Remarks and a question-and-answer session at a Democratic National Committee luncheon in Palm Beach, Florida

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, Nov 10, 1997

But I would also point out, those of you politically active a long time know this, the money has not driven the cost up, the costs have driven the money up. It's like every other endeavor in human life: The cost of communicating with voters has exploded exponentially. So if we really want to get a handle on this problem, we also have to say, "If you observe the campaign finance limits, you should get free or reduced air time and access to voters." If we do that, we can also change the nature of debates and elections.

You look at a British election, for example, where each party gets a certain amount of time in different time blocks, and where people have reasoned debates, and they're much more like the Presidential debates are here, and almost nothing else is like that. And I'm convinced if we have free and reduced air time, more citizen participation like the debates we did in '92 and '96, that our campaign insisted on to bring real people into the debates, the voting record of the country would go way up.

Well, anyway, these are just a few of the things I wanted to talk about. The last thing I wanted to say is, in the '98 elections going forward, people will not be able to paint this sort of gnarled, twisted picture of Democrats anymore. You can't say we're weak on foreign policy and national defense. You can't say we can't be trusted to manage the economy. You can't say we're spending the country blind. You can't say we're against responsible tax cuts or that we're not strong for welfare reform or sensible criminal justice policies.

If you look ahead to the future, the major issues that will affect the lives of ordinary Americans - education, the environment, health care, the overall strength of the country - these are issues that our party, with its new direction, is strong on. And you are helping to contribute to that, and in doing it, I think you'll help make America a better place.

Thank you.

I've got time for one or two questions if anybody wants to ask a question.

Education

Q. It's really not a question. It's just sort of a comment and sort of a personal anecdote - when people have talked about the public schools and a lot of criticism about it. My daughter is in seventh grade at the School of the Arts here, and recently was sick - in St. Mary's Hospital, actually - missed 3 weeks of school. And in the public schools where I would expect very little to happen, every one of her teachers called her to find out how she was. Her principal sent her balloons to cheer her up - been involved in the School of the Arts and I guess the foundation quite a bit.

There are some really good stories, and it would be nice if they got out somehow. This is just one that I know personally. And I never would have dreamed - as my daughter had gone to private school until this year - and for whatever it's worth people ought to try to find out more success stories from the public schools.

The President. Ninety percent of our children are in public schools. If most of them weren't doing a good job, they wouldn't be there. That's the first point. Second thing is - it's very important to make this point because I've been working at this now since, seriously, since 1979, and I think I've been in enough schools and looked at enough data and talked to enough people to know, the schools are better than they used to be, and they're getting better.