For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
April 24, 2002
President Discusses Ag, Trade in South Dakota
Remarks by the President on the Farm Bill and Trade Promotion Authority
Dakota Ethanol Plant
Sioux Falls, South Dakota
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. Please be seated. Ron, I want to
thank you very much. I thought Washington was where it got a little
windy. (Laughter.) You've got to remember, I was raised in West Texas
-- I'm kind of used to the wind. It reminds me of home.
I want to thank you all for a warm welcome. Thank you for being so
gracious. Ron, thank you very much for hosting us here. I appreciate
the briefing I had and the chance to meet with some of your fellow
citizens in South Dakota, a chance to talk about ag policy. And I want
to thank all those for coming, as well.
I appreciate so very much Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman
traveling with me today. I'm proud of the job Ann is doing. She's a
great leader for the Ag Department. She understands farmers,
understands farming, and she's doing America a fine job. (Applause.)
I want to thank your Governor for coming. Janklow and I have been
friends for a long time. I was a governor of Texas, he was a governor
of South Dakota. And he kept telling me what to do all the time when I
was around him. (Laughter.) But I appreciate you being here,
Governor. Thank you very much. (Applause.)
We share something in common -- we both married above our heads.
(Laughter.) I'm sorry my wife isn't with me. I had the honor of
saying hello to the First Lady of South Dakota at the steps of Air
Force One. I bring up Laura because I can't tell you how proud I am of
her. She is -- you know, when I married her, she was a public school
librarian who really didn't like politics, and didn't care for
politicians, either, I might add. (Laughter.) And she has been such a
calm and steady influence for the country and she's come a long way
from a public school librarian to a great First Lady. I'm real proud
of her. (Applause.)
I want to appreciate the Senate Majority Leader, Tom Daschle, for
being here today. Tom, I'm honored -- (applause.) I'm honored you'd
come. And Tom and I have spent some quality time together. I invite
him to the Oval Office for breakfast. He doesn't eat much, I want you
to know, which is good for my wallet. (Laughter.) But I appreciate
working with him, and I also appreciate Senator Tim Johnson being here,
as well. Thank you, Tim, for coming. (Applause.)
As well, we're honored to have the only Congressman from the state
of South Dakota, John Thune. Thank you for being here, John.
(Applause.)
I want to spend some time talking about agriculture and the
importance of agriculture for our country. But, before I do, I want to
tell you about the war. I want you to know that we're fighting against
killers, cold-blooded murderers, and they still want to hurt us. I --
Bill Janklow and I were talking coming in about what he has done to
help secure the homeland here in South Dakota. And, for that, I am
grateful, and you need to be. He takes it seriously. He is on top of
the situation here in South Dakota.
And I believe that around the country we're making great progress
toward making our homeland more secure. We've got to do a better job
of understanding who's coming into our country and why they're coming
in, and if they're going out when they're supposed to be going out.
We've got a good amount of money in the budget, as Senator Daschle can
tell you, to make sure that our first responders are ready, should
something happen. We've got a good initiative on bioterrorism that
we're working on, to make sure the homeland is secure.
But the best way to secure the homeland is to chase these murderers
down, one by one, and bring them to justice. And that's exactly what
America is going to do. (Applause.)
The reason I tell you that is it's important for you to know that
this war to secure our homeland and to protect freedom is not going to
end anytime soon. I don't have a calendar on my desk that says, by
such and such a date we're going to quit. That's not how I think --
much to the chagrin of the enemy. I don't know what they were thinking
when they attacked America. They must have thought we were so
materialistic, so self-centered, so weak that all we were going to do
was to file a lawsuit. They found out we don't file lawsuits when it
comes to defending freedom. We send our United States military.
(Applause.)
And I've submitted a budget to the United States Congress that says
our defense is the number one priority. It's a big increase, no
question about it. But my attitude is we're in it for the long haul.
And we must send that signal not only to the enemy, but to our
coalition partners. And secondly, anytime we commit a U.S. citizen who
wears our uniform to combat, or in harm's way, they must have the best
equipment, the best training, the best pay possible. The price of
freedom's high, but as far as I'm concerned, it's not too high, and
we're going to pay it.
And there's no cave deep enough for them to hide. We're going to
get 'em one by one, because this nation is patient and we're plenty
tough when it comes to defending our country. (Applause.)
But it's also important to know that we're a compassionate nation,
as well. I remind our citizens, particularly the young, that we don't
seek revenge; we seek justice. And when we went into Afghanistan to
uphold the doctrine that said, if you harbor a terrorist, you're just
as guilty as the ones that came to kill America, and routed out the
Taliban, we didn't go in there as conquerors, we went in as
liberators. We freed people from the clutches of one of the most
barbaric regimes ever. And now, thanks to the United States of America
and our coalition partners, young girls go to school in Afghanistan.
(Applause.)
We've got a lot of work to do on the war front. We've got a lot of
work to do on making sure that Afghanistan is a viable nation which can
defend herself, and is a good neighbor in an important part of the
world.
And so you just need to know that I am proud of America, I'm proud
of the fact that we're unified. This isn't a Republican war, this
isn't a Democrat war; this is an American war. And our country is
unified, and we are strong and we are resolved. And that makes this
President and I know it makes the members of the Congress feel really
good. (Applause.)
And we have work to do at home, as well. The enemy, when they hit
us, did affect our economy. And there's no question about that. And
my attitude is anybody who wants to work who can't find work, we've got
a problem in the economy. And there was a lot of people who wanted to
work who couldn't find work.
