[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (1999, Book II)]
[June 30, 1999]
[Pages 1116-1124]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]
Interview With Susan Page of USA Today Aboard Air
Force One
June 30, 1999
President's Medicare Modernization Plan
Ms. Page. We want to talk to you first about Medicare and then about
new markets. You've got your long-awaited plan out on Medicare. What do
you think the prospects are, especially looking at the early initial
reaction that you got yesterday? What do you make of that?
The President. Well, first, I think it's a good sign that we have
the Republican leadership with the door open. That's what having Senator
Roth and having Congressman
Thomas and the other two Republican
congressmen there--McCrery from Louisiana, in
particular, is a guy I know and have a regard for. He believes in
getting things done. McCrery would like to
[[Page 1117]]
make an agreement on Medicare and Social Security--very serious man. So
these guys came; even though there were only three House Members and
Bill Roth, they were the right people.
I think, also, the breadth of the presence of the Democrats
indicates that the most liberal Democrats have acknowledged that we need
to make serious structural reform; and our moderate-to-conservative
Democrats believe that this is enough structural reform to unify and
coalesce around. So I think we've got something to go forward on.
And what I intend to do is to call the leaders--Senator Lott and the Speaker and
Senator Daschle and Mr. Gephardt--and ask them to come and meet with me the day we
get back from Fourth of July recess, and let's try to make a plan for
how we could do it this summer. Because I believe that I can do the same
thing with the Social Security I've done with Medicare, I can offer them
something. We could even maybe build on it and get the--done, because we
can't know that we're really going to pay the debt off which, as you
know, I believe is profoundly important, unless we understand where we
are on both. But I think the first thing to do is to get the Medicare
because there's a real interest in it.
Ms. Page. When you have this meeting with the congressional
leadership, are you going to give them a deadline for action? What will
you do, specifically, at the meeting? What do you want to come out of
it?
The President. Well, what I want to come out of it more than
anything else is a common commitment to the goal. In other words, if the
leaders will all say we want to do this and we think we can, it doesn't
mean we will, but it will get us a lot closer. That will send a signal
to the rank and file in both caucuses that this is something we're
really going to try to do.
And it would be a phenomenal gift to the country to do it, and we
have the money to do it, and the only reason not to do it, frankly, is
if somebody makes a real decision that the money should be diverted to
something else. There is no reason not to do it. We're close enough now;
we're much closer now, frankly, on Medicare than we were before we did
the omnibus balanced budget in '97.
Ms. Page. This meeting or really the release of the plan is the
start of a process. Some people think the end of the process could be a
deal that enables Republicans to get some of the tax cuts they want and
you to get the Medicare plan you want. Do you think that's what will
happen? Is that a possible end of this?
The President. Well, I think it depends first on whether we can get
close enough so that--on the particulars of the structure of the
Medicare--that is, can we get everybody, or more or less everybody for
the kind of structural modernization that I think is imperative, where
we have some genuine competition, but we do it in a way that doesn't
sacrifice quality--that's why I want to set up this extra fund, because
most people believe that in the '97 Balanced Budget Act we had excessive
savings in some areas of Medicare from the point of view of providers,
so we set aside a fund for the Congress to deal with that--and then
whether we can get a general agreement on the structure of the drug
benefit.
A lot of our people--and I'm very sympathetic--and maybe some of
theirs would like to accommodate both the people that have huge drug
bills and the biotech industry which wants to be able to sell these
drugs if they keep investing and pushing the envelope on the big things.
But I thought it important not to have a drug benefit that would be
subject to the same criticism that we leveled at one of their tax
programs back in '97--that, okay, it looks good for 5 years. So now,
we've avoided that.
But I think that if we can get agreement on the fundamentals of this
and then if we can get agreement on real commitment to paying down the
debt and taking the interest savings and plowing it into Social
Security, then I think there is enough funding left over, not committed
to either of those pots, given this new budget, that we can probably
make it a kind of omnibus agreement covering other things.
