[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 36, Number 42 (Monday, October 23, 2000)]
[Pages 2482-2489]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks at a Reception for Governor Gary Locke in Seattle

October 14, 2000

    Thank you so much. I am really glad Gary decided to have the event 
in this Washington.
    I want to say, first of all, thanks to your wonderful attorney 
general. Christine, you have been a great attorney general. You have 
been a leader for the whole nation, and I could have listened to you 
give that cheerleading speech all night long. I think you have a 
limitless future, and I wish you well. And I thank you for being here 
and for all you've done.
    I want to thank Gary and Mona Locke for being such good friends to 
Hillary and me and for the example they set by their leadership. I also 
think they've set a good family values example by having those two 
beautiful children since they've been in politics. I think that's a very 
good thing.
    Mayor Schell, it's great to be back in Seattle, and I want to thank 
your State party chair, Paul Berendt. And I want to introduce one person 
I think has not been introduced tonight, maybe. And maybe before I got 
here, he was. But our national democratic chair, Ed Rendell, from 
Philadelphia, is here. Thank you, Ed.
    And I believe one of our candidates for Congress, Rick Larson, is 
here. If he is, let's give him a big hand. [Applause] And I want to say 
a special word of appreciation and gratitude, and I want to say a little 
more about her later, but I want to say a special word

[[Page 2483]]

of appreciation to Maria Cantwell. I am grateful that she has run for 
the Senate, and I hope you will make sure she wins.
    Now, as perhaps most of you know, after I finish my rounds in 
Washington tonight, I'm going to red-eye back to the other Washington 
and give my crew a little rest. I had intended to spend the night here 
and go to Portland in the morning and on down to California, but I am 
going to fly to the Middle East tomorrow.
    Last week was an amazing week for our crowd. It was heartbreaking 
when we lost those sailors on the U.S.S. Cole. I talked to the captain 
of the ship and others in the chain of command and thank them on behalf 
of the American people and say that our prayers are with the families. 
And Wednesday we will have a memorial service for them on the East 
Coast. Those who were killed and those who are wounded are being brought 
home starting today.
    And we've had these terrible turn of events in the Middle East which 
has been heartbreaking for me. I was at the airport earlier, and a man 
came up to me and asked me to sign the remarks I made on September 19, 
1993, when Mr. Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin signed the peace accord, 
committing themselves to a process that would lead to peace. I have seen 
so much progress in the last 7\1/2\ years, so it's been a very difficult 
and painful experience.
    But I also want to say, last week when the number two leader in 
North Korea came to see me after the President of South Korea had gone 
to North Korea and justifiably won the Nobel Peace Prize for doing so 
and for a lifetime of courageous standing up for democracy and freedom, 
I was thinking that when I took the oath of office in January of 1993 
and I got all my security briefings starting from the time I was 
elected, everybody said the most dangerous place in the whole world is 
North Korea. ``You've got to really worry about this. You know, they've 
got a nuclear program. It's going to be terrible. You've got to do 
something about it.''
    So first we got the nuclear program shut down, and then we began to 
deal with them and insist that they had to deal with the South. And then 
our former Defense Secretary, Bill Perry, went to see them and said, 
``Look, you know, you're still making all these missiles. Our 
relationship has got to get better or worse. It can't just stay the 
same.'' And Kim Dae-jung got elected President, and he said, ``It's time 
we bury the hatchet and try to find ways to live in peace.'' And the 
rest is history.
    So what I thought would be the most dangerous problem for our 
children and grandchildren 8 years ago may not be now, if, God willing, 
we can keep it going.
    And then the people of Serbia elected a new President. And I knew if 
the United States had not stood against ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and 
Kosovo and kept those economic sanctions on, that the moment would not 
have arrived for the people to do right. And so I was very grateful last 
week, too.
    And it's a sober reminder that we have to keep plugging away at the 
things we believe in. And I wanted to come out here today because I've 
missed 3 or 4 days of work already traveling the country in this season. 
And I wanted to come here, if for no other reason, to just have one more 
chance to say thank you to the people of Washington for being so very 
good to me and Hillary and Al and Tipper Gore these last 8 years, for 
giving us your electoral votes twice, and I hope you're about to make it 
three in a row.
    And I also wanted to say why it is so important that you spend every 
minute you can in your very busy lives talking to other people about 
this election between now and election day, because every one of you has 
a lot of friends who have never been to an event like this. Isn't that 
right? You have a lot of friends. You work with them. You worship with 
them. You socialize with them. They never go to things like this. But 
they'll vote because they love their country. And it's important that 
they understand what the issues are.
    In an amazing way, in this election I can tell you that there is 
such clarity of difference, even though the other side often tries to 
muddy it up. And I don't blame them, because if everybody figures it 
out, they'll lose, and we'll win. [Laughter]
    But I've learned--you know, I was a Governor for a dozen years 
before I became President. I loved it. I don't think I would have ever 
gotten tired of it. And I know that no matter how good the economic 
policy of

