For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
August 26, 2001
President Speaks at Pittsburgh Steelworkers Picnic
Remarks by the President to Steelworkers Picnic at Mon Valley Works
U.S. Steel Group
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
View the President's
Remarks
3:05 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all
very much. Governor, you don't look a day over
60. (Laughter.)
I appreciate my friend Tom
Ridge. I really care for him a lot. He's a really
decent man. And I know the people of Pennsylvania are going
to miss him when he retires from the governor's office. He's
done a good job. A good, even-handed fellow -- (applause) -- who, like
me, married really well. (Laughter.)
I'm thrilled that my wife has traveled
with me today. We came up from Crawford, Texas. I
was wondering what that wet stuff coming out of the air was for a
while. (Laughter.)
But I can't tell you how proud I am of
Laura. When I married her, she was a public school
librarian. (Applause.) There's always one in
every crowd. (Laughter.)
But like that public school librarian, she
not only loves books, she loves children. And one of the
things she is going to work with me on is to make sure that every
child, I mean every child in America, gets a first-rate education by
starting with making sure every child in America learns to read.
Thank you for coming,
Laura. (Applause.)
We both grew up in Midland,
Texas. She remembers me -- I think she remembers me as a
Little League baseball player, so she is somewhat in shock over the
fact that I'll be inducted into the Little League Hall of Fame this
evening. (Laughter.)
It's an honor to be here in
Pennsylvania. I'm proud that two of my Cabinet officials are
here, my long-time friend from Texas, Don Evans. One thing
about old Don, and even Leo will admit this, he'll answer the phone
call from the people who work in the steel industry. When
you call, he'll be on the other end of the line. (Applause.)
And Elaine Chao, I'm proud of her
representing the working people of America in my
Cabinet. She's smart, she's capable and she brings a lot of
dignity to her office as well. Thank you for being here,
Elane.
I've enjoyed working with Senator Santorum
and Melissa Hart and Bob Ney from Ohio. Every time I see
them, they say steel. "Mr. President, you must understand
steel and its woes." You've got three great advocates for
the steel industry and its workers in those three elected officials who
took time out of their day to be here. Congress is on
vacation, the country has never run better. (Laughter and
applause.) But I appreciate them coming over to say hello.
I want to thank Tom Usher and congratulate
the folks at U.S. Steel for 100 years of productivity for
America. I want to thank Leo. I was sitting there
watching during the speeches. Leo was sitting there working
the Secretary of Commerce the whole
time. (Laughter.) He never misses a moment to say
what's on his mind, and I appreciate a straightforward fellow, a fellow
who you know where he stands.
And I was asking the folks at the table I
was at, how's Leo doing? They said, we like him, he represents us
well. And I appreciate your service, Leo, and we look
forward to working with you to do what's right for the steelworkers and
the steel industry of America. (Applause.)
I got to say something about
Ross. Where are you, Ross? There he is. He's my
table host. Ross made sure I got through the line in a
record time, 45 minutes. (Laughter.) It's not
that he stopped and ate every dish along the way, but he was gracious
in letting me say hello to as many people as I could.
I love people and I love the American
citizens. It doesn't matter whether you're Republican,
Democrat, don't care about political parties, I love representing this
great country because it's a country full of good and decent, honorable
folks. (Applause.)
Ross told me he's been in power for 30
years. Tell me how you do it, Ross. It's not
because of your looks. (Laughter.)
Well, at any rate, thank you all for
coming. I have been on what they call a working
vacation. I've been at our place in Crawford, Texas, and
then I've been traveling out of the place to go to what I call a
heartland tour, which is really a way for me to herald the great values
of our country.
See, Washington passes laws, but it
doesn't pass values legislation. Values exist in the hearts and souls
of our citizens. And I am here to trumpet one of the great
values of America. That's the enterprise of the American
worker, the hardworking American citizens who make this economy
go. And those are the steelworkers of America. I
appreciate what you do for our country. (Applause.)