But I think we----
Ms. Page. Including tax cuts?
The President. Yes, but I think that what we have to focus on is
first things first. I think that, for the Democrats and for me, the
important thing will be having the right kind of Medicare reform, having
the prescription drug benefit, and getting the details right here. And
so that's why I think we have to really--we've got to focus on that.
I think the other stuff--assuming, as I said--it's a big
assumption--assuming you get the financing right on the Social Security
piece, I'd also like to have an omnibus agreement. I'm going to try to
get them to agree on Social
[[Page 1118]]
Security, too. And a lot of people--most people don't think we can do
that. I disagree. I think there's a lot more commonality than most
people think. I spent a lot of time just quietly thinking about it, on
our trip to Europe and other things, trying to write out different
scenarios. But I think there is much more energy right now behind the
Medicare issue and a much greater sense of urgency. And frankly, you've
got one that goes broke in 2015 and the other one, if they just hang
with the money I've got, will stay all right until 2053 or 2055.
So I think Medicare first, see if they want to do it, see if they'll
commit to try to do it by the summer. And then I think they can raise
their other concerns once we get into the framework of the substance.
But we've got to stay--this is a big, big--changes in Medicare, and we
need to focus on that first.
Ms. Page. Are you concerned at all, though, that there may be a good
number of Democrats who are afraid there will be a deal that they won't
like? And I know you've said you want to----
The President. But none of them think that so far. In other words, I
have worked very, very hard to keep our caucus together. I took a good
deal of time to come out with the specifics of this plan, and we did a
lot of serious work, all of us--and I include the White House in that,
too--really trying to take the politics out of this in terms of what
specifics we recommended. That is, I really tried to figure out what I
thought had to be done structurally for this program to work, what kinds
of savings we had to achieve, whether the economics really would support
getting rid of all the copays on the preventive screening if you put in
the copays on the lab tests that tend to be--most people believe are
overused. That kind of stuff.
So I think that--all I can tell you is that the negotiating process
that I would support would be designed to produce an agreement that
would be supported by the overwhelming majority of our caucus, and I
would hope the overwhelming majority of theirs.
If you look at the balanced budget agreement, we did a pretty good
job. They had a slightly higher percentage of Republicans voting for it
in the House than the Democrats, and in the Senate we had a slightly
higher percentage of Democrats voting for it than Republicans. But in
both Houses, there were big, big majorities in both parties. I think to
get an agreement, we're going to have to do that.
President's Agenda and 2000 Election
Ms. Page. Given how important it is to you to try to win the
Congress back, or as much as you could, for your party, do you ever feel
personally torn about a deal versus trying to give Al Gore and the
Democrats an issue?
The President. No, because I don't believe--it might help some
individual Republicans get reelected to Congress if they voted for such
an agreement, but I believe that for Democrats what is good policy is
almost always the best politics. The ``do right'' rule is almost always
best for us because we get hired to do things.
The American people, when they vote for Democrats, they hire them.
They give you this job, and you get a contract, and your contract is 2
years, 6 years, or 4 years if you're President; and they hire us to go
to work every day and to do things. And I don't believe--for example, it
didn't hurt the Democrats in 1998 that we had a big budget at the end
where there was a compromise that a lot of Republicans voted for, and we
got the big downpayment on 100,000 teachers and a lot of other
educational priorities. It didn't hurt them at all.
The only--this is not going to turn into a status quo country, and
there are too many issues on which we are too deeply divided. If we can
reach agreement on--and I'm not saying this could happen--if we could
reach agreement on Medicare, Social Security, taxes, investments in
education, and there would still be differences in 2000 on next steps in
education, on guns, on patients' rights, even if we pass a Patients'
Bill of Rights, there are going to be differences, unresolved
differences, on choice, on a lot of issues.
