[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1996, Book II)]
[November 4, 1996]
[Pages 2062-2065]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks in Lexington, Kentucky
November 4, 1996

    The President. Thank you.
    Audience members. Four more years! Four more years! Four more years!
    The President. Thank you. Hello, Kentucky! Thank you very much. 
Thank you. Mayor Miller, Governor Patton, Senator Ford, Lieutenant 
Governor Henry, Mayor Abramson, Chairman Babbage, and Steve Beshear----

[At this point, there was a disturbance in the audience.]

    The President. Let me ask you--wait, wait, folks. If you pay 
attention to him, you're just rewarding him. So why don't we make a deal 
and we'll ignore him. I have a totally different attitude about this 
than a lot of people do. I always welcome people from the opposition to 
our rallies, because unlike them, my America includes everybody who's 
willing to work hard. And I'm always glad to see them.
    I'm always even willing to sort of be quiet and let them talk, but 
they never want to stop, because what they really want is to stop me 
from talking and you from hearing. And if I was running against the 
record we've established and the ideas for the future, and I had to 
carry that budget I vetoed around on my back the way they do, maybe I'd 
be trying to shout my opponents down, too, but I hope not. I hope not.
    So we've had enough smear and smear and smear, and why don't we just 
take a few minutes on this beautiful, beautiful fall night in Kentucky 
to think about our future. And if we get interrupted, let's just keep 
thinking about our future.
    I want to thank all the young people who came here tonight, 
especially, because the election is more about you than anyone else. I 
want to thank all the entertainers who came: Kevin Cronin, the Central 
Kentucky Youth Orchestra, Carol and Vanessa Det, Black Voices, and the 
marching bands of Harrison County, Nicholson County, Mercer County, and 
Lafayette County. Thank you very much. Thank you, Ashley Judd, for 
coming. Thank you. Now, Coach Pitino, we're both defending our titles, 
and maybe I'll see you in the White House again next year.
    Let me say on this beautiful day, what is really at stake here, 
clearly, beyond any doubt, is what this country will look like when we 
cross that bridge just 4 years from now into a new century and a new 
millennium. And all of you who are students here and probably everybody 
who is in this audience understands that we're going through a huge 
change in how we work and live, how we relate to each other and the

[[Page 2063]]

