CLINTON APPEARANCE: ARSENIO HALL

 

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Subject: CLINTON APPEARANCE: ARSENIO HALL

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Governor Bill Clinton

Hillary Clinton

The Arsenio Hall Show

Los Angeles, California

June 3, 1992

Announcer:  From Stage 29 at Paramount Studios on Melrose

Avenue in the heart of Hollywood, California in these United States!

It's the Arsenio Hall Show, starring Arsenio Hall!  Tonight Arsenio

welcomes presidential candidate Governor Bill Clinton!  ...And actress

Terri Garr!  And now...Rolling Hills, Honolulu, Booneville, and all the

rest of y'all-it's Arseniooooo Hall!

Musical break-Clinton on Saxophone playing "Heartbreak Hotel"

Arsenio:  Did you ever think of playing professionally?

Gov. Clinton:  Yeah, and I liked it tonight.  I liked being on the

other side of the posse.  You know what you're drummer said?  He

said, "If this music thing doesn't work out, you can always run for

President."

Arsenio:  Cute twist, Chuck.  You carry a lot of people with you.  You

have more people than Hammer.  There are like a lot of guys in your

posse today.  But I'm glad you're here.  Let's get right down to things.

What do you like?  The old Elvis or the, ummm...  Which stamp?  I

know you're an Elvis fan.

Clinton:  I led a national crusade for the young Elvis.

Arsenio: Really?

Clinton: Yeah.  You know when you get old, he got fat like me.  I

think it has to be the young Elvis.  That's when he had all his energy

and real raw, new, fresh power.  It would have been a shame to do

the old stamp.  Had to be the new one.

Arsenio:  You were here recently.  I didn't get to meet you.  You

went to my church.

Clinton:  I sure did.  I met your pastor.  He's a wonderful man.

Arsenio:  He is.  He has guided me well.  When I talk to kids at

church, when I talk to kids in their classrooms, there are a lot of

young people who don't think they should vote at all any more.

They feel that you're all the same.  Why are you not the same?

Clinton:  I'm not the same because I'm talking about things in this

election that I've been working on for years-that I really care about.

I was in South Central L.A. three years before the riot occurred.  I

came out here and all the politicians always go to Hollywood to meet

the movie stars and the entertainers to raise money.  And I gave a

speech here three years ago and I asked to go to South Central L.A.

and meet with people from UNO and S.C.O.C.-those community

organizations.  I could see how terrible it was and how things could

get out of hand.  And I met with a dozen sixth graders about my

daughter's age who told me their biggest fear was being shot going to

and from school.  And the reason those kids should vote is, this

country's been around for more than two hundred years because

more than half the time the people have been right.  And have

elected the kind of leadership we needed to move our country

through crisis periods.  And we're in trouble now.  We've got a lot of

problems.  And the only way the people can have a say is when

they're in the driver's seat.  You're in the driver's seat at election

time.  If you don't get in the car you can't drive.

Arsenio:  Yeah...  In South Central L.A., we've had our riots.

Everybody knows about it.  I've always said that that was just the

spark, this Rodney King situation...that was the spark that lit the

flame.  But there's a problem there.   Do you understand what's going

on?  Do you understand why that happened?

Clinton:  I think I understand some of why it happened.  A teacher

told me after it occurred, when I was here with your

congresswoman, Maxine Waters, in her home.  This teacher said to

me, "Now, after we've cleaned up this mess that the riots caused, let's

clean up the mess that caused the riots."  And I thought that was the

best one liner to describe where we ought to be going.

        You've got millions of people in this country today who just

don't feel connected to the life the rest of us wanted to live.  You tell

them to register and vote, get an education and go to work and they

say, "May not have a job, but if I deal drugs, I can make money."

You tell them that they ought to register and vote and they say,

"Why, I'll still be unsafe on my streets."

