    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2002, Book II)]
    [September 2, 2002]
    [Pages 1517-1522]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks at a United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners

    Labor Day Picnic on Neville Island, Pennsylvania
    September 2, 2002

        Well, I thank you very much for this warm welcome. Thanks for
    inviting me. If I speak too long, it's going to remind me of Crawford.
    [Laughter] But I appreciate you all coming. I love to see your families.
        I'm here to talk about the greatness of this country. And it starts
    with the fact that we've got great Americans who work hard to make a
    living to put food on the table. Our workers are the most productive,
    the hardest working, the best craftsmen in the world. And I'm here to
    thank all those who work hard to make a living here in America. I also
    want to talk today about how to make sure our country is safer, our
    country is stronger, and our country is a better place for everybody.
        But before I do so, I want to thank Doug. I appreciate his leadership. I appreciate his vision. But
    most of all, I appreciate the fact that Doug McCarron cares deeply,
    deeply about the members of his union. Each person in this union matters
    to Doug. You can tell it when you talk to him, and I've had a chance to
    talk to him quite a lot. He is a fine, fine man who cares deeply about
    people and who loves his country just as much as I do. Doug, thank you
    for your leadership, and thank you for your friendship.
        I, too, want to thank Jack Brooks. I've had the honor of meeting Jack before. He's a
    decent, kind, smart, hard-working fellow. And I appreciate Jack's
    leadership as much as you do. I want to thank Ray Vogel, as well, for giving me a tour of the training center
    here. One of the things that distinguishes this union is that they
    understand, through training, somebody is going to get better pay. If
    you help a man or a woman enhance their skills, it's going to enhance
    their pocketbook. And I appreciate so very much the attention that this
    union pays to the skill level of its members. So I want to thank Jack
    and Ray for helping set this

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    picnic up and giving me a chance to come by and talk to you all.
        I also appreciate the Secretary of Labor being here. Elaine
    Chao is doing a fine job. Her door is open.
    People are able to come in and visit with her. She's a good, honest, and
    open person, and I appreciate her service to the country.
        I want to thank your Governor, Mark Schweiker; your attorney general, Mike Fisher; your Allegheny County executive, Jim Roddey; and the mayor of Pittsburgh, Tom Murphy. Thank you all for coming. The mayor has got a lot of
    spunk. He challenged me to a 3-mile run. [Laughter] I said, ``Fine, see
    you in Crawford at 4 in the afternoon in August.'' [Laughter]
        I do appreciate--I appreciate Melissa Hart and Phil English coming, Members
    of the United States Congress. Thank you all for being here.
        I had the honor of meeting a lady named Doris Harris today. Where
    are you, Doris? Thank you for coming. You see, the reason I introduced
    Doris is because she volunteers her time to help people in need. Doris
    knows that when somebody is shut in, they're alone and lonely. And so
    she takes time to visit homebound seniors, to say, ``I love you. What
    can I do to help you?'' Doris is a member--is a soldier in the army of
    compassion here in America. And the reason I bring that up is because
    there are soldiers in the armies of compassion here amongst you as well.
    I want to thank Doris, and I want to thank you all for doing everything
    you can to bring love and compassion to the neighborhoods in which you
    live. It's the true strength of the--America. Thank you, Doris.
        You know, Doug mentioned, a year
    ago, Labor Day, I was in Wisconsin talking to carpenters. I said that we
    were a nation that's strong because our people are strong. See, we're a
    great nation because we've got great people. I said, ``We're a decent
    nation because our people are decent.''
        I didn't realize, when I said that at the time, how tested we would
    be. But a couple of days later, the enemy hit us, and they tested the
    character of this country. They tested our will. They tested our very
    fiber. I don't know what was going through their mind when they attacked
    us. [Laughter] They must have thought we were so materialistic, so self-
    absorbed, so selfish, that all we would do is shrug our shoulders and
    file a lawsuit, maybe. They didn't understand the America we know.
        No, they hit us, and we united. They hit us, and we're now working
    together as a nation to make the Nation a safer place, a stronger place,
    and a better place. My most important job is to keep our families safe.
    That's my most important job now. I want you to know that there's still
    an enemy out there that hates America. I'm sure your kids, they're
    wondering, why would you hate America? We didn't do anything to anybody.
    Well, they hate America because we love freedom. We cherish our
    freedoms. We value our freedoms. We love the fact that people can
    worship an almighty God in a free land, any way they choose to worship.
    We value the idea of people speaking their mind freely here in America.
    We value a free press; we value our freedoms. But most importantly, we
    say, ``Each life matters. Everybody counts. Everybody has got purpose.
    Everybody is important in life.''
        And the enemy doesn't view it that way. They don't view it that--
    they don't value life. See, they've hijacked a great religion, and
    they're willing to kill innocent people in the name of their sordid
    attitude about the future. And so, so long as we love freedom, which
    we'll do forever, and so long as this enemy is still standing, they're
    going to come and try to get us. That's just the reality that we face.
    And so, therefore, our biggest job is to protect the homeland.
        And there are a lot of good people working hard to do so. There
    really are a lot of fine folks in Washington at the Federal level and
    here in Pennsylvania at the State level and at the local level in
    Pittsburgh, doing everything they can to run down

