[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George H. W. Bush (1992, Book I)]
[April 14, 1992]
[Pages 600-603]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



[[Page 600]]

Remarks at a Bush-Quayle Fundraising Dinner in Dearborn, Michigan

April 14, 1992
    Thank you very, very much. And John Engler, thank you, sir, 
Governor, for that kind introduction. John Engler and I have been side 
by side in politics for a long time, and I'll tell you, I am mighty 
proud of the job he is doing as Governor of this great State. You're 
lucky, and you ought to know it. I might salute your lovely wife, 
Michelle. He had to go to Texas to find her, but here she is, and we're 
all for her, too.
    And let me thank Mike Timmis for the thoughtful invocation and Randy 
Agley for the superb job as master of ceremonies and for so many other 
things as well. Also, of course, our special thanks to our esteemed 
friend Max Fisher, whom we heard from tonight, always at my side, always 
with sound counsel and advice, a great friend of every Republican and a 
great leader of this State and, indeed, of our country. Max, thank you, 
sir.
    And of course, if you want to get the job done, get Heinz Prechter 
involved; he'll twist the arm right out of your socket. But he did a 
first-class job. And I also want to thank Dave Doyle and Chuck Yob and 
Tim Leuliette. And let me also acknowledge Bob Mosbacher, our former 
Secretary of Commerce, now one of the great leaders of our campaign; 
Bobby Holt, the national finance chairman, whom you met; and Michigan 
natives Spence Abraham, who used to be the State party chairman, now 
doing a superb job for the NRCC in Washington, and then our special 
friend Bob Teeter, who is calling a lot of the shots at our campaign. 
We've got a great team, and I'm grateful to each and every one of them, 
all here tonight.
    And there's two others I was privileged to sit between, Andrea 
Fischer and Yosef Chafari. These are the two leading ticket sellers. And 
I had a fairly relaxed evening, sitting between these two leading ticket 
sellers. They're trying to sell me tickets to the next event. [Laughter] 
But I'm telling you, this thing was put together in quite a short period 
of time, relatively short period of time, and we are very, very 
grateful. I understand that there's even an overflow room. And after we 
finish these remarks, I want to go in there.
    I will repeat for the benefit of the people in the overflow room: 
You are safe. By that, I'm referring to a joke that Billy Graham used to 
tell about the speaker that went on and on and on. And finally, the 
chairman picked up the gavel, heaved it at the speaker, missed him, and 
hit the woman in the front row. And she said, ``Hit me again; I can 
still hear him.'' [Laughter] So, to the people in the overflow room, you 
are safe.
    Let me say that it's a pleasure to visit the Detroit area. On our 
final approach on Air Force One, we had to climb a little higher over 
Tiger Stadium. Cecil Fielder's turn at bat, at the batting cage there, 
and we wanted to be out of his range. [Laughter]
    Let me thank all of you who had contributed so generously to this 
reelection campaign. With help like yours and the efforts of millions of 
people like you at the grassroots level, our team is going to win 4 more 
years to lead this country. I'm absolutely confident of that.
    And as John said, we have been trying since 1989, working for reform 
and change. And I've often had to buck a Congress that, frankly, is 
resistant to change. But now, this year, in the election year, we can 
put it in focus, the things we've been trying to get done, and let the 
American people say whether they want change or not.
    We must accelerate reform, reforms to strengthen the bulwark of our 
Nation's character, and I mean the American family. A major mayors group 
came into my office, and the thing that they say is the most common 
problem in the great urban areas of America is the dissolution of the 
American family. And we've got to find ways to strengthen it.
    We've got to find reforms to preserve half a century's hard-won 
gains for world freedom and peace, reforms to provide Americans with 
first-rate jobs in this whole new global, the new world economy. And

[[Page 601]]

