For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
May 22, 2001
Remarks by the President at RNC Gala
D.C. Armory Washington, D.C.
7:53 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very
much. Be seated. Thank you all very
much. Mr. Vice President, thank you for that kind
introduction. Governor Gilmore, thank you very much for
agreeing to become the Chairman of the Republican Party. Our
party will thrive under your leadership, and we appreciate you doing
this, sir. (Applause.)
I want to thank all the folks who worked so
hard on this dinner tonight -- Ann Wagner, Al Hoffman, Jeff and Nancy
Marcus, from the great state of Texas, all the table chairmen -- thank
you so much for your generosity.
I'm honored to be able to say -- to introduce
the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Denny
Hastert. Mr. Speaker, you and your team are doing a
fantastic job. (Applause.)
I haven't seen Congressman Armey here, but I
know Congressman DeLay is here, as are many other members of the House
of Representatives. I can assure you, knowing that we've got
such a fine leadership team and a solid core in the House gives the
Vice President and me a lot of comfort. And I can't tell you
how joyous it is to work with this fine Speaker and the members of his
team.
I would like to have introduced Majority
Leader Lott, but he and the other senators are working as hard as they
can to get a meaningful, real tax relief package out of the United
States Senate. (Applause.) It is time for the
Senate to stop delaying tax relief. It is time to move the
package on, for the good of the American people. (Applause.)
I'm so thankful that I did well at the
altar. America is better off for it -- we've got a fabulous
First Lady in Laura Bush. (Applause.)
We came to your dinner last year, and I
remember the warm welcome in the middle of a hard-fought
campaign. A lot of things have changed since
then. Last year I had to fly halfway across the country to
get here. Today it took me five
minutes. (Laughter.) For another thing, I was
running against the Vice President. This time around I
brought a fantastic Vice President with
me. (Applause.) And, of course, it's a great joy
to welcome Lynn Cheney, as well. (Applause.) The
best decision I made in 2000 was to ask Dick Cheney to be my running
mate. (Applause.)
I want to thank you all very much for your
generous contributions so that my drive was only five
minutes. (Laughter.) I appreciate your support
during the campaign, and I appreciate so very much your support to make
sure our agenda gets advanced. (Applause.)
As well, there are members of my Cabinet who
are here. I'm really proud of the men and women who decided
to serve our country. It's a diverse group of folks who are
dedicated to one proposition -- a hopeful America. And if my
Cabinet Secretaries would stand I'd appreciate you recognizing
them. (Applause.)
And finally, I've assembled one of the finest
staffs a President has ever put together, headed by Andy Card, and
National Security Advisor Rice, Karen Hughes and Karl Rove -- all these
folks work harmoniously; they do what's right for
America. And our nation should be proud that such fine
citizens are willing to dedicate their life to this great country.
(Applause.)
Laura and I have had the honor of living in
the White House for four months and two days. That's already
one-twelfth of a term, and we haven't wasted a
day. (Applause.) I have visited 28 states and two
countries. I met with 46 heads of state, and more than 300
members of the House and the Senate; four Cabinet meetings, one speech
to Congress, not to mention a Cinco de Mayo festival, a gathering of
Hall of Famers, celebrations for St. Patrick's and Cuban Independence
Day, and T-ball. (Applause.)
It's been a joyous time for us in the White
House, and a high honor. And it's been a busy time, and that's just
the way I like it. I often said during the campaign that
Dick Cheney and I were not going to Washington just to mark
time. We came to make good on our commitments for the great
people of America. We came to get something
done. We weren't afraid to state our case, nor were we
afraid to work with anybody who heard our cause. We came not
to have Washington change us, but for us to change
Washington. (Applause.)
And I think we started doing that in our own
party. We welcome new faces, because ours is a philosophy
that is conservative and compassionate. Ours is a philosophy that
holds out hope for every single American, no matter what their
background or their heritage may be.
We're also a party of principle and
optimism. We believe strongly in our soul not in the supreme
wisdom of Washington, but in the wisdom of the American
people. Ours is an administration, as America is coming to
learn, that it's not afraid to take on the tough issues confronting our
country; that we're willing to --(applause.) I can remember
during the campaign, and perhaps you all do, as well, about the
collective yawn from members in the Fourth Estate about tax
relief. People used to say, well, he's just saying that
because it might make good politics. No, Dick Cheney and I
talked about tax relief because we thought it was right for the
country. This nation can afford tax relief and we can't afford not to
have it, with our economy slowing down. (Applause.)
And we're making good
progress. We're making good progress. I believe
we convinced Congress to cut the rates on everybody who pays taxes.
We've eliminated this business about the Congress getting to pick and
choose who the winners and losers are in the tax code. Our
philosophy was fair and descent, and it said loud and clear, if you pay
taxes in America, you ought to get tax relief. (Applause.)
We believe we ought to do something about the
marriage penalty. And we believe, once and for all we need
to get rid of the death tax in the tax
code. (Applause.) Again, Mr. Speaker, I want to
thank you for your -- for working with us on this issue.
