15 Oct 1992

Brief, Governor Clinton. Thank you. We have a question right here.

May I answer that?

Who do you want to start with?

It caused me to disrupt my private life and my business to get involved in this activity. That's how much I care about it. And believe me, if you knew my family and if you knew the private life I have, you would agree in a minute that that's a whole lot more fun than getting involved in politics. But I have lived the American dream. I came from very modest background. Nobody's been luckier than I've been, all the way across the spectrum, and the greatest riches of all are my wife and children. That's true of any family. But I want all the children -- I want these young people up here to be able to start with nothing but an idea like I did and build a business. But they've got to have a strong basic economy and if you're in debt, it's like having a ball and chain around you. I just figure, as lucky as I've been, I owe it to them and I owe it to the future generations and on a very personal basis, I owe it to my children and grandchildren.

Well, I think the national debt affects everybody.

Obviously it has a lot to do with interest rates --

You, on a personal basis -- how has it affected you?

I'm sure it has. I love my grandchildren --

I want to think that they're going to be able to afford an education. I think that that's an important part of being a parent. If the question -- maybe I -- get it wrong. Are you suggesting that if somebody has means that the national debt doesn't affect them?

I'm not sure I get -- help me with the question and I'll try to answer it.

Yeah.

I think she means more the recession -- the economic problems today the country faces rather than the deficit.

Governor Clinton.

Um --

Well, yeah, uh-huh.

Thank you.

Yes, I do. My name is Ben Smith. I work in the financial field, counseling retirees, and I'm personally concerned about three major areas. One is the Social Security Administration or trust fund is projected to be insolvent by the year 2036. And we funded the trust fund with IOUs in the form of Treasury bonds. The Pension Guarantee Fund, which backs up our private retirement plans for retirees, is projected to be bankrupt by the year 2026, not to mention the cutbacks by private companies. And Medicare is projected to be bankrupt maybe as soon as 1997. And I would like from each of you a specific response as to what you intend to do for retirees relative to these issues, not generalities but specifics because I think they're very disturbing issues.

Well, the Social Security -- you're an expert and I could, I'm sure, learn from you the details of the Pension Guarantee Fund and the Social Security Fund. The Social Security system was fixed about 5 years, and I think it's projected out to be sound beyond that. So at least we have time to work with it. But on all of these things, a sound economy is the only way to get it going. Growth in the economy is gonna add to the overall prosperity and wealth. I can't give you a specific answer on Pension Guarantee Fund. All I know is that we have firm government credit to guarantee the pensions. And that is very important. But it's -- the full faith and credit of the US, in spite of our difficulties, is still pretty good. It's still the most respected credit. So I would simply say, as these dates get close, you're going to have to reorganize and refix as we did with the Social Security Fund. And I think that's the only answer. But the more immediate answer is to do what this lady was suggesting we do, and that is to get this deficit down and get on without adding to the woes, and then restructure. One thing I've called for that has been stymied, and I'll keep on working for it, is a whole financial reform legislation. It is absolutely essential in terms of bringing our banking system and credit system into the new age instead of having it living back in the dark ages. And it's a big fight. And I don't want to give my friend Ross another shot at me here but I am fighting with the Congress to get this through. And you can't just go up and say I'm going to fix it. You've got some pretty strong-willed guys up there that argue with you. But that's what the election's about. I agree with the governor. That's what the election's about. And sound fiscal policy is the best answer, I think, to all the three problems you mentioned.

On the broad issue here, when you're trying to solve a problem, you get the best plans. You have a raging debate about those plans. Then out of that debate, with leadership, comes consensus. Then, if the plans are huge and complex like health care, I would urge you to implement pilot programs. Like the old carpenter says measure twice, cut once. Let's make sure this thing's as good as we all think it is at the end of the meeting. Then finally, our government passes laws and freezes the plan in concrete. Anybody that's ever built a successful business will tell you you optimize, optimize, optimize after you've put something into effect. The reason Medicare and Medicaid are a mess is we froze them. Everybody knows how to fix them. There are people all over the federal government, if they could just touch it with a screwdriver, could fix it. Now, back over here. See, we've got a $4 trillion debt and only in America would you have $2.8 trillion of it or 70% of it financed 5 years or less. Now, that's another thing for you to think about when you go home tonight. You don't finance long-term debt with short-term money. Why did our government do it? To get the interest rates down. A 1% increase in interest rates in that $2.8 trillion is $28 billion a year. Now, when you look at what Germany pays for money and what we don't pay for money, you realize there's quite a spread, right, and you realize this is a temporary thing and there's going to be another sucking sound that runs our deficit through the roof. You know, and everybody's ducking it so I'm gonna say it, that we are not letting that surplus stay in the bank. We are not investing that surplus like a pension fund. We are spending that surplus to make the deficit look smaller to you than it really is. Now, that -- put you in jail in corporate America if you kept books that way but in government it's just kind of the way things are. That's because it comes at you, not from you. Now then, that money needs to be -- they don't even pay interest on it. They just write a note for the interest.