In other words, there will be a vibrant election-year environment in
2000 for issues still to be decided by America that will be clear in the
Presidential race and clear in the congressional races. Even if both
parties--even if the Republicans join us--if you look at George
Bush's message, it's assumed he will be
nominated on this compassionate conservatism thing--and that both
parties are competing for the dynamic center of America, I happen to
think that's a healthy thing. If you just look at the real substantive
differences, all--just the issues I've mentioned and others, we'll have
[[Page 1119]]
plenty to fight about, argue about in the election.
So I think that actually both parties will be better off in dealing
with the agenda of the 21st century. If we dealt with the baby boom
problems right now, if we dealt with Social Security and Medicare and
committed to pay the debt down, if we did all that, the Republicans
would still say we need more for tax cuts than maybe we'll get, or
here's our next round of tax cuts, or whatever. There will be plenty to
debate.
President's Medicare Modernization Plan
Ms. Page. One last question on Medicare, before we turn to new
markets. Senator Breaux was critical, saying your plan didn't go far
enough by addressing structural reforms. And you, yourself, since
``Putting People First,'' have supported things like means testing. Are
you frustrated that politically it wasn't possible to go farther than
you went in this Medicare plan?
The President. No, I think--well, first of all, I think the
structural reforms in the health care--there are two issues there. One
is the means testing, which was not in his report, either, because some
of the Republicans didn't go for it. I don't think that's as big a
problem as some people do, and I'll come back to that.
The second is an area on which we have an honest disagreement--
Breaux and Thomas and me--and it's an honest disagreement. I want there to
be--I want the managed care Medicare people to be given the maximum
opportunity to make their program attractive to people in the
traditional fee-for-service program, if they can do so. In that regard,
I go just as far as they do.
Now, what I don't do, and I really don't think I should do,
especially given the level of anxiety Americans have about managed
care--even though I have imposed a Patients' Bill of Rights for
federally funded programs, so our guys, our Medicare people, get the
Patients' Bill of Rights--what I don't do that they do is I don't permit
a level of what they call competition in the fee-for-service program in
a way that would permit the cost of the traditional program to the
beneficiaries to rise so rapidly that it would force people into managed
care, whether they wanted to be there or not. That's the only
difference. And we just have an honest, philosophical difference about
that.
Now, on the upper income premium issue--I ran on that in '92. I've
never made any secret to the American people that I think that's the
right thing to do. But it is not as compelling as it once was--and a lot
of people have forgotten this for one simple reason: We took the income
limit off of the Medicare tax in the '93 balanced budget act. So every
wealthy person in America today is paying much more in Medicare taxes
than they will use anyway. In other words, if you're making a quarter of
a million dollars a year, you don't have that $67,000--I think it was
$80,000 cap, something like that--you don't have that cap anymore.
So since '93, you've been paying a great deal into the Medicare
program. So you don't have the equity argument you used to have. One of
the reasons that Medicare program was extended in its life--apart from
the cost savings we effected and waste, fraud, and abuse stuff, which we
really did better about than most of us thought we could--is that we
took the earnings limitation off the Medicare tax, and I think that a
lot of times people who say upper income people should pay more have
forgotten that and forgotten just what a significant amount of money
that is to a lot of people.
New Markets Initiative
Ms. Page. We better turn to new markets, because we want to talk a
little about that, too. So you're going next week from Appalachia to
Watts. Tell us why you're doing the tour.
The President. Well, I'm doing it first to shine the light on these
areas in America, because I believe that we have both an obligation to
give the communities and the neighborhoods that haven't been touched by
the economic recovery the chance to be a part of it, to go into the new
century with us, and secondly, because I think it is very good economic
strategy.
All the discussion leading up to what the Federal Reserve was going
to do today on interest rates was all premised on the fact that we're
having a great national debate now, because no one thought 5 years ago,
6 years ago that we could possibly have average growth well in excess of
3 percent and unemployment under 4.5 percent without having inflation.
So we don't have any signs of inflation, but shouldn't they be worried
about it, since nobody really thought we could have it?
