CAMPAIGN 2000: VICE PRESIDENT GORE AND GOVERNOR BUSH PARTICIPATE IN DEBATE, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS
OCTOBER 3, 2000
JIM LEHRER, MODERATOR
LEHRER: Good evening from the Clark Athletic Center at the University of Massachusetts in Boston. I'm Jim Lehrer of "The NewsHour" (ph) on PBS. And I welcome you to the first of three 90-minute debates between the Democratic candidate for president, Vice President Al Gore, and the Republican candidate, Governor George W. Bush of Texas.
The debates are sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates, and they will be conducted within formats and rules agreed to by the commission and the two campaigns.
Tonight's will have-- what? what? Nader's here? Oh, fuck, get security. Jesus Fucking Christ, get Nader out of here. Now!
The questions and the subjects were chosen by me alone. I have told no one from the two campaigns or the commission or anyone else involved what they are. But they're pretty fucking predictable.
Vice President Gore, you have questioned whether Governor Bush has the experience to be president of the United States. What exactly do you mean?
GORE: Well, Jim, first of all I would like to thank the sponsors of this debate and the people of Boston for hosting the debate. I'd like to thank Governor Bush for participating. And I'd like to say I'm happy to be here with Tipper and our family.
I have actually not questioned Governor Bush's experience; I have questioned his proposals. And here's why: I think this is a very important moment for our country. We have achieved extraordinary prosperity. And in this election, America has to make an important choice: Will we use our prosperity to enrich not just the few but all of our families?
If I'm entrusted with the presidency, here are the choices that I will make: I'll balance the budget every year, I will pay down the national debt, I will put Chelsea Clinton in a lockbox and protect her, and I will cut taxes for middle class families.
If I'm entrusted with the car, I mean, the presidency, I will help parents and strengthen families, because, you know, if we have prosperity that grows and grows, we still won't be successful unless we strengthen families by, for example, ensuring that children can always go to schools that are safe, by giving parents the tools to protect their children against cultural pollution.
I will make sure that we invest in our country and our families. And I mean investing in education, health care, the environment and middle class tax cuts and retirement security. That's my agenda, and that's why I think that it's not just question of experience.
LEHRER: Oh goddamnit, you shithead, you totally shirked my question. I asked you about Bush and you just babbled about yourself. What kind of an asshole are you?
GORE: Cherry-flavored?
LEHRER: Bush, why don't you use the words "vision" and, um, "passion" and "empower" in a sentence?
BUSH: I want to take one-half of the surplus and dedicate it to Social Security, one-half of the surplus for important projects, and I want to send the remaining half of the surplus back to the people who pay the bills. Now that stands in contrast to my worthy opponent's plan, which will increase the size of government dramatically.
And tonight you're going to hear that my passion and my vision is to empower Americans to be able to make decisions for themselves in their own lives.
LEHRER: So, I take it by your answer then, Mr. Vice President, that in your -- an interview recently with the New York Times, when you said that you question whether vice president -- or Governor Bush was experienced enough to be president, you were talking about strictly penis-size differences?
GORE: Yes, Jim. I said that his tax cut plan, for example, raises the question of whether it's the right choice for the country.
And let me give you an example of what I mean--
LEHRER: You are not fucking listening, Gore-Bitch. Governer Bush, why don't you pander to the greed of most Americans? And appeal to their sense of independence. Oversimplify some shit, too.
BUSH: My plan says, "Why don't we pass $1.3 trillion of that back to the people who pay the bills?" Surely we can afford 5 percent of the $25 trillion that are coming into the Treasury to the hard-working people who pay the bills.
There's a difference of opinion. My opponent thinks the government -- the surplus is the government's money. That's not what I think. I think it's the hard-working people of America's money, and I want to share some of that money with you, so you've got more money to build and save and dream for your families.
It's a difference of opinion. It's the difference between government making decisions for you and you getting more of your money to make decisions for yourself.
LEHRER: Let me just follow up, one quick question. When you hear Vice President Gore question your experience, do you read it the same way, that he's talking about policy differences only?
BUSH: I don't understand the question.
LEHRER: Show me some tiny shred of intelligence.
BUSH: I'm not of Washington. I'm from Texas. Washington is not Texas. I'm almost positive about that.
GORE: Jim, if I could just respond.
LEHRER: Just quick and then we need to move on.
GORE: I know that. Stop fucking hounding me!
