    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1999, Book I)]
    [May 7, 1999]
    [Pages 715-717]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks on Departure for Houston, Texas, and an Exchange With Reporters
    May 7, 1999

        The President. Good morning. Tomorrow I will be visiting some of the
    communities that were so terribly damaged by the tornadoes this week.
    Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Oklahoma, Kansas, and
    Texas, with the people of Tennessee who also endured terrible storms and
    destruction.
        Before I leave, I'd like to make comments on a couple of other
    matters. First, on the new economic report issued today: We received
    more good news for our working families. Unemployment is 4.3 percent,
    with 234,000 new jobs added last month alone. African-American
    unemployment is at its lowest level on record. And real wages, after
    declining 4.3 percent in the 12 years before I took office, have now
    risen over 6 percent in the last 6 years. The American economy continues
    to see a remarkable combination of strong growth, job creation, and low
    inflation. Our economic strategy continues to be the right strategy for
    prosperity, and it is the one we should follow as we work to strengthen
    Social Security and Medicare for the 21st century.
        It's worth remembering that the move from economic stagnation to
    sustained prosperity is not the only turnaround our Nation has seen in
    the last 6 years. We also see the crime rate falling, the welfare rolls
    falling, the teen pregnancy rate falling, drunk driving going down, a
    host of other social ills now easing, even though for so long they
    seemed destined only to worsen.

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        The American people, in homes and communities all across this
    country, are working hard at the grassroots level to turn around every
    one of these social problems, and others are doing their part. That is
    the kind of national commitment we need to protect our children from
    violence. I believe, more than anything else, we need a grassroots
    effort which involves every single American, from the White House down
    to the smallest community, a national campaign that draws out everyone's
    commitment, all our resources, and depends upon everyone taking
    responsibility.
        On Monday, as you know, we'll have a White House meeting here, a
    strategy session to seek out the best ideas for this effort, from people
    who can really make a difference, parents and young people, teachers and
    religious leaders, law enforcement, gun manufacturers, representatives
    of the entertainment industry, and those of us here in Government.
    Together, we will talk about how we can shield children from gratuitous
    violence, keep parents involved in their children's lives, reach out to
    troubled young people early enough, and do more to keep guns out of
    their reach. We will not ask who takes the blame but how we can all take
    responsibility, and I will challenge everyone there and everyone in
    America to do their part.
        We know this kind of sustained, organized effort can work. Let me
    just give you one example. Four years ago, I asked for a national
    campaign to reduce teen pregnancy. Today, under the leadership of
    Governor Tom Kean, former Governor of New
    Jersey and now the president of Drew University, that campaign is
    finding what works, spreading it to other communities, working with the
    media to send the right message to our children.
        Two years ago, I called for a national effort by businesses to hire
    people off welfare, to make sure the welfare reform effort would work.
    Today, under the leadership of Eli Segal, the
    Welfare to Work partnership has grown to 10,000 companies that have
    helped us move more than 400,000 people from the welfare rolls to the
    job rolls.
        Time and again, we have seen when citizens, businesses, communities,
    nonprofits, and government take responsibility to work together, we can
    overcome any challenge. We are turning the tide on all kinds of social
    problems. Now we must turn our intense efforts to this issue of
    violence. We have remarkable Americans who have been working on it for
    sometime now, with real success in community after community; you will
    hear from them on Monday. But obviously, in the aftermath of what
    happened in Colorado and the school shootings of the last 2 years, we
    have to do more. I'm very much looking forward to this meeting and to
    getting to work with Americans all over our country to give our children
    the safe childhoods they deserve.
        Thank you very much.

    Military Pay Raise

        Q. Mr. President, will you accept a military pay raise as part of
    the emergency supplemental, the Kosovo emergency--supplemental bill?
        The President. Well, as you know, we're supporting a military pay
    raise, and I don't think there's any difference in when the Congress and
    I think it should take effect. So there may be some--I have to get
    briefed on this--you know, I've been gone to Europe, but my
    understanding is, the only difference in the two bills is at what point
    they fund it and whether they take it out from under the ceilings of
    next year's budget, not when the military actually gets it.
        So I think we're all--my view is, at least when I left to go to
    Europe, we were all for the same pay raise going into effect at the same
    time. And I understand why Congress wants to advance fund it, and I'd
    like to see the bill loaded up with as little extraneous spending as
    possible. But we are going to give a military pay raise. We're all
    committed to it, and we just have to work out what the best way to do it
    is.

    Kosovo Peacekeeping Force

        Q. Mr. President, do you insist that the American Commander of NATO
    be in charge of whatever forces wind up as peacekeepers in Kosovo?
        The President. Well, I think the best thing for me to say now is
    what--I think it will work best if we have a system like we had in
    Bosnia, where there was U.N. approval; NATO was the core of the force,
    but there was Russian participation, there was Ukrainian participation,
    there was participation from a lot of other countries; and the command
    issues were worked out by and large in three different segments of the
    country, where primary responsibility was taken in one section by the
    United States working with Russia, in another by Britain, and another

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    by France. There may be some other way to do it in Kosovo; I don't want
    to prejudge all the details.
        The important thing--I don't want neither to add nor subtract from
    the basic conditions that we have said we believe are necessary to make
    this work. That is, the refugees go home to safety and autonomy, Serb
    forces out, and an international security force in, with NATO at the
    core. Anything I say today, while we're working hard to try to push this
    and to try to gain more converts and get more people involved in this,
    would be, I think, a mistake, except to say I think that what we did in
    Bosnia was functional.
        But I think it's important for the United States and for our Allies
    neither to add nor subtract from the basic conditions that we have said
    all along are absolutely essential to make this work.

    Note: The President spoke at 10:38 a.m. on the South Lawn at the White
    House.