    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book II)]
    [October 19, 1995]
    [Pages 1628-1632]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    [[Page 1628]]

    The President's News Conference
    October 19, 1995

        The President. Good morning. The Congress is about to take some
    votes that I believe will move this country in the wrong direction.
    Before they do it, I want to urge them to think again. There's a right
    way to balance this budget and a wrong way. I strongly believe the
    Republicans in Congress are taking the wrong way.
        On Medicare, the House is voting on a $270 billion cut in Medicare
    that will eviscerate the health care system for our older Americans. It
    goes far beyond what is necessary to secure the Medicare Trust Fund. Our
    plan to secure the Medicare Trust Fund secures it for just as long as
    the Republican plan at less than half the cost and with far less burden
    on our seniors.
        The House plan, by contrast, actually weakens existing law on waste,
    fraud, and abuse in the Medicare program, which is a serious problem.
    And therefore, it will undermine our efforts to save funds through
    cracking down on waste, fraud, and abuse, as the Attorney General has
    outlined. On the other hand, it increases costs on older Americans
    dramatically. That is the wrong way.
        So my message to the Republicans is simple: I hope you will think
    again. I will not let you destroy Medicare, and I will veto this bill. I
    have to do that to protect the people of the United States and to
    protect the integrity of this program.
        On taxes, just last night we learned from the Republicans' own Joint
    Committee on Taxation that more than half of the American people who
    live in the group earning under $30,000 will pay more taxes if the
    Republican economic plan passes. Why? Because they have a $43 billion
    tax hike targeted at working families. Now this doesn't count the cost
    to working families of the increases in college loans, the child support
    collection fees, the Medicare increases, the Medicaid increases, all
    told, over $140 billion of taxes, fees, and other increases on the most
    vulnerable people in our country and on working families.
        So again, I would say, think again. I won't let you raise taxes on
    working families $48 billion. That is not the right way to balance the
    budget. It isn't fair, and it won't happen. These bills undermine our
    values, our values of supporting both work and family, our values of
    being responsible and creating opportunity. They are not necessary to
    balance the budget.
        Meanwhile, Congress is lagging behind on its other business. For the
    budget this year--the fiscal year, as all of you know, ended 3 weeks
    ago, and they have still sent me only 3 of the 13 appropriations bills.
    Last year, all 13 were here and signed into law by the beginning of the
    fiscal year.
        It's been 6 months since the Oklahoma City bombing killed 169 of our
    fellow Americans and 6 months since congressional leaders promised that
    they would pass the anti-terrorism legislation by Memorial Day. They
    still haven't passed the bill. They haven't even scheduled it for a
    final vote. I might add also, one of the important items in their
    contract which I did support, the line-item veto, has still not been
    passed by the Congress and sent to me. And perhaps most troubling of
    all, because they refuse to extend the debt limit, they are threatening
    to plunge our country into default for the first time in the entire
    history of the Republic. This would, of course, mean higher interest
    rates, which would increase the deficit we both want to reduce, and it
    would also lead to higher home mortgage costs for millions of homeowners
    whose mortgages are tied to Federal interest rates. I was told this
    morning by the Council of Economic Advisers probably somewhere between 7
    and 10 million homeowners have mortgages that are tied to Federal
    interest rates.
        So again, my message to Congress on this issue is simple: We must
    not play political games with the good faith and credit of the United
    States. Pass the debt limit, and I will sign it.
        It's time for Congress to turn back from passing extreme measures
    that never will become law and instead to work with me for the American
    people to balance this budget in a way that advances our values and
    supports our interests. That is what we ought to do. We can still do
    that; it is what I still believe we will do.