What I thought was necessary was to cut the taxes on the people who
work. See, my attitude is if you get people more money, they increase
demands for good and services. When they increase demand for goods and
services, somebody produces the goods and services. And when somebody
produces the good and services, somebody's going to have a job to
produce the goods and services. For the good of the jobs in America,
cutting taxes and passing an economic -- and signing an economic
stimulus bill was good. It was good for the country. (Applause.)
And part of the tax relief package was the repeal of the death
tax. (Applause.) The death tax is particularly tough on South Dakota
and Texas farmers, or anybody who farms or ranches. It's a tax that
keeps taxing somebody's assets over and over again. You know, it's
this -- you get taxed by the income tax, you die, you keep paying taxes
even after you're dead. It's not a fair tax. And we got rid of it.
Except for, there's a quirk in the rules in the United States
Senate that means that after 10 years, it's conceivable that the death
tax doesn't go away. The House made the repeal of the death tax
permanent. I saw that Senator Daschle is going to bring that to a vote
on the floor of the Senate, for which I am grateful. It is time to get
rid of the death tax forever. (Applause.)
American agriculture is incredibly important for our economic
vitality. I -- when I was the governor of Texas, I had the honor of
being the governor of the second largest farm state in the Union. I'm
heading to Crawford after tonight. It's not a very big town; almost
everybody there is in agriculture business.
Like you all, I like to -- I used to like to go down and sit around
the coffee shop. They don't let me go down to the coffee shop
anymore. (Laughter.) But I think I got a pretty good handle on the
importance of agriculture for the future of this country. And one of
the most important ways to make sure the agriculture economy is strong
is to promote value-added processing. (Applause.)
I said when I was running for President, I supported ethanol, and I
meant it. (Applause.) I support it now, because not only do I know
it's important for the ag sector of our economy, it's an important part
of making sure we become less reliant on foreign sources of energy.
(Applause.) I appreciate Senator Daschle working on the RFS standard.
And I appreciate John Thune working on the bio-energy rebate
program, to make sure that we help increase, on the one hand, the
demand for ethanol, and on the other hand, the supply of ethanol. It's
good public policy for America. It's good for our air, it's good for
our economy, and it's good for our national security. (Applause.)
Thank goodness we're self-sufficient in food. But we're not so
self-sufficient in energy. And pretty soon they're going to get an
energy bill to my desk, and I look forward to signing it. On the one
hand, it's going to encourage more conservation. On the other hand,
hopefully it will spur not only the development of renewables, but more
oil and gas at home. And the two are not mutually exclusive. The less
reliant we are on foreign sources of crude oil, the better off we are
in America. (Applause.)
I mentioned we're self-sufficient in food, and that's good. And we
generally produce more than we need here at home. And if that's the
case, it seems like we ought to figure out how to sell more of it
overseas. (Applause.) The more markets that are open for U.S. farmers
and ranchers, the better off our economy will be.
It is important that this nation embrace free and fair trade. It
is important that we understand that when we're good at something --
and we're the best farmers and ranchers in the world -- we ought to
work to open up markets to sell our products all across the world.
(Applause.)
And I will tell you the days are over with, with American ag kind
of being shunted aside when it comes to international trade
agreements. We need to keep American ag in the forefront of trade
agreements. It ought to be the cornerstone of international trade
policy. And that's been my record thus far as the President, and it
will be my record so long as I am the President. (Applause.)
I understand that the Senate is getting to take up a trade bill,
for which I'm grateful. I look forward to getting that bill to my
desk. It's important to get it passed and to get it moving. And it's
important to get a farm bill to my desk, as well. We need good farm
legislation. It's -- the farm bill needs to get done quickly so that
the farmers who are out there fixing to plant know what the rules of
the game is.
And we can do it. We need to put aside all the posturing, all the
noise, and for the good of American agriculture, get a trade bill to my
desk and get a farm bill to my desk. (Applause.)
I want you to know that this great country is going to make the
right decisions when it comes to peace, is going to make great
decisions when it comes to how to bolster our economy, and make sure we
understand that a strong ag sector is good for America, good for
everybody in America. But this country is also going to stand squarely
in the face of evil, and here's how. We're going to love our neighbor
like we'd like to be loved ourself, and show the world that good
overcomes evil every single time. (Applause.)
We can not only boast of a strong military and hopefully a vibrant
economy all across the country, but we can do small acts of kindness
that, in their aggregate, in their total, defines the true nature of
America. You know, when you go to your Sunday school or your synagogue
or mosque, and vow to help somebody in need, you're really helping
define the face of America. When you mentor a child who seems lost or
hopeless, you're helping to define America. When you teach in a
classroom, when you love your children and you tell your children you
love them every day, that's part of making sure that America is as
compassionate as can be.
No, the enemy hit us, but out of this evil is going to come some
incredible good. Out of this evil is going to come a nation that will
be stronger, more resolved, tougher, but also more loving.
I believe that the country is on the verge of changing the culture
which for years has said, if it feels good, just go ahead and do it,
and, if you've got a problem, blame somebody else, to a day in which
each of us understand we're responsible for the decisions we make in
life; that we're responsible for something greater than ourselves.
That came home to me on Flight 93, when Americans were on an
airplane, they got the word that they were -- the enemy was going to
use the airplane as a weapon. They got on cell phones and told their
loved ones good-bye; they said a prayer; they drove the plane into the
ground to save somebody else.
It's the America that I know, and it's the America that I love that
was represented in that act. And that happens every day. It happens
every day here in South Dakota. It happens every day in states and
communities across the country. That willingness to serve something
greater than yourself is such a wonderful part of the American
character.
And my call to you is, if you want to fight evil, do some good.
Love a neighbor just like you'd like to be loved yourself. It's
happening all across America. Because, folks, I happen to be the
President of the greatest nation on the face of the Earth because of
our people. God bless you all. (Applause.)