, when I graduated fromhigh school, that we were going to solve thecivil rights crisis and the poverty problemsof America through the orderly legislativeprocess in Congress and working with peo-ple. We believed we were going to be able


to stand against communism without havingan unacceptable cost at home or around theworld. We believed that we could do this.

Four years later, I was at my college grad-uation, 2 days after Robert Kennedy waskilled, 90 days after Martin Luther King waskilled, 94 days after Lyndon Johnson said hewouldn’t run for reelection. The economywas beginning to shut down. The country wastorn apart over Vietnam, and we had hadriots in the streets of America. I have waited,as an American, over 30 years for my countryto get another chance to build the future ofour dreams for our children.

Most of us get at least one second chancein life, and if we didn’t, we’d be a long waybehind where we are. Our country, in ourlifetime, has this chance in even better cir-cumstances than existed 30 years ago, withscience and technology changes that arebreathtaking. I believe that the young womenhere may very likely give birth to childrenwho will have a life expectancy of 100 years.They will come home from the hospital withgenetic road maps of their children’s lives.And if they give birth to young daughters thathave one of those two broken genes that arehigh predictors of breast cancer, they’ll beable to take gene therapies that will blockthem from ever developing in the first place.I believe that will happen.

I believe the young people here will soonbe driving automobiles that get probably 80,90 miles a gallon, and within 5 years they’llbe running on biofuels that will be the equiv-alent of getting 500 miles to the gallon be-cause they require so little oil to produce.I believe we’ll find out what’s in those blackholes in outer space. I believe we’ll be ableto keep people with diabetes, adult onset dia-betes, alive and healthy to a normal lifespan.I believe that we will actually develop com-puters the size of a tear drop that use DNAfor computer memories more powerful thanany human chip, so that you will have tinylittle computers with a computing power ofall the super computers today.

I believe all this is going to happen. I thinkwe’ll also have to deal with highly sophisti-cated terrorists and organized criminals anddrugrunners that have access to chemical andbiological and other weapons. There will al-ways be enemies of civilization out there. But

we’ll do just fine if we understand that it stillcomes down to whether you believe every-body counts, everybody ought to have achance. We’re all going to do better if wework together.

For 30 years I have waited for this mo-ment. If I contributed at all to it, I am grate-ful. But as a citizen, I implore you, don’t letAmerica turn away from what works whenwe’ve finally got a chance to redeem thewhole promise of our Nation.

Thank you.

NOTE: The President spoke at 8:30 p.m. at a pri-vate residence. In his remarks, he referred to FredBaron and Lisa Blue, dinner hosts; Mary Albert,widow of former Speaker of the House Carl B.Albert; Bernard (‘‘B’’) Rapoport, former chairmanand chief executive officer, American Income LifeInsurance Co., and his wife, Audre; Garry Mauro,former Texas land commissioner; Mayor Ron Kirkof Dallas; State Senator David Cain and his wife,Sally H. Cain, Region VI Director, Office of Inter-governmental and Interagency Affairs, Depart-ment of Education; Regina Montoya Coggins,congressional candidate for Texas’ Fifth Congres-sional District; Edward G. Rendell, general chair,Democratic National Committee; and Jim Nichol-son, chairman, Republican National Committee.

Remarks at a Democratic UnityReceptionFebruary 10, 2000

Thank you very much. Let me say howdelighted and profoundly honored I am tobe here with Senator Daschle and LeaderGephardt, with their colleagues in the Senateand the House who are here in large num-bers, and all those who aren’t here who arewith us in spirit today; how much I appre-ciate Bob Hatcher, and Thelma—and JennyMae for being here to remind us of whywe’re all here in the first place. Their testi-mony makes clear that our agenda is Amer-ica’s agenda, and our presence here makesclear that we are united in our support ofthat agenda.

I know some of our friends on the otherside of the aisle have suggested that, becausethis is an election year, we really shouldn’tdo much. Well, I don’t think that the twopeople who just spoke could take a year off


from their jobs. And since everybody hereis still drawing a salary, I don’t think we couldtake a year off from our jobs either.

I want to join with what Senator Daschleand Leader Gephardt have said in thankingthe members of this caucus for your role inthis long boom and so much of the socialprogress we have enjoyed, beginning with thecourageous vote for the economic plan in1993. Your commitment, constant over theyears, to opportunity for every responsibleAmerican and for a community of all Ameri-cans, to a Government that gives Americansthe tools to live their own dreams, has beenabsolutely critical to anything that our admin-istration has achieved.

I know that we’ve had a lot of differentpolicies, but more important than all of thespecifics was our common commitment. Wewanted Bob and Thelma to be here todaybecause we believe that every Americancounts. We believe every American shouldhave a chance, and we believe we all do bet-ter when we help each other. That is whatwe believe.

Today I received the Annual EconomicReport from my Council of Economic Advis-ers. It provides further evidence that Ameri-cans have built a new economy and that whatwe believe actually works. The report makesclear that this is the strongest economic ex-pansion in history, not just the longest, thatunlike previous economic expansions which,in the end and somewhere in the middle,normally bring you higher deficits, slowerproductivity, and higher inflation, this onehas turned it around, unlike the 1980’s whenincome inequality increased and many hard-pressed working families saw their incomesfall while we were told that the expansionwas going on. We now see solid incomegrowth across all groups of American workerssince 1993.

All groups are sharing in the prosperity byincome, by region, by race. Now, as my lead-ers said so eloquently, it is for us here inWashington and for the American people todecide what we are going to do with whatis truly a magic moment. I argued in the Stateof the Union Address that we ought to bethinking about people like Bob and Thelmaand Jenny Mae, that we ought to ask our-selves, ‘‘What are the great challenges before

us?’’ We ought to clearly state what we be-lieve America’s goals ought to be and whatsteps we intend to take toward them thisyear. That is what we are united in doing.

And let me say—we have a lot of youngpeople here—I want to say something nowand something to you at the end. Anybodyover 30 in this audience can recall at leastone time in your life and probably more thanone time when you made a big mistake, notbecause you were under the gun but becausethings were going so well, you thought therewere no consequences; you thought youcould relax; you thought you really didn’thave to think about what you knew was outthere plainly before you; so you didn’t reallyhave to take those tough decisions; just sortof sit back, relax, enjoy the things that weregoing on.

That is a message that some people sud-denly are sending America today, and thatis dead wrong. We will never, in all prob-ability, have another time in our lifetime withso much prosperity, so much progress, somuch confidence, and so little trouble athome and abroad, to define the future of ourdreams for the next generation of Americans.And we had better take this chance and makethe most of it.

I must say, I have been quite amused bya lot of the commentators on both sides ofour policy of paying the debt off. Some havesaid I sound like Calvin Coolidge, and otherssay that I’m using it as an excuse to spendmoney on Americans. All I know is, it works.If we get this country out of debt, it meansthe American people can borrow money atlower interest rates to invest in new busi-nesses, to pay their home loans, to pay theircollege loans, to pay their car loans. It meansthat all the young people here for a genera-tion will have a healthier economy and amore affordable life than otherwise wouldhave been the case, and it will be more pos-sible for us to meet the great challenges ofthis country. That is our united commitment,and we ought to do it.

We are united in meeting the challengeof the aging of America. And believe me, thisis not an option. I know things are going well,so we can sort of say, ‘‘Well, we’ll let thisslide a while.’’ The people in this country,the number of people over 65 are going to


double in the next 30 years. Now, if we startto prepare for it now—to reform and mod-ernize and strengthen Medicare, and to takeSocial Security out beyond the life expect-ancy of the baby boom generation—we cando it relatively painlessly.

But make no mistake: This country will doit. And if we just fool around and ignore thisfor 10 years, who knows what the economywill be like 10 years from now? Who knowswhat the demands on the American peoplewill be like 10 years from now? Now is thetime to add a prescription drug benefit toMedicare and to take Social Security out to2050 and take Medicare out for 25 years—now. Do it now. Save Social Security andMedicare for the baby boomers’ retirement.

We know that we live in a marvelousworld, where the kids with a good educationare going to be able to do things their parentscould not even have imagined. And yet, weknow that the penalty of not having an edu-cation is even greater than ever. We knowthat it’s more challenging than ever beforebecause we have a more diverse group ofstudents, from different racial, cultural, reli-gious, even linguistic backgrounds. We knowthat right now. And we know that’s only goingto become a more pronounced trend.

