On the economy
CLINTON: The deficit now has been building up for 12 years. . . . I think we can bring it down by 50 percent in four years and grow the economy. Now, I could get rid of it in four years in theory on the books now, but to do it you`d have to raise taxes too much and cut benefits too much to people who need them and it would even make the economy worse. . . .
You have to increase investment, grow the economy and reduce the deficit by controlling health care costs, prudent reductions in defense, cuts in domestic programs and asking the wealthiest Americans and foreign corporations to pay their fair share of taxes and investing and growing this economy.
BUSH: I don`t think the American people are taxed too little. I think they`re taxed too much. . . .
Here`s some thing that`ll help. Give us a balanced budget amendment. . . . I`d like to have what 43 governors have, the line item veto, so if the Congress can`t cut, and we`ve got a reckless spending Congress, let the president have a shot at it by wiping out things that are pork barrel or something of that nature.
PEROT: Well, we`re $4 trillion in debt. We`re going into debt an additional $1 billion, little more than $1 billion every working day of the year. . . .
Put it to you bluntly, American people. If you want me to be your president, we`re going to face our problems. We`ll deal with the problems. We`ll solve our problems. We`ll pay down our debt.
On Education
BUSH: You can`t do it with the school bureaucracy controlling everything and that`s why we have a new program that I hope people have heard about. It`s being worked now in 1,700 communities . . . across the country. It`s called America 2000. And it literally says to the communities, re-invent the schools, not just the bricks and mortar but the curriculum and everything else. Think anew. We have a concept called the New American School Corporation where we`re doing exactly that. . . .
And so our America 2000 program also says this. It says let`s give parents the choice of a public, private or public school-public, private or religious school. And it works. It works in Milwaukee. . . . And the schools that are not chosen are improved-competition does that.
CLINTON: We live in a world depends on what you can learn, where the average 18-year-old will change jobs eight times in a lifetime and where none of us can promise any of you that what you now do for a living is absolutely safe from now on. . . .
Under my program we would provide matching funds to states to teach everybody with a job to read in the next five years and give everybody with a job the chance to get a high school diploma, in big places on the job. . . . We would provide two-year apprenticeship programs to high school graduates who don`t go to college. . . .
I would have an aggressive program of school reform, more choices-I favor public schools or these new charter schools. . . . I don`t think we should spend tax money on private schools. But I favor public school choice, and I favor radical decentralization in giving more power to better-trained principals and teachers with parent councils to control their schools.
PEROT: By and large it should be local-the more local, the better. Interesting phenomenon: small towns have good schools, big cities have terrible schools. . . .
If I could wish for one thing for great public schools, it would be a strong family unit in every home-nothing will ever replace that. You say, well, gee, what are you going to do about that? Well, the White House is a bully pulpit, and I think we ought to be pounding on the table every day. . . .
On health care
CLINTON: 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. . . . 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. . . .
BUSH: 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.
So I want to keep the quality of health care. That means keep government out of it. . . . 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. . . .
PEROT: 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 six 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 . . . . Till you change it you`re gonna be unhappy.
