THE WHITE HOUSE

                    Office of the Press Secretary

______________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                             August 6, 1994

                       REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
                             UPON ARRIVAL

                    Selfridge National Guard Base
                          Detroit, Michigan



5:00 P.M. EDT


             THE PRESIDENT:  Hello.  Thank you for waiting. (GAP IN
TAPE) and her two children.  I want to just get out and shake hands,
so I won't make a long speech.  But I would like to say, first, -- be
supportive of the new candidate for the United States Senate,
Congressman Bob Carr; and our new candidate for governor, former
Congressman Howard Wolpe.  (Applause.)

             I'm glad to be here with Congressman Dingell and
Congressman Conyers and Senator Levin, and with your state officials
and a lot of my friends in Michigan.

             I just want to make a comment or two.  The lady to my
left is Linda Clark.  You may have read about her in the Michigan
press -- she and her two children.  In 1993, her husband was killed
in his business by five young people with previous criminal records.

             After he died, she received a $24,000 bill from the
hospital for his medical care, even though she didn't have health
insurance.  Since then, she has become a crusader for health care for
all Americans, and for a sensible policy on crime; and specifically,
a supporter of our crime and health care initiatives.  I read her
letter again coming in today, and I asked her and her children to
come here and be with me today because in Washington, very often what
we do gets all caught up in partisan, political rhetoric and name-
calling and stuff that is very hard for ordinary citizens to
understand.  And I just want to make two or three points here today.

             When I went to Washington as your President, I
understood well that there would be forces there who would do
anything -- anything -- to fight change, to keep the established
order of things, to stop us in our determination to give the American
people their government back again, to make it work for ordinary
citizens and to reawaken the American Dream.  But I want to ask you
to look at the record, not the hype.

             When I became President, the deficit was going up, and
the economy was going down.  By the narrowest of margins, we passed
our national economic strategy.  It cut $255 billion worth of
spending.  It raised taxes on the wealthiest 1.2 percent of
Americans, and all their money went to pay down the deficit.  It gave
a tax break to 15 million American working families -- in Michigan
that means 392,000 families got a tax cut, 41,000 got a tax increase.
Ninety-one percent of the American small businesses were made
eligible for a tax cut.  We shrunk the federal government to its
smallest size since Kennedy was President; produced three years of
deficit reduction in a row for the first time since Harry Truman was
President; and you've got 4.1 million new jobs in the United States
since our administration took office.  (Applause.)

             And since our administration took office, job growth in
Michigan has been three and a half times what it was before.  It is
no wonder that the other party would rather not talk about economics
or crime or health care, and instead are interested in other things
and division and always saying no.  We did not have a single,
solitary vote -- not one -- for that economic strategy from the
opposition party.  And I have done everything I could to reach out to
people without regard to their party and ask for a bipartisan
consensus to govern America.

             You just remember that, folks, when Bob Carr is up here
asking for your vote for the United States Senate.  If it hadn't been
for him, there would have been no deficit reduction; there would have
been no economic recovery fueled by the first sensible economic plan
we've had in more than 12 years.  They want to go back, we're trying
to go forward.  And I appreciate your coming out here today saying,
you don't want to go back, you'd rather go forward, you'd rather
create jobs, you'd rather grow the economy, you'd rather keep the
American dream alive.  (Applause.)

             Now, let me just make two other points.  There's hardly
a family in America that has not been affected by crime.  And the
Congress has passed the toughest, smartest crime bill in history in
each house, but they haven't passed the same bill.  There are things
in that bill that are controversial.  There are people who don't
support the capital punishment provisions of the bill.  There are
people who don't support the fact that the bill bans 19 assault
weapons, which are so often used by criminal gangs; even though it
protects 650 hunting and sporting weapons from being banned.

