    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2002, Book II)]
    [October 31, 2002]
    [Pages 1933-1939]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    [[Page 1933]]

    Remarks in Aberdeen, South Dakota
    October 31, 2002

        The President. Thank you all. Thanks a lot for coming. Thanks for
    having me here. The next time you get me to come back, let's go pheasant
    hunting. I can't go today. [Laughter] I've got to work. I'm traveling
    our country to remind people that the American spirit is alive and well
    today.
        That spirit is the spirit of a determined nation willing to defend
    our freedoms, no matter what the cost. That American spirit says loud
    and clear that we're willing to serve something greater than ourselves.
    We're willing to serve people in need, a community we love. And part of
    the American spirit is for our citizens to exercise their duty, and
    their duty is to cast a vote on November the 5th. You have a duty. You
    have a duty in this country. If you believe in freedom, if you believe
    in the values that make this country the finest nation on the face of
    the Earth, you have a duty to go to the polls. That's part of what it
    means to live in a free society.
        I want to thank you all who have voted. I want to thank you who are
    fixing to vote. And I've got some suggestions for you when you get
    inside the voting booth. [Laughter] For the sake of South Dakota, for
    the sake of our country, John Thune should be
    the next United States Senator.
        Audience members. Thune! Thune! Thune!
        The President. For the sake of South Dakota and for the sake of the
    country, Bill Janklow needs to be the next
    United States Congressman. And for the sake of South Dakota,
    particularly the sake for excellence in education, Mike Rounds needs to be the next Governor.
        I urge all the citizens of this State and around the country,
    Republican, Democrat, or independent alike, to go to the polls. But I
    believe when those discerning Democrats and those wise independents take
    a look at the candidates that I'm here to support, they're going to vote
    for them. It's in the best interests of their families. It's in the best
    interests of this State that these three men
    be elected to their offices.
        Not only have these three good men decided to put their
    hat in the ring, all of them married above themselves. [Laughter]
    Kimberley Thune is a great wife of John
    Thune. She is a wonderful lady. She'll bring a lot of class--she has
    brought a lot of class to Washington. We're proud to call her friend.
    John is proud to call her wife, and her kids are proud to call her
    mother.
        I'm proud to be up here with Mary Dean Janklow, who's been a great first lady for the State of South
    Dakota. And Jean Rounds will be a great first
    lady for the State of South Dakota.
        I know something about First Ladies. One of them got stuck with me.
    [Laughter] Laura sends her love; she sends her
    very best. She's coming to the State to campaign, which means you drew
    the short straw. [Laughter] Laura and I share the values of the people
    of South Dakota. After all, as John mentioned, we were raised in west
    Texas. It's good. [Laughter] Then you know what I'm talking about.
    Actually, when I married Laura, she was a public school librarian. She
    didn't like politics. She didn't care for politicians. [Laughter] Thank
    goodness she said yes when I was there on bended knee. America now knows
    why I asked her to marry me. She's smart. She's capable. She's calm. She
    is a great First Lady for this country.
        I want to thank Dr. Hilpert for opening
    up this beautiful facility for this rally. I want to thank the
    university staff for putting up with the President's entourage. I want
    to thank you for your hospitality. I want to thank the mayor of
    Aberdeen, Tom Hooper, for coming out to say hello today. I appreciate--
    Tom Hopper. I appreciate