[[Page 2484]]

the country is, no matter how good our educational policy is, our health 
care policy, our environmental policy--the way America works, the people 
of this State cannot fully benefit from it unless you have a good 
Governor and good leadership. And if you do, you can do better, even, 
than the rest of us are doing.
    And I've really had the opportunity over the last several years to 
get to know Gary and Mona. I'm crazy about them, personally. I think 
they're wonderful people. They embody my idea of where we're going as a 
country.
    Indeed, all Washington State does. You are today, and you are 
tomorrow. You are the most connected State to the global economy and one 
of the most wired States in America. [Laughter] And you are one of the 
most diverse States in America. And part of your diversity is, you also 
have a lot of people of European heritage who still live in little, 
rural towns and make a living on the farm.
    And so you represent today and tomorrow. You're doing so well. Part 
of the reason you're doing so well is, you've got a great Governor, and 
you need to keep him.
    Now, I also would say that no one in America understands any more 
clearly than I do how important every single Senate seat and every 
single House seat is. And I said something about Maria Cantwell before. 
I was thrilled when I met her when I became President. Here is a person 
who really is a New Democrat, a person who understands the economy but 
wants it to work for everybody, a person that believes in fiscal 
responsibility and is actually, unlike most politicians, actually 
willing to do something about it, not just talk about it.
    And I want to say, one of the amazing things to me is that her 
opponent is still trying to attack her for voting for the '93 economic 
plan by picking out one little piece of it that he can make look 
unpopular now, without pointing out that we cut taxes for 10 times as 
many people as paid taxes and higher taxes, and that most of the people 
that paid higher taxes were in Maria's income bracket. [Laughter] And 
she voted for it anyway.
    And you know, her opponent and all those Republicans, they voted 
against it, every last one of them. And they said if my economic plan 
passed, the world would come to an end; we would have a recession; 
people would lose their jobs; the deficit would get bigger. Time has not 
been kind to their predictions.
    I'll say this. You've got to give it to the Republicans. They are 
never deterred by the facts and the evidence. [Laughter] They are 
shameless. You know, they'll just go right on just like nothing ever 
happened. [Laughter] And I say that because if she hadn't been willing 
to put her entire political career on the line, one vote, we wouldn't 
have passed that plan. And if you think Washington State is in better 
shape today than it was 8 years ago, then you have an obligation to tell 
every person you know between now and November 7th to vote for Gary 
Locke and for this great candidate for the United States Senate, Maria 
Cantwell.
    In the parlance of my home region, I know I'm preaching to the saved 
tonight, but I want to say a few things. [Laughter] First of all, I want 
to say congratulations to the Mariners. But I hope you'll understand, 
since I have more than a passing interest in the Senate race in New 
York--[laughter]--why this may be the only issue in 8 years I don't side 
with you on. [Laughter]
    Look, I want you to listen a minute. I want you to think about this. 
I want you to think about all the people who you'll see between now and 
the election. And if they ask you, ``Why should I vote for Maria 
Cantwell? Why should I vote for Gary Locke? Why should I vote for Al 
Gore and Joe Lieberman?'' Can you give them an answer?
    Here is what I want you to understand. Clarity is our friend. And 
there are big differences with real consequences to the American people, 
to every single family in Washington State. We have a different 
philosophy. We believe that everybody who is responsible ought to have 
an opportunity to be a part of the American dream. We believe we ought 
to all be part of the same community and that we should go forward 
together. We believe in Government that gives people the tools and the 
conditions to make the most of their own lives. We believe that you can, 
as Gary said and as Christine said, be pro-economic growth and pro-
environment, pro-