        You tell them to register and vote and they look at most people

in south central L.A., they obeyed the law.  They didn't loot, they

didn't burn, they didn't riot, they didn't steal.  But a lot of them are

still living below the poverty line even though they're working forty

hours a week.

        So, there are real problems there that have divorced a whole

lot of Americans from the rest of us.  And I think what this election

is about, in a way, is reconnecting more folks to the American dream.

Making them feel like they're a part of our community.  Making

them feel that tomorrow can be better than today.  There are too

many people who don't feel a part of the community and are

convinced that tomorrow won't be better than today.  I hardly ever

meet an American who's not worried about something about the

future.

Arsenio:  Yeah.  You know, when I think about racism, I always-as

a black man-I always think about the racism I experience.  During

the riots, I realized that there are a lot of kinds of racism that we're

suffering from.  Racism against a lot of different peoples.  We all hate

each other for something.  We noticed the Korean situation.  We

noticed the anger at just white faces, no matter who they were.

We've always seen the hostility towards black faces, no matter who

they are.  How do we deal with racism in America, because it's

getting out of hand?

Clinton:  I think we've got to do two things.  First of all, we've got to

find ways for people to talk to each other again.  On a regular,

consistent basis, not just across racial lines but across income lines.

That is you and I can live in an integrated society but it would be a

fairly narrow strata.  But if you go to South Central L.A., or most

places in America, most working people and low income people, they

don't have the kind of inter-racial contacts that people who are in a

stronger income group have.  So you've got to have basic contacts.

        Second thing we've got to realize is a lot of the racism that was

raging in Los Angeles dealt with what people don't do, rather than

what they do.  People who feel like they don't even exist to people of

other races until they walk into a department store and people

follow them around to make sure they don't steal anything.

        But day in and day out, they get up and trudge through their

lives.  They live in substandard housing on unsafe streets.  They

work their guts out, they fall further behind.  Nobody even knows

they're there until there's a riot.

        I think that in the 90's this whole business of economic

empowerment has got to be at the center of the civil rights

movement.  You've gotta have it.  A lot of the problems just relate

to..., like the tensions between the African-American and the Korean

community?

Arsenio:  Umm-huh.

Clinton:  I've talked to a lot of black folks who are convinced that

the Korean people get preferential treatment at banks.

Arsenio:  For loans?

Clinton:  For loans.  But what they don't know is, those folks have an

entrepreneurial culture.  They work together.  They loan each other

money.  They come out of a culture that favors small businesses.

        Most of the black families that moved to Los Angeles, when

they did, came out of the south and came here for manufacturing

jobs.  When the manufacturing jobs went away, there was only small

business and nobody stepped in and said, "Here's how you get a loan.

We're gonna make sure that the loans are made in this community.

We're gonna make sure you learn to how manage these businesses

and create markets."  None of that was ever done, so I think a lot of

the problem is these folks are just invisible to each other until they

raise hell.  And you can't run a country that way.  We've gotta know

we're around all the time.

Arsenio:  Yeah.  Let's take a quick commercial and come right back

with Governor Bill Clinton.

Commercial break.

Arsenio:   I'm sure you're familiar with Ross Perot's quote about

unfaithful men, unfaithful people and homosexuals.  He's been

backpedaling a little bit.  What do you think about the initial quote

or any element of it?

Clinton:  I thought it was wrong.

        You know, he has a right to hold high standards of personal

behavior and to think what he will about right and wrong.  But, my

whole idea is we don't have a person to waste in this country.  And

that we should make maximum use of everybody's talents.  And we

don't even know how he proposes to know about the private lives of

the people that he would hire in the federal government.  Is he

gonna hire investigators and figure out what's going on in their lives?

I just thought it was something better left unsaid.

        I also believe that this is a fundamentally tolerant but not a

permissive society.  We gotta be tolerant, we're a different group of

people.  This is the most diverse country on Earth, and we need

everybody.  We need everybody.  We're all in this together.