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    very much his hospitality. I want to thank all my citizens for coming.
        I want to thank the grassroots activists who are here. I want to
    thank you for your activity in the democratic process. I want to thank
    you for turning out the vote. I want to thank you for what you have done
    in the past. I want to thank you for what you are going to do during the
    next couple of days, which is to man the phones, which is to go to your
    coffee shops and remind the people there that when you find good,
    honorable, decent, honest people, they ought to vote for them. When you
    go to your community centers, urge your neighbors to turn out to vote.
    Make sure that you do your duty not only to vote but, if you believe in
    the character and the vision of these candidates, turn out your
    neighbors to the polls come next Tuesday. Work hard. And you know what's
    going to happen on election day: These three good people are going to get elected.
        And there is a reason why. Mike Rounds has
    got a vision for education for this State that says no child will be
    left behind, a vision which says every child can be educated. There's a
    reason why to vote for him, besides the fact that he's a good and
    honorable man. It's because he's got a vision that's positive for the
    future of this State.
        There's a reason to support Janklow,
    besides the fact he and I are good buddies. There's a reason to support
    him, besides the fact it will be a vote that I can count on to make sure
    that we go the right direction in this country, and that is, he's got a
    solid record of accomplishment in the State of South Dakota.
        And there's a reason why John Thune ought
    to be in the Senate. He's an independent fellow who works on behalf of
    the citizens of South Dakota with all his heart. He can work with both
    Democrats and Republicans. He doesn't get caught up in all the nasty
    rhetoric that tends to divide our Nation's Capital, that rhetoric which
    sends bad signals to many of our citizenry. He's a fellow who works hard
    on behalf of the schoolchildren of South Dakota. After all, with his
    help we were able to send $185 million in educational funding this year.
    John Thune was working hard to make sure that the schools of South
    Dakota were treated well.
        He's a man who is committed to our
    military, not just at election time, by the way. After all, his dad,
    Harold, was a World War II fighter pilot who
    taught John that peace comes through strength, that the stronger this
    Nation of ours is, the more peaceful the world will become. John also,
    like me, listens to his mother. [Laughter] She
    told him, she said, ``You get up there, you better make sure Social
    Security is secure.'' And he has made that commitment.
        I look forward to working with John on key
    issues in the United States Senate, like Medicare. That's a key issue.
    This Nation has made a promise to our seniors, and we need to do
    something about the Medicare system. After all, medicine is modern;
    Medicare isn't. Medicine has changed, but Medicare is stuck in the past.
    I need a Senator with whom I can work to modernize Medicare, and a
    modern Medicare system means prescription drugs for our seniors.
        I need somebody I can work with in the Senate to make sure that the
    crisis of our--in our judiciary gets solved. There's too many vacancies
    in our--on our Federal benches, which means the dockets are crowded. It
    means Americans aren't getting the justice they deserve. The Senate has
    done a lousy job with my nominees. I need a Senator with whom I can work
    to make sure that we stop playing petty partisan politics with the
    judicial nominations I've sent up, to make sure people's records aren't
    distorted, and to make sure we have a bench that is full of judges who
    aren't there to write the law but are there to strictly interpret the
    United States Constitution. And make no mistake about it: That Senator
    is John Thune.