Do you want to fix the problem or sound-bite it? I understand the importance of time but see, here's how we get to this mess we're in.

This is just 1 of 1000. Now then, to nail it, there's one way out -- a growing, expanding job base. A growing, expanding job base to generate the funds and the tax revenues to pay off the mess and rebuild America. We've got to double-hit. If we're $4 trillion down, we should have everything perfect, but we don't. We've got to pay it off and build money to renew it- -spend money to renew it, and that's going to take a growing, expanding job base. That is priority one in this country. Put everybody that's breathing to work. And I'd love to be out of workers and have to import them, like some of our international competitors.

Sorry.

Okay.

Absolutely. I apologize.

I think I remember the question. (Laughter.) Let me say first of all, I want to answer your specific question but first of all, we all agree that there should be a growing economy. What you have to decide is who's got the best economic plan. And we all have ideas out there, and Mr. Bush has a record. So I don't want you to read my lips and I sure don't want you to read his. I do hope you will read our plans. Now, specifically, one, on Medicare, it is not true that everyone knows how to fix it. There are different ideas -- the Bush plan, the Perot plan, the Clinton -- we have different ideas. I am convinced, having studied health care for a year hard and talking to hundreds and hundreds of people all across America, that you cannot control the cost of Medicare until you control the cost of private health care and public health care, with managed competition, ceiling on cost, and radical reorganization of the insurance markets. You've got to do that; we got to get those costs down. Number 2, with regard to Social Security, that program -- a lot of you may not know this -- it produces a $70 billion surplus a year. Social Security is in surplus $70 billion. Six increases in the payroll tax -- that means people with incomes of $51,000 a year or less pay a disproportionally high share of the federal tax burden, which is why I want some middle-class tax relief. What do we have to do? By the time the century turns, we have got to have our deficit under control, we have to work out of so that surplus is building up so when the baby boomers like me retire, we're okay. Number 3, on the pension funds, I don't know as much about it, but I will say this. What I would do is to bring in the pension experts of the country, take a look at it, and strengthen the pension requirements further, because it's not just enough to have the guarantee. We had a guarantee on the S&Ls, right? We had a guarantee -- and what happened? You picked up a $500-billion bill because of the dumb way the federal government deregulated it. So I think we are going to have to change and strengthen the pension requirements on private retirement plans.

We've come to a position where we're in the new world order, and I'd like to know what the candidates feel our position is in this new world order, and what our responsibilities are as a superpower?

Well, we have come to that position. Since I became president, 43, 44 countries have gone democratic, no longer totalitarian, no longer living under dictatorship or communist rule. This is exciting. New world order to me means freedom and democracy. I think we will have a continuing responsibility, as the only remaining superpower, to stay involved. If we pull back in some isolation and say we don't have to do our share, or more than our share, anymore, I believe you are going to just ask for conflagration that we'll get involved in the future. NATO, for example, has kept the peace for many, many years, and I want to see us keep fully staffed in NATO so we'll continue to guarantee the peace in Europe. But the exciting thing is, the fear of nuclear war is down. And you hear all the bad stuff that's happened on my watch; I hope people will recognize that this is something pretty good for mankind. I hope they'll think it's good that democracy and freedom is on the move. And we're going to stay engaged, as long as I'm president, working to improve things. You know, it's so easy now to say, hey, cut out foreign aid, we got a problem at home. I think the US has to still have the Statue of Liberty as a symbol, caring for others. Right this very minute we're sending supplies in to help these little starving kids in Somalia. It's the US that's taken the lead in humanitarian aid into Bosnia. We're doing this all around the world. Yes, we got problems at home. And I think I got a good plan to help fix those problems at home. But because of our leadership, because we didn't listen to the freeze -- the nuclear-freeze group, do you remember -- freeze it, back in the late 70s -- freeze, don't touch it; we're going to lock it in now or else we'll have war. President Reagan said no, peace through strength. It worked. The Soviet Union is no more, and now we're working to help them become totally democratic through the Freedom Support Act that I led on, a great Democratic ambassador, Bob Strauss, over there, Jim Baker, all of us got this thing passed -- through cooperation, Ross -- it worked with cooperation, and you're for that, I'm sure, helping Russia become democratic. So the new world order to me means freedom and democracy, keep engaged, do not pull back into isolation. And we are the US, and we have a responsibility to lead and to guarantee the security. If it hadn't been for us, Saddam Hussein would be sitting on top of three-fifths of the oil supply of the world and he'd have nuclear weapons. And only the US could do this. Excuse me, Carole.