[[Page 2485]]

business and pro-labor. That's what we believe.
    We believe that in order for people to succeed at work, you have to 
help them succeed in raising their kids and balancing work and family. 
And we think all this diversity of ours is the greatest thing in the 
world, that it's a more interesting country if we respect our 
differences and if we reaffirm our common humanity. That's what we 
believe, and so far, it has worked out pretty well.
    What does that mean in practical terms? It means if you want to keep 
the prosperity going, you've got a clear choice here. Now, Gary wants to 
be effective, as well as reelected, and he wants Washington to keep on 
having a great economy. You've got a big choice here, and you heard it 
in these two debates. It was sort of buried in the weeds and, for 
reasons I'll never understand, not very well publicized.
    But in the first Presidential debate, the Republican candidate 
admitted that he had a tax cut of about a trillion and a half bucks and 
that it would cost another trillion to partially privatize Social 
Security. And then there are hundreds of billions of dollars in spending 
promises. So you're already back to deficits. But if you're in a high-
income group, you can get a bunch of money out of it right now.
    Our leader, Al Gore, says, ``Look, I'd like to tell you the same 
thing, but it's not responsible. So I want to pay off the debt, keep 
interest rates coming down, save some money to invest in education, 
health care, and the environment and defense, and give you a tax cut we 
can afford.''
    Now, you've got a choice. You know, we've tried it our way for 8 
years, and we tried it their way for 12 years. And you ought to go out 
and tell people, if they want to go back to deficits and higher interest 
rates and a weaker economy, they've got a clear choice.
    But it's not like--we can't pretend there's no choice here. We can't 
pretend there's no difference here. There is a record. There is 
evidence. There is a difference.
    And let me say, a lot of the things I've heard are just flat bogus 
on the economy. You know, they say, ``We trust you with your money. They 
want Government to run your lives.'' You know? That's their new shtick, 
you know? That's basically a sort of modernized, more--a kinder, gentler 
version of what they've been saying since 1980.
    Now, here are the facts, okay? Fact number one: Under the leadership 
of Al Gore, we have reduced the size of the Federal Government to its 
lowest point since 1960, when Eisenhower was President--fact number one. 
Fact number two: Government spending as a percentage of our national 
income is the lowest it's been since 1966. Fact number three--here's the 
biggest one--fact number three: If Al Gore wins the Presidency, in 4 
years Government spending will be a smaller percentage of national 
income under a Gore Presidency than under the alternative, even though 
we're going to spend more on education and health care.
    How can that be? You need to think about it. You need to talk to 
people about this. How can that be? Because he's going to keep paying 
off the debt, and that will make interest rates lower. That will make 
the stock market higher, making all of you that own Microsoft happy and 
everything else. [Laughter] It will make the stock market higher. It 
will mean lower costs for business loans, and it will mean everybody 
will pay lower mortgage rates, lower credit card rates, lower college 
loan rates, lower car payment rates. In other words, everybody will get 
that tax cut in lower interest rates. And because the third-biggest item 
in the Federal budget is interest on the debt--after Social Security and 
defense, interest on the debt is the third-biggest item in the budget--
as we pay it down, even though the Democrats will spend more on 
education and health care and send it to Governor Locke so he can be 
more effective for you, Government will actually be a smaller percentage 
of the economy than it will if you pass this big tax cut, privatize 
Social Security, and run a deficit again.
    You need to explain that to people. I think people like it our way, 
and they want to keep changing in that way.
    Now, but you only get it if you vote for Al Gore, Joe Lieberman, 
Maria Cantwell, your candidates for Congress, and Gary Locke. You'll 
only get it--you know, you do have a choice. You don't have to have this 
good future. [Laughter] You know, you can vote with them and go back to 
the way it

[[Page 2486]]

