Giving America Back Its Future
Remarks/Speech by John Kerry
January 14, 2004
Davenport, IA -
As you?ve heard me say before, Teresa and I have loved this process ? we?ve loved the way the Iowa caucuses challenge you, not just to think on your feet, but to bear your soul.
I?ve learned a lot here. Particularly here in Iowa where democracy is lived out in living rooms and VFW halls, campaigns are a time of listening and learning - and this one has been for me. I head into the last five days before we caucus more convinced than ever that we have to change politics in this country and the radically wrong direction of our nation.
And I come into these last days convinced that we owe you a politics and a dialogue as good and as honest as the questions you ask us when we visit your homes, your community centers, and your Elks Lodges.
Just last night in Vinton, a woman deciding whether to caucus raised her hand and sad to me, ?we hear about these issues every four years. How do we know you?ll be any different ? everyone talks about healthcare, everyone talks about jobs, how are you going to do it??
I don?t offer her my resume, I offer her my gut ? my values, my determination that?s guided me ever since I came home from Vietnam. I have spent 35 years fighting for the values you and I believe in, standing up for people, and taking on powerful interests ? as a matter of conviction, as a matter of duty, fighting the fights that are hard.
I stood up to Richard Nixon when I came back from Vietnam and I led thousands of veterans to the Mall to end that war. They tried to kick us off, and they took us to the Supreme Court of the United States to do it. We stood our ground and we said: Mr. President, you sent us 8000 miles away to sleep in the jungles of Vietnam; we have earned the right to sleep on this Mall and talk to our Senators.
As Lieutenant Governor, I took on some of the biggest utilities in the country and led the way to the first national plan to crackdown on acid rain and save our lakes and rivers and streams.
As a Senator, I stood up and led the fight to stop Ronald Reagan?s illegal, secret, unconstitutional war in Central America.
I led the fight with John McCain to change and finally make peace with Vietnam.
I fought against Newt Gingrich?s effort to decimate the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts and I?m proud that I led and we won the fight to stop the Bush Administration from drilling in the Arctic Wildlife Reserve.
I?m asking you to measure the candidates not just by what we say, but by what we have done ? because the fights ahead are going to be as tough as they come ? the fight to make our workplace fair, the fight to lift up the quality of life for all Americans, the struggle for a foreign policy that makes us safe.
Five days from now, Iowa will set the course for the most important election of our generation.
One choice is fundamental: I?m running for President so you will have a President who?s on your side, and who will take on the powerful interests that stand in your way.
I?m running for President to free our government from the dominance of the lobbyists, the drug industry, big oil, and the insurance companies and HMOs ? so that we can give America back its future and its soul.
I?m running to restore fairness and economic justice ? and repeal the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy so we can invest in education and health care for all.
As I?ve said many times in recent days, in community halls, workplaces, and homes across Iowa, we are here not just to count down the days until the start of the nominating process and the Iowa caucuses; we are here to mark the beginning of the end of the Bush presidency.
This election is not just about which candidate wins, but about whether we will win the fight to put opportunity and security in the hands of the many and not the few.
Look at what is happening to family farms ? agribusiness literally spreading across the land, vertical ownership constantly on the rise, hog lots that poison our streams, unwanted, out of control, degrading the value of property and the quality of life itself. Why? All of us know why. Because the power of special interests is dominating the choices of Iowans and Americans.
It is happening across the nation, in every area of concern. Add up the deficit; count the cost that working families are paying while the privileged ride high and reap all the rewards. Three million people have lost their jobs. For two million people, health insurance has been blown away. Seniors have had their retirements stolen by Enron and Worldcom, by financial scandal and a marketplace where this President licenses a creed of greed. And when we add it all up, as we will and I will all across this country if I am the nominee of our party, we are going to make it clear to America that the one person in the United States who deserves to be laid off is George W. Bush.
He has given working people the worst deal of modern times ? and the worst record on jobs of any President since Herbert Hoover. Today in America, people are out of work or working harder and longer and earning less.
Last weekend, the President of the United States gave a speech suggesting that his tax cuts have created an enormous economic recovery in America. Yes, it?s a recovery if you?re a Republican with a rich stock portfolio; it?s a recovery for Wall Street and a 40% increase in the profit of corporations.
But for the unemployed, the Bush Administration said they would create 250,000 jobs last month. And how many did they create? A grand total of 1000 jobs. That leaves them 249,000 jobs short. And while corporate profits soar and layoffs continue, the income of working people has dropped. This truly is a Bush-league recovery.
At the same time, the economy of special privilege, special favors and tax giveaways for those at the top has been paid for by the cynical neglect of education. Ask the teachers of Iowa what?s happened with this President?s promises. We have new requirements imposed on schools, but not the new resources needed for schools. This Administration has the money to lavish billions in subsidies on oil companies in their energy bill, but they say we can?t afford to pay for excellence in education. I say we can?t afford not to.
As a former prosecutor, I used to talk to kids who lost their futures early in life. Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen years old, they were in the criminal justice system. Today, building prisons is a growing industry; I?m tired of us running a farm system for prisons in America. We have to stop being a country that?s willing to spend $50,000 a year to house someone in jail for the rest of their life, when we should be investing $10,000 a year in Head Start, Early Start, Smart Start, and early childhood education.
George W. Bush has an open door and an open treasury for the likes of Halliburton, but he has turned his back on our children and turned his back on our teachers. And in this campaign, I intend to criss-cross this country and hold him accountable for making a mockery of the words "leave no child behind."