Well, it's cost-effective to help Russia succeed in its revolution; it's pennies on the dollar compared to going back to the Cold War. Russia is still very unstable; they could go back to square one, and worse. All the nuclear weapons are not dismantled. I am particularly concerned about the intercontinental weapons, the ones that can hit us. We've got agreements, but they are still there. With all this instability and breaking into republics, and all the Middle Eastern countries going over there and shopping for weapons, we've got our work cut out for us. So we need to stay right on top of that and constructively help them move toward democracy and capitalism. We have to have money to do that. We have to have our people at work. See, for 45 years we were preoccupied with the Red Army. I suggest now that our number one preoccupation is red ink and our country and we've got to put our people back to work so that we can afford to do these things we want to do in Russia. We cannot be the policeman for the world any longer. We spent $300 billion a year defending the world. Germany and Japan spend around $30 billion a piece. If I can get you to defend me and I can spend all my money building industry that's a home run for me. Coming out of World War II it made sense. Now, the other superpowers need to do their part. I'll close on this point. You can't be a superpower unless you're an economic superpower. If we're not an economic superpower, we're a used to be and we will no longer be a force for good throughout the world. And if nothing else gets you excited about rebuilding our industrial base maybe that will because job one is to put our people back to work.

I'd rather answer her question first and then I'll be glad to. Because the question you ask is important. The end of the Cold War brings an incredible opportunity for change. Winds of freedom blowing around the world, Russia demilitarizing. And it also requires us to maintain some continuity -- some bipartisan American commitment to certain principles. And I would just say there are three things that I would like to say -- number one -- we do have to maintain the world's strongest defense. We may differ about what the elements of that are. I think that defense needs to be -- with fewer people in permanent armed services but with greater mobility on the land, in the air and on the sea, with a real dedication to continuing development of high technology weaponry and well trained people. I think we're going to have to work to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Got to keep going until all those nuclear weapons in Russia are gone and the other republics. Number 2, if you don't rebuild the economic strength of this country at home, we won't be a superpower. We can't have any more instances like what happened when Mr. Bush went to Japan and the Japanese prime minister said he felt sympathy for our country. We have to be the strongest economic power in the world. That's what got me into this race, so we could rebuild the American economy. And number three, we need to be a force for freedom and democracy and we need to use our unique position to support freedom, whether it's in Haiti or in China or in any other place, wherever the seeds of freedom are sprouting. We can't impose it, but we need to nourish it and that's the kind of thing that I would do as president -- follow those three commitments into the future.

Yes. We've talked a lot tonight about creating jobs. But we have an awful lot of high school graduates who don't know how to read a ruler, who cannot fill out an application for a job. How can we create high paying jobs with the education system we have and what would you do to change it?

Go ahead, sir. Yeah, go ahead.

Governor Clinton.

Thank you, Governor Clinton.

The question is, what is it going to cost? What is it going to cost?

Thank you. Mr. Perot, you on education, please.

No, you don't.

Thank you.

And in the first few years they either learn how to learn or don't learn how to learn. And if they don't, they wind up in prison.

And it costs more to keep them in prison than it does to send them to Harvard. I rest my case.

I just had a word of clarification because of something Governor Clinton said. My school choice program, GI Bill for Kids, does not take public money and give it to private schools. It does what the GI Bill itself did when I came out of World War II. It takes public money and gives it to families or individuals to choose the school they want. And where it's been done, those schools, like in Rochester, those schools that weren't chosen find that they then compete and do better. So I think it's worth a shot. We've got a pilot program. It ought to be tried. School choice -- public, private or religious. Not to the schools but to -- you know, 46% of the teachers in Chicago, public school teachers, send their kids to private school. Now, I think we ought to try to help families and see if it will do what I think -- make all schools better.

Very briefly.

We have very little time left and it occurs to me that we have talked all this time and there has not been one question about some of the racial tensions and ethnic tensions in America. Is there anyone in this audience that would like to pose a question to the candidates on this?

Governor Clinton, why don't you answer that first?

I do, too.

Okay. I'm sorry. We have just a little bit of time left. Let's try to get responses from each of them. President Bush or Mr. Perot?

(Inaudible).

Excuse me. I'm extremely impressed with that.

Sure -- I just wanted to know -- yes.

I'm totally impressed with that. I just wanted to know is, when's your-

When?

Yeah.

(Laughs)

Mr. Perot.

We have -- thank you.

Mr. Perot -- I don't want to cut you off any more but we only have a minute left.

How about a woman?

How about Dr. Lou Sullivan?

Yeah, a good man.

Oh, oh.

(Laughs)

Many?

When?

Hm-hm.

Good.

All good Republicans.

Thank you. I want to apologize to our audience because there were 209 people here and there were 209 questions. We only got to a fraction of them and I'm sorry to those of you that didn't get to ask your questions but we must move to the conclusion of the program. It is time now for the 2 minute closing statements and by prior agreement President Bush will go first.