    1993 Budget

        Now, I can only imagine what the first question is. [Laughter] Wait
    a minute, let me just say one thing. Before you ask this question, I

    [[Page 1629]]

    want to say something about my speech--well, the two speeches I gave in
    which I made reference to the economic plan of 1993. If anything I said
    was interpreted by anybody to imply that I am not proud of that program,
    proud of the people who voted for it, or that I don't believe it was the
    right thing to do, then I shouldn't have said that, because I am very
    proud of it. I think it was absolutely the right thing to do. I am proud
    of the people in Congress who voted for it. And the results speak for
    themselves. After all, that program actually did reduce the deficit by
    $1 trillion over 7 years. That program drove down interest rates. That
    program created an economic climate in which the American people were
    able to produce 7\1/2\ million new jobs, 2\1/2\ million new homeowners,
    a record number of new businesses, and put this country moving in the
    right direction.
        So if I said anything which can be read in any other way, then I
    should not have said that. And I certainly did not mean to do that, and
    I accept responsibility for it, because I am very, very proud of what I
    did. And I have tried to make that clear in every talk I have made this
    year, and I reaffirm it to you here today--all of the parts of the
    program. We did the right thing for America, and I'm proud of it today,
    and I'm proud of the people who voted for it.
        Q. Mr. President, did you mean to say what you said, that you regret
    having raised taxes as much as you did?
        The President. What I said was--what I meant to say is, I think
    nobody enjoys raising taxes. I think our system works better when
    Democrats and Republicans work together to reach consensus, and I think
    it would work better now if we did. That's what I meant to say.
        But I do not believe that when we had the decision to make and we
    had the vote to cast, I take full responsibility, proudly, for what we
    did. It was the right thing to do. I believe all the people who have
    heard me talk about it knew what I meant to say, and I'm proud of the
    Congress for voting for it. And if we hadn't done it, we'd really be in
    a fix today. And I might say, the Republicans who criticize us obviously
    think we did the right thing since they're not trying to undo much of it
    at all.
        Q. But did you raise taxes too much?

    Medicare Legislation

        Q. Mr. President, you said that you'd veto the Republican Medicare
    bill for $270 billion worth of cuts. Your own Medicare bill is $124
    billion in cuts. Where do you see a compromise between the two? How far
    are you willing to go?
        The President. Well, first of all, I think we have to draw a--I am
    willing to do what they want to do, which is to extend the life of the
    Medicare Trust Fund to 2006. That's what we both do. Now beyond that, I
    don't believe we ought to be raising costs on the elderly poor through
    the Medicare program and the far worse things that are in the Medicaid
    program. You know, the Medicaid program supplies the copays and the
    deductible for very poor elderly people, and they propose to stop doing
    that.
        It's estimated we could lose a million seniors out of the Medicare
    program, and I just don't think we need to do that. We can balance the
    budget with the cuts that I have proposed, and that's what I think we
    ought to do. I believe that they are more than adequate to balance the
    budget and to secure the Medicare Trust Fund without really burning our
    seniors.
        Helen [Helen Thomas, United Press International].

    Bosnia

        Q. Mr. President, slight change of subject. Would you send
    peacekeeping troops to Bosnia if we do not get congressional approval?
    And you have never stated that you would only keep them for one year.
    Your people have and the Cabinet has, but is that a flat commitment?
        The President. Let me answer the question carefully. The reason I
    have never said that is that I wanted to define our mission and have the
    mission be defined in the way that we did in Haiti. We defined our
    mission in Haiti, and we said, okay, this is when we think we will
    complete our mission, and we did it. And then we said the United Nations
    would complete its mission with the next Presidential election, which
    occurs early next year.
        In Bosnia, I wanted to make sure that we had a clear notion of what
    our mission was. Yesterday, General Joulwan, who is our NATO Commander,
    came in with the national security team, and we had a very extended
    session about the plans that are now being developed, which, of course,
    cannot be finalized until we get a