Within a decade, our largest State, Cali-fornia, will have no majority race. Now, weknow that. We also know that there’s no-where near equal educational opportunity inthe country, and we know what the chal-lenges are. So we say, now—not later—nowis the time for high standards, smaller classes,well-trained teachers. Now is the time for allthe kids who need it to have the preschooland the after-school programs they need.Now is the time—not later, now.

We know that more and more families willhave the parents working, whether they’resingle-parent families or two-parent families.And we know right now that for all of oursuccess, America gives less support to helppeople balance the demands of childrearingand work than any other advanced country.

We can be proud of what we did with fam-ily and medical leave. We can be proud withwhat we did with the Children’s Health In-surance Program. We can be proud withwhat we did with the Kennedy-Kassebaumbill to let people take their health insurance

from job to job. But we know that we donot do enough to help people balance thedemands of work and childrearing. And rais-ing children, like that beautiful little girl, isstill America’s most important work. It alwayswill be. And we know we have to do more.

So we believe now is the time to increasethe child care tax credit and make it refund-able, to help parents do more to pay for col-lege tuition, so that we can go beyond wherewe were with the HOPE scholarship, whichopens the doors of community college to allAmericans. With the college tax deductionat 28 percent for all income groups, we canopen the doors of 4 years of college to allAmericans.

We know we should increase the earnedincome tax credit for lower income workingpeople. We know we should genuinely easethe marriage penalty for both middle andlower middle income groups. We know weshould do this. We don’t know whether 10years from now we will be able to do this,and we don’t know what the consequencesto countless families will be if we don’t doit now. We are united in saying, let’s do itnow. We don’t have to wait. Now is the timeto help families to balance the demands ofhome and work.

You heard Thelma’s story. So you knowthat the one area where the social indicatorshave not gone in the right direction since1993 is in the number of people who arecovered with health insurance. One of thewits in our Democratic caucus said to methe other day, ‘‘You know, all those insurancecompanies told me back in 1993 or ‘94, ifI voted for your health care plan, the numberof uninsured Americans would go up. I votedfor it, and sure enough, that’s what hap-pened.’’ [Laughter]

We know we need a strong, enforceablePatients’ Bill of Rights. And the Congress hasfooled around with it long enough. The timeis now to pass it. We know we should domore to help enroll more children in theChildren’s Health Insurance Program. Twomillion children are enrolled. This Congressprovided enough money for somewherebetween 4 and 5 million children to beenrolled. And we know—and that’s why it’sso important.


You remember Thelma’s story. I was 4years old, like this little girl, once, with amother who was working and, then, a singlemother. There are people like her all overthe country. One of the most importantthings we have proposed in this Congress isto let the parents of children who are in thisCHIP program also get insurance. They needit. They’re working out there. And we oughtto do it. And we ought to do it now, notlater.

We know the crime rate has gone downto a 30-year low, and it’s still too high. Andwe believe not later, now is the time to learnthe lessons of Columbine and all the otherthings we’ve seen and pass commonsenselegislation to do more to keep guns out ofthe hands of criminals and away from kids.We can do that and honor every constitu-tional provision in our founding documentand every fundamental value in our society.

We know we’ve got to keep putting morepolice on the street in high-crime areas. Whoknows, 5 years from now, what kind of condi-tion this country will be? Why should anymore children die we can save? Why shouldany more crimes be committed we can pre-vent? Now is the time to take strong actionto make America the safest big country inthe world.

We know there are still too many peopleand places that haven’t participated in thisprosperity. We know that. That’s why wefavor increasing the number of empower-ment zones, increasing the incentives to in-vest in them, and giving Americans all overthis country—people like Bob Hatcher—weknow there are inner-city neighborhoodswhere he might be able to put people towork; I think we ought to give him the sametax incentives to invest in those neighbor-hoods we give him today to invest in LatinAmerica, Africa, or Asia. And we ought todo it now—not later, now.

We are united in that. And as I look atSenator Feingold, I think I should say oneother thing. Unlike the other party, we areunited—united, down to the last vote in bothHouses—in saying now is the time to passmeaningful campaign finance reform legisla-tion in this Congress.

We are also united in believing we haveto build one America. That’s why we want

to pass the ‘‘Hate Crimes Prevention Act.’’That’s why we want to end all discriminationin employment. We don’t—I’ll say again—we think everybody counts; everybody oughtto have a chance; we all do better when wehelp each other.

I want to make this last point. I see allthese young people here. The last timeAmerica had a chance like this was when Iwas about your age. I finished high schoolin 1964. The Nation was heartbroken whenPresident Kennedy was killed. But PresidentJohnson lifted our spirits, united the country,began to deal with the challenges of civilrights, and we believed that our economywould grow on forever. We believed wewould meet the challenges of civil rights ina lawful, peaceful way. We believed we couldwin the cold war without what ultimatelyhappened in the dividing of our country inVietnam. And we thought it would go on for-ever, and everything was hunky-dory.

Four years later, when I was graduatingfrom college, it was 2 days after RobertKennedy had been killed, a couple of monthsafter Martin Luther King had been killed,and Lyndon Johnson said he wouldn’t runfor reelection. We had riots in the street. Theeconomy became a cropper on the burdensof paying for a war and inflation. And all thatwe thought would happen was lost. And thePresidential election in that year was decidedon the politics of division, something calledthe silent majority, which means the worldand America is divided between ‘‘us’’ and‘‘them.’’ ‘‘I’m with ‘us,’ and they’re with‘them.’ ’’ And I have lived with that as a cit-izen for 30 years.

Now I’m not running for anything. I amnot on the ballot. I am telling you this asan American. I have waited for 30 long yearsto see my country in a position to pull to-gether and move forward together and buildthe future of our dreams for our children.We dare not blow that chance.

Thank you, and God bless you.

NOTE: The President spoke at 1:52 p.m. in theGreat Hall at the Library of Congress. In hisremarks, he referred to Robert L. Hatcher,chairman, Minority Business Roundtable, whointroduced the President; and Thelma Pierce,single working mother, who enrolled her


daughter, Jenny Mae, in the Children’s Health In-surance Program.

Statement Announcing EmbassySecurity InitiativesFebruary 10, 2000

Today I am announcing initiatives to fur-ther improve the security of American menand women serving their country in diplo-matic and consular missions overseas and toensure that the United States performs theseactivities in the most efficient and effectivemanner possible.

I intend to request $1.1 billion in my budg-et for fiscal year 2001 for Embassy securityinitiatives including construction of new fa-cilities, additional protective measures for ex-isting facilities, and the full cost of maintain-ing a high level of security readiness. Thebudget also includes a sustained commitmentto this effort, including $14 billion over thenext 10 years in security enhancement fund-ing and new construction. I will again askthe Congress to provide advance appropria-tions for the construction of new facilities infuture years to provide a solid foundation onwhich to plan and execute the Embassy secu-rity construction program.

We must continue to reexamine how wemanage and protect all U.S. Governmentemployees who work overseas. Last year, fol-lowing on the excellent work of AdmiralCrowe and the Accountability Review Board,the Secretary of State appointed a panel,chaired by Lewis Kaden, to review our over-seas operations. The Overseas Presence Ad-visory Panel included a distinguished arrayof individuals with diplomatic, military, andgovernmental experience, as well as impor-tant members of the business community.The Panel’s report last November rec-ommended a wide range of improvementsin rightsizing, managing, improving, and pro-tecting our staff who work abroad. The reportalso recommended changes to the way ourrepresentatives overseas work as a team insupport of American interests and in themanagement and financing of U.S. Govern-ment overseas facilities.

The Panel has made an important con-tribution to our Nation’s security and theconduct of international affairs. My budget

proposals reflect and fully support their rec-ommendation that a greater commitment isneeded in this critical area. I also agree withtheir recommendation for review and im-provement in the way we manage ouroverseas presence.

I have asked the Secretary of State to leada Cabinet committee to implement the Pan-el’s recommendations regarding rightsizing.This process will look at the full range ofagency staff, who serve in U.S. missionsabroad, and make recommendations aboutthe appropriate levels and skills with whichwe should staff our Embassies in the newcentury. It will also review and make rec-ommendations regarding the management,financing, and computerization of overseasfacilities.

I ask the Congress to join me in workingto protect America’s presence throughout theworld and to ensure that we maintain thebest and most effective presence overseas toserve America’s interests.