[[Page 1120]]
Everyone knows that the technology explosion, especially in
telecommunications and information technology, has dramatically
increased productivity in ways that traditional economic models don't
measure. But no one really believes the whole business cycle and all
traditional economics has been repealed. So if you're sitting in my
chair and you're asking yourself not only what would you like to do to
make sure all these people who aren't participating get a chance to
participate--you ask yourself a bigger question: Is there any way we
could keep this economic recovery going, creating even more jobs,
raising incomes even more, and not have inflation?
And the answer is, yes, if you can either find more customers for
American goods and services or more workers to come in and produce more
so they're not just being added on for the same level of production.
Now, what are the possibilities for that? Expanded trade, which is
why I've worked very hard to build a consensus in my own party for
trade, plus labor and environmental standards--why I went to Geneva and
made those speeches, why I went to the University of Chicago and all
that--for trade.
Two, getting more discrete populations into the work force. The most
obvious ones in America are more people from welfare to work. Tonight I
had Eli Segal at the fundraiser, if you listened
in on that. He's now got 12,000 companies in this deal where we're
trying to hire even hard-to-place welfare recipients and train them.
Why? Because that's adding to the productive capacity. You get people
who are both workers and consumers. The other big discrete population
are the disabled, which is why this thing that apparently we're going to
have an overwhelming bipartisan majority of Congress do, which is to let
disabled people keep their Medicaid in the work force, it's potentially
a very big, positive contribution to long-term growth, because, again,
you're creating more workers and more consumers.
Now, the third big opportunity is to find what areas have not been
fully reached with investment and jobs in growth. And that's what this
is about. I want to emphasize--so that's the idea.
Now, I want to talk about three things when we go there. One is I
want to emphasize the tools that are already out there, to make sure
people are making the most of them: the empowerment zones; the community
development banks, including the microenterprise zones and the
enterprise communities; the tax credits employers get now for hiring
people in those areas; and the Community Reinvestment Act, which, as you
know, had been on the books for over 20 years, but over 95 percent of
all the lending under the Community Reinvestment Act has been done
during our administration. We really pushed it. So we'll do a little of
that, hear things that are working now.
The second thing I want to do is to point out that one of the
reasons there hasn't been more investment in these areas is that there
is imperfect knowledge on the part of the American business and
investment community. They don't know what a good deal it is. The head
of Aetna insurance company, when we went to
Atlanta, when we did our pre-trip--on the way back he was ragging me. He
said, ``You know, I'm the only guy here who's not happy we did this,
because,'' he said, ``I'd already figured all this out by myself, and
now all my competitors are going to know.'' He said this is a big deal.
I'll just give you one example. On average, there is a gap, between
purchasing power and retail sales in the inner cities, of 25 percent. In
Los Angeles it's 35 percent. In East St. Louis, where we're going, it's
40 percent. That's just retail sales, no small-scale manufacturing, no
professional services, none of that other stuff, all the other things
you could do.
So I think there's really a lot I can do just with the bully pulpit
and taking these business leaders around and getting them--you know,
we're going to have bipartisan political folks there; we've got Jesse
Jackson and Al From; we're
going to have Republican and Democratic Congressmen and Governors and
all. But I think that just getting the business community to focus on
the fact--because they're all interested in this question, what I want
to say to them is, look, you don't just have to debate what Alan
Greenspan is going to do; you can change the
underlying reality on the ground if you change the economics.
And the third thing that I want to do is to push the specific new
markets legislation. Why? Because all these other things we've done--
even though the CRA, the Community Investment Act, is a nationwide law,
it depends still in part on the vigors of the bankers in specific
places, and all the other things have discreet impacts. In other words,
we don't have a community
[[Page 1121]]
development bank everywhere; we don't have an enterprise zone or
empowerment community everywhere--I mean, an empowerment zone or an
enterprise community everywhere.
This new markets initiative basically is designed to put in place
for the whole Nation, all distressed areas the same incentives that we
give America to invest in developing economies overseas. I think they
ought to have those incentives, developing economies at home.
