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President Bush Addresses the American Enterprise Institute

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指点迷津
2024-11-29
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10:44 A.M. EST ,MR. DeMUTH: Mr. President, what's on your mind this morning? ,THE PRESIDENT: First, thanking you for being the leader that you've been, and thanking AEI for generating good thought. People in the public arena need to have support for philosophy -- and that's what you provide, so I appreciate all your hard work. ,I thought I'd share some thoughts about the presidency -- you could call it "reflections by a guy who's headed out of town." (Laughter.) And then I'd be glad to answer questions -- and foreign policy, if you want to. ,First, I have found that -- and by the way, every President is going to conduct their own way of doing business there in the White House. Mine is just mine. I have found that in order to have good decision-making and a White House that functions well, that the President needs to articulate a set of principles from which he will not defer. In other words, a set of principles that are inviolate -- such as the universality of freedom. That's the heart of my foreign policy. A cornerstone of my foreign policy is my firm belief that freedom is universal. And freedom applies to Methodists and Muslims, men and women. ,I've just come from an Afghan Women's Council that Laura was hosting. I believe that Afghan women have a right to be free, just like women in America have a right to be free. ,I believe in the collective wisdom of the American people. In other words, I believe we ought to trust individuals to be making decisions for their families. And it's always a tension between government -- who can spend the money better, government or the individual? And that's been the basis of my tax-cut policy. ,The tax cuts, of course, have been, you know, obscured -- the benefits of the tax cuts have been obscured by the recent economic crisis, no question about it. But when they finally take a look back at whether or not tax cuts were effective or not, it's hard to argue against 52 uninterrupted months of job growth as a result of tax policy. And so my hope is, is that after this crisis passes -- and it will -- that people continue to write about and articulate a public policy of low taxes. ,My health care policy also was all aimed at empowering individuals to make decisions for themselves and an attempt to establish a marketplace for individual policy by changing the tax code or health savings accounts. ,I've been a firm believer in markets. That may sound contradictory to some of the policies that I have been making recently, which I'd be glad to discuss with you -- (laughter.) But I strongly believe in the principle that markets really do represent a free society. I mean, after all, people produce goods and services based upon the demand of the individual. ,I can remember going to China when my dad was the envoy there and everybody had the same clothes on -- it was like, there was no demand -- and then having gone back at the Olympics and saw a society in which the marketplace is beginning to function. It's just a vastly different society. And I happen to believe it's a society that - society is based upon the marketplace will be not only more free, but more hopeful. ,I have found that a President should take on tough problems. The temptation in politics sometimes is just kick them down the road, like, it's too hard to do, so let's just let somebody else do it. One such problem was immigration reform. And in this case I chose to put the spotlight directly on the issue by giving an Oval Office address. Obviously, we weren't successful about getting comprehensive immigration reform. Nevertheless, I feel good about having tried. ,Part of the presidency is the willingness to say, no matter how tough the issue may look, if it requires solution, go after it. And we did. And I do believe there will be a blueprint for a way forward. We must change the system. It's not working. Obviously, there needs to be more border enforcement -- and we're doing that -- but people need to be treated with dignity, and there needs to be a way forward for people who are lawful citizens. And there needs to be a temporary worker program, for example, so that our employers who are relying upon people who are doing jobs Americans weren't doing aren't criminalized. ,Anyway, the job of the President is to tackle these problems. And finally, the job of the President is looking over the horizon. And that's -- sometimes that gets you in conflict with the legislative branch. The legislative branch tends to have a shorter-term horizon than the executive branch. And so Chris mentioned Social Security, it's an example of a President looking beyond the moment, and recognizing that this system is going to be bust unless we change it. #p#分页标题#e#,And I worked to lay out solutions. Rather than just call attention to the issue, I actually used my State of the Union address a couple of times to talk about how we can look at changing the benefit structure, based upon wealth, as a way forward. ,And I also talked about something that was quite controversial, and that's personal savings accounts. And of course anytime you go from a defined benefit plan to a defined contribution plan, and you're the person who gets to define the benefits, you're not likely to want to give up that ability. Nevertheless, there, too, is an issue where it didn't succeed, but nevertheless, I used the presidency, the executive branch, the concept of the presidency, to lay out a way forward. And so I appreciate you giving me a chance to come by and just share thoughts. ,One final thought on the presidency is the presidency, the institution of the presidency, is more important than the individual. And that really makes our country great -- Presidents will come and go with their strengths and weaknesses, but the ship of state sails on because of the institution being greater than the person. ,And so the job of the President is to not only make decisions -- you campaign for office and you lay out what you're going to do -- but a lot of times decisions come that you didn't expect. You got to be hoping for the best and planning for the worst in your presidency. But it's also to