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        Audience members. Thune! Thune! Thune!
        The President. I appreciate the fact that John understands the importance of agriculture in our economy
    and in our way of life. He tried to convince me of that one time. I
    said, ``You don't have to convince me. I'm from the second largest
    agricultural State in the country.'' He said, ``Yeah, but you're not
    from South Dakota.'' I said, ``No, good point.'' [Laughter] He
    understands farmers and ranchers. We both know the values that are found
    on our farms and our ranches, those family values that are dear to the
    heart of America.
        He knows, if you're good at something, we
    ought to promote it. We're good at raising crops, and we ought to be
    selling them all around the world, for the sake of South Dakota farmers
    and South Dakota ranchers.
        He's a commonsense fellow. He understands
    good, practical policies can make a large difference. We need to change
    our forest policies. We need to change our forest policies for the sake
    of the people who live in this State. We need to change our forest
    policies so we can preserve our national treasure. It doesn't make any
    sense to have a forest policy that will not allow for thinning and
    clearing, a forest policy that is so backward that we allow kindling to
    build up in these forests, and then with an act of nature or with a
    sleight of hand by mankind, our national treasures burn to the ground.
    John Thune has got a commonsense vision for good forest policy. I look
    forward to working with him in the United States Senate to preserve
    these national heritages.
        I look forward to working with John to
    deal with some of the high hurdles we have to cross as a nation. One of
    the high hurdles is our economy. Anytime people are looking for work and
    they can't find work means we've got a problem in America. We've got
    some good news today. The third quarter growth was positive, and that's
    good. We're kind of moving our way toward a time when people can find
    work. But there's more to do. There's more to do, and Congress has a
    role to play. They need to get an antiterrorism insurance bill to my
    desk that will put hardhats back to work, that rewards hardhats and not
    America's trial lawyers.
        But one of the best things we can do is to make sure these tax
    relief plans that we--package we passed is permanent. The Senate rules
    say that they last for only 10 years. That creates uncertainty. How can
    a small-business owner plan for the future if the Tax Code is going to
    shift around on him or her? You can't. If you want to create jobs, there
    must be steadiness in our Tax Code. There has to be a permanency to the
    rules.
        And we passed a tax relief plan that over the next 10 years will
    yield $3.2 billion in tax relief to the South Dakota citizens. That
    means you have more money in your pocket. And when you have more money
    in your pocket, it means you're likely to demand a good or a service.
    And when you demand a good or a service, in the marketplace it means
    somebody is likely to produce that good or a service, which means
    somebody is more likely to find work. For the sake of jobs, for the sake
    of job creation, we need to make the tax relief permanent.
        Be wary of those folks who say we need to revisit the tax relief
    plan. That's Washington, DC, code for, ``I'm fixing to raise your
    taxes.'' When the economy is bumping along, we don't need to be raising
    taxes; we need to be reducing taxes. And we've got to also remember you
    need to have somebody in Washington that understands whose money we're
    talking about. That money is not the Government's money. We're talking
    about your money.
        So I look forward to working with Senator Thune and Congressman Janklow on the
    issues that relate to the--our citizenry, issues like economic growth
    and good health systems and education. The biggest issue we'll be
    working on together is to protect the American people. That's the

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    biggest issue. The biggest challenge we have in America is to protect
    our citizens from killers. They're nothing but a bunch of coldblooded
    killers. These people have hijacked a great religion, and they kill
    innocent life. See, they don't like America; they don't value life like
    we do. We say in our country, ``Everybody matters. Everybody is precious
    in the sight of an Almighty. Everybody counts.'' That's not the ways
    these folks we're chasing down think. You just got to know that.
        But the Nation is--we've been warned. We understand the stakes. We
    understand our life is changed. And so there's a lot of good folks doing
    everything they can to do our number one job, which is to protect you, a
    lot of good folks at the Federal level and the State level and the local
    level doing everything we can to disrupt and deny, to run down every
    hint, every lead. Anytime we've got any kind of inkling that somebody is
    thinking about doing something to an American and something to our
    homeland, you've just got to know we're moving on it, to protect the
    United States Constitution, and at the same time, we're protecting you.
        But we can do a better job. And that's why I went to the United
    States Congress and asked them to join me in the creation of a
    Department of Homeland Security, so we can get all of the agencies
    involved with protecting you to have as their number one focus your
    protection and, if need be, be able to change cultures within these
    agencies.
        The House of Representatives passed a good bill. I want to thank
    John Thune for his vote. This bill is stuck in
    the Senate. It's stuck in the Senate because some Senators are trying to
    extract a price from the President, and the price is, is that I will
    give up the capacity to suspend certain bargaining rules in the name of
    national security, the ability that every President since John F.
    Kennedy has had.
        Let me put it to you this way: The work rules--I wouldn't have the
    capacity to suspend some work rules for the Department of Homeland
    Security if I accepted their version, but I would for the Department of
    Agriculture. Here we are at war; I have more flexibility in dealing with
    the work rules in the Department of Agriculture than I would in the
    Department charged with your protection. It doesn't make any sense. I
    need to be able to put the right people at the right place at the right
    time to protect the American people. John Thune will support me in advancing a homeland security bill that
    makes sense.
        But the best way to protect you is to find these killers, one at a
    time, and bring them to justice. And that's exactly what we're going to
    do. It doesn't matter how long it takes. It just doesn't matter how long
    it takes to defend our country and defend our freedoms. There's not a
    calendar on my desk that says, on such-and-such a date you'll be hauling
    them home, on such-and-such a date we quit. That's not an America I
    know, and that's not the America you're a part of. You see, when it
    comes to defending that which we hold dear, our freedoms, it doesn't
    matter what the cost; it doesn't matter how long it takes.
        See, history has called us--it's called this generation into action.
    And we are not going to let future generations of Americans down. We
    have an obligation to future generations to do whatever it takes to
    defend that which we hold dear, and we hold our freedoms dear.
        I signed the biggest increase in defense spending since Ronald
    Reagan was the President. I want to thank the Members of Congress and
    the Senate for getting that bill to me. The reason I asked for such a
    big increase is, there's two principles involved. One, anytime we put
    our troops into harm's way, anytime we put our youngsters into a zone in
    which there's danger, we owe it to them and we owe it to their loved
    ones to make sure they've got the best pay, the best training, and the
    best possible equipment.