That's right.

Give this man more time. (Laughs)

Thank you, Mr. President. And now a closing statement from Mr. Perot.

Mr. Perot, I'm sorry --

-- once again.

And finally, last but not least -- Governor Clinton.

Good evening and welcome to this second of three presidential debates between the major candidates for president of the US. The candidates are the Republican nominee, President George Bush, the independent Ross Perot and Governor Bill Clinton, the Democratic nominee. My name is Carole Simpson, and I will be the moderator for tonight's 90-minute debate, which is coming to you from the campus of the University of Richmond in Richmond, Virginia. Now, tonight's program is unlike any other presidential debate in history. We're making history now and it's pretty exciting. An independent polling firm has selected an audience of 209 uncommitted voters from this area. The candidates will be asked questions by these voters on a topic of their choosing -- anything they want to ask about. My job as moderator is to, you know, take care of the questioning, ask questions myself if I think there needs to be continuity and balance, and sometimes I might ask the candidates to respond to what another candidate may have said. Now, the format has been agreed to by representatives of both the Republican and Democratic campaigns, and there is no subject matter that is restricted. Anything goes. We can ask anything. After the debate, the candidates will have an opportunity to make a closing statement. So, President Bush, I think you said it earlier -- let's get it on.

And I think the first question is over here.

That's right at the top of my agenda. We've shipped millions of jobs overseas and we have a strange situation because we have a process in Washington where after you've served for a while you cash in, become a foreign lobbyist, make $30,000 a month, then take a leave, work on presidential campaigns, make sure you've got good contacts and then go back out. Now, if you just want to get down to brass tacks, first thing you ought to do is get all these folks who've got these 1-way trade agreements that we've negotiated over the years and say fellas, we'll take the same deal we gave you. And they'll gridlock right at that point because for example, we've got international competitors who simply could not unload their cars off the ships if they had to comply -- you see, if it was a 2-way street, just couldn't do it. We have got to stop sending jobs overseas. To those of you in the audience who are business people: pretty simple. If you're paying $12, $13, $14 an hour for a factory worker, and you can move your factory south of the border, pay $1 an hour for labor, hire a young -- let's assume you've been in business for a long time. You've got a mature workforce. Pay $1 an hour for your labor, have no health care -- that's the most expensive single element in making the car. Have no environmental controls, no pollution controls and no retirement. And you don't care about anything but making money. There will be a job-sucking sound going south. If the people send me to Washington the first thing I'll do is study that 2000-page agreement and make sure it's a 2-way street. One last point here. I decided I was dumb and didn't understand it so I called a "Who's Who" of the folks that have been around it, and I said why won't everybody go south; they said it will be disruptive; I said for how long. I finally got 'em for 12 to 15 years. And I said, well, how does it stop being disruptive? And that is when their jobs come up from a dollar an hour to $6 an hour, and ours go down to $6 an hour; then it's leveled again, but in the meantime you've wrecked the country with these kind of deals. We got to cut it out.

Carole, the thing that saved us in this global economic slowdown has been our exports, and what I'm trying to do is increase our exports. And if indeed all the jobs were going to move south because there are lower wages, there are lower wages now and they haven't done that. And so I have just negotiated with the president of Mexico the North American Free Trade Agreement -- and the prime minister of Canada, I might add -- and I want to have more of these free trade agreements, because export jobs are increasing far faster than any jobs that may have moved overseas. That's a scare tactic, because it's not that many. But any one that's here, we want to have more jobs here. And the way to do that is to increase our exports. Some believe in protection. I don't; I believe in free and fair trade, and that's the thing that saved us. So I will keep on as president trying to get a successful conclusion to the GATT Round, the big Uruguay Round of trade which will really open up markets for our agriculture particularly. I want to continue to work after we get this NAFTA agreement ratified this coming year. I want to get one with Eastern Europe; I want to get one with Chile. And free and fair trade is the answer, not protection. And, as I say, we've had tough economic times, and it's exports that have saved us, exports that have built.

I'd like to answer the question, because I've actually been a governor for 12 years, so I've known a lot of people who have lost their jobs because of jobs moving overseas, and I know a lot of people whose plants have been strengthened by increasing exports. The trick is to expand our export base and to expand trade on terms that are fair to us. It is true that our exports to Mexico, for example, have gone up and our trade deficit has gone down; it's also true that just today a record high trade deficit was announced with Japan. So what is the answer? Let me just mention three things very quickly. Number one, make sure that other countries are as open to our markets as our markets are to them, and, if they're not, have measures on the books that don't take forever and a day to implement. Number two, change the tax code. There are more deductions in the tax code for shutting plants down and moving overseas than there are for modernizing plant and equipment here. Our competitors don't do that. Emphasize and subsidize modernizing plant and equipment here, not moving plants overseas. Number three, stop the federal government's program that now gives low-interest loans and job training funds to companies that will actually shut down and move to other countries, but we won't do the same thing for plants that stay here. So more trade but on fair terms -- and favor investment in America.

