[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1998, Book I)]
[February 19, 1998]
[Page 246]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Exchange With Reporters in Baltimore, Maryland
February 19, 1998

Living Classrooms Water Quality Experiment

    Q. Tell us, what does it mean?
    The President. Well, this water is from here. So they wanted to test 
the water to see if it could accommodate life. And you had to put this 
free agent in the water, and then you shake it up, and then you match it 
up with these colors here, to see which one it's like. So we put it in 
here, and the color is most like this one--7.5 to 9, and then here's the 
chart. It's around neutral; this way it will accommodate life. If it's 
too acidic, obviously it won't. But if it gets way out here, it's too 
basic, it won't. So anywhere in this range, right, 7 to 10 is okay. And 
you see the color here is like in between these two.
    I learned all that from Brandon here, my 
science instructor--[laughter]--my marine biology instructor here. You 
did a great job.
    Brandon Hunter. Any time.
    The President. And so did you, Aaron.
    The Vice President. Aaron did a great 
job, too.
    Brandon. This was fun.
    The President. Was it fun for you?
    Brandon. Yep.
    The President. It was fun for us, too. Thanks.

Vice President's Travel

    Q. Mr. President, if you're grounding the Vice President, will you 
be skipping some of your trips over the next couple of weeks, too?
    The Vice President. We're going to go 
do this event now, and then we'll----
    The President. I didn't ground him. 
Don't get too carried away with the school metaphors here. I just asked 
him to stay around.

Note: The President spoke at 11:55 a.m. at the Living Classrooms 
Foundation. In his remarks, he referred to Brandon Hunter and Aaron 
Hunt, Middlesex Elementary School students who participated in a water 
quality experiment. A tape was not available for verification of the 
content of this exchange.