             There are people who think we should not spend a lot of
money on prevention programs to give our young people something to
say yes to, instead of something to say no to.  There are people who
don't think it's important, but that crime bill gives 100,000 police
to the streets of this country -- a 20 percent increase.  It makes
our streets safer; it bans handgun ownership by minors; it has
programs for safe schools; it has programs that will build more
prisons and have three strikes and you're out for serious offenders,
and do more to help kids stay out of trouble.  It is a good bill, and
it should pass the United States Congress next week.  We should stop
fooling around with it.  There are other families like Linda's family
who deserve to have their streets safer and their futures better and
brighter; and we ought to quit fooling around with it.  (Applause.)

             And finally, let me say something about health care.
You know, I get tickled at all these people who say that this health
care bill is some big government socialist scheme; that it's some
horrible idea to take over a big part of our economy.

             Let me ask you something, folks.  Here's a few
questions, and I'd say the folks that aren't with us owe us some
answers.  Which country spends the most on health care?  The United
States.  Which advanced country is the only one that doesn't provide
health care coverage for everybody?  The United States.  Which is the
only advanced country in the world where we're going in reverse --
we're losing ground in health care coverage?  The United States.
Ten years ago, we had 88 percent of the people with insurance; now
it's 83 percent.  Today in America, there are 5 million -- 5 million
--Americans, almost all of them working people and their children,
who don't have insurance today who had it five years ago.

             Now, until we provide affordable private health
insurance for all Americans, we are not going to be able to have a
secure, stable family environment, work environment, offer people the
chance to grow.  What do they say about this health care plan?  They
say it's bad for small business.  Well, let me ask you this -- this
is an interesting thing -- why, if it's bad for small business, have
600,000 small businesses signed up to support our plan to require
everybody to cover their employees and split the difference on the
insurance premium?  I'll tell you why -- because most small
businesses do provide health insurance to their employees, and
they're getting ripped off today, they're paying too much for it.

             I met a farm family from Western Oklahoma a couple of
days ago when I gave their daughter an award.  She's a young teenager
who had a car wreck in 1990, paralyzed her from the chest down.  And
she's spent the last four years trying to encourage people not to
drink and drive, not to ride with drunk drivers and always to put
their seatbelts on -- a marvelous girl.

             But the story this family told me was interesting -- a
Republican farmer from Western Oklahoma, his wife and their two
beautiful daughters, one confined to a wheelchair.  They've had
almost no medical bills in the last two years.  But they just got
notice that in August, their health insurance premiums are going from
$3,400 a year to $9,600 a year; and they are going to have to drop
their health insurance.

             Now, this is not a partisan political issue.  Anybody
working that hard with two kids to educate, one of them with a
serious illness -- injury in the past, deserves affordable health
insurance.

             The only state that has ever provided health care to all
its citizens is Hawaii.  For 20 years, employers and employees have
had to provide health care.  And you know what?  Insurance premiums
in Hawaii are 30 percent lower than they are in the rest of the
country.

             We can do this.  I am tired of people saying, we cannot
do this, we cannot do that, we cannot do the other thing.  The
interests -- the violent, extremist interests in this country that
are trying to keep health care out of the reach of ordinary American
working people are a disgrace to the American Dream.  Most of them
have health care and most of them have parents on Medicare.  Why do
they not want you to have the same thing that they have?  (Applause.)
Why?  Why don't they want you to have what they can?  Let them give
up their health care and see how they like it.

             Now, folks, we're going to have to make some tough
decisions here.  I don't mind being a controversial figure.  You
didn't invite me to go to Washington to sit in the White House and
warm the chair.  We are changing this country.  We are rebuilding the
economy, we're taking on crime, we're taking on welfare reform, we're
taking on health care; we're taking on the tough issues.  But I
cannot do it alone; you have to help.  Support the members of
Congress, tell them you want them to move on the crime bill, tell
them you want them to move on health care.  Tell them a simple
message -- we are coming to the end of this century; we have got to
keep the American Dream alive.  The only way to do it is to restore
the economy, empower individuals to take advantage of it and rebuild
our communities and families.

             Let's make government work for ordinary citizens again.
That's what I'm fighting for.  Thank you for being here to help me
make the fight.  God bless you.  (Applause.)

                                 END5:12 P.M. EDT