was. But don't let your friends pretend there's not a choice and there 
are no consequences.
    Look at health care. Washington passed a Patients' Bill of Rights. 
Good for Washington. Good for Washington. But he'll be the first to tell 
you that because of the way Federal law works, if all the States passed 
a good Patients' Bill of Rights, there would still be a lot of Americans 
who weren't covered. So if you want every American, including every 
person in Washington State, covered with the protections of the 
Patients' Bill of Rights you have, you've got to vote for Al Gore, Joe 
Lieberman, and Maria Cantwell.
    Why? Why? Because we're for it, and they're not. [Laughter] And now, 
they've got something that they say is a Patients' Bill of Rights, but 
300 health care organizations are for ours and not for theirs. Why? 
Because the health insurers don't want our Patients' Bill of Rights, 
because they don't want to be sued, and they don't want to cover 
everybody, and they say it's going to run your health costs up.
    Well, if you've checked lately, your insurance premiums are going up 
anyway. But let me just tell you what the facts are. I put the Patients' 
Bill of Rights in, by Executive order, for everybody the Federal 
Government pays health care on, Medicare, Medicaid, military personnel, 
retirees, Federal employees. Do you know how much it increased premiums? 
About $1 a month. A dollar a month to see a specialist when your doctor 
recommends it. A dollar a month to be able to keep the same doctor if 
you change health care providers in the middle of a pregnancy or a 
chemotherapy treatment. A dollar a month to go to the nearest emergency 
room if, God forbid, you get hit by a car when you walk out of this room 
tonight, instead of being carried past three or four hospitals to one 
your plan covers. A dollar a month to be able to file suit and get 
redress if you're really harmed by the failure to observe these rights.
    Now, even the Congressional Budget Office says it's less than $2 a 
month. I'd pay $1.80 a month to make sure you got those rights, and I 
think most Americans would. It's a clear choice. But if you want it, 
you've got to vote for Al Gore and Joe Lieberman and Maria. You've got 
to. There's no other option. You've got to do it.
    You take this Medicare drug thing. The Governor and Mona, they care 
a lot about children having health care. The Children's Health Insurance 
Program was one of the major initiatives of this administration. It's 
part of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. It led--last year, for the 
first time since 1987, we had a reduction in the number of people 
without health insurance in America.
    Now, what we'd like to do, the Democrats, is give them some more 
funds to cover the parents of those kids in the Children's Health 
Insurance Program who are low-income working people. And we think 
Medicare ought to provide a prescription drug benefit that's voluntary 
to every senior that needs it.
    Now, they don't feel that way. Why? Because the drug companies won't 
let them. Now, that's a fact. And originally the drug companies wanted 
to be for nothing, and the Republicans went to them and said, ``You 
don't understand. We can't win this issue. They're going to beat our 
brains out. We need to muddy this up, so give us a bill we can be for.''
    And that's why they say, ``Okay, we'll give it to people up to 150 
or 175 percent of the poverty line, but everybody else gets to buy 
insurance.'' Now, I will say this about the health insurance companies. 
They have told us, they said, ``Hey, there is no insurance policy you 
can write for this problem. We can't write you an insurance policy that 
you can afford that has decent coverage.'' Nevada passed the Republican 
plan and not a single, solitary health insurance company has offered 
insurance to people who need this medicine. And over half of the seniors 
who need affordable medicine are above 150 percent of the poverty line--
over half of them.
    Now, what is the deal here? [Laughter] Did you ever meet anybody in 
a business that didn't want more customers? Have you ever asked 
yourself, why are the drug companies against this thing? They get more 
customers. They sell more medicine. Did you ever meet a politician that 
didn't want more votes? [Laughter] You never hear this. I just want you 
to know. You've got to talk to people about this.

