[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George H. W. Bush (1992-1993, Book II)]
[October 28, 1992]
[Pages 2033-2037]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks at a Rally in Toledo, Ohio
October 28, 1992

    The President. Thank you so very much. Let me just thank Bruce 
Willis, a man of conviction. I'll tell you a little story about Bruce. 
About 4 months ago, when everyone was declaring us dead and buried 
politically, we got a phone call at the White House. Somebody came to me 
and said, ``Well, Bruce Willis is calling.'' I said, ``Well, how do you 
know it's Bruce Willis?'' And they said, ``Well, it is.'' So we called 
back, and when things were really rough, down he came. Barbara and I had 
dinner with him. And he has been out there, working hard, helping me at 
every turn, and I am very, very grateful to him.
    Let me tell you something that I think Ohioans know, but again, on a 
very personal basis something I feel strongly about. I know you know 
you've got a great Governor. But I want you to know that the Voinoviches 
are close, personal friends of ours to whom we will always be grateful. 
He is a good and decent and strong leader for this State, and I'm 
grateful to George Voinovich.
    I want to salute Walbridge Mayor Robson; and Donna Owens, the former 
Mayor of Toledo; Tom Nowe, the Republican Party chairman. Do me a good 
favor. Do yourselves a favor. Do the country a favor. Clean Senate, and 
send Mike DeWine to the United States Senate. We don't need any more 
gridlocked Congress, so help me clean House, and send Ken Brown to the 
United States Congress.
    I love this sign back here, ``Six days to victory.'' Believe me, we 
are going to win this election. The reason we're going to win is that 
there is a vast difference in experience, a vast difference in 
philosophy, and a vast difference in character and trust. Believe me, 
character and trust matter for President of the United States.
    Governor Voinovich kind of put it out there as it is, talking about 
the Arkansas record. One reason I will win the election is, after 11 
months of distorting our record, we begin to put into focus the Arkansas 
record. I'll repeat just one or two parts of it, because it is 50th in 
the quality of environmental initiatives in Arkansas, 50th in percentage 
of adults with college degrees, 50th spending on criminal justice, 49th 
per capita of police protection, 48th in percentage of adults with a 
high school diploma, and on and on and on it goes.
    Governor Clinton bragged about leading the Nation in jobs. They did 
it for one year, and he was out of the State for 85 percent of the year. 
The rest of the time, they were 30 percent behind the national.
    You know, there was a scary moment in one of those debates. He said, 
``I want to do for America what I've done to Arkansas.'' I said, ``No 
way. Please, no.''
    No, but, you know, if you listen to Governor Clinton and the Ozone 
Man, and all they do is talk about--you know who I

[[Page 2034]]

mean, Mr. Ozone? You know what they'd do to the auto workers right here 
in Toledo? They want CAFE standards, those are fuel efficiency 
standards, of 40 to 45 miles per gallon. Talk to the union guys working 
in the plants here in the auto business. That will put almost every Ohio 
auto worker out of work, if we went for the extreme on the environment. 
I have a strong environmental record, but I'm not going to let Mr. Ozone 
dictate to the American worker.
    One of the reasons things are moving--and everybody here knows that 
it's moving nationally--good news out there today on these national 
surveys. One reason it's moving is that people do not want $150 billion 
in new taxes and $220 billion in new spending. We cannot get the deficit 
going up. We've got to bring it down. Let me tell you how we're going to 
do it.
    We're going to control the growth of spending, and then I'm going to 
get the American people to insist that we get a balanced budget 
amendment to force the Congress to do it; that we get a check-off so 
every person in this country paying income tax can check 10 percent on 
their income tax and make that go to one thing, and that's one thing 
alone: reducing the deficit. The Congress is going to have to cut to 
make that possible. Then the third thing we're going to do is get the 
American people to insist that the President be given what 43 Governors 
have. Give me that line-item veto, and let's get that spending under 
control. Those three things will help enormously.
    There's one more that I like. Presidents serve two terms. Let's give 
the Congress back to the people and have term limits for the Members of 
the United States Congress.
    I had it figured out one day in one of the speeches. I think 
Governor Clinton and the Ozone Man had about 58 references to change. 
Change, change, change. Raise the taxes $150 billion, and that's all 
you'll have left in your pocket is change. We're not going to do that.
    Something happened yesterday that's casting fear into the hearts of 
these talking heads on television, fear into the hearts of the Clinton-
Gore team. You know what it was? It came out that our economy had grown 
at 2.7 percent for the last quarter, and it puts the lie to the fact 
that we are in a deep recession. And yes, people are hurting; and yes, a 
guy has a job today and might not know whether he's going to have it 
tomorrow. But the answer is, we are not in a recession. We are growing. 
If you go to their plan, you'll put us back into a Jimmy Carter malaise 
days, with interest rates at 21----
    Audience members. Boo-o-o!
    The President. Hey, wait a minute, I don't want to ruin this 
meeting, but you remember what it was when you had a Democratic 
President and a liberal--you had 21.5 percent interest rates, and you 
had inflation at 15 percent. They did it through the same Clinton 
siren's call of tax or spend. Let's keep this economy growing. Let's 
reduce the Federal deficit. Let's control spending, and let's control 
taxes.
    Two point seven. The economy----
    Audience members. Four more years! Four more years! Four more years!
    The President. You know, let me tell you something. Let me tell you 
something good about this country. You hear plenty that's bad from the 
Clinton-Gore ticket. Our economy is growing. It's growing too weakly, 
but we're going to lead the country through increasing jobs that sell 
the best-made products in the world. That's U.S.A.-made products. Expand 
our markets abroad through exports. We are leading the world in exports, 
and that means jobs for America.
    Our economy is doing better than Japan, than France, than Germany, 
than England. You hear them talk about it, Clinton and Gore. The only 
way they can win is to convince the American people that we're in a deep 
recession, and we're not. The good news yesterday--even the talking 
heads on those Sunday television shows are going to find a hard time 
making bad news out of good news. I'm tired of that.
    You know, we landed out here, came in a helicopter and landed next 
to a factory out here. There was a big sign. And on it, it said, ``Annoy 
the Media. Reelect Bush.'' Why is it? Why is it that everybody, 
Democrat, Republican, liberal or conservative, know what that sign 
means?
    Now, I ask your forbearance, and I'll tell