I also intend to expose the despicable tactics George Bush, Karl Rove and their disciples on the radical right. They do not really defend their politics of privilege on its own terms; instead, they take refuge in false appeals to patriotism. We do not need ? and we will not accept ? lectures on patriotism from the likes of Steve King and Tom DeLay. Not when they cut $1.8 billion on the VA budget. Not when there are 40,000 veterans waiting six months to have a doctor sign off on their prescription drugs for the first time. Not when this Administration denies 400,000 veterans as a whole category access to the VA. I will stand up, on behalf of our party, our country, our flag, and our values ? and I will make it clear that the first definition of patriotism is keeping faith with those who wore the uniform of our country.
So we must take our stand as Democrats ? fighting for people, determined to break the grip of powerful interests.
Let me tell you what I will do in the first 100 days of my presidency. I will sign an executive order that bans anyone from government from going into lobbying for five years, so that public office once again becomes a public trust, not a means to peddle influence and access. I will also require every single meeting between a public official and a lobbyist to be a matter of official public record. It is time to give the people?s government back to the people.
And the very first piece of legislation that I will introduce will end the shame of the United States of America being the only industrial nation on the face of this earth not to understand that health care is not a privilege for the wealthy or the powerful; it is a right for all our people.
As I have said before, this is personal for me; last year at this time, I faced a health care crisis. I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. But I was lucky and I?m cured today because I had some of the best health care in the world. I had it for two reasons. I could afford it and I?m a United States Senator. Thanks to you, every one of you in Iowa and everyone in America, Senators and Congressman give themselves excellent health care, and you pay for it.
Well, your family?s health is just as important as any politician?s in Washington. But in George Bush?s America, it isn?t ? because of the power of the insurance industry and the HMOs. They have blocked health care for all our people ever since Harry Truman first proposed it. We need a President who?s determined to finish Harry Truman?s mission. I will fight to cover every American; to give every American access to the same health plan as members of Congress; and, while the insurance companies may not like it, I will fight to hold down costs for the 163 million Americans who are already covered today. The average American family will save $1000 a year; the average insurance company will have to stop overcharging consumers.
The pharmaceutical companies will have to give up $139 billion in windfall profits that they just paid their lobbyists $139 million to get from this Administration and this Congress. They twisted a prescription drug benefit for seniors into a benefit for the prescription drug companies. Their bill will force seniors out of Medicare and into HMOs. But if I am President, and with your help, we will tell the profiteers who bought and paid for this bill: Forget about it. It?s over; it?s repealed ? and we?re going to replace it with a real prescription drug benefit and more affordable prescriptions. We?re going to save and strengthen Medicare.
And while we must repeal the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, I will fight ? and I ask you to join me in fighting against ? proposals to increase taxes on the middle class. I disagree with those in my own party who are so mad at George Bush that they want to take it out on working families in Iowa by raising their taxes an average of $2,000 a year. To me, this is a matter of principle: Democrats should stand up for everyday Americans who work hard, hope for the future, and face extraordinary challenges everyday.
A government on their side will know when to take sides. So as President, I will scrub the tax code, which has grown from 14 pages to 17,000 pages, to remove every single loophole, every single incentive, every single provision that rewards Benedict Arnold CEOs and corporations for moving profits and American jobs overseas. And we?ll stop giving government contracts for companies who do wrong by their workers.
We will put an end to tax giveaways for corporations who cut back on their workers while they lavish millions on CEOs. And corporations won?t get tax breaks for CEOs million dollar retirement windfalls while they cut back on worker pension plans. We need a President who fights for a fair retirement for every family not Paradise Island for millionaires.
I will revoke every single Bush executive order that favors polluters. I will end the secret meetings and the secret energy task forces in the White House.
Next, I will propose a plan to invest in renewable fuels and new technology to make America energy independent of Mideast oil in the next 10 years. We only have 3% of the world?s oil. We can?t drill our way out of this crisis; we have to invent our way out of it. Never should young Americans in uniform ever, ever have to be held hostage to our dependence on oil in the Middle East.
We need leadership, strength and resolve to take on the special interests here at home ? and the experience and judgment to lead America in a dangerous world, in a perilous time.
We are at war today, and the whole world is looking to the United States of America. We should long ago have been negotiating bilaterally with North Korea. We should long ago have led the world to a comprehensive attack on the global threat of AIDS and the global poverty and despair that are the breeding grounds of terrorism. We should be leading the world to stop nuclear proliferation instead of advancing George Bush?s scheme to build new bunker busting nuclear weapons ? smaller and more usable nuclear bombs. If I know one thing, and so do you, the last thing we need here on this earth is more usable nuclear bombs.
George Bush has run the most arrogant, inept, reckless, and ideological foreign policy in the modern history of our country. He has overextended our troops and turned our guard and reserve into full-duty, active-duty, personnel.
My friends, we need a nominee who can stand up to this President eye to eye, toe to toe, face to face, and make it clear: We Democrats know how to make this nation of ours safe. George Bush doesn?t have the experience to be commander-in-chief. And I will tell you: I know something about aircraft carriers for real.
George Bush and Karl Rove want national security to be the central issue of this campaign. They?ve announced that they do ? and obviously they have to ? because they can?t talk about jobs. They can?t talk the environment. They can?t talk about health care. They can?t talk about keeping their promises on education. So they?re going to play the politics of fear in America. This is my reply: If George W. Bush plans to make national security the central issue in this campaign, I have three words for him that I know he understands ? bring it on.
I ask you to join this fight ? not just to defeat George Bush, but to drive the forces of greed and privilege from the precincts of power and make America work again for the people who are the heart and strength of our country. I?m asking you to join me in making our country safe again.
The Iowa caucuses don?t belong to the special interests; they belong to you. On Monday night, you can open the way to a stronger, fairer, more prosperous country ? to victory for our party and our ideals.
I ask you to vote for answers, not just anger.
I ask you, my friends in Iowa: when you go to those caucuses only days from now, don?t go there just to send America a message. Go there and send America a President of the United States.
