From Mail-Server@lex-luthor.ai.mit.edu  Fri Sep  3 23:07:03 1993
To: Clinton-News-Distribution@campaign92.org,
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 1993 21:39-0400
From: The White House <75300.3115@compuserve.com>
Subject: NAFTA Vice Chair Announcement  9/3/93

                           THE WHITE HOUSE

                    Office of the Press Secretary

_________________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                          September 3, 1993     

	     
                       REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
                AT ANNOUNCEMENT OF VICE CHAIR OF NAFTA
	     
                           The Oval Office 

2:37 P.M. EDT

	     THE PRESIDENT:  Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.  A 
few days ago, as all of you know, I announced that Bill Daley in 
Chicago would be Special Counselor to the President to coordinate our 
effort to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement in the 
Congress.  It is my great pleasure today to announce that Bill will 
be joined in our team by the gentleman to my left -- probably an 
uncomfortable position for him -- (laughter) -- the distinguished 
former ranking minority member of the House Ways and Means Committee, 
Bill Frenzel from Minnesota who, for 20 years in Congress, 
established a well-deserved record and is a genuine expert on this 
use of trade.  He is now a guest scholar at the Brookings 
Institution, and he has agreed to come aboard as Special Advisor to 
the President for NAFTA while we work through this effort in 
Congress.
	     
	     I also want to point out that we have just received a 
letter signed by 283 economists.  Among them, liberals and 
conservatives and 12 Nobel laureates, reinforcing the position that I 
have taken strongly for over a year now, which is that this 
agreement, especially coupled with the side agreements, means more 
jobs, not fewer jobs, for the American people.  This is a jobs issue.
	     
	     Since the late 1980s, over half of our net new jobs have 
come from expanding exports.  And one of the biggest deterrent to our 
expanding the job base in America today is declines in exports 
because of the flat economy in Europe, the flat economy in Japan.  
Latin America, as a whole, is the second fastest-growing area of the 
world.  Mexico is leading that growth.  I believe this is a very good 
move for the United States.  It means more jobs.  And I want to thank 
Bill Frenzel for his willingness to come aboard to make clear to all 
of America that this is a truly bipartisan effort, and also to make 
it clear that we are serious about getting as many votes from members 
of both parties as we can in the United States Congress.  I thank 
you.
	     
	     Congressman, I invite you to make a few remarks.
	     
	     REPRESENTATIVE FRENZEL:  Thank you very much.  First of 
all, I want to say that I am not a bit uncomfortable.  I think NAFTA 
is an enormously important thing for the people of the United States 
and for the world, and I'm anxious to help.  I'm flattered to be 
asked by the President and anxious to get to work.
	     
	     I think it is important that Republicans in the Congress 
early on suggested that there be a Republican involved in the 
administration's work in this program, and even better, that the 
administration and the President followed up and said, yes, we want 
to do that.  I think it is going to be not an easy thing to get this 
agreement ratified, by I think the bipartisan approach is the right 
way.  I'm anxious to work on it, glad to be involved with the 
President, with Bill Daley, Mickey Kantor and others, including the 
Vice President, and all I want to do is go to work.
	     
	     Q	  Mr. President, do you think it will pass?  And, 
also, is there some intramural fight on whether health care should go 
first, or you should focus on NAFTA first?
	     
	     THE PRESIDENT:  Yes, I think it will pass, and no, there 
isn't one.  We believe that it is the challenge, obviously, to 
present any kind of a major initiative to the Congress.  But there is 
quite a difference between the two issues.  Once the bill is ready 
for introduction under the laws governing NAFTA, it must be voted on 
in a certain amount of time.  So there is a legislative timetable 
that will control that.  
	     
	     The health care issue -- the timetable for that will be 
largely determined by how quickly a consensus can be reached and by 
how much time the individual members of the Congress are willing to 
put into mastering what is clearly the most complex public policy 
issue facing the United States today.
	     
	     Nevertheless, I continue to believe strongly that the 
two issues complement each other; I do not think they conflict.  I 
think that there is an enormous amount of bipartisan interest in 
doing something to control health care costs as a way of stimulating 
the economy, as well as providing health security to all Americans.  
And it gives people something to be for, and it puts in the larger 
context that all these things are being done to try to provide the 
American economy and bring the American people into a stronger 
position as we face the 21st century.  So I just don't buy the 
conflict argument; I feel good about this.
	     
	     Q	  Mr. President, do you think that the fact the 
Congress won't let you go forward with any additional broad-based 
taxes to pay for health care reform, that that's going to force you 
to so scale back the universal health care that you once envisaged 
that it won't have the kind of effect that you thought it would 
originally?
	     
	     THE PRESIDENT:  No, not at all.  If you go back to my 
February address, I have never wanted to have any big, broad-based 
taxes to pay for health care.  I have never thought that was right, 
and I've never understood why you can justify taxing the American 
people as a whole to pay to cover those who aren't covered, when more 
than half of the American people are paying more for their health 
care than they'll be paying today. 
	     
	     And when we are paying now almost 40 percent more of our 
income for our health care than any other advanced nation, I just 
don't think you can justify that.  So I'm quite comfortable with 
that, and I think when we put out our ideas and others put theirs 
out, that the American people will see pretty quickly we can do --
comprehensive coverage and without a big, new tax.
	     
	     Q	  Do you think Mr. Kantor is big enough to take on 
Mr. Perot?
	     
	     THE PRESIDENT:  Yes, I -- (applause) -- he's wanted to 
-- show them your -- he's already wounded; but, even wounded, Mr. 
Kantor is a formidable fighter.  Now he's got a lot of good help, 
too.
	     
	     Q	  What do you think of your new surroundings?
	     
	     THE PRESIDENT:  I like them very much.  I think it's a 
beautiful rug.  I like the couch.  I like it. 
	     
	     Q	  How much input did you have in this?  I mean, is 
this you? 
	     
	     THE PRESIDENT:  I like it a lot.  A little input.  I 
thought a darker rug would be pretty and would lift the room, and 
something other than white couches.  I like it.  
	     
	     You ought to sit on the couches.  He also made them 
stronger so people don't sink in when they come in here.  Did you 
ever go into an office and sink into the couch, you know?  I don't 
think that's very good, so I wanted people to feel good.
	     	  
	     Helen, when Mickey opened his coat, did you think of 
President Johnson -- (laughter) -- 
	     
	     Q	  I think it's going to be deja vu all over again.
	     
	     THE PRESS:  Thank you.
	     

                                 END2:43 P.M. EDT