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you why. We've got some good people traveling with us in the press. And 
because they've felt that sign so strongly, some of them started 
hectoring the cameramen or the photographers. These are the good guys. 
Leave them alone. They're just doing their job. Take your frustrations 
out, as I do, on the guys back East in those Sunday talk shows who tell 
you everything that's wrong, whether they're Republicans or Democrats, 
because we're going to make them eat their words on November 3d.
    No, all I'm asking is that people make a comparison on the plans, 
and I've told you the fundamental differences. But we've got to keep 
going forward. I'll tell you a big difference we have. Governor Clinton 
talks about getting the Government to invest to create jobs. That's what 
Europe tried, and that's where Europe failed. It is not the Government 
that does it. It is small business that creates the jobs in this 
country. They create two-thirds of the jobs.
    How do we help them? We give them a little relief for taxation. Give 
them an investment tax allowance. Give them a capital gains so a new guy 
will get out there and start a new business. Give that first-time 
homebuyer a tax credit so he or she can buy a home and live the American 
dream.
    Then we lighten up on regulation. And one other thing where I have a 
big difference with the Governor from Arkansas, and that is on 
litigation. We are suing each other too much and caring for each other 
too little; $200 billion a year go to lawyers; $25 billion to $50 
billion are added to your health bills every year because of these crazy 
malpractice suits. Little League coaches are scared to coach because 
somebody will come up and sue them. You good Samaritans are afraid to 
stop along the highway for--afraid if you move the person, then this--
``Oh, you did that wrong,'' and they'll slap a lawsuit on you. We've got 
to end and cap these crazy lawsuits.
    Governor Clinton will not do that, because the trial lawyers are his 
biggest supporters. The lead trial lawyer in Arkansas sent around a 
letter: Elect our man, and then we won't have anything to worry about 
changing the lawsuits.
    We've got to help the American people, the doctors, the medical 
practitioners, by reducing the fear of nutty lawsuits.
    Speaking of health care, we've got an enormous difference on that. 
Governor Clinton, typical of the way the liberal Democrats work, he 
wants to set up a board to kind of set the controls and prices. You 
can't do that. The Bush plan is good. Provide insurance through vouchers 
to the poorest of the poor, pool the insurance, provide tax credit to 
the next people--the most overtaxed end of the tax scale on the working 
men and women in this country--pool the insurance, control malpractice, 
streamline the efficiency, and get the cost down through this pooling, 
but keep the Government from rationing health care.
    My daughter-in-law Margaret is a teacher. God bless the teachers, 
because they are out there trying to restore some values to these kids. 
And we have a good program in education. We have a good program. It 
bypasses the NEA that tells the teachers how to think and supports the 
bureaucracy. We have 1,700 communities participating in this program. We 
have a rather old-fashioned idea. We think that the parents should have 
the right to choose public, private, or religious schools. Give them a 
chance to do that.
    We have a positive record. One out of two college students has 
financial aid. We've increased the Pell grants. We've increased 
dramatically Head Start spending. We've got a good education program, 
but it puts our confidence with the teachers and with the local 
community, and not with that educational bureaucracy that's sopping up 
the money and not letting it get to the classroom.
    I have a big difference with the Governor on crime, because I have 
an old-fashioned idea. We ought to have a little more sympathy for the 
victims of crime and a little less for the criminal. Governor Clinton 
wants to put--Governor Clinton--quiet, you guys. [Laughter] Governor 
Clinton wants to put Mario Cuomo on the Supreme Court. How do you like 
that?
    Audience members. Boo-o-o!
    The President. And I instead want to back up those police officers 
that lay their lives on the line for you and for me and for our 
neighborhoods every day of their lives.