Message to the Senate Transmittingthe Russia-United States Treaty onMutual Legal Assistance in CriminalMatters With Documentation

February 10, 2000

To the Senate of the United States:With a view to receiving the advice and

consent of the Senate to ratification, I trans-mit herewith the Treaty Between the UnitedStates of America and the Russian Federa-tion on Mutual Legal Assistance in CriminalMatters, signed at Moscow on June 17, 1999.I transmit also, for the information of theSenate, a related exchange of notes and thereport of the Department of State with re-spect to the Treaty.

The Treaty is one of a series of modernmutual legal assistance treaties being nego-tiated by the United States in order tocounter criminal activities more effectively.The Treaty should be an effective tool to as-sist in the prosecution of a wide variety ofcrimes, including terrorism, money laun-dering, organized crime and drug-traffickingoffenses. The Treaty is self-executing.


The Treaty provides for a broad range ofcooperation in criminal matters. Mutual as-sistance available under the Treaty includesobtaining the testimony or statements of per-sons; providing documents, records andother items; serving documents; locating oridentifying persons and items; executing re-quests for searches and seizures; transferringpersons in custody for testimony or otherpurposes; locating and immobilizing assetsfor purposes of forfeiture, restitution, or col-lection of fines; and any other form of legalassistance not prohibited by the laws of theRequested Party.

I recommend that the Senate give earlyand favorable consideration to the Treaty andgive its advice and consent to ratification.

William J. Clinton


Letter to Congressional LeadersTransmitting the Report on BilateralAssistance to Opposition-ControlledAreas of SudanFebruary 10, 2000

Dear Mr. Chairman:Pursuant to section 592(b) of the Foreign

Operations, Export Financing, and RelatedPrograms Appropriations Act, 2000 (PublicLaw 106–113), I hereby transmit to you areport concerning U.S. bilateral assistance toopposition-controlled areas of Sudan.

Sincerely,

William J. Clinton

NOTE: Identical letters were sent to C.W. BillYoung, chairman, House Committee on Appro-priations, and Ted Stevens, chairman, SenateCommittee on Appropriations.

Interview With the Chicago Tribune,the Los Angeles Times, and USATodayFebruary 10, 2000

National EconomyQ. I guess I wanted to ask you, given the

way that the economy is going—given that

there’s been so much growth, and it’s beenso successful—how much credit do you thinkthat you and your administration can realisti-cally take, compared to the other factors thatpeople talk about? There’s been some discus-sion, I’m sure you know, recently, with peo-ple crediting everything, going back to Presi-dent Reagan. And I’m just curious on thattopic, what your views are?

The President. Well, I think, first of all,if you look at the difference in the expansionsof the eighties and the nineties, we had a—the one in the eighties was funded by an old-fashioned explosion of deficit spending. Butit built in a structural deficit, which guaran-teed profound long-term problems for theeconomy, very high interest rates, and veryslow job growth.

There was a lot of commentary in ’91 and’92 about how, even though nominally a re-covery had begun, I think some of the writerscalled it a ‘‘triple dip’’ phenomenon, that wekept sliding back and sliding back.

So I think the main thing we did was tocut interest rates by getting rid of the deficit.And I think that if you go back and read all—I remember what a boost in the bond marketthere was when we just—when LloydBentsen announced our economic programin December of ’92. So I think our main con-tribution in the short run was to make it abso-lutely clear that we would have a consistent,disciplined fiscal approach that would cutand then eventually eliminate the deficit.And I think that played a major role in theinvestment boom. And it cut interest rates,which also put more money in consumers’pockets, which helped fuel the consumerside of this recovery.

But I think that the consistent policies ofthe Government that go back to the previousadministrations, that reflected the second legof our approach, which also deserves credit,which is keeping the markets open. You’vehad three administrations here in a row com-mitted—in the eighties and the nineties—committed to open trade. And I think thatthat’s been very good, because that’s kept in-flation down and spurred continuing com-petitiveness. And I do believe the previousadministrations deserve credit for that.

Then I don’t—you know, the lion’s shareof the credit belongs to the people in the


private economy: the people who restruc-tured in the eighties; the workers who gotbetter training and understood the globaleconomy and didn’t press for what wouldhave been inflationary increases in pay andbenefits, that aligned them more with thereal profitability of their firms; and then fi-nally what, I think, only in the last coupleof years has come to be fully appreciated isthe enormous contribution of the technologyrevolutions, which are centered, still, in thehigh-tech sector—they’re 8 percent of ouremployment, but they’ve been 30 percent ofour growth—but also are rifling throughevery other sector of the economy in a waythat has added to productivity that is onlynow being measured. If you noticed, the lastcouple days we had a new estimate of pro-ductivity growth. My sense is that all along,the economists underestimated—under-standably, based on past experience—theproductivity contribution of technology andthe ability of a combination of fiscal dis-cipline, open markets, and productivity in-creases, to prolong the growth in a way thatwould generate large numbers of jobs andbegin to broaden the benefits of the recov-ery. That was another real problem for—wehad 20 years where income inequality contin-ued to increase, because of the way the re-covery was structured. So I think you haveto look at the whole piece.

And then I think now, we’re beginning toget the benefits of the third part of our eco-nomic strategy, which was to continue tomake the requisite public investments, whichhave, I think, made a significant contributionin education, in training, and we’ve got col-lege going up by 10 percent now, over whenI took office. We’ve made real, continuinginvestments in science and technology, whichI think are pivotal to the long-term healthof the economy and the continuation of thisproductivity increase.

So I think that we’ve made a contribution,but the lion’s share of the credit—as always,since it’s a private economy; we had the high-est percentage of private-sector jobs in thiseconomic boom, I think, of any one sincewe’ve been keeping such statistics.

Q. To follow up on this, Mr. President,I notice that in your last interview with agroup here about the economy a week ago

or so, you were very generous with credit.There are some people, in fact, who are say-ing, this is one long boom. We’re in the 17thyear of an expansion. What do you think ofthat account of what’s going on with theeconomy?

The President. Well, we could say that,basically, we’ve been in a 30-year boom andgone back to ’61, or a 40-year boom, but forthe oil price problems, which led to all theinflation. I mean, you can argue this flat orround. There is a fundamental health in theAmerican free enterprise system, which hasprospered in the global economy. And in thatsense, the people who set up the system atthe end of World War II deserve a lot ofthis credit. I don’t think you can disaggregateall this.

I think the fundamental mistake that wasmade in the eighties was basically aban-doning arithmetic. I think that we got outof that recession, and we had—you remem-ber—we had impossible conditions in theseventies, with recession and high inflationat the same time, caused by a set of economiccircumstances that were not of our own mak-ing, at least certainly mostly not of our ownmaking.

So the idea of stimulating the economy inthe early years—of the Reagan years was,even though it was masked in anti-Govern-ment rhetoric, was basically traditionalKeynesian economics. But the problem is,when we had a recovery, because it was soldas a, you know, ‘‘tax cuts are good; Govern-ment’s bad’’ package, we wound up with astructural deficit that couldn’t be overcomewithout a series of highly difficult and con-troversial decisions that were embodied inthe Budget Act of ’93, which required bothtax increases and spending restraint. And thepeople who shouldered the burden of thatpaid a considerable political price in the elec-tions of ’94, but I think there’s no questionthat it enabled us to have a balanced, long-term, stable, not only statistical recovery butfinally job-growth recovery that was morebroadly shared. It seems to me that was theproblem with the eighties philosophy, thatwe wound up with a structural deficit thatwas totally unsustainable. And I think it basi-cally grew out of the ideological wrappingof what was done in 1981.


Q. Just one last question along those lines.Sometimes when I listen to you recently, inthe talks that you give, I get the sense thatyou’re trying to assure or encourage that youradministration get sufficient credit for theboom that’s going on now, whether for histo-rians, whether in the next election. And I’mwondering if you have any sense of that.

The President. No, I don’t have any senseof that. What I say is what I believe to betrue, and I’ve tried to—with you, I’ve triedto, as I said in the State of the Union, asalways the major credit for anything goodthat happens in this country belongs to theAmerican people and the people and whatthey do in their private lives.