    [[Page 1630]]

    peace agreement, because the nature of the map and the nature of the
    agreement among the parties will determine in part the nature of the
    commitments that the United Nations and that NATO will have to make.
        But our commanders believe we can complete our mission in a year.
    That's what they believe. Before I make that pledge to the American
    people, I want to know what the peace agreement is finally, and I want
    to have a very high level of confidence that I can make that commitment
    and keep it. But it looks like we're talking about a commitment in the
    nature--in the range of a year.
        Q. Wait a minute. Would you go ahead then and send the troops, even
    if Congress does not approve?
        The President. I am not going to lay down any of my constitutional
    prerogatives here today. I have said before and I will say again, I
    would welcome and I hope I get an expression of congressional support. I
    think it's important for the United States to be united in doing this. I
    believe that we had a very good meeting with the Speaker and Senator
    Dole and a large number of Congressmen, as you know, a couple of weeks
    ago. I expect that our people will be asked and will have to answer
    difficult questions; that's the job of the Congress. But I believe in
    the end, the Congress will support this operation.

    1993 Budget

        Q. Mr. President, may we take it--just a final followup on this--may
    we take it from what you said here today that what you meant to say on
    taxes was that while you raised them more than you would have liked to,
    that it was perhaps a mistake to say you raised them too much?
        The President. If I said anything which implies that I think that we
    didn't do what we should have done, given the choices we faced at the
    time, I shouldn't have said that.
        My mother once said I should never give a talk after 7 o'clock at
    night, especially if I'm tired. And she sure turned out to be right, is
    all I can say. [Laughter]

    Bosnia

        Q. Mr. President, back on the subject of the deployment in Bosnia,
    many experts feel that by the very nature of a deployment, American
    troops would become targets for various groups who want to disrupt the
    situation. How do you prevent that? And having committed troops to
    Europe twice in this century because they got into a mess they couldn't
    resolve, why does the United States have to continue to come to Europe's
    rescue?
        The President. Because now what we're trying to do is to avoid just
    what drug us into Europe. If you remember, I said we would not go into a
    situation in which we'd be in combat in Bosnia on one side of the
    conflict, nor would we be engaged with the United Nations mission
    because of the rules of engagement there, but that if we can make a
    peace, since NATO would have to be involved in implementing the peace
    agreement and assuring its success and we are the leaders of NATO, we
    would have to go into it. The reason we need to do this is to--precisely
    to avoid the kind of convulsive conflict with massive consequences that
    drug us into Europe twice before and got huge numbers of Americans
    killed in the defense of freedom and decency. I strongly believe we can
    do that.
        Now one of the things we are concerned about, obviously, is that if
    a peace is made, even in good faith, there may be people who don't like
    the peace. And we don't want--not only the United States but any of the
    NATO soldiers or any of our allies not in NATO who will be taking part
    in this, and we expect a significant number of non-NATO members to
    contribute--we don't want anybody to be targets, and we've given quite a
    bit of thought to that. And as this plan proceeds, we'll see what
    happens.
        Let me just emphasize--first of all, first things first. The leaders
    of the three countries have agreed to come here to the United States to
    meet in Ohio at the end of this month. We are very pleased by that, and
    that is the next big step. The most important thing, the thing that will
    reduce danger to everybody, is if these leaders will agree to an
    honorable peace and then do everything they can in good faith to keep
    it.
        I must tell you, I'm somewhat encouraged by the fact that the cease-
    fire seems to be taking hold. The incidents seem to be dropping
    throughout Bosnia. There seems to be an atmosphere of mutual commitment
    taking hold there, and we obviously hope that can be sustained.

