For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
February 28, 2001
Remarks by the President at Nebraska Welcome
Omaha Civic Center Omaha, Nebraska
Listen to the President's Remarks
1:46 P.M. CST
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you
all. (Applause.) Thank you very much.
(Applause.) I'm glad I
came. (Applause.) I'm not saying I don't like my
new address, I do. But it's good to get out in the
countryside, too. (Applause.) It's good to get out so I can
shake hands with the folks that make America
work. (Applause.) It's good to get to the
heartland. (Applause.) Where people proudly stand on values
of faith and family. (Applause.)
I'm honored you'd invite me. I'm
glad I came. Mr. Mayor, thank you for your
friendship. It's great to be here with the Governor and
First Lady of the state of Nebraska, two fine
people. (Applause.) And two good friends of Laura
and mine.
It's also a thrill to travel from Washington
with two fine United States
Senators. (Applause.) Senator Hagel -- (applause)
-- and Senator Nelson. (Applause.) The good thing
about these two Senators is this: I know I'm going to be
able to count on them in the pinch. (Applause.) I
know when it comes to doing the right thing, they'll listen to the
people of Nebraska. (Applause.)
I'm also honored to be traveling with the
Congressman Lee Terry. He's a good, solid
man. (Applause.) I'm proud to be on the stage
with three Iowa Congressmen. And I appreciate you relaxing
your border standards to let them
in. (Laughter.) The Lt. Governor is
here. My fellow citizens, it is an honor to be your
President. (Applause.)
I'm proud to call 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
home. And so is the First
Lady. (Applause.) And I was proud to stand up in
front of the United States Congress last night to bring a message of
the American people, a common-sense message, a message of budgets and
priorities. I truly felt like I was representing you when I
talked about fiscal sanity and talked about the need for our government
to set clear priorities.
One of our priorities in the budget and one of
our national priorities must be to make sure that every child -- I mean
every child -- gets educated in the great land called
America. (Applause.) Even though I have a
Washington, D.C., temporary address, I want you to know I strongly
believe in local control of
schools. (Applause.) I believe the people who
care more about the children of Nebraska are the citizens of Nebraska
-- (applause) -- and we must work together, the Congress and the
Executive Branch must work together to pass power out of Washington to
provide flexibility at the local level. One size does not
fit all when it comes to educating the children of our country.
I want to insist that we spend more money on
programs like reading initiatives, an initiative that will help all
children learn to read, an initiative that will be based upon the fact
that reading is a science and we must use curriculum that will
work. Phonics needs to be an integral part of the
curriculum. (Applause.)
We're going to raise the
standards. You see, what we believe is that every child in
America can learn. We're going to reject the thought that
certain children can't learn, so we'll just move them through the
system. That's got to end. It's got to end. And
what we stand for, what the people know makes sense is that, in order
to determine whether or not all children are learning, it's essential
that we measure. It's essential that local folks develop
strong accountability systems. So we ask the question, do
you know how to read?
And if you do, we'll praise the
teachers. And we always have got to praise the
teachers. But if our accountability system shows that
children are not learning to read, instead of sitting by and saying,
oh, maybe something positive will happen, it will serve as a go-by, it
will serve as an opportunity for us to say, let's solve the problems
early before it's too late. There are no second-rate
children in America and there are no second-rate
dreams. (Applause.) So our budget prioritizes
education with the understanding, however, that the schools should be
run at the local level.
I set another priority, and that's to pay the
men and women who wear our uniform better
wages. (Applause.) I am proud to be the Commander
in Chief. (Applause.) The mission of the United
States military will be to train our troops to be prepared to fight and
win war, and therefore, prevent war from happening in the first
place. (Applause.)
A priority in the budget is to make sure the
people who don't have health care insurance who work have health care
insurance. A priority in the budget is to fulfill our
promise to the seniors by funding Medicare. I want you to
know you can hear all the rhetoric about the apologists for bigger
government in Washington, but with the right priorities and the right
focus, we will double the Medicare budget over the next 10 years, to
make sure our seniors have got a Medicare system that we can be proud
of; one that, by the way, includes prescription
drugs. (Applause.)
Oh, I know you'll hear a lot of talk about
Social Security, and we should talk about Social
Security. But under our vision of what we ought to do with
the budget, we set aside all $2.6 trillion of the payroll taxes that
are heading into Social Security and spend them only on Social
Security. (Applause.)