I think Government plays a pivotal role,and I do not—let me flip it around. If yougo—forget about what I might say. Look atwhat Alan Greenspan has said; look at whatall the commentators have said, going backto the ’92, ’93, ’94 period. I do not believethat we would have had a recovery this ro-bust, with this many jobs—I don’t think we’dbe anywhere close to that—if we hadn’ttaken serious, aggressive, and immediate ac-tion to get rid of the deficit and to bring in-terest rates down and to free up investmentand at the same time, by getting interest ratesdown, to put more money into the pocketsof people. They had lower home mortgage,car payments, college loan payments, creditcard interest payments, which enabled theconsumer side of this boom to continue.

I also don’t believe that there would havebeen anything like the amount of businessinvestment borrowing or consumer bor-rowing, if—I don’t think that would havebeen sustainable, in this environment, unlessthe Government had not only eliminated thedeficit but gone into surplus and begun tooffset private debt with public savings.

So I simply think that’s a fact. But Idon’t—but my view of this is different. Idon’t think anybody can claim sole credit.And I’m not so interested in that. I thinkwhat’s happened is, America is following abalanced policy now. And if America stayson that course when I’m not President any-more, I think we’ll meet with success. Andthen we’ll have to be flexible, you know, ifintervening events cause a recession, well,there will be cause for adjustment in policy.

But if we had adjustment in policy, it mightwork.

I mean, if we had continued with thesedeficits, then the next time we had a reces-sion, deficit spending wouldn’t have been anoption to help get the country out of a reces-sion. So to me, the American people shouldlook at this in terms of—I think I did myjob. But I think the rest of the—I think AlanGreenspan did his job. I think the peoplein the high-tech sector were terrific. I thinkthe people who restructured all of Americanindustry and business to increase their effi-ciency and productivity were great. And Ithink the working people of this country de-serve a lot of credit for understanding thatthey can only get wage and benefit increasesthat were real, and if they got out of linewith economic growth, then that could con-tribute to inflation as well.

So I think we’ve had a remarkable balancehere, where the American people, all of usin our own way, essentially have done whatwe were supposed to do. And there’s morethan enough credit to go around.

Technology RevolutionQ. Mr. President, can you talk just a little

bit—you talked about the high-tech sectorand how important that is to the economy.Can you talk about the Internet for a secondand how important it is to the ongoing boom?And also, can you tell us how worried youare about what’s happened over the last 3days with these attacks on websites? If thisis a growing part of the economy, should webe concerned that it’s so vulnerable to attack?And is there anything the Government oughtto be doing about it, beyond what the FBIis already doing?

The President. Well, let me give you abrief answer to the first question you asked,because I think we could talk for hours aboutthat. Quite apart from the technology revolu-tion, I don’t think we have any way of meas-uring the contributions that the Internet ismaking and will continue to make, not onlyto the overall growth of the American econ-omy but to the range of individual opportuni-ties open to people.

You may have heard me say this in someof my talks, but I was amazed—I was outin northern California a few weeks ago with


a bunch of people who work with eBay. Andthey were telling me, now, that there are over20,000 Americans who actually make a livingon eBay, not working for eBay but on eBaybuying and selling, trading—and that theyhave enough information on their user baseto know that a significant number of thesepeople were once on welfare. And they fig-ured out a way to stay home, take care oftheir kids, and literally make a living buyingand selling on eBay.

Now, that’s all I know about that. I don’thave any more facts. It’s an interesting storyyou might want to follow up on, but the pointis that this is just one example of, I think,a virtually unlimited number of new eco-nomic opportunities which will be open. Ialso think it will shrink distance in a way thatwill make it possible for more profitable in-vestments to be made in areas that are nowstill kind of left behind in this economy.

And I—you know, we’ve tried to do ananalysis of all the areas in America whichhave had slow job growth or which still havehigher unemployment. And we developedthis new markets initiative and proposedmore empowerment zones and things of thatkind. But the—if we can bridge the digitaldivide and literally make the Internet acces-sible to lower income people and to placesthat are not fully participating in this econ-omy, I think the potential is staggering.

Now, to the second question, yes, I’m con-cerned about the latest hacking incidents.But I think that, you know, we’ve gotten allthis incredible benefit out of a system thatis fundamentally open. And as you know, I’veworked hard to keep it unencumbered, totry to make sure that Internet commerce isnot unduly burdened by regulation or tax-ation. And if you have an open system likethis, you’re going to have to have continuousguarding against intrusion. And people gowhere the money is. It’s like Willie Sutton,you know? I mean, the money’s in informa-tion and in knowledge about transactions andopportunities.

And so my view of this is that this—ourrenewed vigilance to try to deal withcyberhacking, or even cyberterrorism, is partof the cost of doing business in the modernworld. We’ve been working hard on this for2 years. We’ve proposed, I think, $2 billion

in this budget to deal with it. We’ve got this,you know, this proposal for a cyber-academyto train young people to try to work to helpus prevent illegal intrusions into the Internetand into important databases.

And we have this FBI center, as you know,and—I think it’s in Pennsylvania, near Pitts-burgh—that’s looking into these latest inci-dents. But I’m going to bring in some peoplenext week from the private sector and fromour Government team, to talk about what ifanything else we can do about this.

Q. Because of the incidents that just hap-pened?

The President. What?Q. You’re going to bring them in because

of these events that just happened?The President. Yes, Yes. As a result—you

know, we have a continuing ongoing con-sultation with them. We’ve had extensiveconversations leading up to the proposalsthat we’ve already made and the work we’vedone for the last 2 years.

But I don’t—I wouldn’t—I think it’s im-portant that we not overreact to this. I mean,we don’t want to shut off this incredible re-source, which I think will be a source of greatwealth and, I think, will have all kinds of so-cial benefits, not only in the United Statesbut around the world. And we just have torecognize that it’s like any other new institu-tion that’s a source of ideas, information, andwealth.

I mean, people used to—it’s harder to roba bank than it used to be, and we figuredout how to make it harder. And we’ll figureout—we’ll continue to figure out to securethe Internet without shutting it down or clos-ing off options. But the American people, inmy view, should look at this as an inevitablenegative development in what is an overallvery positive trend. And there’s probably nosilver bullet to deal with it, but we’ll keepworking at it until we can prove our capacityto protect the people who are participatingin it.

Q. But doesn’t this set some limits on thegrowth of the new economy, the Interneteconomy? I mean, there was this poor soulwho was described in the Post today—he satthere on E-TRADE and watched his stockdrop 6 percent while he couldn’t get online.I mean, if some 14-year-old kid—and we


don’t know who has done this, but if some14-year-old kid with a PC can screw up thesystem that badly, doesn’t that effectivelylimit how much people are going to trust itand how much people are going to use it?

The President. Unless we can solve it. Butunless we can figure out how to solve theproblem—but my instinct is that there arepeople just as clever or more clever who willbe interested in making the thing work forsociety as a whole as there are those that wantto gum up the works.

The fact that a 14-year-old did it, I don’tthink, should be surprising to anyone. Imean, all the rest of us—you know, you getto thinking by the time you’re 35, you’re tooold to break new ground in this area. Butit’s troubling, but I don’t—again, I would saythat if you look throughout history, every newpositive development contains within it theseeds of its own vulnerability, and then peo-ple, either for pure mischievousness or be-cause they’re trying to do something reallywrong and reach some illicit benefit try tointerfere with it.

So I don’t think what you’re seeing todayis sort of anything new in terms of humannature or people trying to put their ingenuityto work for destructive purposes. And we justhave to keep working until we find ways tothwart it. Because I think fundamentally, thishas been an extraordinarily positive develop-ment for our country and for the world.

Biotechnology and the HumanGenome Project

Q. Mr. President, can I take you from thenew economy to what you may call the new-new economy, biotech and the human ge-nome. As you know and as you’ve said inthe State of the Union, we’re within monthsof having a first draft of the entire humangenetic code. As I’m sure you also know,there is some argument about how we canbest put it to use: Whether we should havevery broad access to it by scientists and soon, or whether we get products, new treat-ments, and so on, faster, if it’s more narrowlyconstrained, or access to parts of it, substan-tial parts of it, are more narrowly con-strained; should the public, and especiallythe research community have ready access

to the underlying human code, the genomeitself?

The President. Yes.Q. You know that there are people who

say that we should allow extensive, broad pat-enting of it, not just to use, but have acompositional matter portion where peopleactually—companies, biotech companies—biotech companies, the drug companies actu-ally control the underlying sequence, andthat’s the best route to get products out fast,get new treatments. What do you think ofthat argument?