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    The reason is--and you don't have to demonize the drug companies. 
We're fortunate to have these drug companies in our country. They 
provide wonderful jobs for tens of thousands of people. They find 
lifesaving drugs every day. But here is the issue. It costs a bunch of 
money to develop the drugs. They spend a lot of money to advertise them. 
And they want to sell them all over the world, but they can't recover 
the development or the advertising cost any place but America, because 
everybody else fixes prices.
    Once they get us to pay the development and the advertising costs, 
then it just costs a pittance to make another pill or two, so they can 
sell them and make a killing in Canada or Europe or anywhere else, even 
with price controls, because you've already paid for all the advertising 
and development. And to be fair to them, they know that if Medicare is 
the buyer for millions of people, they'll have enough market power to 
get lower prices so that Americans will buy drugs made in America almost 
as cheap as they can buy them in Canada. And they're worried that their 
profits will go down, and they won't be able to spend enough money to 
develop drugs or to advertise them. Now, that's a legitimate problem. 
Nobody ever talks about this. You haven't heard any of this in the 
debate, have you? That's what the real deal is.
    Now, here's my issue. Surely to goodness the answer to their problem 
is not continuing to deny the elderly people of America the right to 
have the medicine they need to stay alive and improve the quality of 
their lives.
    Now, so let's fix the people's problem. If you live to be 65 in 
America today, your life expectancy is 82 years, and it's going to go 
up. And with the human genome project, there are young women in this 
audience who have yet to have their first children. Within the next 10 
years, they'll start having babies with a life expectancy of 90 years. 
You mark it down. It's going to happen.
    Now, if that's going to happen, we've got to think about what life's 
going to be like. The answer to the drug companies' problem is not to 
deprive our seniors of the ability to buy affordable prescription drugs. 
This is crazy. This is wrong.
    So what I say is, vote for Al Gore and Joe Lieberman and Maria and 
our crowd and take care of the seniors. And those folks have a lot of 
money and influence, in case you hadn't noticed. And even though we 
don't let them tell us how to vote, we're not against them, and we'll 
figure out how to solve their problem. There's got to be a solution to 
their problem that does not require us to punish the seniors of America 
by depriving them of the medicine they need.
    I could give you the same arguments on education. We're for 100,000 
teachers, smaller classes, modernizing our schools, preschool and after 
school for every kid who needs it, and accountability and choice through 
charter schools, which the Democrats brought to America. We had one 
charter school in the whole country when I was elected. We got 1,700 
now, and Al Gore wants to triple the number of them. That was our 
initiative.
    They're for accountability, but they don't want to invest in the 
specific things that the educators and the research tells us works. And 
let me tell you, it's a big myth that you can't turn these public 
schools around. In the last 8 years, the dropout rate is down; the 
graduation rate is up. There has been a two-thirds increase in the 
number of our kids taking advance placement tests, 300 percent increase 
in Hispanic kids taking advance placement courses, 500 percent increase 
in African-American kids taking advance placement courses, all-time high 
college-going rate. You can turn these schools around.
    I think our plan is better than theirs. And I think Gary Locke can 
do more with what the Democrats will do, plus which, we'll invest more. 
So if you want the education for your children that is most likely to 
really work, you've got to vote for Gary Locke and for Maria and for Al 
Gore and Joe Lieberman. There is a difference. There is a difference.
    Now, I could give you a lot of other examples. Just listen to this. 
We're for a real hate crimes bill, and they're not. If you heard the 
second debate, you know that. Oh, there was a little shoveling around. 
And I want to put it on the table. It wasn't clear from the debate what 
was going on. The reason the Republicans are not for our hate crimes 
bill and the reason that James Byrd's family in Texas was shut out of 
getting the hate crimes bill

[[Page 2488]]

they wanted in Texas is that they don't want to make their right wing 
mad by including gays in protection against hate crimes. Now, that's 
what is going on.
    We had an event in Washington with the police commissioner from 
Wyoming who had to supervise the investigation in the Matthew Shepard 
case. And he said that it changed his whole life. He met that young 
man's family and his friends, and he realized how badly he needed 
Federal hate crimes legislation so the Federal Government could come in 
and help him work that case and develop it. There is a difference.
    We're for the employment and nondiscrimination law, and they're not. 
We're for a minimum wage increase, and they're not. We think we ought to 
keep a woman's right to choose, and they don't. There's a difference.
    And the environment, there's been a commitment--I will say that the 
other side has been clearer on the environment. The Republican nominee 
has said if he's elected, he will reverse my order setting aside 43 
million roadless acres in the national forests. The Audubon Society said 
it was the most significant conservation move in 40 years. He says they 
will review all the national monuments we have established. And they 
will relax some of the air standards, because they're too hard on 
business.
    Look, anybody who thinks you can't--we got cleaner air, cleaner 
water, safer food. We've cleaned up 3 times as many toxic waste dumps in 
8 years as they did in 12. And the economy's doing reasonably well under 
this enormous environmental burden I have imposed, you know? But you've 
got to choose. You've got to choose.
    We've got a different crime policy. They said that--you know, we 
believe that we should finish putting our 150,000 police on the street. 
And their party is committed to repealing that. It's not just a gun 
issue. They don't believe that we were right to put--we've already put 
over 100,000, and we're on our way to 150,000 police on the street. And 
we've got the lowest crime rate nationally in 26 years and the lowest 
murder rate in 33 years.
    They don't believe in the 3-day waiting period, even though the 
Brady law--which led to the defeat of some of the Congressmen that we 
lost in Washington State in 1994, because they stirred up all the 
hunters and sportsmen, you know? Told them we were coming after their 
guns. You remember all that. They're doing it again now.
    Well, let's just look at the facts here. We passed the Brady bill. 
Half a million felons, fugitives, and stalkers couldn't get handguns 
because we did the background checks. And there hasn't been a single 
hunter, law-abiding hunter or sportsman in Washington State that's 
missed 5 minutes in the woods in hunting season or 5 minutes at any 
shooting contest because we said criminals should not have guns--not 
one.
    So this is bogus. Now look, these are the things you need to talk to 
people about. It will shape the future of our children and 
grandchildren. And you cannot make an easy distinction anymore between 
national and State efforts.
    We can't succeed if Gary Locke is not committed to enrolling 
children in the Children's Health Insurance Program. We can't succeed if 
the State of Washington is not committed to moving people from welfare 
to work and giving them the support they need to stay in the work place. 
We can't succeed if Washington State doesn't have a good education 
program. America can't succeed in Washington if you don't do it.
    On the other hand, what he can do will be severely limited or 
enhanced by who gets elected President and who gets elected to the 
Senate and who gets elected to the House. So I want to say to you again, 
these elections are tight. They're tight because the other guys have 
figured out they can't really do what they did in '95 and '96 and '97 
and '98, so they've got to blur the differences instead of clarify them, 
and they've got a bunch of money to do it.
    What you have to do is clarify the differences. You know the 
American people nearly always get it right. We wouldn't be around here 
after 224 years if the American people didn't nearly always get it 
right, if they have enough information, they understand what it means, 
and they have time enough to digest it.
    And I am telling you--you just think about this tomorrow when you 
get up--every one