Now, some of the people in Washington aren't
going to like my budget because we don't grow the budget quite as fast
as they would like. The budget increased last year by 8
percent. That's significantly higher than the rate of
inflation. That was higher than real income
grew. I mean, they were growing that budget, it was like a
bidding contest to see who could spend the most money got out of town
first. Those days must end. (Applause.) The
budget I submitted to the Congress is one that said we could meet our
needs and grow our discretionary spending at a realistic and reasonable
4 percent. (Applause.)
There's a lot of talk in Washington about
debt, and like you I'm concerned about debt. I want to
remind you there's two types of debt; one is at the government level,
and one is at the individual level. First let me talk about
government debt. With the right kind of leadership and the right kind
of focus, and working with members of both parties, we can pay down $2
trillion of the national debt over the next
decade. (Applause.)
Somebody said, well, why don't you pay down
more than that. Well, first of all, a lot of the bonds don't
retire, aren't to be retired, they don't expire during the 10-year
period. It makes absolutely no sense to prepay debt which
will cost the taxpayers more money. That doesn't make any
sense. We ought to pay debt as it comes due. And
the only debt that comes due is $2 trillion over the next 10 years, and
that's the debt we'll repay. (Applause.)
We paid down debt, we've met our priorities,
there's still money left over. And like any wise -- any wise
person who cares about budgets, we ought to set some aside for
contingencies. So we set aside a trillion dollars over the
next 10 years for contingencies.
And what might some of those contingencies
be? Well, making sure we take care of the
seniors. As you know, one of the things I'm going to do is
have a full review of our military's capabilities and how we ought to
restructure our forces to meet the
future. (Applause.) And perhaps we'll need more
money to fund those priorities.
I can assure you, we're going to worry about
the agricultural sector here in the United
States. (Applause.) And perhaps -- and perhaps
we'll need to spend some of that contingency money on the ag sector as
we transform our agriculture sector to one that is going to be able to
trade freely around the world.
Let me say as an aside, I strongly support
ethanol. Let me say as an aside -- (applause) -- we should
not use food as a diplomatic weapon from this point
forward. (Applause.) We shouldn't view
agriculture as a stepchild when it comes to international trade
negotiations. (Applause.)
So we've set priorities, we've paid down $2
trillion dollars of debt. We've got a trillion dollars of contingency
set aside over the next 10 years and there's still money left over --
there's still money left over, and there's a fundamental
choice -- do we spend it?
AUDIENCE: Nooo!
THE PRESIDENT: Or do we remember
whose money it is in the first place? (Applause.)
The surplus is not the government's
money. The surplus is the people's
money. (Applause.) And I'm here to ask you to
join me in making that case to any federal official you can
find. I think we're in pretty good shape with the Nebraska
delegation. (Applause.) I certainly hope so. I
certainly hope so.
But this is a plan that hears the voices of
thousands of working Americans, people who are struggling to get
ahead. I'm keenly aware the energy bills are going up all
across the country. We need an energy policy. We
also must have a tax relief policy that understands working Americans
are paying energy costs than ever before.
I'm keenly aware that many of our citizens
have got a lot of consumer debt. There's a lot of talk about
debt at the national level, and I'm worried about it. I'm
also worried about consumer debt on individual families. I'm
aware that this economy is beginning to sputter a little bit, and it
makes sense to combine good monetary policy with good fiscal
policy. I believe by giving people some of your own money
back it will help kick-start this economy so people will be able to
find work who's looking for a job. (Applause.)
In case anybody asks you, here's the
plan. We're going to drop the bottom rate from 15 percent to
10 percent. (Applause.) We increase the child
credit from $500 to $1,000. (Applause.) We drop
all rates and simplify the code. We drop the top rate from
39.6 to 33 percent, and there's two primary reasons, two reasons I want
to share with you. One is there ought to be some principle
involved in the tax code, and one of the principles is the federal
government should take no more than a third of anybody's
check. (Applause.)
But there is a second principle. We
must understand that there are thousands of unincorporated small
businesses in America and thousands of sub-S corporations that pay the
highest income tax rate. And in order to stimulate the
entrepreneurial spirit of America, in order to encourage capital
formation in small businesses, it makes sense to drop the top rate from
39.6 to 33 percent. (Applause.)