This is for Governor Clinton. In the real world, that is, outside of Washington, DC, compensation and achievement are based on goals defined and achieved. My question is about the deficit. Would you define in specific dollar goals how much you would reduce the deficit in each of the 4 years of a Clinton administration and then enter into a legally binding contract with the American people, that if you did not achieve those goals that you would not seek a 2nd term? Answer yes or no and then comment on your answer, please.

Mr. President.

How about you, Mr. Perot?

You're all wonderful speakers, and I know you have lots more to add, but I've talked to this audience, and they have lots of questions on other topics. Can we move to another topic, please? We have one up here, I think.

Who wants to take that one? Mr. Perot, you have an answer for everything, don't you? Go right ahead, sir.

Like Jerry Brown, the 800 number.

Thank you, Mr. Perot. So that seems directed; he would say it's you gentlemen that have been doing that. Mr. Clinton, Governor Clinton -- oh, President Bush, how would you like to respond?

Mr. President, I'm getting time cues and with all due respect --

I'm sorry.

Governor Clinton.

Yes, you do. (Laughter)

Please don't get into the Washington Post.

May I -- I talked to this audience before you gentlemen came and I asked them about how they felt about the tenor of the campaign. Would you like to let them know what you thought about that, when I said are you pleased with how the campaign's been going? (Audience: "No.")

Who wants to say why you don't like the way the campaign is going? We have a gentleman back here.

So your question is?

How do you respond? How do you gentlemen respond to --

Let's do it.

Let's do it. Let's talk about programs for children.

I think it depends how you define it. I mean, I think in general, let's talk about these issues. Let's talk about the programs. But in the presidency, a lot goes into it. Caring goes into it. That's not particularly specific. Strength goes into it. That's not specific. Standing up against aggression. That's not specific in terms of a program. This is what a president has to do. So in principle, though, I'll take your point and think we ought to discuss child care or whatever else it is.

Ross had his hand up.

Just no hedges, no ifs, ands and buts. I'll take the pledge because I know the American people want to talk about issues and not tabloid journalism. So I'll take the pledge and will stay on the issues. Now, just for the record, I don't have any spin doctors. I don't have any speechwriters. Probably shows. I make those charts you see on television. But you don't have to wonder if it's me talking. See, what you see is what you get and if you don't like it, you got two other choices, right?

May I finish?

Very briefly?

And I don't have any foreign money in my campaign. I don't have any foreign lobbyists on leave in my campaign. I don't have any PAC money in my campaign. I've got 5.5 million hard-working people who put me on the ballot, and I belong to them. And they're interested in what you're interested in. I take the pledge. I've already taken the pledge on cutting the deficit in half. I never got to say that. There's a great young group, Lead or Leave, college students, young people, who don't want us to spend their money. I took the pledge we'd cut it out.

Yes. I would like to get a response from all three gentlemen. And the question is, what are your plans to improve the physical infrastructure of this nation, which includes the water system, the sewer system, our transportation systems, etcetera. Thank you.

I'll be glad to take a shot at it.

I'm not sure that -- and I can understand if you haven't seen this, because there's been a lot of hue and cry. We passed this year the most furthest looking transportation bill in the history of this country since Eisenhower started the interstate highways -- $150 billion for improving the infrastructure. That happened when I was president. And so I'm very proud of the way that came about and I think it's a very, very good beginning. Like Mr. Perot, I am concerned about the deficits and $150 billion is a lot of money, but it's awful hard to say we're going to go out and spend more money when we're trying to get the deficit down. But I would cite that as a major accomplishment. We hear all the negatives. When you're president you expect this. Everybody's running against the incumbent. They can do better. Everyone knows that. But here's something that we can take great pride in because it really does get to what you're talking about. Our home initiative -- our home ownership initiative -- HOPE -- that passed the Congress is a good start for having people own their own homes instead of living in these deadly tenements. Our enterprise zones, that we hear a lot of lip service about in Congress, would bring jobs into the inner city. There's a good program. And I need the help of everybody across this country to get it passed in a substantial way by the Congress. When we went out to south central in Los Angeles -- some of you may remember the riots there. I went out there. I went to a boys' club. And everyone of them -- the boys' club leaders, the ministers -- all of them were saying pass enterprise zones. We go back to Washington and very difficult to get it through the Congress. But there's going to be a new Congress. No one likes gridlock. There's going to be a new Congress because the old one -- I don't want to get this man made at me -- but there was a post office scandal and a bank scandal. You're going to have a lot of new members of Congress. And then you can sit down and say, help me do what we should for the cities. Help me pass these programs.