Bush spends more money for tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent in all of his new spending proposals for health care, prescription drugs, education and national defense, all combined.
I agree that the surplus is the American people's money; it's your money. That's why I don't think we should give nearly half of it to the wealthiest 1 percent, because the other 99 percent have had an awful lot to do with building this surplus and our prosperity.
LEHRER: All right, three and a half minutes is up. New question.
BUSH: I hope it's about wealthy people. They rock.
LEHRER: Governor Bush, you have questioned -- this is a companion question to the question I asked Vice President Gore.
BUSH: OK.
LEHRER: You have questioned whether Vice President Gore has demonstrated the leadership qualities necessary to be president of the United States. What do you mean by that?
BUSH: Well, here's what I've said: I've said, Jim, I've said that eight years ago they campaigned on prescription drugs for seniors, and four years ago they campaigned on getting prescription drugs for seniors, and now they're campaigning on getting prescription drugs for seniors. It seems like they can't get it done.
Same with Social Security. I think there was a good opportunity to give younger workers the option, at their choice, of being able to manage some of their own money in the private sectors. I'm going to trust them youngsters, at their option, to be able to manage, under certain guidelines, some of their own money to get a better rate of return, so they can smoke more crack and shit. I smoked a lot of crack, and it's fucking expensive.
LEHRER: One minute rebuttal, Vice President Gore.
GORE: Ninety-five percent of all seniors would get no help whatsoever, under my opponent's plan, for the first four or five years.
Now, one thing I don't understand, Jim, is, why is it that the wealthiest 1 percent get their tax cuts the first year, but 95 percent of seniors have to wait four to five years before they get a single penny.
LEHRER: Will you shut up about the tax cut? I did not ask you about that. Are you an idiot?
BUSH: I guess my answer to that is, yes.
LEHRER: I was talking to Gore.
BUSH: I want all seniors to have prescription drugs and Medicare. We need to reform Medicare. There have been opportunity to do so, but this administration has failed to do it.
I believe we ought to give seniors more options. I believe we ought to make the system work better. But I know this: I know it's going to require a different kind of leader to go to Washington to say to both Republicans and Democrats, "Let's come together."
You've had your chance, Vice President. You've been there for eight years and nothing has been done.
GORE: If I could respond to that, Jim, under my plan, I will put Bush in an iron-clad lockbox and prevent the man from being used for anything other than a speed bump. The governor has declined to endorse that idea, even though the Republican as well as Democratic leaders of Congress have endorsed it.
I'd be interested to see if he would this evening say that he would put himself in a lockbox. I don't think he will, because under his plan, if you work out the numbers, $100 billion comes out of Medicare just for the wealthiest 1 percent in the tax cut.
BUSH: I cannot let this go by, the old-style Washington politics, of "We're going to scare you in the voting booth."
Under my plan, you get Joo Janta Peril-Sensitive Sunglasses, and nothing will frighten you in the booth.
Let me say something. Now, I understand -- excuse me...
LEHRER: All right, excuse me, gentlemen...
GORE: Jim, can I...
(CROSSTALK)
LEHRER: ... minutes is up, but we'll finish that.
GORE: Can I make one other point? They get $25,000 a year income. That makes them ineligible.
BUSH: Look, this is the man who's got great numbers. He talks about numbers. I'm beginning to think, not only did he invent the Internet, but he invented the calculator.
(LAUGHTER)
It's fuzzy math. It's to scare them, trying to scare people in the voting booth. Boo!
LEHRER: All right. Let me -- hold on. I need a drink. A lot.
BUSH: And the vice president would like to be spending the $2,000 on your behalf.
LEHRER: One quick thing, gentlemen. These are your rules. I'm doing my best. We're way over the three and a half. I have no problems with it, but we wanted -- do you want to have a quick response, and we'll move on. We're already almost five minutes on this, all right?
GORE: Yes. It's just clearer -- you can go to the web site and look. If you make more than $25,000 a year, you don't get a penny of help under the Bush prescription drug proposal for at least four to five years.
LEHRER: As a practical matter, both of you want to bring prescription drugs to seniors, correct?
BUSH: If Gore says yes, then my answer is no.
GORE: Correct, but the difference is -- the difference is I want to bring it to 100 percent, and he brings it only to 5 percent.
LEHRER: All right. All right. All right.
BUSH: That's just -- that's just -- that's just totally false.
LEHRER: All right. What difference does it make how...