rest of the world. And the real issue here is whether we're going to 
make a decision to do things together that will help each other have a 
chance to make the most of our own lives, live up to our God-given 
capacities, and build together stronger families and communities and 
States and nations or whether we're better off being told that we're on 
our own.
    Now, all these issues have been debated to death, I guess, so let me 
just give you some personal examples out of my life. A couple of nights 
ago I was in Denver, Colorado, and we had a rally like this--it wasn't 
as big; it was at night and in a little--in an inside place--but I was 
going along the row like this, shaking hands. Here's what happened to me 
in about 5 minutes. In each case, I want you to listen and see if you 
identify with it.
    I met a young woman who was a victim of domestic violence who 
thanked me for setting up the violence against women section at the 
Justice Department and working to stop violence against women and 
children and setting up that hotline.
    I met a man who was doing ground-breaking research against 
Parkinson's disease who got a research grant because of an initiative of 
our administration. And he had fire in his eyes when he said, ``We are 
going to cure this disease; we're going to whip it; we're going to get 
to the point where we have 100 percent cure rate.''
    And then I met a man who told me that he and his wife had just 
adopted a young child, and because of the family and medical leave law 
she was home with the child, getting the child accustomed to being in a 
new environment and they were not going to lose her job and her income 
because of it, because of the family and medical leave law.
    And then I met three women who were breast cancer survivors who 
thanked me for fighting hard for the research funding in the budgets of 
the last 4 years that include more women and more research. We've 
uncovered two of the genes that cause breast cancer, and we may well be 
able not only to cure it but prevent it in the next few years.
    And then--just walking down the line now--and then I met a young 
person who went back to school on the AmeriCorps program after serving 
in his community and then got some money to pay his way to college.
    And then I met a young woman who was a police officer in a smaller 
Colorado town, thanking me for our police program that Wendell Ford 
voted for to put 100,000 more police on the streets of America because 
they were getting 5 more.
    And then I met a young man who told me that he was a dropout and had 
given up on his life, but he heard me talking about the importance of 
going back to school. He found out about the changes that we've made in 
the student loan program and what we were trying to do, and he said, ``I 
got one of those new loans and now I'm going back to school and I'm 
going to get a degree in microbiology. I didn't just get in, I got in in 
a big way,'' he said.
    Now, that's just one ropeline. Every issue I talk to you about, 
every single one, my opponent and the leaders of the other party opposed 
us on the initiatives which made those things possible--every single 
one. That is what is at stake here. When I said we ought to pass a crime 
bill that puts 100,000 police on the street, they said, ``It won't do 
any good, and you'll never do it.'' Then when they passed their budget, 
they must have been worried about us doing it because they tried to stop 
me from doing it. But we've only funded about half those police 
officers. It's a 5-year program; you will decide whether we finish the 
job.
    Now, here are the facts. The crime rate has gone down 4 years in a 
row. We have a 10-year low in American crime. If we bring it down for 8 
years in a row we might make our streets, our schools, our neighborhoods 
safe for all of America's children. I believe we're right and they're 
wrong. But you have to decide.
    You have to decide so many of these issues. But if you strip them 
all away, you look at what is really at stake: What is it that we should 
be doing together to help each other make the most of our own lives? 
Now, we have had some time to see whether this approach works or not. 
Compared to 4 years ago, we have 10.7 million more jobs, record numbers 
of new small businesses, incomes are going up again, the lowest rates of 
unemployment and inflation in 27 years.
    I met a woman--we were just in Cleveland, Hillary and I were--I met 
a woman who was crying and had a picture of her house because she had 
been able to buy a house because we have a 15-year high in 
homeownership, which is what happens if you drive the deficit down 63 
percent and get those interest rates down.

[[Page 2064]]

    So the country is moving in the right direction. And the real 
question before you is, what do you want it to look like 4 years from 
now? This is the last day of my last campaign. I will never seek office 
again unless I go home and run for the school board someday. [Laughter] 
This election is about your future. It's about what America will look 
like when your children are your age. And I tell you, we are on the 
verge of the greatest age of possibility in human history. The young 
people in this audience will have more chances to live out their dreams 
than any generation has ever had. There are many of you in this audience 
who before long will be doing jobs that have not been invented yet. Many 
of you will be doing jobs that have not even been imagined yet.
    When I became President, there were 3 million people working in 
their homes. Today, there are 12 million. Four years from now there will 
be 40 million people. That's just one example. Things are changing so 
fast that we're building a supercomputer with IBM that will do more 
calculations in a second than you can do on your hand-held calculator in 
30,000 years. Things are changing.
    We have differences on the budget. We have differences on crime. We 
have differences on the environment. I believe we can preserve the 
environment and grow the economy, and I don't think we can grow the 
economy over the long run unless we do preserve the environment. It's an 
honest difference of opinion.
    We have differences on issues like Medicare and Medicaid. The 
Medicaid program for 30 years has allowed families to maintain a middle 
class lifestyle, even if a member of their family was severely disabled, 
because people could work and still get some help for medical care for 
their loved ones. It's enabled people to go into nursing homes in their 
later years, and it has national standards of quality care. It's enabled 
poor children to get good care from the moment they're born. They wanted 
to take away that 30-year guarantee. I thought it was wrong. You can 
decide. I think that's one of the things we ought to do together.
    But the most important issue before you is your education and the 
education of those who will come behind. Because in a world that is 
changing as it is, if you really want all the American people to have a 
chance to go into that future together, we've got to guarantee all our 
children world-class education. I want that to be the lasting legacy of 
this administration.
    And I ask you to think of this. There are still 40 percent of the 8-
year-olds in America who cannot read a book on their own. But I have a 
plan to mobilize one million volunteers to go out to the parents and the 
teachers of this country and help teach those kids to read. We got 
200,000 more work-study slots out of this last budget for college 
students; I want 100,000 of them to go to young people who say, ``Send 
me. I will go. I will teach the children to read.'' Will you help? Will 
you help us do that? [Applause]
    You heard Wendell Ford talking about my dream that within 4 years 
every classroom and library and every school in America can be hooked up 
to the information superhighway. Think what it would mean if the 
children in the most remote Appalachian schools and the children in the 
biggest, poorest urban school districts were, together with the students 
in the richest, middle class, suburban, urban, rural school districts 
all over America--the first time ever, all these kids got access to the 
same information in the same way at the same time. That would 
revolutionize learning in America. It would explode the potential of our 
children. Will you help us do that? [Applause]
    The last thing I want to say is, I am very proud that we've reformed 
the student loan program to make it less costly and to let people pay 
their loans back as a percentage of their incomes so no young person 
need fear going broke when you borrow money to go to college. I'm proud 
that 70,000 young people are in AmeriCorps, I'm proud that we got the 
biggest increase in Pell grants in 20 years, but we must do more. I want 
to open the doors of college to all Americans, and if you give me 4 more 
years, that's exactly what I intend to do.
    Now, I want to make 2 years of college after high school as 
universal as a diploma in high school is today, and we can do that 
simply by saying, you can deduct from your tax bill, dollar for dollar, 
the cost of a typical community college tuition. I want to open the 
doors to all 4-year colleges and to graduate school by saying you can 
deduct from your tax bill up to $10,000 of tax deduction for the college 
tuition at any college and university in the United States today. Will 
you help us do that? Will you? [Applause]