that's why it's so important that you're here tonight. We have much to 
do if we're to prepare our Nation to compete in this exciting new 
century ahead.
    None of us can do it alone. But together we are up to any challenge 
that lies ahead. And frankly, I'm a little sick and tired of some of the 
gloomy news out there every single night, telling us what's wrong with 
the United States of America. There's a lot right about it, and I'm 
going to take that message to the American people.
    But your support is key if we're truly going to change this country. 
And it's key if we're to revolutionize our schools, make health care 
accessible and affordable. It's key to the frivolous court cases that 
drain our economy; reform the way our Government works, especially up 
there on Capitol Hill. And finally, your support is key if we're to open 
markets the world over for American goods and services, to sustain and 
to create jobs for Americans, jobs right here in Michigan.
    Each one of you tonight is making a difference on these five 
important challenges because they're all part of my mission as President 
of the United States. And with your support, I aim to complete that 
mission. We've got to get this job done.
    Take education, for example. Our America 2000 education strategy 
thrives on local initiatives. Polly Williams in Milwaukee and Patrick 
Rooney in Indianapolis have captured national attention for their new 
programs to give inner-city parents what wealthier families have right 
now, a real choice for schools for their children.
    And right here in Detroit there's an exciting new effort in the 
inner city, Cornerstone Schools. And one of the leaders is Eddie 
Edwards, a Protestant pastor in the black community, whom I have been 
pleased to recognize as one of our daily Points of Light for our Nation. 
A key partner with the Reverend Edwards in this project is Archbishop 
Maida of the Catholic Church. And they've won generous support from 
business leaders as they break down barriers and reinvent, literally 
reinvent excellent schools for children who need them most. And they 
didn't wait for bureaucrats in Washington, DC, to mandate them or to 
give them direction. They rejected business-as-usual. And I salute them 
for reform. And our America 2000 education strategy will change America 
by encouraging that kind of innovation.
    And meanwhile, grassroots Republicans in the Michigan Legislature 
are working with our great Governor on Michigan 2000, this State's plan 
to give parents more freedom and responsibility in their children's 
education. And there's a powerful reform spirit in Michigan to ease the 
strictures of teacher tenure and certification, to establish solid core 
curricula, and to measure results, and to give individual principals new 
incentives to innovate through charter schools and school empowerment.
    I can assure you, the Republican reformers in Michigan's Legislature 
are light years ahead of the liberal Democratic leadership in the United 
States Congress. And I can't wait to elect a new Congress that will work 
for true reform of our Nation's schools. And I might add, a centerpiece 
for our strategy for reform is choice for parents for public, private, 
and religious schools. And then you watch the schools that are not 
chosen bring themselves up through competition. Parental choice is an 
important key to our reform program.
    You know, Michigan is also a leader in making quality health care 
available and affordable to absolutely everyone. And Michigan soon hopes 
to become the first State in the Nation to enroll its entire Medicaid 
caseload, one million people, in managed care. Managed care improves 
quality while cutting costs. And it's an important part of our national 
health care reform package. We have the best quality health care in the 
entire world here in the United States, but too many people lack basic 
health insurance coverage. And the Capitol Hill liberals' ideas of 
health care are expensive and coercive.
    And some Democratic leaders promote a plan they call ``play or 
pay.'' It's a mandated benefit scheme whose costs would be virtually 
unmanageable. And then there's another favorite Democratic plan: It's to 
make the Federal Government the monopoly 
provider of national health insurance. 
And if you think socialized medicine is a good idea, ask a Canadian for 
a second

[[Page 602]]

opinion. Because central planners ration their health care, Canadians 
often must wait weeks or months for treatments readily available to 
Americans.
    And like my agenda for literally revolutionizing our schools, my 
health care reform package emphasizes consumer choice. It promotes 
private sector competition. It promotes innovation. Transferable credits 
and tax deductions would enable virtually every American to purchase 
basic health insurance. We would change the law to assure that no one is 
denied coverage for a preexisting condition or because of a job change. 
And in many cases, providing basic health insurance will help us drive 
down costs. And right now, for instance, poor people who lack insurance 
often go to emergency rooms for nonemergency treatment. Well, with 
health insurance, these kind of cases would be handled in family 
doctors' offices more effectively and for much less cost. New 
efficiencies such as this would enable us to reform our health care 
system without having to raise taxes on the overtaxed American people.
    Another institution that we've been trying to change--and now that 
we've taken the case to the American people maybe we'll have a chance to 
get it changed--one that's ripe for reform, is our legal system. We have 
become the most litigious society on Earth. We have 3 times as many 
lawyers per capita as Great Britain, 5 times as many as France. And I'm 
often asked, if an apple a day keeps the doctor away, what works for 
lawyers? [Laughter] Litigation costs, liability insurance costs, and 
other costs associated with litigation or the avoidance of litigation 
are estimated to run as high as $300 billion a year. And that is an 
indirect tax on every business transaction in America, and it siphons 
off more than 2.5 percent of our gross national product. And that's 5 
times as high as the average in other nations.
    And it's high time, then, we spent more time reaching out our hand 
and helping each other and less time suing each other. And that is why I 
have asked the Congress to pass my ``Access to Justice Act,'' a reform 
bill to encourage people to resolve problems out of court and to crack 
down on frivolous lawsuits by making losers in certain cases, not all, 
but in certain cases, pay more court costs. And it's time for action to 
stop the epidemic of lawsuits. And we need some changes in Congress to 
get an up-or-down vote on this important reform program.
    And now, if we're to reform education and health care and our legal 
system and if we're to reduce redtape and regulation and get our 
horrendous Federal deficit down, we must reform the United States 
Congress. And our congressional system is simply not working. And over 
the years we've all seen the symptoms: gridlock on important 
legislation; unconscionable delays on nominations; failure to modernize 
our banking laws, to reform our system, financial system; failure to 
strengthen our anticrime laws that would support the police, have a 
little more compassion for the victims of crime and a little less for 
the criminals themselves; failure to pass fair and simple proposals to 
stimulate our economy. I still have seven laserlike proposals that would 
stimulate the economy without increasing this deficit.
    Major reforms are in order. And it's time for the Congress to govern 
itself by the laws it imposes on others. And I am going to fight to make 
them now pass laws that will put them under the same laws that you and I 
have to live by, laws they've exempted themselves from. No more special 
treatment. And it's time for sweeping reform of campaign financing, time 
to eliminate the special interest PAC's. It's time for real spending 
reform; time for the President to have what 43 Governors have, the line-
item veto. And I'm going to take that case to the American people this 
fall.
    And it's time to make Congress a citizen assembly, not a club for 
careerists. And it's time to limit the terms of Congress. My term is 
limited to two terms, and I want to serve both of them--[laughter]--but 
nevertheless, it's limited to two terms, and I don't see that it would 
hurt to have Congress limited to six terms for a Member of the House and 
two terms for a Senator. I think it would be good. I think it would keep 
Government more active and vital and closer to the people.
    In my second and final term as President, I want to lead America in 
adopting each of

