Remarks in a discussion at Southridge High School in Beaverton, Oregon

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, August 23, 2004

August 13, 2004

The President. Thank you all for coming. Thank you all. Thanks for being here. Go ahead and be seated, please. Thanks for coming. Laura and I are here--we're here in your State asking for the vote. That's why we're here in the great State of Oregon. Today I've got a unique way to explain why I'm running for office again and what I intend to do, and that's to talk to some of our fellow citizens about job creation, job growth, the entrepreneurial spirit. It's one way to help make the point to the people of Oregon that there's more work to be done. Then I'd like to answer some of the questions you have.

But before I do so, I want to tell you how proud I am of Laura. You're going to hear reasons why I think you ought to put me back in, but perhaps the most important one of all is to have Laura as the First Lady for 4 years.

These campaigns, when you campaign for President, it's a long ordeal, and that's the way it should be, really. You should have to go out and ask for the vote and let people know your heart and your vision. It also means you get to spend some quality time with your family. [Laughter] So it's great to be traveling with Laura. And one of the really--joys for our family is that Barbara and Jenna are now campaigning with us. It's like going on the camping trip I never took them on, you know.

I'm running with a good man in Dick Chehey. I like to tell everybody--I admit it--he's not the prettiest face in the race. [Laughter] However, that's not why I picked him. I didn't pick him for his looks. I picked him because he can do the job and his judgment.

I appreciate your friend and mine, your Senator, the great Gordon Smith, for traveling with us today. He's a joy to work with. He's a decent, gentle soul who cares deeply about the people of Oregon. He understands this State well. He's a great patriot. I'm proud to call him friend. I want to thank you for being here, Gordon. We just have come from announcing a project to deepen the Columbia River so that the port of Portland and Vancouver, Washington, can remain vibrant hubs of commerce. I like to remind people, in the Nation's Capital, a lot of them can talk a good game. I like to be the person known as somebody getting the job done, and this project we announced today is getting the job done. And I'm proud you're here, Sharon. Thanks for coming. It's great to see you again.

And old Greg Walden showed up. Thanks for coming, Greg. He's a good man, fun to work with. We worked on a lot of important projects for Oregon, including the Healthy Forest Initiative. You might remember, they've been talking about doing something about these catastrophic wildfires. We actually got the job done through the Healthy Forest Initiative.

It wasn't easy to get done, because some of the big talkers in Washington blocked it, One in particular finally came out west and he said, well, even though he had blocked it in the past, some of the parts looked like they're all right now, you know. It's kind of like those wildfires. He shifts in the wind. [Laughter]

As well, we've got a man running for the United States Senate from the State of Washington. I strongly support his candidacy, George Nethercutt. Thank you for coming, George.

I want to thank all the State and local officials who are here. Again, I appreciate the small-business owners who are on stage and with us today. We're going to talk a lot about small business creation.

It's good to see my buddy Molly. Thanks for coming, Molly. I want to thank all the grassroots activists who are here. Not only am I asking for the vote, I'm asking for your help. You see, we have a duty--we have a duty in this country to vote. And one of the things I'm asking our supporters is to register people to vote, encourage our fellow citizens to do their duty.

You know, it wasn't all that long ago--I'm going to talk about Afghanistan a little later on but one of the interesting statistics that came to my desk was the fact that over 8 million people in liberated Afghanistan have registered to vote. This, in spite of the Fact--it's an amazing statistic when you think about the fact that it wasn't all that long ago that a bus was stopped the thugs from the Taliban pulled over four women registrars of voters and killed them. And yet, the people, because they long for freedom, said, "You're not going to intimidate us. We want to participate in a free society." They're registering to vote, and we herald that.

We ought to be--we ought to have that same spirit in our own country. And so, therefore, I ask you to register people to vote, and when you get them headed into the polls, or in your case, by ballot, head them our way, because we've got a plan to keep the country safer, stronger, and better.

Thank you all for coming. There's all kinds of ways to make America better. I'll talk about two, fight quick. We're at a school. One way to make America better is to make sure every child learns to read and write and add and subtract. You might remember, when we went to Washington, when my administration went to Washington, there was this practice around the country in certain school districts where they would move children from grade to grade, year after year, and the children didn't learn the basics. So we changed that attitude. I went to Washington for a reason, and that is to challenge the soft bigotry of low expectations. You know what that means. It means, in certain places, the standards were so low that what they got were lousy results. And that's not good enough for this great country.