[[Page 2065]]

    Folks, let me say, in our politics today there is too little 
discussion of these issues and too much finger-pointing and insulting. 
In the end, when you're like me and you come to the end of more than 20 
years of endeavor, I have to tell you something. I want to say this for 
our friends on the other side, too. Most of the people I've known in 
over 20 years of public life in both parties, people with different--who 
have disagreed with me, people who ran against me for office, most of 
the people I've known loved our country, worked hard, and were honest 
people. We just have honest differences of opinion.
    Today, I still feel that way. But you must also understand the 
honest differences of opinion. And you are now the judges in that court 
of public opinion. These differences are being brought to you. Are we 
going to say, ``You're on your own,'' or are we going to build a bridge 
to the 21st century we can all walk across? Is our education program 
going to be abolishing the Department of Education or opening the doors 
of college to every single American who wants to go?
    These are the decisions for you to make. This is a very great 
country. Its best days are still ahead. You can make sure that the 21st 
century is a time of unparalleled opportunity for all Americans, and you 
can do it only if you decide that we have to work together without 
regard to race, region, religion, or income. We've got to work together. 
We've got to be able to say to one another, ``If you are willing to show 
up tomorrow and say you believe in this country and its timeless values, 
you're ready to show up for work or school and do your part, we don't 
need to know anything else about you. You are part of our America, and 
we're going to build the greatest country the world has ever seen in the 
21st century.'' Will you help us do it?
    Audience members. Yes!
    The President. Will you be there tomorrow?
    Audience members. Yes!
    The President. Will you elect Steve Beshear to the Senate?
    Audience members. Yes!
    The President. We need you. Thank you, and God bless you all. Thank 
you.

Note: The President spoke at 5:15 p.m. at the University of Kentucky. In 
his remarks, he referred to Mayor Pam Miller of Lexington; Gov. Paul E. 
Patton and Lt. Gov. Steve Henry of Kentucky; Mayor Jerry E. Abramson of 
Louisville; Bob Babbage, chair, Kentucky Democratic Party; Steve 
Beshear, Kentucky senatorial candidate; actress Ashley Judd; and Rick 
Pitino, University of Kentucky men's basketball coach.