The President. I basically agree with theguidance that the Patent Office has now an-nounced, that they believe that the broad in-formation, the basic sequencing of the ge-nome should be made public and should bemade publicly available to scientists and re-searchers, to all people in private sector busi-nesses and——

Q. Why do you think the Patent Officeis—do you think the Patent Office is sayingthat, and why do you think the Patent Officeis saying that? Because there are many peo-ple, Dr. Collins, for example, who you werewith 2 days ago who say that’s not what thePatent Office is doing?

The President. Let me answer your ques-tion first of all, and then—I think the pat-enting should be for specific discoveries anddevelopments that have a clear and definablebenefit, because you don’t want to take thosethings, you don’t want to—I think we wouldbe making an error not to give people whodevelop such things the benefits of them, andyou would, then, discourage private invest-ment and research in that area.

Now, I think some—I believe—and I thinkthat’s the position that Dr. Collins believesthat we should have. Now, the Patent Officehas been criticized for not following that, forhaving a policy that was too broad if you will,but they have—my understanding is thatthey’ve announced new guidance and thatthis is the policy they’re going to try to followprospectively into the future, and it’s the oneI think they should follow. And I understandthere is a debate about this.

But I think most scientists and researchersbelieve the basic information ought to be asbroadly shared as possible. And then whenpeople develop something that has specific


use and commercial benefit and the kind ofthing that has to be done and should properlybe done in the private sector, then that oughtto be patentable.

Q. Because, for example, Dr. Collins, whoyou were with a couple of days ago, and Dr.Lander talked with you and to you about thisat the millennial evening last fall, have con-cern about this, I wonder, would you sketchwhat you think—in a little more detail—whatyou think ought to be publicly available andhow you can assure that that is publicly avail-able even when we have a very aggressive,very innovative private sector that is filingpatents like mad?

The President. The thing that I’m con-cerned about, obviously, the thing that I’mconcerned about is the capacity of the PatentOffice to make the judgments and to makethem at a timely fashion and to draw the linesin the right way. And you know, I certainlydon’t feel, for example, that I have the levelof knowledge to know how to split the hairsthere. And I think what we’ve got to do isto make absolutely sure if we’ve got the rightpolicy. Then we have to make sure that thePatent Office has the capacity to implementthe policy, not only in the right way but ina timely way.

The worst thing would be to have thesethings all bogged down for years and yearsand years. And I think that’s one of the thingswe’re going to have to assess this year to real-ly try to make sure that we have the capacityto make the right judgments and to makethem in a timely fashion.

National EconomyQ. If I could take the discussion back to

a little bit of a more broad approach, thingsare going so well now economically speaking,and you regularly recite figures that are veryimpressive, I’m wondering if there is any par-ticular thing or set of things that you regardas possible threat on the horizon that weneed to look out for, that we need to be pay-ing attention to. There’s been some discus-sion of high oil prices, for example, andthey’ve talked about the trade deficit.

What would you see as the things we needto be watching?

The President. The thing that bothers meabout the high oil prices, primarily, is the

disproportionate effect it has on people whoare excessively relying on oil. We still have,mostly in the mid-Atlantic and New Eng-land—we still have too many people who stillrely on home heating oil. They’re the onesthat have really been hurt.

The country’s overall reliance on oil ismuch less than it was 25 years ago when wehad the big oil price problem. And we’re onthe verge of real, new breakthroughs in fuelefficiency. Our ability to build our buildingswith far less energy use per square foot isdramatically increasing, both residences andoffice buildings. There are all kinds of ad-vances in factory efficiency now.

So the real problem I have with the oilprices is the very old-fashioned problem ofthe people that are just too dependent onhome heating oil, and it’s a real, serious prob-lem.

But I don’t think that will sink the overalleconomy or threaten it. I think it’s far morelikely that we have to be vigilant about thesize of our trade deficit and the amount ofAmerican obligations held by people in othercountries, combined with a very high levelof debt in this country.

One of the reasons—right now, we’re ingood shape on that, because the debt-to-wealth ratio of Americans looks very, verygood indeed, even though the per capita debtis high. I also think the individual savings rateis somewhat understated because I don’tthink we calculate the impact of homeowner-ship as well as we should, and we have thehighest homeownership in history.

But for me, that’s another argument forour economic strategy. That’s why we oughtto be trying to—not trying to, we ought tobe actually paying down the debt and be verydisciplined about it and say that we’re on atrack to eliminate the publicly held debt overthe next 13 years. I understand there’s a lotof problems with people who think thatwould be bad for the bond market and inter-est rate settings and all that. That’s an arcanedecision we could have on another day.

But I think basically, one of the reasonsthat I have been so adamant about payingthis debt down is that it tends to stabilizea system that requires if you’re having a lotof business expansion, requires a lot of busi-ness borrowing for new investment, and


where you have a lot of personal borrowingfrom people who feel the security to do it,because they have more assets, but the valueof the assets is dependent in part on the over-all stability of the economy, the confidenceof the American people, and the confidenceof investors around the world.

I don’t think we made a mistake to leaveour markets open, for example, during theAsian financial crisis, even though it explodedour trade deficit, because I think it helpedthe Asians to recover more quickly, and ithelped to stabilize the global economy. Butif you ask me the only things that I’m con-cerned about, I’m concerned about thosethings. And I think the way to deal with themis to do what we’re doing, which is to keeppaying the debt down, so that the overall fis-cal health of the American economy, whenyou look at public and private debt, againstassets and wealth and growth potential, con-tinues to be robust and strong and the con-fidence remains high.

Japan’s Economic SituationQ. Speaking of the trade deficit, Japan

looks like it’s sliding back into recession. Iknow that this Government has beenjawboning the Japanese for years now to tryto get them to change policies. How worri-some is it that after all their effort, they’regoing backwards at this point in terms of ourtrade deficit?

The President. I think that—let’s just talkabout Japan a minute. First of all, it’s a verydifficult case, because you’ve got this countryof people who work very hard, who are verywell educated, and who have an enormoustechnological base. My heart goes out tothem, because they have tried to take—they’ve taken interest rates down virtually tozero and are virtually paying people to bor-row money. And then the savings habits ofthe Japanese are so great—and for that andother reasons they’ve had difficulty makingthat strategy work.

Then they’ve got a Government deficitnow—they’ve tried deficit spending, and thedeficit is a higher percentage of GDP thanours was when I became President. So Ithink that somehow what they have to do isto unlock the creative potential and the con-fidence of their people at the same time,

which will be politically difficult because itwill require them, I think, to keep going to,in effect, deregulate, open up, and makemore competitive their economy. I think thatsomehow they’ve got to tap the energies ofall these young people, like all these youngpeople in America are creating all theseInternet companies and doing all the thingsthey’re doing there.

They’re an immensely gifted people, andthey work like crazy, and they have every-thing they need I think to succeed. Andthey’re highly efficient in their energy use.They’ve got a lot of things going for them.I just think that it must be so difficult forthem because the traditional stimulus hasn’tworked, traditional bringing interest ratesdown hasn’t worked, because of the natureof the present economy. So I think they’rejust going to have to keep pushing to unlockthe sort of spirit of entrepreneurialism andcreativity and confidence in their economy.And meanwhile, we’ll just keep working withthem and do the best we can.

Yes, I’m concerned about it, but I just haveto believe that sooner or later—and hope-fully, it will be sooner rather than later—they’ll come back, because they just have somany assets, they have so much talent.

Q. Does it frustrate you at all that theyrefuse to change some of the structural poli-cies that we have tried to get them to changeover the years?

The President. Yes, but it just takes time.I mean, look at how long the rest of the worldbeat up on us before we finally had the—in the eighties—look how long the rest ofthe world hit on us before we finally didsomething about our deficit. For all of thetalk about the globalization of the world’seconomies, nations are still governed by theirpeople, their own institutions; they deal withtheir own impediments as well as their ownpromise. And I think they’ll get there.

I think the Prime Minister of Japan is anable man and a man who has shown somepolitical courage already in making somechanges, and I think what we have to do iskeep pulling for them and do our best toshare what we believe will work. And we allneed a little humility because they—youknow what works in one decade is not always


great in the next decade. And all these coun-tries had to—they worked on us for a longtime before—you know, telling us we hadto so something about the deficit.

