Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Thursday, 8 Oct 1992 20:03:39 CDT
From: <U56503@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton
Subject: ==> Clinton Kinston, NC Speech

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Information in the public interest which does not imply that it
is the opinion of UIC.  Contact 75300.3115@compuserve.com for
further information.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 Remarks by Governor Bill Clinton
 Grainger Baseball Field
 Kinston, N.C. October 4, 1992

      Thank you, Tracy.  I want to thank Reverend Wilson and I want to
 thank Mayor and County Chairman Rich.  I want to thank your speaker,
 Dan Blue, who came all the way over here with me to get wet,
 Secretary of State Rufus Edmundston.  And I want to thank Eva Clayton
 and, in his absence, my good friend, Congressman Lancaster.

      Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you something.  I know this is
 a minor league baseball team, but we are not in the bush leagues
 tonight.

      I also want to say to you, I'm sorry it's raining, but we've had
 12 years of trickle down.  If you'll give me 12 minutes, we can turn
 this country around.

      I'm glad to be in East Carolina tonight, and I'm glad to be in
 this community.  I've heard a lot about this wonderful town.  I've
 been indoctrinated from a ``can'' to a ``can't'' in the global
 transport, and I like it.

      I want to say to all of you here, I've had a wonderful day in
 North Carolina.  We started in Raleigh.  I gave an economic speech,
 and then we had a rally at Wolf Pack basketball arena.

      Well, they vote, too, now.  And then we drove over here, and
 I've had a good time all along the way, and i don't even mind the
 rain.  Let me tell you, if North Carolina votes for the Clinton-Gore
 ticket, I believe that will clearly mean that America will vote for
 the Clinton-Gore ticket.

      I've always believed that this state understood the challenges
 that we're facing as a nation, understood the challenges of the
 global economy, understood that we had to have a national policy that
 was not trickle-down economics, not tax- and-spend economics, but a
 commitment to invest in our people, to educate ourselves, to
 cooperate with one another and do whatever it takes to compete and
 win, to get good jobs and have a good future for our people--and
 that's what we stand for.

      I have worked for 12 years to create jobs, to educate people, to
 deal with the health care problems of the children and the elderly,
 to move from welfare to work, to solve the problems that have gripped
 this country.  And I know we're not ever going to make America what
 it needs to be until we have a change in the White House.  That's why
 I got in this race for president and what I want you to help me do.

      There's a guy here who doesn't believe in free speech, but the
 rest of you do.  Let me tell you something, folks.  If George Bush
 comes here, I hope you'll go to his rallies and not interrupt him.
 Be polite and listen, and then vote for me.

      Let me tell you what you have to decide.  You got four years
 now.  The first four years in 50 years when we have had no gain in
 private-sector jobs in the United States of America, a decline of
 almost 40,000.  The first time in the history of America when we
 actually had a reduction in manufacturing production in America.  We
 got a census report that says two- thirds of the American people are
 working harder for lower wages than they were making ten years
 ago--and I bet that includes a lot of people in this audience
 tonight.

      One in ten Americans is on food stamps and 100,000 Americans are
 losing their health insurance every month.  They want four more
 years.  Sounds more like a threat than a promise.

      What you have to decide is whether you really believe that we
 need four more years of trickle-down economics -- their whole idea is
 to keep taxes as low as possible on the wealthiest Americans, get out
 of the way and hope everybody else will get the benefits that trickle
 down.  It ain't like the rain.  The rain trickles down; the benefits
 don't.

      And what we need to do is say we've got a different idea.  We
 believe the wealthiest Americans who've had their taxes cut while
 yours have been raised should pay a little more. But we also think
 they should have incentives, but not across- the-board tax cuts.  But
 incentives if they'll spend their money on new plants, new
 businesses, helping to modernize our farms, helping to do housing
 projects, energy projects and build the economy of the 21st century.
 That's what we stand for.

      And we believe this country needs a real education
 president--somebody that understands that everybody needs the
 opportunities that this community college offers.

      You know, we are the only advanced country that doesn't make
 sure that every high school graduate gets at least two years of
 further training, on the job or in a community college.  But if
 you'll vote for me, we'll have that kind of system.


      And we need to teach everybody with a job in America, every
 working person in the next five years ought to be taught to read and
 given the chance to get a high school diploma so they can learn and
 grow and increase their earnings.

      And we ought to open the doors of college education to all
 Americans without regard to their income.

      I have proposed to set up a national trust fund out of which any
 American can borrow the money to go to college--and then pay it back
 either as a small percentage of their income or by giving two years
 to their country here at home in a domestic peace corps to rebuild
 America, being police officers or teachers or nurses or working in
 housing programs, or working with the elderly.

      We could solve a lot of the problems this whole country's got
 and educate a whole generation of Americans.  It would be the best
 money we ever spent.