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        And secondly, we're sending a clear signal to friend and foe alike
    that this is a determined nation. I'm determined to make sure that that
    doctrine that says, ``Either you're with us or with the enemy,'' is
    still clear in everybody's mind around the world. It still stands, by
    the way. If you harbor a terrorist, you're just as guilty as the
    terrorist; that doctrine still stands, too. And that defense bill shows
    we mean what we say.
        For those of you who have got loved ones in the military, you need
    to pass on this message: The Commander in Chief has got all the
    confidence in the world, all the confidence that our military can
    achieve any objective. I'm proud of them, and I appreciate their
    sacrifices for our great Nation.
        And we're making progress. We're making progress. Sometimes you'll
    see it on your TV screens, and sometimes you won't. See, it's a
    different kind of war. In the old days, we'd destroy tanks and ships and
    airplanes and say, ``Look, we're destroying the enemy's hardware, and
    we're making progress.'' This bunch we're fighting is people who hide in
    caves and send their youngsters to their suicidal deaths. It's a
    different kind of war. But we're still making progress, one at a time.
    We're hauling them in. We've got a coalition of people on the hunt.
        A couple of thousand of them have been hauled in, and they're no
    longer a problem. Like number met a different fate, and I can assure you
    they're not a problem. One of them popped his head up the other day, the
    guy who was going to be the 20th hijacker. He's not a problem to the United States either. We're
    slowly but surely rounding these killers up to make America a safe
    place.
        We've got to be clear-eyed. We've got to understand the risk that
    our country faces. We've got to be realistic, particularly in
    Washington, DC, when it comes to setting priorities to defending our
    homeland. It's important that we not see the world the way we hope it is
    but we see the world the way it really is. The world changed on
    September the 11th, 2001. It used to be, when a lot of us were growing
    up, that oceans could protect us. Oh, if there was a conflict overseas,
    we could pick or choose if we wanted to be involved, but the threat
    wasn't really real to America. It might be real to some Americans who
    were overseas, but it wasn't real to our homeland. It was not a threat,
    but that all changed. And it's important for those of us who are
    responsible for your safety to be clear-eyed about the threats, to see
    threats as they are, not as we hope they are.
        There is a threat in Iraq. And the threat exists because a leader
    there not only has denied and deceived the
    world about whether or not he's got weapons of mass destruction, but
    this is a guy who's used weapons of mass destruction. He not only has
    them; he's used them. And he's not only used them in his neighborhood;
    he's used them against his own people. This is a man who cannot stand
    what we stand for. He hates the fact, like Al Qaida does, that we love
    freedom. See, they can't stand that. This is a guy who has had
    connections with these shadowy terrorist networks. As I said in
    Cincinnati, Ohio, a while back, he's the kind of fellow who would love
    nothing more than to hurt America and not leave any fingerprints by
    using a surrogate army on his behalf. He's a problem. He's a true threat
    to America and our friends and allies.
        I went to the United Nations a while ago because I want the United
    Nations to be effective. It's a different kind of war we face; we face
    different kind of threats. It makes sense for there to be an
    international body that has got the backbone and the capacity to help
    keep the peace. And so here is my message, a message, by the way,
    resoundingly supported by members of both political parties in the
    Senate and the House: The message to the world is that we want the U.N.
    to succeed.