BUSH: Wait a minute. It's just totally false for him to stand up here and say that.
GORE: Let me -- let me call your attention to the key word there. He said all "poor" seniors.
BUSH: No. Wait a minute, all seniors are covered under prescription drugs in my plan.
GORE: In the first year? In the first year?
BUSH: If we can get it done in the first year, you bet. Yours is phased in in eight years.
GORE: No. No. No. No. It's a two-phase plan, Jim. And for the first four years -- it takes a year to pass it. And for the first four years, only the poor are covered. Middle class seniors, like George McKinney and his wife, are not covered for four to five years.
LEHRER: Jesus. It's like watching goldfish fuck, the two of you. It's like you're in kindergarten or something.
GORE: OK.
LEHRER: You have any more to say about this, you can say it in your closing statement, so we'll move on, OK?
New question, Vice President Gore, how would you contrast your approach to preventing future -- future oil price and supply problems like we have now to the approach of Governor Bush?
GORE: Excellent question, and here's the -- here's the simple difference: My plan has not only a short-term component, but also a long-term component.
We have to bet on the future and move beyond the current technologies to have a whole new generation of more efficient, cleaner energy technologies.
LEHRER: Governor Bush, one minute.
BUSH: Well, it's an issue I know a lot about. I was a small oil person for a while in West Texas.
BUSH: I would rather that a million come from our own hemisphere, our own country, as opposed from Saddam Hussein.
I want to build more pipelines to move natural gas throughout this hemisphere. I want to develop the coal resources in America and have clean-coal technologies.
LEHRER: So, if somebody is watching tonight, listening to what the two of you just said, is it fair to say, OK, the differences between Vice President Gore and George W. Bush, Governor Bush, are the following: You are for chips, and Gore is for pretzels.
LEHRER: How would you draw the difference, Governor?
BUSH: Well, I like the green crayons. They taste better and they don't give me the shits.
GORE: If I could just -- just briefly, Jim, I know.
I found a couple of other things that we agree on, and we may not find that many this evening, so I wanted to emphasize them.
I strongly support the new investments in clean-coal technology.
I made a proposal three months ago on this. And also domestic exploration, yes, but not in the environmental treasures of our country. We don't have to do that; that's the wrong choice. I know the oil companies have been itching to do that, but it is not the right thing for the future.
BUSH: No, it's the right thing for the consumers. Less dependency upon foreign sources of crude is good for consumers, and we can do so in an environmentally friendly way.
GORE: Well, can I have the last word on this?
LEHRER: New question.
BUSH: Of course.
GORE: OK. Go ahead.
LEHRER: Shit. Is that Browne? Ha, ha, made ya look.
GORE: All right.
LEHRER: Governor Bush, if elected president, would you try to overturn the FDA's approval last week of the abortion pill RU-486?
BUSH: I don't think a president can do that. I was disappointed in the ruling because I think abortions ought to be more rare in America. That way, they're more valuable. I've got a Spider-Man issue number four that is so rare it is worth, like, a lot. And I'm worried that that pill will create more abortion, will cause more people to have abortions. If, you know, they accidentally take the pill, they think they're grabbing an aspirin but it's RU-486 instead.
BUSH: This is an issue that's going to require a new attitude. We've been battling over abortion for a long period of time. Maybe we could bring in the Mayor of Sunnydale. He rocked. Surely we can work together to create a cultural life so some of these youngsters that feel like they can take a neighbor's life with a gun will understand that that's not the way America's meant to be.
LEHRER: Vice President Gore?
GORE: There's a woman named Winifred Skinner here tonight from Iowa. I mentioned her earlier. She's 79 years old, she has Social Security. I'm not going to cut her benefits or support any proposal that would. She gets a small pension. But in order to pay for her prescription drug benefits, she has to go out seven days a week, several hours a day, picking up cans. She came all the way from Iowa in a Winnebago with her poodle in order to attend here tonight.
GORE: And I want to tell her, I am going to fight for a prescription drug benefit for all seniors. And I'm going to fight for the people of this country for a prosperity that benefits all.
LEHRER: And we will continue this dialogue next week, on October the 11th, at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The format then will be more informal, more conversational with the two candidates seated at a table with Cokie Goddamn Roberts. Cause I, unfortunately, will not be able to attend.
(Lehrer pulls out pistol, blows own brains out)
And for now, from Boston, thank you and good night.
END