So, for example, the way this would work is let's suppose someone
wanted to build a $150 million shopping center in East St. Louis and
open 20 stores--I'm just making this up--and they started with $50
million of investments; they've got a $50 million investment fund. On
that $50 million they could get tax credits of 25 percent for their
investment. They would also be able to go to the bank and borrow $100
million and have that $100 million subject to the Government guarantee,
which would dramatically lower the interest rate that they would be
charged to borrow the money, because if they defaulted on the loan, the
Government would guarantee it. And those are the kinds of mechanisms we
have in place now for people who invest in developing markets overseas.
The reason that's important is, number one, unlike the empowerment
zones, it would be nationwide, and number two, even if you had perfect
knowledge on the part of investors, that you don't have now, there would
be, in many of these places, somewhat greater risk to the investment
than in a traditional investment. So by providing these two big
incentives you lower the relative risk of this investment compared to
others and make it even more attractive to do.
But if you think about it, this is sort of my classic Third Way kind
of approach. In the 1980's, we found out for sure that free enterprise
alone would not develop these areas into the 1990's. In the 1960's, with
the whole Great Society approach, it isn't true that it didn't
accomplish anything. It accomplished a great deal. It fed people; it
educated people; it started Head Start; it provided health care in rural
areas; it provided some Government-funded jobs. But there was no
internal structural change that would allow a lot of these places to
become more self-sufficient on a long-term basis.
If we could do this and really make a big difference over the next
few years, then when the next recession comes along in America, it won't
hit these areas as hard, because they will have, just like other places,
some underlying economic supports, some self-sufficiency. And that means
fewer people on the streets. It means the crime rate won't go up as
much. It means you won't lose as many kids. It means a lot of things
when times are tough.
But it seems to me that there is an enormous interest in this now,
in the business community. You can see it in the Wall Street Project
that Jesse Jackson and Dick Grasso and others have done for the last few years, and you
can see it in the massive commitment that--and NationsBank made to
setting up community banks and microenterprise lending over the next 10
years. They made a huge commitment on their own.
So there is a lot of this stuff just sort of germinating out there.
A lot of great things have happened in our empowerment zones. A lot of
these development banks are beginning to really show some results. But
there is no either nationwide awareness or nationwide framework which
could be applied to every place. And that's what the new markets
initiative is all about.
It's about just increasing the awareness and the attractiveness of
these areas to the investment community and then putting in place a
framework that would make it even more attractive to invest now. And if
we could get a lot of this done while the economy is growing, I think
the benefits to America could be permanent. I think, in that sense, it's
the perfect public/private partnership example that I've been trying to
develop all along. I'm really excited about it. I'm just--it's a real
dream of mine to prove this can be done.
Ms. Page. You'll apparently be the first sitting President to ever
go to an Indian reservation.
The President. Is that right?
Ms. Page. I think so.
The President. It's high time. I'm sorry it has taken me so long,
because I spent a lot of time with Native American leaders. I went to
reservations back in '92, and I spent enormous time with the leaders of
the tribes over the last 6\1/2\ years. So I'm very excited about going.
Ms. Page. Some people would say you've done a lot--you've focused on
empowerment zones; you've focused on some of these problems of poverty,
people who haven't participated in the economic good times--but that we
haven't heard so much about it lately, '95, '96. Why now? Why is now the
time to put this kind
[[Page 1122]]
of spotlight on the places that remind people that the economic
prosperity hasn't been good for everybody?
The President. Two reasons. One is, I think that there is a feeling
that the prosperity of the country is broadly shared, and that's right.
We've got the lowest minority unemployment rates we've recorded. In the
last couple of years, we've finally started to close the inequality gap.
We've had substantial increases in wages for people in the lower 40
percent of our earnings. And there's a level of security about the
direction of our economy that I think frees people in a way to think
about those things that are still not done, because I think most
Americans genuinely want to see everybody who is willing to work have a
chance to participate in this.