bring stability to the institution itself. ,And so there are some reflections for you. I'd be glad to answer some of the questions. ,MR. DeMUTH: I have a batch here for you. And I'd like to start with a few questions about the institution of the presidency, and with a genuinely hard, difficult question involving the President as constitutional officer. When you were a candidate in 2000 you said that you thought that you would veto legislation that you thought was unconstitutional. In office you've done what all of your predecessors, recent predecessors have done, which is to sign legislation and leave the constitutional questions to the courts. ,It was pretty clear, at least to me, that you had real constitutional reservations about McCain-Feingold. But you signed it, your Justice Department argued for it, rather than against it, in the Supreme Court and won. And I'm wondering if, looking back, what you think of the old practice, which is for the President to stick to his own view on the Constitution, rather than leaving the Supreme Court as the sole decider. ,THE PRESIDENT: Well, there's been a big debate about war powers inherent in the Constitution. And I made some decisions during this war based upon what I thought was my constitutional power. And so there's an example of -- as opposed to a piece of legislation, there's an example of me not -- you know, initially having the courts define what the power is. And that's -- this has been a long-time debate, constitutional debate, is what are the war powers of a President? ,And as you know, I have been aggressive at pursuing the enemy within the bounds of the Constitution. And some of the decisions I have made are being adjudicated in the court. And so I'll dodge the one on legislation, but I won't when it comes to taking a constitutional view of the office of the presidency. ,MR. DeMUTH: On legislation and dealings with the Congress, tell me, which is harder for a Republican President -- a Democratic Congress or a Republican Congress? (Laughter.) ,THE PRESIDENT: Sometimes they're both equally difficult. (Laughter.) A Republican Congress was easier in some ways because we were able to work with the leadership on the timing of votes, for example, or judicial nominees. In some ways it was more difficult because when you work with the Congress, there was a ability at times to forgo Republican principles, and it put the President in a awkward position. ,For example, budgeting. Without the line-item veto, the President is in an awkward position when it comes to budgeting. So we sit down the leadership and say, here's the top line. We agreed to the top line. That's what the budgets did in the top line -- with the top line. And yet, the slices of the pie were, in the recent past, really earmarks. And so without the line-item veto, it made it very difficult for me to bring budgets discipline. They could have -- people said, well, just veto the whole budget. And my answer to that is, we, in good faith, negotiated the size of the pie. And so some Republican principles were violated when it came to earmarks, for example. ,#p#分页标题#e#It's easier to veto bills when you're going against the -- when the Democrats are in power, because, after all, it's Republicans who crafted the bills coming in. And so both are difficult, and both are necessary, and both have been interesting. (Laughter.) ,MR. DeMUTH: Presidents have to make compromises to get legislation that they really want. You made several compromises in winning your first big legislative victory, the No Child Left Behind program. Were there compromises that you made in obtaining that legislation, in legislation or execution, that you regret as you look back on it? ,THE PRESIDENT: I'm pleased with the progress in No Child Left Behind. The philosophy of No Child Left Behind was that in return for money, you must measure. That, of course, created some issues. Some Republicans and conservatives said, what business is it of the federal government to insist upon accountability? After all, there shouldn't be much of a role for the federal government. And people on the other side said, we don't want to be measured. ,I believe it is a Republican and conservative principle that we ought to ask for results. And if you're going to spend money, then it makes sense to say, are we achieving results? ,Secondly, as you know, I campaigned on compassionate conservatism. It's conservative to ask for accountability; it is compassionate to insist that inner-city children be able to read at the 4th grade level. And yet, oftentimes the system was so process-oriented that the school districts would say, how old are you, and if you're 10, you're supposed to be here; and 11, here; 12, here -- without wondering whether or not the child can read or write and add and subtract. So the basic principle inherent in No Child Left Behind, the philosophy of it remained very much intact in the bill -- and it's working. ,The Medicare bill -- a quite controversial bill -- was one where Republicans wrote the bill and there was some compromising inherent in the bill. Nevertheless, the two broad principles remained intact: one, if you're going to make a promise, reform the program so it's effective. So, like, for example, we paid thousands of dollars for surgery but not a dime for the prescription drugs that could prevent the surgery from being needed in the first place. And we put market-oriented principles in the bill. You probably remember the debate where the -- you know, there was a big debate about how much would this cost. And the CBO came up with a number and I think it's now 40 percent less than what was anticipated because of market principles. Nevertheless, the bill wasn't as strong on market principles as I would have liked to have seen it. ,And so, yes, you're obviously making compromises all the time with Congress. The key is to compromise without compromising principle. You can compromise points, but don't sell out the principle that is inherent in the bill. ,MR. DeMUTH: You'll be surprised that I have several questions about the auto bailout. (Laughter.) Let me put it in the context of this discussion. Isn't the Detroit bailout an example of interest groups thinking they can get a better deal from the executive branch than from the Congress?

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