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    every lead, to chase down every idea, to hold people to account, to
    disrupt. And we're making some pretty good progress. But I've asked the
    Congress to join me in creating a new Homeland Security Department. And
    the reason I did is because I wanted to be able to come and, when I see
    the people, say, ``Our most important priority is to protect America,
    and therefore, I want all agencies involved with protecting America
    under one umbrella.'' See, if you want the most important thing to be
    done, you've got to gather up the over 100 agencies that have got
    something to do with homeland security and put them under one boss, put
    them under one lead, so you can not only change the priorities but
    change the culture.
        I'll give you one example. We need to know who's coming into
    America, what they're bringing into America, and whether or not they're
    leaving America when they say they are. But see, on your border, you've
    got your INS and your Customs and your Border Patrol, three different
    agencies, and they've got different cultures. And we need to have them
    under one umbrella, so we can do a better job of assuring the American
    people we're doing their job.
        Look, anybody who wants to join a union can do so in this crowd,
    with the Homeland Security Department. I mean, if you're a
    whistleblower, you'll get protections. You'll have all the rights to be
    free to join. But I need the flexibility to put the right people at the
    right place at the right time to protect the American people, and the
    Senate better get it right.
        No, we're doing everything we can. A lot of people are working hard,
    but the best way to secure our homeland for the long run is to hunt
    these killers down, one person at a time, and bring them to justice. And
    that's what America is going to do.
        And that's how you ultimately make America a safer place. For those
    of you who have got relatives in the military, you need to be proud of
    the job they're doing. I sure am. It's a different kind of war, though.
    In the old days, you could count tanks and figure out how strong the
    enemy was. This is an enemy that hides in caves. They try to find the
    darkest cave, the deepest cave, and then they send youngsters to their
    suicidal deaths. It's a different kind of hater than we're used to.
        But my attitude is, there's no cave deep enough and dark enough to
    hide from the long arm of justice of the United States and our friends
    and allies. And that's exactly what we're going to do, folks. It doesn't
    matter how long it takes. You see, they put the spotlight on us, and
    we're going to find out what we're made out of, and so are they. And
    what we're made out of is, we're freedom-loving people who are plenty
    tough and plenty determined to make sure the future for our children is
    a future that is free and peaceful.
        And that's why I want to strengthen the military. Anytime you put a
    soldier in harm's way, they deserve the best pay, the best training, and
    the best possible equipment. So a stronger America, to me, means a
    stronger military. And that's why I've submitted the biggest increase in
    defense spending since the mid-eighties, when Ronald Reagan was the
    President. I wanted to send a message. The message is: We'll take care
    of our people. See, we owe it not only to those who wear the uniform; we
    owe it to their loved ones as well. We owe it to the husbands and wives
    of our soldiers. We owe it to the moms and dads. We owe it to the sons
    and daughters.
        But I also wanted to send a message to the enemy and our friends
    that we're in this deal for the long haul. See, when it comes to
    defending that which we hold dear to our hearts, we're in it for the
    long pull. I've asked Congress to get that bill to my desk soon. They
    don't need to be playing politics with the defense bill. They don't need
    to hold it up for other reasons. They need to get home--come from their
    homes--they need to get to Washington and get me a bill as soon as
    possible, so we can win this war and fight this war.