But I just hope that they will—I wish thatthey had the confidence in themselves rightnow that I have in them. I wish that theybelieved that they could make this sort ofleap into the 21st century economy and stillbe able to maintain their social fabric. AndI think eventually they’ll do it because I don’tthink they want to fail. I think they want tosucceed. And you can’t blame them for play-ing out these two tried and true strains ofeconomic recovery, on the deficit spendingand on the low interest rates, before gettingto—because that was easier to do than to dealwith the underlying structural issues. And Ithink eventually they’ll do that.

I mean, look at the pain that was causedin America in the 1980’s when all the indus-tries had to be restructured and all the—thewhole economy was topsy-turvy, and therewas a lot of difficulty there for people. Andcountries don’t willingly absorb that kind ofshort-term pain, even though they know thelong-term gain is out there.

So I just think that—but I think they’ll getto it. They’ll have to. And I think they will,and I think we just need to stick with them,keep encouraging them, keep supporting theright kind of change.

Q. Thank you very much.The President. It’s an interesting time to

be alive, gentlemen. Don’t you think?

NOTE: The interview began at 5:36 p.m. in theOval Office at the White House. In his remarks,the President referred to Francis S. Collins, Di-rector, National Human Genome Research Insti-tute, National Institutes of Health; former SenatorLloyd Bentsen; and Prime Minister Keizo Obuchiof Japan. An interviewer referred to Eric Lander,director, Whitehead/MIT Center for Genome Re-search. Participating in the interview were GeorgeHager of USA Today, Peter Gosselin of the LosAngeles Times, and Naftali Bendavid of the Chi-cago Tribune. This interview was released by theOffice of the Press Secretary on February 11. Atape was not available for verification of the con-tent of this interview.

Memorandum on United StatesMilitary Activities in East TimorFebruary 10, 2000

Presidential Determination No. 2000–12

Memorandum for the Secretary of StateSubject: United States Military Activities inEast Timor

Pursuant to the authority vested in me asPresident, including under sections 10(d)(1)and 10(a)(2)(B) of the United Nations Par-ticipation Act of 1945, as amended (22U.S.C. 287 et seq.) (the ‘‘Act’’), I hereby:

(a) determine that the deployment ofUnited States military forces to supportEast Timor’s transition to independencewithout reimbursement from theUnited Nations is important to the secu-rity interests of the United States; and

(b) delegate to you the authority containedin section 10(d)(1) of the Act with re-spect to assistance to support EastTimor’s transition to independence thatis covered by section 10 of the Act. Youare authorized and directed to reportthis determination to the Congress andto arrange for its publication in the Fed-eral Register.

William J. Clinton

NOTE: This Presidential determination was re-leased by the Office of the Press Secretary onFebruary 11.

Remarks on the Dedication of theJames S. Brady Press Briefing Roomand an Exchange With ReportersFebruary 11, 2000

The President. It’s the first time JoeLockhart’s ever introduced me, I think.[Laughter]

Press Secretary Joe Lockhart. Probablythe last.

The President. I thought the last phrasewas going to be, ‘‘and the man who makesmy job somewhere between impossible andmiserable every day.’’ [Laughter]

Well, ladies and gentlemen, this is a happyday for all of us, and, I believe, for people


throughout the United States. I want to wel-come Jim and Sarah, and their son, Scott.I want to welcome Mike and Larry and Jeraldand Pierre here, the former White HousePress Secretaries. I also want to remember,as I know Jim and Sarah would want me to,Jim’s Press Office Assistant Sally McElroy,who passed away last summer. Her husband,Robert Evans, is here, and we welcome him.

Today we honor a man whose courage,purpose and humor make him a standoutPress Secretary and an outstanding humanbeing. Jim Brady, after all, was the man whoconvinced the White House Press Corps toabandon decades of tradition and actuallyraise their hands when they wanted to aska question. [Laughter] Jim Brady was theman who changed press conferences forever,one day in the 1970’s, when he invited jour-nalists to see a bipartisan group of Senatorscutting the budget—with hedge trimmers.Jim Brady was the man who, when Membersof Congress proposed to give themselves a$50-a-day tax deduction, responded with apress release that was one word long: Stupid.[Laughter]

Jim Brady is living proof that you can’t killcourage, that it takes more than a cheaphandgun to destroy a strong spirit. As he him-self once said, ‘‘no one can shoot away yoursense of humor.’’

Jim Brady was the man who changed pressconferences forever for me on this issue. AndI want to thank him and Sarah from the bot-tom of my heart.

Every time I saw him in the early daysof my Presidency, and even before, when theBrady bill was being debated, I realized thathis ready smile and sense of humor had toovercome despair that none of us can fullyunderstand and pain that none of us has everreally experienced. I realized that he couldhave chosen to live his life out in private re-gret, but instead he chose a public embrace.He could have been remembered, no matterwhat he did, as a good Press Secretary, acommitted campaigner, a world-class chilicook. But he instead chose the connectionto other human beings and an eye to the fu-ture. Even when he was still in the hospitaland had doubts about his own future, hereached out to his fellow patients, to givethem reasons to keep going. And for more

than 15 years, now, he has traveled our Na-tion on behalf of the National Head InjuryFoundation and other groups, with a simplemessage: Persevere; never give up.

Jim and Sarah have known uncommonperseverance, and they have demonstrated tous what really counts in life. They have builta bipartisan coalition in this country tostrengthen our Nation’s gun laws, to makeour children and our future safer. Againsttremendous odds, they fought for 7 years topass the Brady bill. It was my great honorto sign it into law in 1993. In 1994, we passedthe assault weapons ban. We then made itillegal for a young person to buy or receivea handgun.

And what has happened? We have seengun crime fall by more than a third. We haveseen the Brady bill keeps guns out of thehands of nearly a half-million felons, fugi-tives, and stalkers. We cannot know howmany people are alive and fully strong andhealthy today because of the labors of Jimand Sarah Brady.

Sometimes in Washington, it’s easy tocover the politics and not the policy. Andsometimes it’s even more interesting, I’msure, for all of you to cover the politics andnot the policy. But when you see Jim andSarah—for many of you not just colleaguesbut friends—you know that what we do herereally does make a difference, and they havemade a difference.

As we have been painfully reminded herein Washington these past few days, guns stillare claiming the lives of too many of our chil-dren. There is more work to do, and Jim andSarah are ready to do it. They have calledfor extending Brady background checks tosales at gun shows, for mandating child safetylocks to be sold with every handgun, for ban-ning the most violent juvenile offenders fromever owning handguns, from ending the im-portation of large-capacity ammunition clips,and for ensuring that all handgun ownershave a State license, showing they’ve passeda background check and know how to handlea gun safely.

It is truly fitting that this room will benamed for Jim Brady, for working here re-quires tenacity and perseverance and, aboveall, a sense of humor. Joe and I also thoughtabout enacting another one of Jim’s ideas


that he and President Reagan advocated,hinging the floor to give deserving reportersimmediate, involuntary access to the swim-ming pool below. [Laughter] But as muchas I admire Jim Brady, I decided that Ishouldn’t do that. Even though I’m not run-ning for anything, I still need a little bit ofpress pander from time to time.

Today we give name to a room. But Jimand Sarah Brady have already given far moreto their national crusade. I want to finish myremarks by quoting a higher authority: HelenThomas. [Laughter] A few years ago, Helensaid these words to Jim Brady’s biographer,‘‘He’s like a great tree standing by the river.He’s a role model, and that’s what life is allabout. He realizes life is to be lived, that weshould give our all, that we’re lucky to bealive.’’

Jim and Sarah, may we all continue to drawinspiration from your strength and spirit herein the James Brady Briefing Room and allaround our Nation.

Now, I want to unveil this plaque and readit to you.

[At this point, the plaque was unveiled.]

The President. It says, ‘‘This room isnamed in honor of James S. Brady, WhiteHouse Press Secretary from January 23, 1981until January 20, 1989. Mr. Brady served hisNation with honor and distinction, strength-ening the bond between Government andpress. May his courage and dedication con-tinue to inspire all who work in this roomand beyond.’’

Congratulations, Jim Brady.

[At this point, former Press Secretary JamesBrady and Sarah Brady made brief remarks.]

Internet SecurityQ. Mr. President, do you want to update

us on the cyberterrorism investigation? Any-thing new there?