        Let me just give you an example.  I think it was terrible that

that woman who won a bronze star in the Tet Offensive in Vietnam

was kicked out of the National Guard, because she said she was a

lesbian.  She gave a lot to this country, and I think she should have

been allowed to serve.

        Now I know my view may be unpopular, but that's the way I

feel.  I think there ought to be presumption in this country that we

need everybody we can get to perform to the maximum of their God-

given capacities.  And that's why I've worked so hard on a good

economic program.  That's why I believe so strongly in education.

And so,  I come at this from a different way.  I want to include

people.  I don't want to exclude people.

Arsenio:  OK.

        You know when I look at you on paper, I mean, it's like the

perfect guy: Rhodes Scholar,youngest governor.  Tell me about your

flaws.  What are you're shortcomings?

Clinton:  We don't have enough time.  We'd have to have a bunking

party if you want to listen to my flaws.  I have a lot of shortcomings.

I think one of them is, even at this age,  I was first elected governor

at your age...

Arsenio:  See, that's embarrassing.  He was governor and I'm like,

"Let's get busy!"

Clinton:  Hey, "Let's get busy," ought to be the motto of this country

right now.

        But, even now, after all these years, I sometimes work hard

instead of smart.  That is, I'm a workaholic. I'm always churning and

doing things and sometimes I lose the forest for the trees.

Sometimes you can do so many things,  that you don't do enough.

        I think, at the end of this campaign, a lot of people may not

know what I want to do as president 'cause I've got so many ideas.

My mind is always churning, you know.  And I think I need to learn

to focus my comments better so can I communicate better with

people who don't know me very well.

Arsenio:  Yeah.

Clinton:  And I need to always learn that you have so little time.

There is so precious little time that you have to really be like a laser

beam, with your words and your actions.  You have to really focus.

You gotta have that kind of mental  discipline that sometimes, still,

my workaholic tendencies don't permit me to have.  I think that's

one problem.

Arsenio:  Yeah...

Clinton:  I sometimes. I always think that everything can be worked

out, too.  Sometimes you can't work everything out, you've just got to

cut it.  And you got to know when to cut it and when to work things

out.  And that's something I've done a lot of work on, trying to make

sure I overcome that weakness.

Arsenio:  Speaking of focusing and communicating.  I know you've

been through this a billion times but can we get into this smoking the

joint thing again?

Clinton:  That's why I play saxophone.  You see, you have to blow

into it, so you have to inhale with a saxophone.  Or you die.  That's

how I learned to inhale.  Playing my saxophone.  You blow out and

then you have to inhale.

Arsenio:  One for Bill.

Clinton:  I tried to do it, I just couldn't.  I wasn't trying to get off the

hook.  I was making a nervous remark.

Arsenio:  OK.  'Cause I've heard different people discuss it.  And I've

done my jokes.  OK, you got the joint in your hand.

Clinton:  I bet you burned me bad.

Arsenio:  OK.  Somebody says, you know that word, E-A-R.  You all

heard it in college, "Ear!"  Somebody says, "Ear!"  And then what do

you do at that point?

Clinton:  I took it, and I tried to smoke it.  Just like a cigarette.  But,

I'd never smoked a cigarette before.

Arsenio:  And you're not a drinker either, right?

Clinton:  Well, I never had a drink 'till I was 22.  I do now.  A little

bit, but not much.  But anyway so I did my best I... and I tried but I

just couldn't inhale it.  I mean, I wasn't trying to get a good conduct

medal for saying, "I didn't inhale."  I was just nervously pointing out

it was another one of those things I tried to do and failed at in life.  I

was 22 or 23 years old.  I gave it my very best shot.  I really tried, I

just blew it.

Arsenio:  I know how it is dealing with the press.  If you could

explain it over again the first time would you do it any differently?

Clinton:  Yeah,  I would've just said, "Yes." But, you know, when a

politician says something, when you're in politics, the cynicism about

politicians is so great-people just thought, "Well, this guy calculated

this whole answer. And he calculated so that he thought, "Well

maybe you won't burn me quite as bad if I say I didn't inhale."