    [[Page 1520]]

    That's what--we owe it to those who wear the uniform to get the defense
    bill done early.
        And part of making sure we have a strong America is to understand
    there are some people who want to find work and can't find work, and
    therefore, we're not as strong as we should be. A strong America is one
    where there's economic security. See, we want people working. I know the
    statistics and all that business. What I worry about is when I hear the
    stories of people who can't find work. And so we've got to make sure
    that we continue to focus on jobs and job creation and job growth.
        I think the ingredients are pretty good. I mean, when you think
    about it, interest rates are low. That's good. Inflation is low, and
    that's positive. Productivity is up because we've got the best workers
    in the world, and that's important. So I'm encouraged about job growth,
    but I'm not satisfied. And neither should you be, and neither should the
    United States Congress.
        And there are some practical ways that we can build on this
    foundation for growth, starting with getting a terrorism insurance bill
    out of the United States Congress. Let me tell you what that means. That
    means some of these big construction projects can go forward. See, a lot
    of them, they've been delayed because they can't get insurance. They
    can't get insurance because of what the terrorists did to America on
    September the 11th. So Doug and I and a
    lot of other concerned citizens have been working with Congress. We
    said, ``Okay, that's fine. We'll take some of the risk to get these big
    construction projects moving.'' There's been over $8 billion worth of
    projects that have been delayed because they can't get insurance. That
    means 300,000 workers aren't working. You see, if we want to do
    something to make sure the job base continues, Congress needs to get
    moving on a terrorism insurance bill. And this bill has got to be good
    for hardhats, not lawyers. This bill--we get this bill, a lot of folks
    are going to go back to work.
        And the same with the energy bill. See, the energy bill that we're
    talking about is a jobs bill. You get the energy bill, we're going to
    get more jobs here in America. It's also a national security bill. See,
    we don't--the less we import oil from foreign sources, the more our
    national security is strong. And so we want to make sure that we
    conserve more, that we use our technologies to develop renewable sources
    of energy. That makes sense. We can do that. We can do a better job of
    exploring environmentally. But we need a bill--we need a bill. We need a
    bill on behalf of the American workers, and we need a bill on behalf of
    the national security of America. Congress needs to quit talking about
    energy and get back to work and do something on behalf of the American
    people when it comes to energy.
        In order to get confidence back in the economy, we've got to do a
    good job of making America's pensions strong. You see, one of the things
    that we did, we passed a--part of this corporate reform bill, one of the
    things we passed which made a lot of sense is that, if the boss gets to
    sell, everybody else does. What's good for the head person is good for
    the people on the shop floor. We also allow people to diversify out of
    their 401(k)s. You ought not to be stuck in one stock forever. After a
    reasonable period of time, you ought to be able to diversify. You need
    to get the best investment advice. We need to make sure our workers are
    protected when it comes to pension reform. And the Congress needs to act
    on it. For the good of the economy, they need to act on this, just like
    they acted on corporate reform.
        And now it's my turn to act. Let me tell you what's going to happen.
    If we catch somebody cooking the books, like we have been doing, it's no
    more easy money; it's just hard time. By far the vast majority of our
    fellow citizens are honest and decent and honorable people; they just
    are. But a few have created a--put a bad name out there. They've created
    a sense of--lack