Secondly, I believe that it's an essential component of my effort to
keep this economy growing without inflation, as I said. In other words,
I think moving people from welfare to work is a moral imperative, but I
also think it's very good for the economy. I think giving disabled
people a chance to take their Medicaid and get in the work force is
morally right; I also think it's very good for the economy, and I think
this could be even better for the economy, and it's certainly morally
right.
We tried to do this in the past, and we've gotten kind of sporadic
publicity for it. But we worked consistently at it. It's one of the many
things that I asked the Vice President to
lead. But he has done a superb job of this, and he's been systematic and
disciplined. And just slowly, slowly, slowly over the last 6 years, I
think we have completely satisfied that a lot of these communities, if
they can get enough investment, can really take off and do well.
So I think that the timing is really right now for America to think
about this as sort of the next economic agenda.
2000 Election and Campaign Finance Reform
Ms. Page. I know we have to leave, but speaking of economic good
times, George Bush has raised $36 million so far in the first half of
this year. What do you think about that? Do you think this has gotten
out of--spiraled out of control? Or is this not--what do you think? It
just seems like a stunning number today.
The President. It's a big number, but you've got to remember,
Republicans have more money than Democrats, and they always promise
upper income people bigger tax cuts. And he's
the Governor of Texas; his brother is the Governor
of Florida; and they've been out for 8 years, and they want in. So all
those reasons mean big numbers.
But what did he raise in Texas? Eleven
million?
Ms. Page. I don't know.
The President. When I ran in '92--8 years ago--in a State of 2.5
million people, with a lower per capita income and not nearly as many
millionaires, we raised $4 million. That would be the equivalent of $20
million or more in Texas.
So he's got a lot going for him. He's a
Governor of a State; his brother is a Governor of a
State; his father was President. They want to
win; they've got more money than we do anyway. So I think that it's a
credit to--he's got good people raising that money, obviously, but I'm
not at all surprised they've raised that kind of money.
Ms. Page. It's early, though; it's very early. Which also raises the
point that conventional wisdom probably told us the Democratic
nomination would be sewed up at this point, but the Republican wouldn't;
and it's actually the opposite, it appears to be actually perhaps the
opposite of that. What do you----
The President. I don't know, it just depends, you know. It depends;
the voters in Iowa and New Hampshire will not be as influenced by the
money, probably, just because there's only so many of them. There's only
so much you can--but I think the real problem for all these guys, and
one reason they can compellingly go out and raise this money--I mean,
arguably, if you're talking about the money Bradley raised, he was a national figure for longer than any of
the other people running in the Republican primary, except for
Elizabeth Dole; maybe she was. But she was in
the Cabinet, but Bradley was a nationally known figure for 18 years in
the Senate, from the day he got there, and traveled the country
extensively all that time building a network, for all 18 years. So I'm
not particularly surprised that he's raised a good deal of money.
But I think that--to go back to the main point--one of the reasons
all these people can compellingly argue that they need to get out and
raise this money early is that, unfortunately, it not only gets more and
more expensive to advertise with every election cycle, the States at the
back end get more and more anxiety-
[[Page 1123]]
ridden, so they keep moving their dates up. So this whole thing gets
more and more and more frontloaded.
And one of the interesting things to me would be--I do not know the
answer to this. I'll start by saying I do not known the answer to this,
but when you write the history of this election in the primary process,
it will be interesting to see whether or not, even though the small
States have retained their early status--which I happen to think is
quite a good thing, having been through it; I think it's a good thing,
because I think it's terrible that when you get all these primaries--
people running for President from tarmac to tarmac, they will run about
the States; they don't really listen to the people's voices, their
concerns, and when it's all said and done, they haven't learned as much
about the country as they should.
If you have to run in Iowa and New Hampshire, you've got to know
things. You've got to take time. You've got to listen and so forth. So I
believe in that. But anyway, it will be interesting to see when the
history is written whether you and other observers conclude that their
relative influence has declined anyway, simply because as soon as you
turn around, everybody else is voting.