        That's the dumbest thing I ever heard of.  They asked me a

question I didn't know they were gonna ask.  And I gave an honest

answer.  And that, "I didn't inhale," was a nervous afterthought.  I

was sort of laughing about it after 22 years.  That's all that was going

on.  I just was laughing in my mind about it.  But I got beat up about

it because everybody thought I'd calculated this answer.  Maybe I

should.  Maybe I should be more calculating than I am.

        But, you folks are never gonna get good politicians-really good

public officials-if all you want is somebody that calculates every

word they say, every deed they do.  And their whole life becomes

like a robot, an automaton.  I did something when I was younger.  I

told the truth about it.  And I made a mess of telling about it because

I guess I'm still kind of embarrassed about it after all these years.

        But it is not a big deal, and it was made into a federal case.  I

got more publicity on that than on my I idea about how to send

every kid in America to college who wants to go, which I think is

more important to the election and to the future of this country.

Arsenio:  I read that you are contemplating raising taxes, possibly,

for people who make two hundred thousand dollars or more.

Clinton:  Yeah, you'll have to pay more if I win.

Arsenio:  Yeah, and I'm mad about that.  Why don't you expound

more about that and talk a little bit about what you will do for the

economy.  That's part of the L.A. riots and some of the other

frustrations all over this country.

Clinton:  Absolutely, it is.  Absolutely.  A big part of California's

problems.  You've lost a half-a-million jobs in California in two years.

Your state government is broke,  11 billion dollars in debt.  You're

cutting back on education when you ought to be increasing

investment in education, to prepare all these kids for the future they

need to live.

        What my theory is, is that we've got to increase our investment

in this country.  After World War II, we rebuilt Europe and Japan.

After the Cold War, we've got this marvelous window of opportunity

where we can rebuild America.  And we better get after it.  And

we've got to do it.  The only way you ever rebuild a country is to

invest in your people-in their jobs, in their education, in their health

care.

        So, my idea is that first we ought to take every dollar we're

cutting the defense budget by-every dollar-and invest it in building

an economy for the twenty-first century.

        In California, what does that mean?  Build high-speed rail

networks.  Don't buy the trains from Europe or Japan.  Build them

here.  Build short hulled aircraft.  Build modern waste recycling

systems.  Build a modern fiber optics network.  Put millions of people

to work, building a rich country for tomorrow.  Do it with the defense

cuts.

        We need some more money to invest in education.  Every poor

child in South Central L.A. should be in a Head Start program.  The

poor school districts, they ought to have elementary counselors in the

schools to deal with those kids who bring problems to the front door.

And small classes in the early grades-there ought to be a computer

in every classroom in America.  The kids that don't go to college

ought to have two years of apprenticeship training, so they can get

good jobs, not dead end jobs.  That's what our competitors do.  And

we ought to loan everybody the money that wants to go to college

and let them pay it back later.

        Now, all of this, believe it or not, in the context of our trillion

dollar budget is not a great deal.  But since we have a deficit that's

enormous and it needs to be brought down, I think we have to raise

some more money.  You can't raise taxes on the middle class because

their taxes went up and their incomes went down in the 80's.  People

in upper income groups, their incomes went up and their taxes went

down.

        Relax, your taxes will still be lower than they were in 1980.

But you'll have to pay a little more so we can send all of these kids to

college.  It'll be the best money we ever spent.  We'll have a stronger

economy.

        All those people that you and your pastor tried to help, if you

tried to tell them, "Look, if you stay straight, you're not gonna make

as much money as you would dealing drugs, but you're gonna make

enough money.  You're gonna have a good decent life.  Your gonna

feel good about yourself and your country's gonna make sure that

you get the education and training that you need," it would be great.