[[Page 2489]]

of you come in contact with people who are friends of yours who trust 
you, every day, who will never come to an event like this, never hear 
this kind of discussion. You need to tell them why you were here. You 
need to tell them what you believe they ought to do, what the 
differences are, what the consequences are.
    And let me just close with this. You know, my party has a new 
leader. My family has a new candidate. I'm not running for anything. 
[Laughter] I am profoundly grateful for the chance I have had to serve. 
And I have done everything I know to do to turn the country around, to 
pull us together and move us forward. But in America, our public life is 
always about tomorrow.
    Maybe once in every 50 years a country gets a chance like we have 
now, where the economy's doing well, the social indicators are 
improving, there's a lot of national self-confidence, there's no 
overwhelming threat to our security abroad or crisis within. The world 
will never be free of problems. But once in 50 years you get in shape 
like this, where you can really imagine what you want the future to be 
like for your children and grandchildren and then go out and build it.
    We ought to be elated to have this election. It should have nothing 
to do with personal attacks. We should posit that our opponents are good 
people who love their families and love their country and will do what 
they believe. But we have to make sure people know that what we believe 
and what they believe on critical things are different, and the 
consequences are profound.
    When Al Gore says in his speeches that you ain't seen nothing yet, I 
know it may sound like a political slogan. But I'm not running for 
anything, and I believe that. I believe the best is still out there. I 
believe that you have no idea where the information revolution, where 
the biotechnology revolution, and where the globalization of not just 
commerce but societies, are going to lead us.
    And the children in this audience can live in the most peaceful, 
prosperous, exciting time the world has ever known. But we have to make 
the right decisions. And now, for America and for Washington State, the 
right decisions are Al Gore, Joe Lieberman, Maria Cantwell, Gary Locke, 
and our candidates for the Congress.
    Thank you, and God bless you.

Note: The President spoke at 6:30 p.m. in the Grand Ballroom at the 
Westin Hotel. In his remarks, he referred to State Attorney General 
Christine O. Gregoire; Gov. Locke's wife, Mona Lee Locke; Mayor Paul 
Schell of Seattle; Paul Berendt, chair, Washington State Democratic 
Party; Edward G. Rendell, general chair, Democratic National Committee; 
Rick Larson, candidate for Washington's Second Congressional District; 
Maria Cantwell, candidate for U.S. Senate from Washington; Comdr. Kirk 
S. Lippold, Commanding Officer, U.S.S. Cole; Chairman Yasser Arafat of 
the Palestinian Authority; President Kim Dae-jung of South Korea; 
President Vojislav Kostunica of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia 
(Serbia and Montenegro); and Special Envoy Vice Marshal Cho Myong-nok of 
North Korea. A tape was not available for verification of the content of 
these remarks.