I know the advocates -- I can already hear
some of the voices of the advocates for big government, the folks that
want to keep your money in Washington to expand the size of the
government. They're going to say, oh, this is only for the
rich. Well, first of all, we're going to reject class
warfare. (Applause.) Secondly, we don't believe
in targeting some people in or some people out. We believe
everybody who pays taxes ought to get tax
relief. (Applause.)
Thirdly, ours is a philosophy that says we
know government's role is not to create wealth, but to create an
environment in which entrepreneurs and small businesses can realize
their dreams in America. (Applause.) Fifthly, we understand
the marriage penalty is unfair and we better do something about
it. (Applause.) And those of us who have spent
some time in the agricultural sector and in the heartland, understand
how unfair the death penalty is -- the death tax is, and we need to get
rid of it. (Applause.)
I don't want to get rid of the death penalty
-- (laughter) -- just the death tax. (Applause.)
There is a lot of talk, there is a lot of talk
about how this plan isn't really going to affect
people. Today, the Ojedas are with us, Tony and Cynthia, and
I want to thank you all for coming. And I appreciate the
patience of your children. (Laughter.) As you can
see, they are proud parents of three children. Right now,
last year, they paid $3,170 in federal income taxes.
Under our plan, a plan that benefits everybody
who pays taxes, a plan where the greatest percentage of tax relief goes
to the people at the bottom end of the economic ladder, a plan that is
eminently fair, a plan that doesn't affect the size of the federal
government in a negative way, a plan that helps meet priorities --
these folks will save $2,120. (Applause.)
Oh, I know that doesn't sound like a lot of
money to folks that are rolling in dough. But $2,120 means a
lot to the Ojeda family. It means a lot when you're paying
high energy bills. It means a lot when you are worried about
the education of your three children. It means a lot when
you want to save. It means a lot when you want to do your
duty as a mom and a dad to prepare for your children's
future. No, $2,120 is a significant amount of
money. (Applause.) It's the right thing to do for
America.
Now, we've submitted the people's budget to
Congress. It's a budget that sets priorities, a budget that
pays down debt, a budget that worries about the future. But
a budget that keeps in mind that our people are
overtaxed. And I am here asking Congress to give you a
refund. (Applause.)
AUDIENCE: Re-fund! Re-fund!
THE PRESIDENT: I want to thank you
all for coming out. It is so refreshing to travel the -- to
travel your streets and to see people come out. I know there
is an overflow room here of a thousand people and I want to thank you
all for coming.
I want to tell you -- (applause) -- there is
something bigger though than just a legislative agenda at
hand. It is truly the greatness of the
country. My job is to remind all of us that responsibility
begins at home, that the biggest job, if you happen to be fortunate
enough to be a mom or a dad, your biggest job is not your day
job. Your biggest job is your 24-hour job of loving your
children with all your heart and all your soul.
(Applause.) That's the best thing all of us can do.
The best thing all of us can do in this
nation, whether our job is President or Boy Scout leader or Sunday
school teacher, or teacher, is to teach our youngsters the difference
between right and wrong. Is to encourage them to be
responsible for the decisions they make in life -- (applause) -- is to
make sure that every child, regardless of how he or she are born, knows
somebody cares for them, somebody loves them.
No, the great strength of this country, the
great strength of this country can be found in the heartland of
America, where neighbor turns to neighbor and says, what can I do to
help you, neighbor, if you've got a problem, where there are thousands
of people saying, I want to help somebody in need, coming out of our
churches and synagogues and mosques.
My job -- my job is not only to argue and work
to get a legislative agenda passed that will help Americans help
themselves. My job is also to remind America how great we
are, that we're a blessed nation, a nation indivisible under God, the
greatest nation on the face of the earth. (Applause.)
Together, together we can help this nation
fulfill its greatest promise, where every child realizes the American
experience is meant for them, where every child can learn to read,
where moms and dads understand the top priority is to love their
children.
No, the greatness of this country is ahead of
us. We've been great in the past, but the future has never
been brighter. (Applause.) And the future has
never been brighter. The future has never been brighter
because the people of this country have never been
greater. It is my honor to be your President.
Thank you for coming and God
bless. (Applause.)
END
2:15 P.M. CST
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