    [[Page 1631]]

    Budget Negotiations

        Q. Mr. President, yesterday you said you were perhaps genetically
    optimistic by nature that there would in the end be a deal when all is
    said and done. But Speaker Gingrich keeps saying he's willing to
    cooperate, but he's not willing to compromise on his bottom line in the
    tax cut, the Medicare cuts, and all these other issues. Why are you
    optimistic that there still will be a deal?
        The President. Because this is America and people usually do the
    right thing, and because we've been around here for a long, long time.
    Now, I know that at least in reading between the lines, it appears that
    the extreme conservative wing in the House continues to move the Speaker
    back and affect what happens in the Senate and make the possibility of
    honorable compromise more remote. But I believe in the end, that's the
    right thing for the country.
        My goal, I will say again, and what I try to capture from time to
    time, sometimes not too well, as we see, is that if you have two people
    who both make a good-faith effort at reaching a common stated goal, the
    balanced budget in this case, and they have different approaches, if
    they get together in genuine honesty and openness--I think there's a way
    for me to meet their stated objectives, which is a balanced budget in 7
    years with a family tax cut, and I think they want a capital gains tax
    cut and extending the Medicare Trust Fund until 2006, and for them to
    meet our stated goals, which is to maintain our commitments to our
    investments in education and our obligations to the elderly through the
    Medicare program and to the elderly and our children, the disabled
    people in America through the Medicaid program, and our obligations to
    the environment and to technology and to the things that will make our
    economy grow--we can both meet our objectives. And if we do it in good
    faith, we might wind up with a budget that is better than either one of
    us proposed. That's what I hope will happen, and I'm going to leave the
    door open for that. But meanwhile, my job is to protect the American
    people if something happens that I think is very wrong. And I think the
    Medicare budget is wrong for America.

    Presidential Commission on Race

        Q. Mr. President, the University of Texas speech included several
    challenges on race to blacks and whites alike. How do you plan to
    further the conversation? Are there any next steps? What are your
    thoughts about a Presidential commission on race?
        The President. Well, as you know, I received a letter signed by a
    number of House Members asking for that. And I have that and a number of
    other ideas under consideration. After I spoke at the University of
    Texas, and after so many came here to Washington in that march in what I
    thought was such a profoundly moving spirit, an open spirit and is
    clearly a manifestation of a desire to assume more responsibilities for
    themselves, for their families, their communities, and to reach out to
    the white community and their fellow Americans and to try to figure out
    how we can work together, I think that there is a big responsibility on
    me and on others to carry forward with that. And as you know, in the
    last few days I've been quite active with previously scheduled events.
    But we are turning our attention now very carefully to what should be
    done to follow up. I think we owe the country a followup, and I'm going
    to do my best to do it right.
        I'll take one more question. Mara [Mara Liasson, National Public
    Radio].

    Budget Negotiations

        Q. Mr. President, just to follow up. This, I believe, is the first
    time you've said that you think you can reach a balanced budget in 7
    years. How would the Republicans' plans need to alter so that you could
    reach that goal and still meet your----
        The President. Well, I think we could reach it in 7 years; I think
    we could reach it in 8 years; I think we could reach it in 9 years. Our
    budget has moved forward from 10 to 9 years just because of the
    improvements in the economy and our deficit reduction package since we
    started. So we're between 7 and 9 now.
        So I think it's obvious--what would have to happen is that we would
    have to find a formula in which we would monitor the reduction of the
    deficit as we go toward balance because under either of these programs,
    no one can predict with any exactitude--I mean, no American corporation
    has a 7-year budget. They may have a 7-year plan or a 10-year plan or a
    5-year plan, but they don't have budgets in that sense, because you
    can't project what all will happen.
        So we have to have sort of checks along the way to make sure we're
    on our downward target.

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    And then we'd have to find a way to take care of these concerns that I
    have repeatedly expressed. I do not want us to make education less
    available. I don't want us to have retrenchment on technology and
    research. I do not want us to burden, unnecessarily, people who barely
    have enough money to get by on, who depend on Medicare and Medicaid. I
    don't want to damage the university hospitals, the children's hospitals,
    and the urban and rural hospital network of this country with what I
    think the Medicare budget will do. I don't want to damage the
    environment. And I do not want to tolerate a $48-billion tax increase on
    working families with incomes under $30,000. That's wrong.
        Thank you very much.

    Note: The President's 103d news conference began at 11:29 a.m. in the
    Briefing Room at the White House.