Sure, but the problem is, you get so many things included in a great big bill that you have to look at the overall good. That's the problem with our system. If you had a line item veto you could knock out the pork. You could knock out the tax increases and you could do what the people want, and that's create enterprise zones.

That bill pays for these urban enterprise zones by asking the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more. And that's why he wants to veto it, just like he vetoed an earlier bill this year. This is not mud slinging. This is fact slinging -- a bill earlier this year. This is facts -- that would have given investment tax credits and other incentives to reinvest in our cities, in our country. But it asked the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more. Mr. Perot wants to do the same thing. I agree with him. I mean, we agree with that. But let me tell you specifically what my plan does. My plan would dedicate $20 billion a year in each of the next 4 years for investments in new transportation, communications, environmental clean-ups and new technologies for the 21st century. And we would target it especially in areas that have been either depressed or which have lost a lot of defense related jobs. There are 200,000 people in California, for example, who have lost their defense related jobs. They ought to be engaged in making high speed rail. They ought to be engaged in breaking ground in other technologies, doing waste recycling, clean water technology and things of that kind. We can create millions of jobs in these new technologies- -more than we're going to lose in defense -- if we target it. But we're investing a much smaller percentage of our income in the things you just asked about than all of our major competitors, and our wealth growth is going down as a result of it. It's making the country poorer, which is why I answered the gentleman the way I did before. We have to both bring down the deficit and get our economy going through these kinds of investments in order to get the kind of wealth and jobs and incomes we need in America.

First you've got to have money to pay for these things. So you've got to create jobs. There are all kinds of ways to create jobs in the inner city. I'm not a politician, but I think I could go to Washington in a week and get everybody holding hands and get this bill signed because I talk to the Democratic leaders and they want it. I talk to the Republican leaders and they want it. But since they're bred from childhood to fight with one another rather than get results, you know, I would be glad to drop out and spend a little time and see if we couldn't build some bridges. Now, results is what counts. The president can't order Congress around. Congress can't order the president around. That's not bad for a guy that's never been there, right? But you have to work together. Now, I have talked to the chairmen of the committees that want this. They're Democrats. The president wants it, but we can't get it because we sit here in gridlock because it's a campaign year. We didn't fund a lot of other things this year, like the savings and loan mess. That's another story that we're going to pay a big price for right after the election. The facts are though -- the facts are -- the American people are hurting. These people are hurting in the inner cities. We're shipping the quote, "low paying jobs" overseas. What are low paying jobs? Textiles, shoes, things like that that we say are yesterday's industries. They're tomorrow's industries in the inner cities. Let me say in my case, if I'm out of work, I'll cut grass tomorrow to take care of my family; I'll be happy to make shoes, I'll be happy to make clothing, I'll make sausage. You just give me a job. Put those jobs in the inner cities instead of doing diplomatic deals and shipping them to China where prison labor does the work.

If you ask me if I could fly a fighter plane or be an astronaut, I can't. I've spent my life creating jobs. That's something I know how to do. And, very simply, in the inner city, they're starved -- you see, small business is the way to jump start the inner city, not --

You want jobs in the inner city? Do you want jobs in the inner city? Is that your question?

Oh, I'm sorry. Well, I've listened to both sides, and if they would talk to one another instead of throwing rocks, I think we could get a lot done. And, among other things, I would say, okay, over here in this Senate committee to the chairman who is anxious to get this bill passed, the president who is anxious, I'd say rather than just yelling at one another, why don't we find out where we're apart, try to get together, get the bill passed and give the people the benefits and not play party politics right now. And I think the press would follow that so closely that probably they would get it done. That's the way I would do it. I doubt if they'll give me the chance, but I will drop everything and go work on it.

My question was originally for Governor Clinton, but I think I would welcome a response from all three candidates. As you are aware, crime is rampant in our cities. And in the Richmond area -- and I'm sure it's happened elsewhere -- 12-year-olds are carrying guns to school. And I'm sure when our Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution they did not mean for the right to bear arms to apply to 12-year-olds. So I'm asking: Where do you stand on gun control, and what do you plan to do about it?

I support the right to keep and bear arms. I live in a state where over half the adults have hunting or fishing licenses, or both. But I believe we have to have some way of checking hand guns before they're sold, to check the criminal history, the mental health history, and the age of people who are buying them. Therefore I support the Brady bill which would impose a national waiting period unless and until a state did what only Virginia has done now, which is to automate its records. Once you automate your records, then you don't have to have a waiting period, but at least you can check. I also think we should have frankly restrictions on assault weapons whose only purpose is to kill. We need to give the police a fighting chance in our urban areas where the gangs are building up. The third thing I would say -- it doesn't bear directly on gun control, but it's very important -- we need more police on the street. There is a crime bill which would put more police on the street, which was killed for this session by a filibuster in the Senate, mostly be Republican senators, and I think it's a shame it didn't pass, I think it should be made the law -- but it had the Brady bill in it, the waiting period. I also believe that we should offer college scholarships to people who will agree to work them off as police officers, and I think, as we reduce our military forces, we should let people earn military retirement by coming out and working as police officers. Thirty years ago there were three police officers on the street for every crime; today there are three crimes for every police officer. In the communities which have had real success putting police officers near schools where kids carry weapons, to get the weapons out of the schools, are on the same blocks, you've seen crime go down. In Houston there's been a 15- percent drop in the crime rate in the last year because of the work the mayor did there in increasing the police force. So I know it can work; I've seen it happen.