I've had the honor of traveling the
world. We're the envy of the world in many ways, and one
reason why is because of our work ethic. People work hard in America
and they're not afraid to do so. And one of the reasons
we're as strong as we are is because of the productivity based upon the
hardworking American citizen. And I appreciate you for your
work.
There's another value I herald when I
travel the country, and that's the value of family. I want
to thank all the families who are here, the moms and dads who have
brought their children out. I love the American
family. (Applause.) And I understand how
important family is to our country.
I like to remind our fellow citizens, if
you're a mom or a dad, the most important job you'll ever have is not
going to take place inside this building; the most important job you'll
ever have is to tell your children you love them with all your heart
and show them you love them with all your mind and all your
soul. (Applause.)
We're a great land because of the values
we hold dear. And there's another reason to get outside of
Washington, because there's a lot of common sense outside of the
nation's capital. And it makes common sense to be
secure. One of my jobs as the Commander-in-Chief is to make
sure our defenses are strong and the nation is secure. It's
common sense to make sure that we have an energy policy that becomes
less reliant upon foreign sources of energy. I want to
appreciate and thank the U.S. Steel and its workers for a good
conservation policy. That's part of a good energy
policy. But the other part is to make sure we've got ample
coal and natural gas, found right here in our own hemisphere to fuel
our own plants so our workers can have jobs and we can have good
product for the American people. (Applause.)
It also makes sense not to be reliant --
if you're the Commander-in-Chief, it makes sense, common sense, not to
be heavily reliant upon materials such as steel. If you're
worried about the security of the country and you become over-reliant
upon foreign sources of steel, it can easily affect the capacity of our
military to be well supplied.
Steel is an important job issue; it's also
an important national security issue. And that is why we
took the actions we took in this administration. (Applause.)
I'm upbeat and my spirits are
high. But I must confess I'm worried about the fact that our
manufacturing sector in our economy is a lot slower than I would
hope. As a matter of fact, our economy has grown at a paltry
1 percent for the last 12 months, and that worries me. It
worries me, first and foremost, for the effect that's going to have on
the families all across America. I worry about -- I worry
about our citizens who work. And we're taking action.
We're paying down record amounts of debt
to ease the pressure on interest rates. We've got a trade
policy that's going to have a level playing field as its
component. And the other thing we've done at the
administrative level is we sent money back to the people who pay the
bills in America. (Applause.)
We said that there's obviously a role for
the federal government and let's fund our
priorities. Educating our children is a priority, national
defense is a priority. Helping people who cannot help
themselves is a priority. But folks, when the economy slows
down, it's time to understand how to get it started
again. And one way to help is to give people their own money
back.
You see, there's a big debate in
Washington about the money in Washington. Sometimes, folks
up there lose sight about whose money it is. That money is not the
government's money; it's the people's money. And we did the
right thing with sharing that money with the people who pay the
bills. (Applause.)
We've taken action. As you can
see, this is an administration that, when we see a problem, we
move. We don't stick our finger in the air trying to figure
out which way the wind is blowing. I don't need a poll or
focus group to tell me what to think. I do what I think is
right for the American people. And we'll just let the
political chips fall where they may. And the right thing to
do was to cut the taxes. (Applause.)
But really, the right thing for me to do
is to travel our land, come to places like the Mon Valley and thank you
all very much for what you do. Thank you for your hard work, thank you
for loving your families. Thank you for helping a neighbor
in need. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for walking
across the street when you see somebody in your neighborhood who needs
a helping hand. Thank you for going to your places of
worship and rallying the good faith and good charity inherent in
programs all aimed at helping somebody help themselves.
Now, this is a great land. It's
a great land because we're blessed with the greatest people on the face
of the earth. It's my honor to be amongst such people
today. Thank you for having me. May God bless you
all and my God bless America. Thank you
all. (Applause.)