    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (1999, Book II)]
    [August 28, 1999]
    [Pages 1470-1473]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks at a Victory 2000 Dinner in East Hampton, New York
    August 28, 1999

        Thank you. Let me thank all of you for the wonderful welcome you
    have given to Hillary and to me, and to the cause that we come here to
    advance tonight for the Democratic

    [[Page 1471]]

    Committee and for the Senate Campaign Committee and for our prospective
    candidate from New York over here.
    [Laughter]
        This is a very special night for me for many reasons. Most of you--
    and perhaps some of you know this, but Liz Robbins has been a friend of Hillary's and mine for about 20
    years now. And she and Doug have brought a lot
    of light into our lives, and I want to thank them for opening their home
    to us. You know, this is kind of a--if you've ever hosted one of these
    deals--[laughter]--you know, the nice wears off after about 10 minutes,
    and you start thinking about it. And you think, ``If it's a bust, I'll
    be humiliated; and if it's successful, they'll destroy all the hedges.''
    [Laughter] So I think we ought to give them a hand and thank them for
    doing this. [Applause]
        I also want to thank all the people who--starting with the folks--
    the singer--and the Turtle Crossing restaurant
    for donating the food, and all the people who served us here tonight.
    Thank you all very much for what you've done. I appreciate it very much.
        We have mentioned our New York State chair, Judith Hope, and Governor Romer and Joe
    Andrew and Beth Dozoretz and Andy Tobias, all the people
    from the DNC, I thank them.
        I'm very grateful to the Members of Congress who are here--to
    Senator Torricelli and Senator
    Lautenberg and Congressman
    Forbes; and Congresswoman
    McCarthy, who had to leave. I'd also like
    to acknowledge a presence that you won't be hard to find in the former
    Congressman, Tom McMillan from Maryland,
    and the former Chairman of the President's Council on Physical Fitness.
    Thank you, Tom, for being here. And Mark Green,
    the New York City comptroller, thank you very much, Mark, for being
    here--the consumer advocate.
        And I love Phoebe Snow. And she has been so
    good to me, and so good to the Democratic Party, and she has sung a lot
    of different songs. Those of you who know a lot about American gospel
    and music may know that ``His Eye is on the Sparrow'' was perhaps Martin
    Luther King's favorite hymn.
        But if you think about it, it's a pretty good reason for being a
    Democrat, because our eye is on the sparrow, and all the other people
    around, and we figure--most of us who can afford to be under this tent
    tonight--that if they do well, God has given us enough gifts that we're
    going to do just fine. If ordinary folks do well and the conditions of
    the country are good, then those of us who have the resources and have
    been gifted with certain talents and certain training, we're going to do
    very well. And so the hymn was a good setting for our meeting here
    tonight.
        I will be very brief. I want to make a case for our party in the
    coming election. I think that the First Lady made a pretty good case for herself--[laughter]--but
    I'd like to say a word or two about that. And I want to talk about you
    and what you're going to do between now and November of 2000. And I'll
    do it quickly.
        When I was elected in 1992, the people of New York and the people of
    the United States took a chance on me and Al Gore, because they were
    worried about the direction of the economy and the direction of the
    society and the fact that we were becoming more divided when we should
    become more united. And we made an argument and said we would challenge
    the country to change. And the country took a chance.
        And when we moved to Washington, we challenged the Democrats to take
    the lead in restoring fiscal responsibility. I didn't think you could
    ever be the progressive party in the country if the wheels were running
    off the economy. And we quadrupled the debt in 10 years, 12 years. And
    interest rates were too high. And so we challenged our Democratic Party.
        We challenged the Democratic Party to take the lead in ending a
    welfare system that was dysfunctional. We challenged the Democratic
    Party to put a human face on the global environment, but not to walk
    away from global trade. And we asked the Republicans to discard their
    hatred of government, and their blind faith that the only thing that
    would ever matter was having more tax cuts. And we asked them to abandon
    wedge politics.
        I think it is very interesting--when the history of this era is
    written and people write the history of New York politics, it will be
    very interesting that New York gave us two party switches based on
    principle: Carolyn McCarthy switched from
    the Republican to the Democratic Party and ran for Congress--and ran for
    Congress when she paid the highest price a human being could pay, and
    she realized she had to do more to ask her country to be a community and
    to adopt responsible, commonsense legislation to

    [[Page 1472]]