The President. No, but as I said, we aregoing to have some people in next week, andwe’re going to look at our overall capabilities.

Q. What can you do, what can the Govern-ment do?

The President. Well, I think we’ve got a$2 billion budget up there on the Hill now,to increase our capacity to make all systemsless resistant to hacking and to train more

young people and pay them better to comeand help work on our side of this issue.

But let me say—I did a couple of inter-views yesterday to make a general point Iwould like to reiterate to all of you—basicallythe development of the Internet and the so-phistication of the computers has been agreat thing for the world. It’s brought us clos-er together. It’s given opportunities to peoplewho wouldn’t otherwise have them, some-thing that Jim and Sarah care a lot about.They’ve helped to empower people with dis-abilities all over America, and all over theworld, to realize their full potential. But thisgreater openness and speed of this systemand the importance of it have necessarilymade for greater vulnerability for people whoare just mischievous and people who havefar darker motives.

And this is no different from any other de-velopment in human history. If you go backfrom the beginning of time, where things ofvalue are stored, people with bad motives willtry to get to those things of value. Willy Sut-ton said he robbed banks because that’swhere the money is.

So now, vast things of value are stored inour computers and transactions of great val-ues occur on the Internet, and what you willsee here, there will not be an instantaneoussolution to this, but banks are a lot harderto rob today than they used to be. That’swhat’s going to happen here. This will be anongoing effort to try to make sure we getall the benefits of the Internet, all the bene-fits of the computer revolution, but we de-velop better defenses and better defenders.And I believe we will do that.

In terms of these specific instances, we’redoing everything we can through our FBIcenter in western Pennsylvania, and in otherplaces, to do the appropriate investigations.

Middle East Peace ProcessQ. In the Middle East, Mr. President, do

you fear that the Israel-Lebanon conflict isspinning out of control? And what does thismean for the peace process in general?

The President. Well, so far I think bothsides have tried to keep it within control buttake the—the Israelis have taken the retalia-tory action they felt they had to take. But


there has been some restraint there in thehope of keeping the peace process alive.

It seems to me that it is a sober reminderof why we ought to resume the peace processwith great determination. A comprehensivepeace between Syria and Lebanon and Israelis the only way, ultimately, I think, to resolvethe continuing difficulties over many years,now, along that border.

And similarly, I think peace between Israeland the Palestinians is critical to resolvingthe gnawing problems which reoccur fromtime to time within the borders of the coun-tries. So I would hope that it would redoublepeople’s energy for it, and so far, I think thatthat’s where we are—that you don’t have thepeople who are the real players here, as near-ly as I can see, and I watch it pretty closely,you know—giving up on the peace process.You do have a lot of frustration, anger; there’sstill a surprising amount of misunderstandingof each other’s motives, given how long thesefolks have been living together and workingtogether. But we’ll see. I’m hopeful.

Northern Ireland Peace Process

Q. Mr. President, the British Governmentis on the verge of moving to suspend thepower-sharing Government in Northern Ire-land. How would you view that move, first,sir? And secondarily, the editorial opinionthere seems to blame the IRA for the latestimpasse. Do you have a comment on that,sir?

The President. Well, when the matter isresolved I might have more to say, but rightnow you should know that, at least beforeI came out here, the thing was still hangingsome fire. But it wasn’t clear to me what wasgoing to happen.

I have been heavily involved, and thewhole administration has been, in the last fewweeks in trying to keep the Irish peace proc-ess on track. We believe that all the require-ments of the Good Friday accords, which thevoters of Northern Ireland and the Irish Re-public embraced, should be fulfilled. And wehope that a way can be found to keep thisgoing. And until there is a suspension, that’sall I want to say, because we’re working hardon this, and there’s still some chance thatwe can go forward without a suspension.

Should there be a suspension, it is impera-tive that all the parties do it on terms whichdo not allow a back-sliding, and that the op-portunity be taken to figure out a way for-ward that again will allow everybody to meetall the requirements that the Irish votersvoted for in breathtaking margins.

I don’t want to say anything else until weknow how this plays out today. We’ve gota few more hours here. When we see howit’s resolved today, I will say a little more.But I have to be very careful. I’ve been work-ing very hard on this, and I want to be apositive, not a negative factor.

Press Secretary Joe Lockhart. This willbe the last question.

2000 ElectionQ. This is a tough political question that

I hope all of your returning guests can appre-ciate. You’ve probably heard of the expres-sion, ‘‘Clinton fatigue,’’ and I’m wonderingwhat you think of that as a phenomenon, andwhether that will have some bearing on howmany people you go out to campaign for inthis election year.

The President. Well, I get tired from timeto time. [Laughter] That’s the only one I’mfamiliar with. [Laughter] I don’t even knowhow to comment on that. I’ve got more re-quests right now to help than I can fulfill,and I think what I will be inclined to do is—I always feel that people running for officeare the best judge of what’s in their own in-terest, not me.

And I got plenty to do here. But so far,I’ve been asked to do more events than Ican do. And I had—I went down to the RioGrande Valley this week, for example, a placethat I was the first President since DwightEisenhower to visit. And I made my thirdvisit down there; I had a wonderfulreception.

But I can’t comment on that. I think that—my guess is that that will vary from State toState, and congressional district to congres-sional district. I’ll just—I’ll do what I can tohelp the people and the causes I believe in,but I don’t want to get in the way.

I also find that the ability of any outsiderto affect in a positive way the course of anelection is far more limited than is generallysupposed. The voters understand that every

285Administration of William J. Clinton, 2000

election year they get to be in control again.And so, if you notice, like when I went tocampaign for Mr. Street in Philadelphia, aplace that has been enormously good to me,I was very careful in what I said to the voters.I said, you shouldn’t be for him because Iam, but you know, I’m your friend; here aremy reasons; I hope you’ll listen to my reasonsand make up your own mind. It’s a very deli-cate thing. I’ve watched this for years.

I remember once, Jim Brady’s old boss,President Reagan, in ’84, when he was win-ning every vote in America, came to Arkansasand made an appearance for my opponent.And afterward, on Election Day, he got 62percent of the vote, so did I. [Laughter] Soyou have to be—you’ve got to be humble inthese things and just sort of show up for workevery day.

NOTE: The President spoke at 10:40 a.m. in theJames S. Brady Press Briefing Room at the WhiteHouse. In his remarks, he referred to Mr. Brady’swife, Sarah Brady, chair, Handgun Control, Inc.;former White House Press Secretaries MichaelMcCurry, Larry M. Speakes, J.F. terHorst, andPierre E.G. Salinger; and Mayor John F. Streetof Philadelphia, PA. The transcript released bythe Office of the Press Secretary also includedthe remarks of former Press Secretary JamesBrady, Sarah Brady, and Press Secretary JoeLockhart. James S. Brady, former White HousePress Secretary, was wounded in the 1981 assas-sination attempt on President Ronald Reagan.

Statement on Peacekeeping Effortsin East TimorFebruary 11, 2000

Over the last several months, the UnitedStates has worked with our partners in South-east Asia to help East Timor in its transitionto independence and peace. I am proud wewere able to support the efforts of the Aus-tralian-led INTERFET force, which hasbrought security and hope to East Timor.With its mission accomplished, INTERFETis now handing responsibility to a U.N.peacekeeping mission, through which thecountries of the region will once again pro-vide the vast majority of troops.

Today I am announcing that the UnitedStates will continue to support our friendsand allies in this important endeavor. A small

number of U.S. officers will serve as observ-ers in the U.N. mission. As part of their nor-mal exercises, other U.S. personnel will con-tribute to humanitarian efforts, such as re-building schools and restoring medical serv-ices. These efforts will complement our fi-nancial contributions to the peacekeepingoperation, as well as humanitarian and devel-opment assistance to East Timor that willtotal over $70 million this year. We will alsocontinue to stand by Indonesia as it continuesits hopeful democratic transformation.

In this way, we will contribute to the birthof two new democracies in a region wherefreedom and tolerance are taking root. Andwe will bolster the ability and willingness ofthe countries in that region to take the leadin building peace.

Digest of OtherWhite House Announcements

The following list includes the President’s publicschedule and other items of general interest an-nounced by the Office of the Press Secretary andnot included elsewhere in this issue.

February 5In the afternoon, the President traveled to

Chappaqua, NY.