I think you put your finger on a major problem. I talk about strengthening the American family and it's very hard to strengthen the family if people are scared to walk down to the corner store and, you know, send their kid down to get a loaf of bread. It's very hard. I have been fighting for very strong anti-crime legislation -- habeas corpus reform, so you don't have these endless appeals, so when somebody gets sentenced, hey, this is for real. I've been fighting for changes in the exclusionary rule so if an honest cop stops somebody and makes a technical mistake, the criminal doesn't go away. I'll probably get into a fight in this room with some but I happen to think that we need stronger death penalties for those that kill police officers. Virginia's in the lead in this, as Governor Clinton properly said, on this identification system for firearms. I am not for national registration of firearms. Some of the states that have the toughest anti-gun laws have the highest levels of crime. I am for the right, as the governor says- -I'm a sportsman and I don't think you ought to eliminate all kinds of weapons. But I was not for the bill that he was talking about because it was not tough enough on the criminal. I'm very pleased that the Fraternal Order of Police in Little Rock, Arkansas endorsed me because I think they see I'm trying to strengthen the anti-crime legislation. We've got more money going out for local police than any previous administration. So we've got to get it under control and there's one last point I'd make. Drugs. We have got to win our national strategy against drugs, the fight against drugs. And we're making some progress, doing a little better on interdiction. We're not doing as well amongst the people that get to be habitual drug-users. The good news is, and I think it's true in Richmond, teenage use is down of cocaine, substantially, 60% in the last couple of years. So we're making progress but until we get that one done, we're not going to solve the neighborhood crime problem.

I didn't get to make a comment on this.

Oh, you're going to let me. Excuse me.

On any program, and this includes crime, you'll find we have all kinds of great plans lying around that never get enacted into law and implemented. I don't care what it is -- competitiveness, health care, crime, you name it. Brady Bill, I agree that it's a timid step in the right direction but it won't fix it. So why pass a law that won't fix it? Now, what it really boils down to is can you live -- we become so preoccupied with the rights of the criminal that we've forgotten the rights of the innocent. And in our country we have evolved to a point where we've put millions of innocent people in jail because you go to the poor neighborhoods and they've put bars on their windows and bars on their doors and put themselves in jail to protect the things that they acquired legitimately. That's where we are. We have got to become more concerned about people who play by the rules and get the balance we require. This is going to take first, building a consensus at grassroots America. Right from the bottom up, the American people have got to say they want it. And at that point, we can pick from a variety of plans and develop new plans. And the way you get things done is bury yourselves in the room with one another, put together the best program, take it to the American people, use the electronic town hall, the kind of thing you're doing here tonight, build a consensus and then do it and then go on to the next one. But don't just sit here slow dancing for 4 years doing nothing.

Please state your position on term limits, and, if you are in favor of them, how will you get them enacted?

Thank you.

Thank you. Governor Clinton.

Mr. Perot, would you like to address term limitations?

Thank you very much. We have a question over here.

I've had more people talk to me about their health care problems I guess than anything else, all across America -- you know, people who've lost their jobs, lost their businesses, had to give up their jobs because of sick children. So let me try to answer you in this way. Let's start with a premise. We spend 30% more of our income than any nation on earth on health care, and yet we insure fewer people. We have 35 million people without any insurance at all -- and I see them all the time. A hundred thousand Americans a month have lost their health insurance just in the last 4 years. So if you analyze where we're out of line with other countries, you come up with the following conclusions. Number one, we spend at least $60 billion a year on insurance, administrative cost, bureaucracy, and government regulation that wouldn't be spent in any other nation. So we have to have, in my judgment, a drastic simplification of the basic health insurance policies of this country, be very comprehensive for everybody. Employers would cover their employees, government would cover the unemployed. Number 2, I think you have to take on specifically the insurance companies and require them to make some significant change in the way they rate people in the big community pools. I think you have to tell the pharmaceutical companies they can't keep raising drug prices at three times the rate of inflation. I think you have to take on medical fraud. I think you have to help doctors stop practicing defensive medicine. I've recommended that our doctors be given a set of national practice guidelines and that if they follow those guidelines that raises the presumption that they didn't do anything wrong. I think you have to have a system of primary and preventive clinics in our inner cities and our rural areas so people can have access to health care. The key is to control the cost and maintain the quality. To do that you need a system of managed competition where all of us are covered in big groups and we can choose our doctors and our hospitals, a wide range, but there is an incentive to control costs. And I think there has to be -- I think Mr. Perot and I agree on this, there has to be a national commission of health care providers and health care consumers that set ceilings to keep health costs in line with inflation, plus population growth. Now, let me say, some people say we can't do this but Hawaii does it. They cover 98% of their people and their insurance premiums are much cheaper than the rest of America, and so does Rochester, New York. They now have a plan to cover everybody and their premiums are two-thirds of the rest of the country. This is very important. It's a big human problem and a devastating economic problem for America, and I'm going to send a plan to do this within the first 100 days of my presidency. It's terribly important.