When is this whole thing over now? March? April? Mid-April? Keep in
mind, on June 2d in 1992--June 2d--you had California, New Jersey, and
Ohio. When are they all voting now? March?
Ms. Page. Yes.
The President. So I just don't know. I'm not particularly surprised
about the amount of money anybody has raised.
Ms. Page. Are you concerned that it's bad news for Gore?
The President. Oh, no. I don't think that at all. I don't think that
at all. I mean, I think the Republicans are going to raise more money
than us. They outspent $100 million last year. They take care of their
interest groups. The NRA's going to give them a ton of money. Look what
they've done on the Patients' Bill of Rights. Everybody in the world
with an opinion is for the Patients' Bill of Rights, except one, who is
health insurance. But the health insurance might wind up giving more
money in the election cycle than all the 200 groups that are for us. And
so, that's the dynamic of modern politics. And their whole strategy is
to rake in that dough and to dominate the communications.
It does not matter in our politics if your opponent outraises you if
you raise enough. The only issue in modern politics is whether you have
enough. And keep in mind, in the primary process--unless Governor
Bush is going to slow the campaign finance
law and not take any matching funds--in the primary process, the only
thing that really matters is whether you can raise all the money you
need before the first primary starts so you can rationally plan how to
spend it during the remainder of the primary season. Because there's a
ceiling on how much you can raise in order to get the matching funds in
all of the campaign finance system.
So he shouldn't--nobody else should be
worried about that. The only people who should be worried are people who
aren't going to have enough to get their message out, and the fact that
early money normally means you've got big political support. What you're
seeing in the Republicans now is a little bit what you saw in '92. We'd
been out a long time, and we wanted to get in. And Governors can raise
more money than Senators, especially Governors of big States.
I'm not too surprised he's got all that
money. But it's not bad news for the Vice President, because he's doing very well, and he's got all he needs,
and he's going to get his money by the time he needs it. I think you
will--my gut feeling is that you will not see that have an appreciable
impact on the outcome of the election.
Ms. Page. Before he actually grabs our arm and drags us out here, I
guess we've got to go.
The President. I'm glad you're covering these things, though. This
is really important. This new markets thing is big, and the Medicare
thing is big. It gives us a chance to really do something important.
Thanks.
Ms. Page. Thanks a lot.
The President. Get some sleep. I'm really sorry I kept you waiting.
Senate Seat in Arkansas
Ms. Page. Oh, it's fine. So, can we get a firm and final no from you
that you're not going to run for Senate? I know it sounds crazy, but
that's not exactly a firm and final, absolute no.
The President. Yes. I have to go out and make a living for my
family, and that is--and I'm going to spend the first 2 years organizing
my life, doing my memoirs, and finishing my library.
[[Page 1124]]
That's what I'm going to be doing. I'm not running for the Senate. I
was----
Press Secretary Joe Lockhart. Sounds
firm to me.
The President. I don't even know where that story came from. I think
the story--the guy that reported the story first said someone said they
mentioned it to me, and I didn't say no. I don't even remember anybody
mentioning it to me. But it's not--I had a lot of people in Arkansas ask
me if I'd come home and run for Governor, every time I go home. And I
tell them that we've got to get a young crop up there and put them in
there. I'm not in--I'm not going to do that.
Note: The interview began at 11:55 p.m., e.d.t., aboard Air Force One en
route from Chicago, IL, to Washington, DC. In his remarks, the President
referred to Governors George W. Bush of Texas and Jeb Bush of Florida;
Eli Segal, president, Welfare to Work Partnership; Richard L. Huber,
chairman and chief executive officer, Aetna, Inc.; civil rights leader
Jesse Jackson; Al From, president, Democratic Leadership Council;
Richard Grasso, chairman and chief executive officer, New York Stock
Exchange; former Senator Bill Bradley; and former president of the
American Red Cross, Elizabeth Dole. This interview was released by the
Office of the Press Secretary on July 2. A tape was not available for
verification of the content of this interview.