[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 35, Number 42 (Monday, October 25, 1999)]
[Pages 2110-2112]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks at a Democratic National Committee Dinner

October 21, 1999

    Thank you. I will be brief, because I want to spend most of our time 
in a conversation. But I would like to say a few things.
    First, I want to thank Senator Kerry for once again opening his 
home. I was here not very long ago with at least some of you who are 
here. I want to thank him for his genuine commitment to modernizing our 
party and to making it an instrument of progress and an instrument for 
bringing our country together. And I'm very grateful for the truly 
exceptional effort he's made.
    On the way in, Joe Andrew, our DNC chair, said that John Kerry had 
done more personally than any other Member of the Congress to try to 
help modernize and strengthen our party, in the last few months, 
particularly. So I thank you for that. And I thank Teresa in her 
absence, and I think she did the right thing to fulfill her 
responsibility. [Laughter] We always say we're for opportunity and 
responsibility, and--[laughter]--she's had a fair share of one and 
discharged the lion's share of another. And we appreciate that.
    I want to thank Governor Romer and Beth Dozoretz and all of the 
other people who are here from the Democratic Party and all of you.
    Let me just say--I want to tell you a story. A lot of you know that 
Hillary and I--because of her, not me; it was her idea--have had a 
series of evenings at the White House called Millennium Evenings, this 
year, which we have primarily disseminated to the public at large 
through the Internet. It's been covered by C-SPAN and occasionally by 
CNN

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and obviously by print reporters who come in. But the primary means of 
connecting to these Millennium Evenings has been through the Internet. 
And at the end of whatever we do, we allow people to--not only in the 
audience; there are always 200, 300 people in the audience--we allow 
people to send us questions from all over the world.
    And it's been a fascinating thing. We started off with a history of 
the United States and where we are now compared to the roots of our 
Founders, in a lecture by Bernard Bailyn, the distinguished professor at 
Harvard. We've had a poetry night with the last three poet laureates of 
our country and a lot of inner-city kids in Washington and all kinds of 
people in-between, reading their poems and talking about poetry.
    The great Wynton Marsalis came and played and lectured on the 
history of jazz as a unique American art form in the 20th century. 
Steven Hawking came all the way from Cambridge and talked about black 
holes and undiscovered galaxies of the 21st century and what it will 
mean for the nature and our understanding of time. And we've had eight 
of these evenings. It's been amazing. Elie Wiesel talked about the price 
of indifference in the 20th century and how we couldn't have it in the 
21st.
    Last week we had a man named Lander from Harvard who's an expert in 
genomics, and a man named Cerf from MCI that had something to do with 
the establishment of the Internet, the architect, that all of you know. 
And what they were talking about was the intersection of genomics and 
the revolution in computer technology.
    And the scientist, the genomics guy, said that it would really not 
have been possible, first to decode the human gene and then to figure 
out anything useful to do with the decoding, were it not for the 
computer and for digital technology, generally. And he said--he was 
talking about how one of the things we've been trying to do in medical 
research, for example, is to deal with spinal cord injuries. And last 
year, for the very first time, we spent a lot of money, and Christopher 
Reeve, since he was injured, has been very instrumental in getting 
higher levels of research put into this issue. And last year, for the 
first time, we succeeded in getting nerves transferred from the body of 
a laboratory animal, a rat, to the animal's spine which had been 
severed, and the animal actually took the transplant and had movement in 
its lower limbs--the first time it had ever been done in any living 
organism that we know of with a spinal cord that had been severed.
    So what this guy said, he said he believes that this whole effort 
will be overtaken by the capacity of us to use a digital device that can 
be inserted into spines, that will replicate all nerve movements, and 
take the right signals and give them. And he said--he offered as exhibit 
A, as sort of prelude to that, his wife, Mr. Cerf's wife, who had been 
profoundly deaf for 50 years, totally beyond the reach of hearing aids, 
and a small digital device was inserted deep in her ears, and she heard 
for the first time in 50 years. And she got up and talked about that.
    Then the genomics guy--we started talking about what all this meant 
for the breakdown of the gene. Then we got into, what does genetics tell 
us about society? And he made the following point: that in spite of the 
fact that you're talking about 100,000 genes and, ultimately, billions 
of permutations, that all human beings are 99.9 percent the same 
genetically.
    And then, against the background of all the racial and ethnic 
conflicts in the world today, he made what I thought was a rather 
stunning statement--that I didn't know, at least; maybe a lot of you do 
know this. He said, if you take any substantial group of people--like if 
you take, say we had a group of people from India, 100 Indians and then 
let's say we had 100 Chinese and let's say we had 100 people from 
Nigeria and let's say we had 100 people from France--he said that the 
genetic differences of individuals within the group would be greater 
than the genetic differences as a whole of the French and the Indians 
and the Chinese and the Nigerians. And therefore, there was no rational 
basis, which we all knew anyway, but it was nice to have it confirmed 
scientifically, that there was no rational basis for this human emotion 
of fear of the other.
    Well, what's all this got to do with technology? What I'm interested 
in--everything I can do while my time of service is here, before it's 
over, in maximizing the ability of

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our country to use technology for economic empowerment, for educational 
empowerment, for political empowerment, and to do it in a way that 
promotes unity, not division. And that's what I would like to talk 
about.
    And I think the Democratic Party is the principal engine in our time 
of economic empowerment, political empowerment, educational empowerment 
and certainly, compared with all the alternatives, the major force for 
the cohesion and unity of our society as we move forward. So that's why 
I'm glad all of you are here. I think this is a huge issue.
    Eric and I had some talks about how we could close the digital 
divide, and of course, we've worked very hard on it, with the Vice 
President's leadership, to make sure by the time we get through with our 
millennium celebration, we'll have all of our classrooms hooked up to 
the Internet.
    But if you think about what it might mean economically for poor 
people in America, if Internet access were as dense as telephone access 
in America, I think it would have a very positive economic impact. I 
believe cell phones and computers, if properly distributed, can save 30 
years of educational and economic development in a lot of the poorest 
countries in this world and can permit an economic development that is 
far less damaging to the environment.
    And I believe that technology, properly used, can not only give 
people a more interactive and personal engagement in the political 
process but can, in the process, dramatically reduce the sense of 
cynicism and alienation, a sense that one person doesn't matter and that 
none of this really amounts to much.
    So my mind is always thinking about this, but everyone knows that 
I'm quite technologically challenged. So I need people like you to help 
me and tell me what to do and how to do it. So that's why I'm here; 
that's why I'm glad you're here; and I'm very grateful for your presence 
and your commitment.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 9:03 p.m. at a private residence. In his 
remarks, he referred to Senator John Kerry, dinner host, and his wife, 
Teresa; former Gov. Roy Romer of Colorado, former general chair, and 
Beth Dozoretz, national finance chair; Democratic National Committee; 
Eric Lander, director, Whitehead Institute/MIT Center for Genome 
Research; and Vinton G. Cerf, senior vice president for Internet 
architecture and technology, MCI WorldCom, and his wife, Sigrid.