    protect people from the kind of madness that she and her family
    suffered. And Michael Forbes, under even
    more difficult political circumstances, changed parties because he
    couldn't believe that the majority party in Congress, in the face of the
    American Medical Association and 200 consumer groups, would continue to
    walk away from a Patients' Bill of Rights, and walk away from its
    responsibility to educate all of our children for the 21st century. I
    thank them both, and I think they represent the future of America.
        Now, the reason I say that is, you took us on faith. And then in
    1996 New York was very good to Bill Clinton and Al Gore again, because
    you had a little more evidence. [Laughter] Now it's not even open to
    doubt. It's our record against their arguments. And we now have over 19
    million new jobs and the highest homeownership in history and the
    fastest business growth in history and the lowest minority unemployment
    rate ever recorded and the lowest crime rate in 26 years, the lowest
    welfare rolls in 32 years.
        And even when they have fought us along the way, we've continued to
    stand up for peace and freedom and justice all around the world. And the
    politics of inclusion works. America has not been hurt or weakened
    because we've asked for every law-abiding American, without regard to
    their race or their gender or their sexual orientation, to be treated
    like decent human beings in this country, to end hate crimes, to end
    abuse, to end bigotry. This is a stronger country because of it.
        So there is no argument anymore. That's the first thing I want to
    say. If people ask you why you showed up here tonight, say, ``Well, I
    took a chance in '92, but there's no argument anymore--it works. Why
    weren't you there? That's why I was.'' If anybody asks you why you were
    here, you ask them why weren't they here? Because there is no argument
    about that.
        The second thing I would like to say is, all elections are about
    tomorrow, and they should be. I remember one time when I was trying to
    run for a fifth term as Governor. I went out to the State Fair in
    Arkansas, and this old boy in overalls came to me, and he said, ``Bill,
    are you going to run again?'' [Laughter] I said, ``I don't know, but if
    I do, will you vote for me?'' He said, ``Yeah, I guess so. I always
    have.'' [Laughter] And I said, ``Well, aren't you sick of me after all
    these years?'' He said, ``No, I'm not, but everybody else I know is.''
    [Laughter] And I said, ``Well, don't you think I've done a good job?''
    He said, ``Sure, but that's what we hired you to do.'' He said, ``You
    drew a check every 2 weeks, didn't you?'' Interesting point. All
    elections are about tomorrow, and they should be.
        Now, we have a record. You don't have to guess about us. But every
    one of us, starting with Vice President Gore, all the other Democrats as far as I know running for any
    office--certainly including Hillary--
    are dealing with what I think are the most important big questions of
    the future. And I'll tell you what I think they are--and I'm not running
    for anything--but I don't want to see all this work we've done derailed.
    And I don't want to see all the progress my country has made sacrificed.
    And believe me, there is still a war going out there for the conscience,
    the soul, and the future of this country.
        You know, the country is working now. So what are we going to do
    with this prosperity? I think we have an obligation as Americans, those
    of us who are of age, to think about the children who are here and the
    long-term challenges facing America. We have never had a chance like
    this in my lifetime. And we've still got some big, long-term challenges.
    I'll just mention three or four: the aging of America--twice as many
    people over 65 in 30 years; under present circumstances, Medicare goes
    broke in 15 years, Social Security in 34 years--the children of
    America--over 53 million children in our schools this year, the most
    diverse student population ever, the highest percentage whose first
    language is not English. It is a godsend of opportunity in a global
    economy if we give them all a good education. Keeping the economy going,
    and that means two things, one of which Hillary already mentioned--
    bringing opportunity to people and places that haven't had it yet.
        Do you know that upstate New York, if it were a separate State,
    would rank in the bottom five in this country in job growth in the last
    6 years? And I'm not proud of that; I've worked hard to drive
    unemployment down everywhere. But there are small towns in New York;
    there are inner-city neighborhoods in every big urban area in the
    country; there are Indian reservations; there's the Mississippi Delta;
    there are places that have not felt this prosperity. If we

    [[Page 1473]]

    get investment there and growth there, we will have more growth without
    inflation.
        The other thing we have to do is to keep paying this debt down
    instead of driving interest rates up with that tax cut that they have
    proposed. You know, people say, ``Oh, they never have any big ideas.''
    Here's a big idea: We can be out of debt in 15 years for the first time
    since 1835, and our grandchildren will have lower interest rates and
    more prosperity and a more harmonious society as a result of it. That is
    a big idea, and it is worth hanging on to.
        So I say this to you because, yes, we have done a good job the last
    6\1/2\ years and, no, you don't have to guess anymore. But we need to
    focus on the future. So when you leave here, and they ask you why you
    came, tell them, ``I took a chance on those rascals, and it worked out
    just fine.'' [Laughter] Tell them that they don't have to guess anymore.
    And tell them you care about your children's and your grandchildren's
    future.
        The last thing I want to tell you is, when I met Hillary in 1971, we started a conversation about this
    stuff that was going on at 1:30 last night, 28 years later. [Laughter]
    And we were walking yesterday; we took a walk, and I said, ``You know, I
    hope you're not tired of this after all these years.'' She said, ``No, I
    still--it's very interesting to me.'' She said, ``You may be a lot of
    things, but you're not boring, which I appreciate.'' [Laughter]
        So, I want to tell you something. Here's what I want to tell you: I
    have known thousands of people in public life, literally. I probably
    know more people in public life than anybody else here. I have known--
    I've served with over 150 Governors. I have known lots of Senators. I've
    known lots of House Members. I've known State representatives and
    mayors. I still believe it is a noble calling, being in public service.
    And you should not even judge all Republicans--I'll say this for Michael
    Forbes' benefit--by the tone set by the
    leadership of their party in the Congress. Most people I've known in
    public life were honest, hardworking people who got up every day and did
    what they thought was right, to the best of their abilities.
        But there is a genuine big debate. If you want somebody that's
    thought about this stuff and worked hard and always tried to do it for
    other people for 30 years, who has more heart, more intelligence, more
    ability, and more commitment than any person I have every known, of all
    the thousands I have known, then you ought to send her to the Senate and give her a chance to serve.
        Thank you, and God bless you.

    Note: The President spoke at 6:45 p.m. in a private residence. In his
    remarks, he referred to dinner hosts Liz Robbins and Doug Johnson;
    singer Phoebe Snow; and former Gov. Roy Romer of Colorado, general
    cochair, Joseph J. Andrew, national chair, Beth Dozoretz, national
    finance chair, and Andy Tobias, treasurer, Democratic National
    Committee.