      The third thing we have to do is to be the last--we'll be the
 last advanced economy in the world, but we're going to do it, if you
 vote for me, to finally control health care costs and provide basic
 health care to all of our people.

      Now every time I say these things, my opponent, Mr. Bush, says,
 ``You can't, you can't, you can't.''  But just last week--look at
 what's happened for this campaign in the last two or three weeks.  I
 never wanted this to be a campaign of party. I tried to challenge the
 Democratic Party to change.  I wanted this to be a campaign for
 America, and look what has happened in the last two weeks. Executives
 who worked in health care in the last Republican and Democratic
 administrations said that my health care plan would save the average
 family $1200 a year by the end of the decade every year, and hundreds
 of billions of dollars a year in the private sector to reinvest in
 America. Republicans said that, as well as Democrats.  And they said
 the Bush plan would leave 27 million people without any health
 insurance and the costs would keep on going up, up.  You've got a
 clear choice there.

      Look what's happened.  Our economic program was endorsed in
 northern California by 21 executives of high-tech electronics and
 computer companies. Two-thirds of them were Republicans.  Four
 hundred business executives from all over America gathered in
 Chicago, over a third of them Republican. And a couple of weeks ago,
 Admiral William Crowe who was the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
 Staff under Presidents Reagan and Bush endorsed our campaign because
 he said he wanted the problems of America faced so that we could move
 into the future.

      I'm telling you, folks, all over this country, Republicans,
 Independents, former Perot supporters are coming together to put the
 American people first again.  They are sick and tired of the average
 people and their average concerns being stomped into the ground by an
 administration that does not wake up every day thinking about them.

      I'll tell you something.  I've been the governor of a state with
 a lot of towns like this one.  I grew up in that state.  I'm give
 generations there rooted in the soil.  If you vote for me for soil, I
 may make some mistakes, but at least I'll do something.  And every
 day, I'll wake up thinking about you and people like you.

      I got into this race for president because I did not want my
 12-year old daughter to grow up to be part of the first generation of
 Americans to do worse than their parents.  I got into this race
 because I was sick and tired of being told ``we can't, we can't, we
 can't.''  When Mr. Bush vetoed the family leave bill for the second
 time just a couple of days ago, he was telling us again, ``We
 can't.''  Seventy-two nations have found it possible to give people
 some time off from work when there's a baby born or a sick child or a
 sick parent, and we've been told we can't.  I'm tired of it.  I am
 tired of it, and I think you are too.

      This is a ``we can'' country, not a ``we can't'' country.  And I
 want to say one other thing.  I was standing up here with Eva Clayton
 and thinking about her going to Congress and Martin Lancaster being
 there.  One of the things that we have learned in the South we need
 to teach the rest of the country now--is that we can't do anything if
 we're divided by race, by region, by income, by age.  We'd better get
 this country back together.

      When the other party met at their convention, they spent the
 first two nights running against my wife and telling us we needed a
 religious war and some of us didn't belong to real families and
 weren't real Americans.  Well, I want you to know something.  You all
 got a place in my America, and I'll try to be president for all of
 you.

      I hope you'll always remember this night--not just for the rain,
 but for the sunshine we felt in our spirits.  And I hope you'll say
 that for 30 more days, you'll talk to your friends and neighbors in
 North Carolina and in every other state in this country.  We are
 being called upon to face a great challenge.  And you know what's
 going to happen, don't you?  For 30 days we'll have a fight of hope
 against fear, of new ideas against the proven failure that's
 comfortable; of having the courage to change against just being stuck
 in the same old rut.

      And you know what the other guys will do.  They can't defend
 their record and they don't have a vision for the future, so they'll
 just throw the mud.  But let me tell you something. We bought it once
 four years ago.  Then it was their fault.  If we buy it a second
 time, it will be our fault, and I don't think we're going to do it.

      I want you to spend 30 days determined to get your future back.
 I want you to remember when everybody says whatever they're going to
 say, I want you to ask yourself this question.  When you see our ads
 and you hear our debates and you hear all that, I want you to ask
 yourself:  What difference will this make to my life on the day after
 the election?  What difference does it make?  Will this make my
 country better? Will it make it stronger?  Will it open up a broader
 future for my child?

      I'm telling you I got into this race because I think we can do
 better.  I think you think we can do better.  We are better than what
 we have been going through.  We need new ideas. We need change.  We
 need the kind of commitment to excellence that I exemplified when I
 appointed Al Gore to be my running mate.

      And we need somebody that wakes up every day remembering his
 roots in place like this.  Give me a chance. I'll give you everything
 I've got.  Let's spend 30 days to get our country back on the right
 track and take it to a brighter tomorrow.  Thank you and God bless
 you all.  Thank you.


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