February 7In the morning, the President returned to

Washington, DC. Later, he traveled to HotSprings, VA, where he attended the 2000House Democratic Issues Conference. In theafternoon, the President returned to Wash-ington, DC.

The President announced his intention toappoint Mary Lou Leary as Acting AssistantAttorney General in the Office of Justice Pro-grams at the Department of Justice.

February 8The President announced his intention to

nominate Donna Jean Hrinak to be Ambas-sador to Venezuela.

The President announced his intention tonominate Douglas Alan Hartwick to be Am-bassador to Laos.

286 Administration of William J. Clinton, 2000

The President announced his intention tonominate Christopher R. Hill to be Ambas-sador to Poland.

The President announced his intention tonominate John R. Dinger to be Ambassadorto Mongolia.

The President announced his intention tonominate Mary Ann Peters to be Ambassadorto Bangladesh.

The President announced his intention tonominate Christopher A. McLean to be Ad-ministrator, Rural Utilities Service at the De-partment of Agriculture.

The President announced his intention tonominate John Martin O’Keefe to be Ambas-sador to Kyrgyz Republic.

February 9In the morning, the President traveled to

McAllen, TX.In the evening, the President traveled to

Dallas, TX, and later, he returned to Wash-ington, DC, arriving after midnight.

The President announced his intention tonominate Donnie R. Marshall to be Adminis-trator of the Drug Enforcement Administra-tion.

The President announced his intention tonominate Michael J. Senko to be Ambassadorto the Marshall Islands and to Kiribati.

The President announced his intention tonominate Alan D. Solomont to be a memberof the Board of Directors of the Corporationfor National and Community Service.

The President announced his intention tonominate Danny Lee McDonald and BradleyA. Smith to be Commissioners on the Fed-eral Election Commission.


nominate Edward William Gnehm, Jr., to beAmbassador to Australia.

The President announced his intention tonominate Daniel A. Johnson to be Ambas-sador to Suriname.

The President announced his intention tonominate Ronald D. Godard to be Ambas-sador to Guyana.

The President announced his intention toappoint Valerie Crotty as a member of theCommission on President Scholars.

The President announced his intention toappoint Jane Macon as a member to the Na-tional Selective Service Appeals Board.

The President announced his intention toappoint Haim Saban as a member of thePresident’s Export Council.

The White House announced that thePresident asked Energy Secretary BillRichardson to take new measures to addressthe critical situation involving home heatingoil, and that he directed Health and HumanServices Secretary Donna Shalala to releaseadditional funding in Low Income Home En-ergy Assistance emergency funds for States,territories, and tribes due to continuing in-creases in home heating fuel prices thiswinter.


nominate Thomas N. Slonaker to be SpecialTrustee for American Indians at the Depart-ment of the Interior.

The President announced his intention tonominate E. Ashley Wills to be Ambassadorto Sri Lanka and to Maldives.

The White House announced that thePresident announced import relief for theU.S. line pipe industry.

The White House announced that thePresident announced import relief for theU.S. steel wire rod industry.

NominationsSubmitted to the Senate

The following list does not include promotions ofmembers of the Uniformed Services, nominationsto the Service Academies, or nominations of For-eign Service officers.

Submitted February 7

Carey Cavanaugh,of Florida, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Counselor, for therank of Ambassador during his tenure ofservice as Special Negotiator for Nagorno-Karabakh and New Independent States Re-gional Conflicts.


Rust Macpherson Deming,of Maryland, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Minister-Counselor,to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato Republic of Tunisia.

John W. Limbert,of Vermont, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Counselor, to beAmbassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Islamic Republic of Mauritania.

Roger A. Meece,of Washington, a career member of the Sen-ior Foreign Service, class of Counselor, tobe Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Republic of Malawi.

Ronald E. Neumann,of Virginia, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Minister-Counselor,to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the State of Bahrain.


John Antoon II,of Florida, to be U.S. District Judge for theMiddle District of Florida, vice G. KendallSharp, retired.

Robert J. Cindrich,of Pennsylvania, to be U.S. Circuit Judge forthe Third Circuit, vice Timothy K. Lewis, re-tired.

John R. Dinger,of Florida, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Counselor, to beAmbassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato Mongolia.

Audrey G. Fleissig,of Missouri, to be U.S. Attorney for the East-ern District of Missouri for the term of 4years, vice Edward L. Dowd, Jr., resigned.

Phyllis J. Hamilton,of California, to be U.S. District Judge forthe Northern District of California, vice anadditional position in accordance with 28U.S.C. 133(b)(1).

Douglas Alan Hartwick,of Washington, a career member of the Sen-ior Foreign Service, class of Counselor, tobe Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.

Christopher Robert Hill,of Rhode Island, a career member of theSenior Foreign Service, class of Minister-Counselor, to be Ambassador Extraordinaryand Plenipotentiary of the United States ofAmerica to the Republic of Poland.

Donna Jean Hrinak,of Virginia, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Minister-Counselor,to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Republic of Venezuela.

Kent R. Markus,of Ohio, to be U.S. Circuit Judge for the SixthCircuit, vice David A. Nelson, retired.

Danny Lee McDonald,of Oklahoma, to be a member of the FederalElection Commission for a term expiringApril 30, 2005 (reappointment).

Christopher A. McLean,of Nebraska, to be Administrator, Rural Utili-ties Service, Department of Agriculture, viceWally B. Beyer.

John Martin O’Keefe,of Virginia, a career member of the the Sen-ior Foreign Service, class of Minister-Coun-selor, to be Ambassador Extraordinary andPlenipotentiary of the United State of Amer-ica to the Kyrgyz Republic.

Mary Ann Peters,of California, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Minister-Counselor,to be Ambassador Extraordinary and

288 Administration of William J. Clinton, 2000

Plenipotentiary of the United States ofAmerica to the People’s Republic of Ban-gladesh.

Marc Racicot,of Montana, to be a member of the Boardof Directors of the Corporation for Nationaland Community Service for a term expiringOctober 6, 2004, vice Reatha Clark King, re-signed.

Bradley A. Smith,of Ohio, to be a member of the Federal Elec-tion Commission for a term expiring April30, 2005, vice Lee Ann Elliott, resigned.

Alan D. Solomont,of Massachusetts, to be a member of theBoard of Directors of the Corporation forNational and Community Service for a termexpiring October 6, 2004, vice Carol W.Kinsley, term expired.


Edward William Gnehm, Jr.,of Georgia, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of career minister, tobe Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato Australia.

Ronald D. Godard,of Texas, a career member of the Senior For-eign Service, class of Minister-Counselor, tobe Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Co-operative Republic of Guyana.

Daniel A. Johnson,of Florida, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Minister-Counselor,to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Republic of Suriname.

V. Manuel Rocha,of California, a career member of the SeniorForeign Service, class of Counselor, to beAmbassador Extraordinary and Pleni-potentiary of the United States of Americato the Republic of Bolivia.

Michael J. Senko,of the District of Columbia, a career memberof the Senior Foreign Service, class of Coun-

selor, to be Ambassador Extraordinary andPlenipotentiary of the United States ofAmerica to the Republic of the Marshall Is-lands, and to serve concurrently and withoutadditional compensation as AmbassadorExtraordinary and Plenipotentiary of theUnited States of America to the Republic ofKiribati.

Checklistof White House Press Releases

The following list contains releases of the Officeof the Press Secretary that are neither printed asitems nor covered by entries in the Digest ofOther White House Announcements.

Released February 7

Transcript of a press briefing by NationalEconomic Council Director Gene Sperling,Council of Economic Advisers ChairmanMartin Baily, Treasury Secretary LarrySummers, Office of Management and Budg-et Director Jack Lew on the fiscal year 2001budget

Released February 8

Transcript of a press briefing by Press Sec-retary Joe Lockhart

Released February 9

Announcement of nominations for the U.S.Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, U.S.Court of Appeals for the Six Circuit, U.S.District Court for the Middle District ofFlorida, and U.S. District Court for theNorthern District of California

Released February 10


Transcript of a press briefing by Council ofEconomic Advisers Chairman Martin Bailyon the President’s Economic Report


Fact sheet: Embassy Security Funding

Statement by the Press Secretary on thePresident’s action on the home heating oilsituation

Released February 11


Acts Approvedby the President

NOTE: No acts approved by the President werereceived by the Office of the Federal Registerduring the period covered by this issue.