Ours is an administration that's willing to
talk openly about Social Security reform. Many candidates
and politicians and others who have been elected to office never wanted
to talk about Social Security. It was called the third rail
of American politics. This is an administration that knows
we'd better make sure Social Security is reformed, safe and solvent for
the older generation, around for the younger generation. And
we'll seize the moment to get it done. (Applause.)
Ours is an administration that recognized our
nation has an energy problem, and we laid out solutions to do something
about it. I'm sure that maybe some other administration has
talked about energy, but we put out a concrete, specific plan, with
over 100 recommendations -- 100 proposals -- to ease the burden on the
American working people.
Our plan starts with wise conservation, the
use of technology to make sure that we are better stewards of our
energy. But California has taught us a lesson -- the state
with the second best record of conservation is a state which ran out of
energy. And so we need additional supplies. We
need reliable supplies. We need a balanced approach to our
energy. We need clean coal technology, and natural gas
exploration, safe nuclear power, as well as alternative sources of
energy.
And finally, we must face up to the problem
that we're having problems getting energy from the power plant to the
light switch. We need to modernize our
infrastructure. No, ours is an administration that won't
simply look at a problem; we'll address it in a concrete, specific
way. (Applause.)
We need to have better language when it comes
to energy. I mean, the people of this country have somehow
been told that you're either for the environment and against energy
policy, or you're for an energy policy or against the
environment. That's the old way of
thinking. That's stale, old-style politics. You
and I know it's not either-or; with good, sound policy, it's
both. We can increase our energy supplies so the people can
find work, and we can protect our environment at the same time.
(Applause.)
Ours is an administration that's also pushing
a compassionate conservative vision. It starts with making
sure that every child is educated in America. We've laid out
a bill that we're working on in the Congress right now that talks about
sound, solid principles to make sure that not one child gets left
behind. It begins by setting high standards for every
child.
Ours is an administration that believes that
every child can learn. And we refuse to accept low standards, because
we understand low standards means lousy results for children all across
the country. Ours is an administration that trusts the local
people to chart the path to excellence.
And ours is an administration that insists
upon results. We want to know. We want to know
whether our children are learning to read and write and add and
subtract. And if they are, we'll praise the
teachers. But if not, we'll demand something else happens
for those children. There are no second-rate children in
this great land of ours, and there are no second-rate dreams, as far as
we're concerned. (Applause.)
We've taken on a different task when it comes
to welfare reform. I strongly believe that this nation must
rally the armies of compassion which exist in every neighborhood in
America. The reason I believe that is because I understand
the true strength of our country. It's not in the halls of
government, it's in the hearts and souls of loving
citizens. I understand cultures and societies change one
heart, one soul, one conscience at a time. And government
can fund, but what government can't do is cause people to love one
another.
Perhaps the most important initiative of all
of the Bush-Cheney administration is to push a faith-based initiative
that says loud and clear, government will never fund religion, but
government will stand side by side with the soldiers in the armies of
compassion to make sure lost souls are found; to make sure wanting
children have somebody to love them in the form of a
mentor. (Applause.)
No question this is an ambitious
agenda. But it's exactly what the Vice President and I told
the American people we would do. You know, Washington is a
place with many temptations. And one of them is to settle in
and just go along and forget about the commitments you made during the
course of a campaign. But this is an administration which
will keep its word. And we expect others to do so, as well.
We may not always agree, but hopefully, we can
be honest with each other, and respect each other, and change the tone
of Washington, D.C., so that when people look at the Nation's Capital
they will be proud of what they see. (Applause.)
Changing the tone of our Nation's Capital
hasn't been easy. I realize that in politics, old ways die
hard. Washington at times has got a plenty sharp edge to
it. The only thing I can do, and the only thing Dick Cheney
and others in our administration can do is to control our own
responses. When I hear my policies and my nominees attacked in a
hostile and partisan way, I simply hear the echoes of an era behind
us. (Applause.)
I'm not going to take the bait. I'm
going to lead this country to a new level of
respect. (Applause.) I came to this town to
change the tone of the capital. And I'm not going to quit.
You know, Mark Twain used to say, always do
right; this will gratify some of the people, and astonish the
rest. (Laughter.) We're going to do the right
thing. We're going to pass an agenda that focuses on the
American people. We will share credit for success, because
we understand the best politics is good public
policy. (Applause.)
I think our good party will have a strong
record of accomplishment to run on. The people of this
country will be able to say, we elected them; they went to Washington;
they did what they said they were going to do, and the people are
better off for it.
I also think the people of our country will be
able to look at their Nation's Capital and begin to see a group of
folks working hard to usher in a period of personal responsibility; a
period in our country when everybody understands that each of us are
responsible for the decisions we make in life. It starts
with those who are fortunate enough to be a mom or a dad -- that each
of us must understand our primary job, our primary focus must be to
love our children with all their hearts and all our souls.
The responsibility era says that each of us
must be responsible for what we say and what we do. And a
period of personal responsibility understands that we must love a
neighbor just like we'd like to love themselves. I'm
absolutely convinced we're on our way to ushering in this new
culture. And I believe America will be better for
it. And I'm honored to be the President during the period of
time when this nation will realize its full
potential. (Applause.)
Thank you all for having me. God
bless you all, and God bless America. (Applause.)
END 8:10
P.M. EDT
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