Clinton seeks governors’ help in continuing good fortune
By Lisa M. Rosellini

Touting his two terms in office as the most prosperous time in America in the last 30 years, President Bill Clinton today (July 10) thanked the nation’s governors for their help during this "economic expansion" and asked them to make his final six months as president productive.

As a featured speaker on day three of the National Governors’ Association meeting at The Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel on campus, Clinton praised the governors for the progress their states have made on several fronts, including extending affordable health care to more than 2 million children. But the president also challenged the states’ leaders to make this election season one that is "devoid of the poison that has often clouded judgment." This was Clinton’s second visit to the University Park campus in four years.

"It is obvious our country has come a long way in the last seven-and-a-half years. We have done a lot of things together ... the welfare rolls are the lowest in 30 years; the crime rate is at a 30-year low; we’ve expanded trade," he said. "The governors have always been there in a bipartisan way ... you have never stopped bringing back common-sense notions of fiscal discipline to Washington."

Clinton, who was making his final appearance as president before the bipartisan gathering of state chiefs, spoke mostly on ways to extend affordable health care to families and the elderly, but also took the opportunity to push other Democratic initiatives and urge the governors to challenge tax cuts being proposed by Congress. Although Clinton didn’t mention the Republican leadership of Congress, he alluded to the opposition he will face in his final six months as president and warned the governors to pay careful attention to how the nation’s budget surplus is spent.

Estimates from the Clinton Administration for this year reveal an expected surplus of $167 billion. In 1999, the nation experienced a budget surplus of $124 billion – the largest dollar surplus on record, according to the White House Web site.

Clinton said 30 percent of the economic surplus came from budget reforms made by his administration to Medicaid and Medicare programs, both of which the president said are now being threatened by Republican-backed measures.

"It is very important what we do in the next six months. This is a big, big moment for our country and we need to take on these challenges and opportunities in a responsible way," Clinton said. "Our single most important obligation is to try to keep the economic expansion going and try to spread its benefits."

Throughout his talk to the governors, Clinton listed programs and bills he has supported and even pushed some initiatives of Vice President Al Gore, the Democratic presidential candidate in the 2000 election. He also slid in a number of examples of tax repeals proposed by Congress that he does not believe will help the nation.

"We have never had a chance like this in my lifetime," Clinton said. "I think we’ve got to keep the economy going by using the same principles of fiscal discipline that got us where we are. That means that whatever combination of spending and tax cuts any candidate proposes ... there ought to be enough left to pay down the public debt."

Clinton said the nation has a great opportunity before it, but dealing with good fortune, such as the budget surplus, is just as stern a task as dealing with adversity.

"There’s not a person in this room over 30 years of age that cannot remember at least one time in your life when you made a personal or a business mistake, not because things were going so badly, but because things were going so well you felt there was no penalty," he said.

That notion struck a loud chord with Penn State head football Coach Joe Paterno, who was in the audience and chatted briefly with the president when his talk was over.

"I really identified with that idea very much," Paterno, a Republican, said. "When things are going well, that’s the time to really be careful. I have found that in football, and really anything in life, when things are going well, you tend to get careless and not pay attention to details. You end up losing a football game you should win. I think he was merely telling us to not be too careless."

Clinton asked the governors to help him make the most of the remaining six months of his second term as president and do nothing that would undermine the progress that has been made to date.

I ask everybody to take a deep breath, be grateful for the prosperity we have, but understand the enormous responsibility it puts on us."

After his nearly 40-minute talk, Clinton traveled slowly around the room shaking hands and talking with governors and the general public. He stopped at Coach Paterno's seat and briefly discussed football, according to Paterno, who said he and the president chatted about Hilary Clinton's father and brother, who had both played football for the Nittany Lions.

Clinton was expected to leave Penn State's conference center and go directly to the airport to catch a flight to Philadelphia, but instead made a quick detour onto the Penn State University Park campus where he stopped at the Creamery for a scoop of Peachy Paterno ice cream on a cone. In 1996 when Clinton was on campus to deliver the commencement address, he discovered Creamery ice cream, which is made from milk produced by the University's dairy herd.

The president was scheduled to give a 6 p.m. talk at a fund-raising dinner at the Warwick Hotel in Philadelphia.

The full text of Clinton’s Penn State speech can be viewed online at http://www.pub.whit ehouse.gov/uri-res/I2R?urn:pdi://oma.eop.gov.us/2000/7/10/15.text.1

The 92nd annual National Governors’ Association meeting will wrap up July 11. The event has brought 38 governors to State College and Penn State and attracted more than 1,200 participants including governors, their families, key staff, corporate leaders and state and national policy experts and media.