[[Page 603]]

these historic reforms, these changes. I'm also working to lead America 
to new success in the global economy. We're working to open markets to 
American products, to create new jobs for the great American worker. And 
if we succeed with the current round of world trade talks, the GATT 
talks, world output could increase by $5 trillion over the next decade, 
and more than $1 trillion of that boom will go to the United States of 
America. Now, this applies no less to Michigan than to the rest of the 
Nation. With the open markets and the level playing field that I'm 
fighting to achieve, I am confident that American workers can 
outperform, outproduce, outcompete anyone, anywhere in the world.
    I was commenting to John Engler as we flew in here this afternoon 
that Detroit will always be a special place for me. It was here 12 years 
ago that Ronald Reagan and I accepted our nomination for President and 
Vice President. And it was here that Ronald Reagan reminded us of Tom 
Paine's revolutionary words: ``We have it in our power to begin the 
world over again.''
    Think how much we have accomplished since then. Think of our 
blessings. With God's help and with hard work to support our 
convictions, we've helped change the world. We've helped the peoples of 
Eastern Europe and the old Soviet empire peacefully throw off the yoke 
of communism. And today we're aiding their transition to free markets, 
helping them reduce their nuclear arsenals. And we stood up against 
dictators and exporters of totalitarian revolution in Latin America, and 
we've helped democracy take root in nearly every country of our 
hemisphere.
    When a ruthless tyrant overran Kuwait and threatened to engulf the 
Middle East in its worst conflagration, we protected the people of 
Israel and Turkey and Saudi Arabia. And we organized an unprecedented 
world coalition, and we liberated Kuwait from the aggressor. And in the 
process we accomplished a breakthrough sought by every President from 
Truman to Reagan. We brought Arab neighbors face to face with Israel for 
the first time at the peace table.
    And we won the cold war and we stopped Saddam's aggression because, 
12 years ago, we renewed our faith in our values and we strengthened our 
defenses. The United States is now the undisputed leader of the entire 
world. And we will keep ourselves strong. And we will stay engaged in 
world politics. This is no time to pull back and to retreat and to be 
afraid of the changes in the world. In world security and in world 
markets, we will remain engaged.
    And we have a mission together to carry on the American dream for 
new generations. And with your help and with grassroots action, we can 
win a mandate to lead this country for 4 more years. And we can keep our 
country open to the contributions of immigrants, of trade, of ideas. And 
we can work together and win our plans to reform our schools, our health 
care system, our very system of Government. And we can assure that when 
we reach the new century, America still will be the strongest, the 
bravest, the freest Nation on the face of the Earth.
    Thank you all. And may God bless each and every one of you and our 
great country, the United States of America. Thank you very much.

                    Note: The President spoke at 7:55 p.m. at the Ritz-
                        Carlton Hotel. In his remarks, he referred to 
                        Max Fisher, Bush-Quayle '92 honorary dinner 
                        chairman; Heinz Prechter, national finance 
                        cochairman; Dave Doyle, Michigan Republican 
                        Party chairman; Chuck Yob, Michigan Republican 
                        national committeeman; Tim Leuliette, Bush-
                        Quayle Michigan finance chairman; and Robert 
                        Teeter, Bush-Quayle campaign chairman.