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    We want those resolutions you pass to be listened to. You have told
    Saddam Hussein he must disarm. Do your job.
        And Saddam Hussein, you have said you'll
    disarm; you need to do your job. But if the U.N. won't act, and if
    Saddam Hussein won't disarm, for the sake of peace, for the sake of a
    free future for our children, we will lead a coalition of nations and
    disarm Saddam Hussein.
        There's no doubt, there is no doubt that we have got a chance in
    this Nation to bring some great good to our country and to the world,
    out of the evil done to us. You know, I kind of wonder what was going
    through the enemy's mind when they attacked us. They probably thought we
    were so selfish and that our true religion was materialism, so self-
    centered that after 9/11/2001, oh, we might file a lawsuit or two. I
    guess they've been watching too much TV. [Laughter] They don't
    understand the country.
        This country is tough, and it's strong, and it's determined. And by
    being tough and strong and determined, we can bring peace to the world.
    You got to know, amidst all the talk--please tell your kids that amongst
    all the talk that you're hearing, the vision is peace. And I believe
    it's going to happen. I believe it's not only peace for Americans, but
    because we value every life--everybody is important; each person
    matters--there can be peace in parts of the world that have given up on
    peace. I believe it's possible to have peace in the Middle East. I
    believe it's possible to have peace in South Asia. The enemy has given
    us a chance, after our grief, not only to be alert here at home but to
    work hard to keep the peace elsewhere. And we will.
        And here at home, we can be a better America, too. And that's
    important for you all to realize, that out of the evil done to America
    can come some incredible good. There are pockets of despair and
    hopelessness in America. There are people who hurt. There are people who
    wonder whether or not the American experience is meant for them, people
    whose lives are hopeless, people whose lives are addicted, people whose
    lives have no love. And while Government can help and pass laws, what
    Government cannot do is put hope in people's hearts or a sense of
    purpose in people's lives. That's done when a fellow citizen takes it
    upon herself or himself to put their arm around a neighbor in need, a
    child, and say, ``I love you. What can I do to help you?''
        And that's happening in this country, and that's happening in
    neighborhood after neighborhood after neighborhood. No, the American
    spirit is alive and well. Part of that spirit is serving something
    greater than yourself in life.
        Today when I came to the airport, I met Clay Crawford, father of four. He took it upon himself for the past
    couple of years to mentor at-risk youths. I'm confident that amongst you
    there are hundreds of people who are doing the very same thing, being a
    part of that movement to make sure that the American experience is alive
    and well in every corner of our country. It doesn't matter whether
    you're going to see a shut-in or running a Boy Scout troop or a Girl
    Scout troop. It doesn't matter whether you're a youngster wanting to be
    involved with the USA Freedom Corps. My call to you is, in order to
    fight evil, is to do some good. You see, it's the gathering momentum of
    millions of acts of kindness and decency which define the true character
    of the greatest country on the face of the Earth.
        Thank you for representing the American spirit. Thank you for
    coming. May God bless you all, and may God bless America.

    Note: The President spoke at 9:40 a.m. in the Barnett Center at Northern
    State University. In his remarks, he referred to John M. Hilpert,
    president, Northern State University; Harold and Pat Thune, parents of
    Representative John R. Thune; Ramzi bin al-

    [[Page 1939]]

    Shibh, an Al Qaida operative suspected of helping to plan the September
    11, 2001, terrorist attacks, who was captured in Karachi, Pakistan; and
    President Saddam Hussein of Iraq.