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Let's pass the Bush plan, the tough anticrime, pro-law enforcement, and 
pass that legislation, and let's help our communities. It just isn't 
right for a mother afraid to send her kid down to the corner store for 
fear of some criminal in the neighborhood. We have got to win the fight 
on drugs. We've got to win the fight on neighborhood crime. We've got to 
back our police officers with strong legislation, and we've got to 
restore the family values that teach these children right from wrong.
    You know, I see all these signs about trust. Let me tell you, I do 
have a big difference with Governor Clinton. It was expressed by him. It 
was expressed by him in one of the debates where he said--he put it this 
way--he said it isn't the character of the President, he said, it is 
``the character of the Presidency.'' My view is this: When you're in 
that White House and when you are the President of the United States, 
the character of the President shapes and is interlocked with the 
character of the Presidency. You can't separate them.
    My argument with him is you cannot be on all sides of every issue. 
You cannot flip-flop. You cannot turn the White House into the waffle 
house. He'll go to the unions here in Toledo and say he's against right 
to work, and yet in Arkansas he is for it. In one point he's for term 
limits, and then he says ``oh, no''--when he gets into the hands of the 
Congressmen that he wants to work with, he says, ``Oh, no, I am against 
it.'' He is, on the North American free trade agreement--you heard it in 
the debate. He said, well--first he had some reservations; then he is 
for it. Then he goes to the labor union leaders, not the rank and file; 
he finds out he's against it. Then he's for it. And then at the debate 
you heard him, ``Well, I am for it, but.'' He does. You can't have a lot 
of ``buts'' in the White House, believe me.
    But the biggest difference, I think the clearest difference in this 
race will be the responsibility a President has as Commander in Chief of 
the Armed Forces. The biggest difference I had with him was on the war. 
I had to organize an international coalition. I had to bring along a 
reluctant Democratic Congress. I had to make a very tough decision.
    I mentioned this the other night. Barbara and I sat up there at Camp 
David on a Sunday before we knew the war was going to start. We'd given 
the orders to Colin Powell, who passed them on to Norm Schwartzkopf. 
Believe me, it isn't any fun to have a decision like that on your hands, 
because you have to send someone else's son or someone else's daughter 
maybe to die for their country. But I did what I felt was right. I made 
the proper decision. We kicked this Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. We 
restored the leadership, we restored the U.S. position as the only 
credible, trusted leader in the whole world.
    And where was Bill? Let me tell you. Here's what he said at the time 
of the war. He said, ``I was with''--I've got to paraphrase and try to 
be accurate on it. I wrote it down, but I don't think--here it is: ``I 
agreed with the minority, but I guess I would have voted with the 
majority.'' What kind of decisive Commander in Chief would that be?
    Audience members. Boo-o-o!
    The President. Somebody asked me about some of the unions protesting 
here. Let me appeal to those union members and say this. Let me say 
this. I know of your patriotism. I know of your love for country. I know 
that many of you served in the Armed Forces. And yes, I do have a 
difference with some--maybe with some here today. But I found it 
appalling that when our country was at war in Vietnam and Americans were 
held hostage and prisoner, that Bill Clinton said, ``I went to England 
to organize demonstrations against the United States.'' I don't believe 
that is right. Protest in front of the White House, but when you're 
abroad stand up for the United States.
    It does make a difference. Character and trust matter. I have tried 
to uphold the public trust in the White House. Let me say this: I've had 
a wonderful person at my side, but you see, I think, and I know Margaret 
agrees--we wouldn't dare disagree--I think we've got the best First Lady 
we possibly could have in Barbara Bush.
    You know, we have been privileged. We have been very privileged to 
serve this country, and we've tried to uphold the public trust. And 
people know this. We're

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lucky. We've got 12 grandkids. We've got five kids all happily married 
now, and we've got a lot going for us in terms of family, got a lot 
going for us in terms of faith. We've got a lot going for us in terms of 
friends.
    People say, well, you know, this hasn't been a particularly pleasant 
year. You know, you've taken your fair share of shots from the media and 
from the Clinton-Gore outfit. Why do you need this? You've got a lot of 
things going for you. Let me tell you why. Bruce touched on part of it. 
We have changed the world. The kids today go to bed at night without the 
same fear of nuclear war. But the job is unfinished. We've got to lift 
these kids up through better education. We've got to tell them that 
America is not in decline, that we are on the move. I want to finish the 
job. I ask for your support. I ask for your trust. We are going to win 
this election.
    May God bless the United States of America. Thank you very much. 
Thank you.

                    Note: The President spoke at 10:26 a.m. at Seagate 
                        Center.