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    of--they diminish the confidence of the American people. We're putting
    those days behind us.
        We had Republicans and Democrats work together to pass the most
    comprehensive corporate reform since Franklin Roosevelt was the
    President. I put together a task force. And I want to assure you, my
    fellow Americans, here on Labor Day, that if we catch them cooking the
    books, if we catch them fudging the numbers, if we catch people trying
    to put a sleight of hand to the detriment of employees and shareholders
    alike, there are going to be serious consequences here in America. We
    expect people to behave responsibly in our society.
        And finally, in order to make sure the economy continues to grow and
    there's jobs, we've got to be wise about how you spend your money. See,
    every idea sounds like a good idea up there. Everybody throws something
    out there, and it sounds like a brilliant idea. But they always cost in
    the billions, it seems like. One way I like to remind Congress about how
    to be fiscally responsible is to remind them whose money they're
    spending. It's not the Government's money they spend. It's your money.
    It's the people's money.
        No, we can meet our needs. We can meet our needs. And by the way, we
    can make that tax relief a permanent part of the Tax Code. You need to
    have more money in your pocket, as far as I'm concerned. No, those are
    ways for us to make America a stronger place by continuing to focus on
    the economic security of all our citizens--every citizen.
        And we've got to make sure that America is not only safer and
    stronger but a better place--a better place. And there are ways to do
    that. One, America will be a better place when our seniors have got
    prescription drugs as a part of Medicare. That's a better country, a
    country that understands that Medicare serves an important purpose.
    Medicine has changed; Medicare hasn't. And therefore, our seniors don't
    have prescription drugs. It will be a better country when we do that.
        It's a better country when we focus on educating every child, not
    just a few children but every single child. I want to thank the teachers
    who are here. [Applause] I could tell. But remember, if you're a mom or
    a dad, you're a teacher.
        We're a better country when we help people get off welfare by
    finding them work. We're a better country when people learn to work.
    This training center here makes us a better country. It's a better
    country when you've got people who are willing to help people help
    themselves. It's a better country.
        It's a better country when people can own their own homes. When you
    own something, it makes America a better place. We've got a minority gap
    in ownership here for homes in America. We need to do something about
    it. We need to close that gap. We need to help people with downpayments.
    We need to get some--we need to get more capital into the marketplace,
    so people can find ways to borrow money to build--to buy their own home.
        No, it's a--the goal is more than just a safer country; it's a
    better place for all of us, see. I mean for all of us. You know, the
    enemy didn't realize, but out of the evil is going to come some
    incredible good here in America. I truly believe that. I believe that.
        I believe that we can achieve peace. And I want you to tell your
    sons and daughters that we fight for our freedom in order for there to
    be peace, for the world to be more peaceful, not only here at home but
    for children all across the world. See, we value each human life as
    important. We don't try to distinguish--everybody has got worth in the
    eyes of the Almighty, as far as we're concerned in this Nation.
        But peace is our goal--peace. There's going to be some steep hills
    to climb, no question about it, but we're going to work hard to achieve
    peace. Out of the evil done by these killers will come peace, we think--

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    I think. We have to be tough and determined and resolute, but we can
    achieve peace.
        And at home, we can have a better America. People say, ``Well, what
    can I do to help?'' You can love your neighbor just like you'd like to
    be loved yourself. You can help a neighbor in need. You can go to a
    shut-in and say, ``I love you.'' That's just a part of being--a part of
    loving your neighbor. You can mentor a child. You can understand your
    most important responsibility, if you're a mom or a dad, is to love your
    children with all your heart and all your soul. You should tell them you
    love them every single day. Put your arm around them. Find somebody who
    hurts, understand there's deep addiction and hopelessness in parts of
    our neighborhoods in America, and we can help change that, one person at
    a time.
        See, Government can hand out money--pretty good at it--[laughter]--
    but it can't put hope into people's hearts. It can't put a sense of
    purpose in people's lives. Somebody said, ``Well, I can't do
    everything.'' No, but you can do something. You can do something. See,
    we can change America, one heart, one soul, one conscience at a time.
        And I call upon our fellow Americans, here on Labor Day, to be a
    part of that change in America. Be a part of the gathering momentum of
    millions of acts of kindness and decency which show the true face and
    character of the greatest nation, the greatest nation on the face of the
    Earth.
        God bless you all. God bless. God bless America. Thank you all.

    Note: The President spoke at 2:35 p.m. outside the Carpenters' Training
    Center. In his remarks, he referred to Douglas J. McCarron, general
    president, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners; John A.
    ``Jack'' Brooks, executive secretary-treasurer, Greater Pennsylvania
    Regional Council of Carpenters; Ray Vogel, coordinator, Carpenters'
    Training Center; and Jim Roddey, chief executive, Allegheny County, PA.