I just have to say something. I don't want to stampede. Ross was very articulate across the country. I don't want anybody to stampede to cut the president's salary off altogether. Barbara's sitting over here and I -- but what I have proposed, 10% cut, downsize the government, and we can get that done. She asked a question, I think, is whether the health care profession was to blame. No. One thing to blame is these malpractice lawsuits. They're breaking the system. It costs $20-25 billion a year, and I want to see those outrageous claims capped. Doctors don't dare to deliver babies sometimes because they're afraid that somebody's going to sue them. People don't dare -- medical practitioners, to help somebody along the highway that are hurt because they're afraid that some lawyer's going to come along and get a big lawsuit. So you can't blame the practitioners for the health problem. And my program is this. Keep the government as far out of it as possible, make insurance available to the poorest of the poor, through vouchers, next range in the income bracket, through tax credits, and get on about the business of pooling insurance. A great big company can buy -- Ross has got a good-sized company, been very successful. He can buy insurance cheaper than Mom and Pop's store on the corner. But if those Mom and Pop stores all get together and pool, they too can bring the cost of insurance down. So I want to keep the quality of health care. That means keep government out of it. I want to do -- I don't like this idea of these boards. It all sounds to me like you're going to have some government setting price. I want competition and I want to pool the insurance and take care of it that way and have -- oh, here's the other point. I think medical care should go with the person. If you leave a business, I think your insurance should go with you to some other business. You shouldn't be worrying if you get a new job as to whether that's gonna -- and part of our plan is to make it what they call portable -- big word, but that means if you're working for the Jones Company and you go to the Smith Company, your insurance goes with you. I think it's a good program. I'm really excited about getting it done, too.

We have the most expensive health care system in the world. Twelve percent of our gross national product goes to health care. Our industrial competitors, who are beating us in competition, spend less and have better health care. Japan spends a little over 6% of its gross national product. Germany spends 8%. It's fascinating. You've bought a front row box seat and you're not happy with your health care and you're saying tonight we've got bad health care but very expensive health care. Folks, here's why. Go home and look in the mirror. You own this country but you have no voice in it the way it's organized now, and if you want to have a high risk experience, comparable to bungee jumping, go into Congress some time when they're working on this kind of legislation, when the lobbyists are running up and down the halls. Wear your safety toe shoes when you go. And as a private citizen, believe me, you are looked on as a major nuisance. The facts are you now have a government that comes at you. You're supposed to have a government that comes from you. Now, there are all kinds of good ideas, brilliant ideas, terrific ideas on health care. None of them ever get implemented because -- let me give you an example. A senator runs every 6 years. He's got to raise 20,000 bucks a week to have enough money to run. Who's he gonna listen to -- us or the folks running up and down the aisles with money, the lobbyists, the PAC money? He listens to them. Who do they represent? Health care industry. Not us. Now, you've got to have a government that comes from you again. You've got to reassert your ownership in this country and you've got to completely reform our government. And at that point they'll just be like apples falling out of a tree. The programs will be good because the elected officials will be listening to -- I said the other night I was all ears and I would listen to any good idea. I think we ought to do plastic surgery on a lot of these guys so that they're all ears, too, and listen to you. Then you get what you want, and shouldn't you? You paid for it. Why shouldn't you get what you want, as opposed to what some lobbyist cuts a deal, writes a little piece in the law and he goes through. That's the way the game's played now. Till you change it you're gonna be unhappy.

One brief point. We have elections so people can make decisions about this. The point I want to make to you is, a bipartisan commission reviewed my plan and the Bush plan and there were as many Republicans as Democratic health care experts on it. They concluded that my plan would cover everybody and his would leave 27 million behind by the year 2000 and that my plan in the next 12 years would save $2.2 trillion in public and private money to reinvest in this economy and the average family would save $1200 a year under the plan that I offered without any erosion in the quality of health care. So I ask you to look at that. And you have to vote for somebody with a plan. That's what you have elections for. If people would say, well, he got elected to do this and then the Congress says, okay, I'm going to do it. That's what the election was about.