        And if you could say to them, "If you go to college, we'll pay

your way to college. But we'll pay it back-you can-either as a

percentage of your income, or even better, let's have a Peace Corps

here at home.  Come back to L.A. and pay your college loan back by

giving two years of your life as a counselor to kids in trouble, as a

nurse in a public health clinic, as a police officer on the block.  You

think about it, a lot of these kids in trouble, they're never the most

important person in the world to anybody except the people they're

in the gangs with.

        We've got to give them a good gang to be a part of, you gotta

have some personal connection.

        Anyway, you have to pay a little more, but not a lot more-

enough to invest in our people again.  That's what we gotta do.

Arsenio:  If it helps our youth, I'm down with it.  I'll be right back

with Bill Clinton.

Commercial Break.

Arsenio:  Well, you all know this lady.  Yes, yes.  The wife beside

the man.  Not behind anymore, but beside.

        Through all this controversy, have you ever found yourselves

at home, fighting?  Honestly?

Hillary:  No.  No.  Not about anything important.  We fight about

what movie we want to see.

Clinton:  This is the only movie we're gonna see for a month and

you're gonna make me see this crazy cheap thrills movie?  You

wanna go see "Lethal Weapon III," when we've got all these other

movies out?  That's the kind of stuff we fight about.

Arsenio:  It's hard to think that at some point you didn't say, "Who

is Gennifer?  You know.  Who the hell is she?"

Hillary:  I know who she is.  I know who she is.

Arsenio:  And you know what her problem is?

Hillary:  She's got lots of problems.

Arsenio:  Yeah.  Through all the pressure and things you've been

through, have you ever thought about quitting?

Clinton:  No.

Arsenio:  Really?

Clinton: No.  I would have quit if I just wanted to live in the White

House or go to Camp David on the weekends.  But, if that were the

choice, I'd gladly stay home with the job I've got and the life I've got.

It's a lot better life in many ways-on a much more human scale.

        I got into this race because I thought this country was going

down the tubes and we ought to change it.  And I stayed in it

because I thought I could be a force for change.  And I wanted the

voters to make up their mind.  If the voters say, "Hey, we think some

other person will be a better president," I will go home a happy man

to the life that I've got.  It's a wonderful life.

        But I would have been a gutless wonder to quit over things I

thought were unfair and insubstantial in the face of the convictions I

have about what we ought to do to change the country.

        So, no.  I never thought about quitting.  This country doesn't

need a quitter.  And the licks that I've taken are nothing compared

to the licks most Americans take.  Look at what those people in South

Central L.A. are going through.  That's a lot tougher than a few days

of bad publicity.  If you can't take a few licks, you've got no business

being president.  It's a tough job, you've got to be a tough guy.

Arsenio:  Yes. Wow.

        Have you-and this is something that I heard a political analyst

talking about recently-he said that you were, I'll use the word

"chilling out."  He said you were pulling back a little bit.  You've been

instructed not to say as much or not to be as out spoken.  No?

Hillary:  I've heard that but I never know who says it.  I think it's

wishful thinking on the part of some people.  I want to tell you

something.  I thought what you did the night after the L.A. riots was

the way television ought to be.  I was so impressed.  Yeah.

Clinton:  It was a wonderful show.

Hillary:  It was not only a great show.  It was honest and it gave

people a chance to connect with each other-what you and Bill were

talking about earlier.  And it used television in a positive way-not

just reporting from a distance, not just pointing fingers, but involving

people and letting those of us at home watching feel we had some

role, some say, too.  I was real pleased.

Arsenio:  See we gotta stay involved everyday. After the fires burn

out, we can't allow our involvement to burn out.  A few weeks before

the riots, I had been on the hill-invited by Louis Stokes-to talk

about gangs and violence.  I'm heavily involved in a lot of those

issues.  What do we do about the gangs and the violence in our

inner-cities.  The black on black crime.  How do we stop it?

Clinton:  Well, if there was a simple answer it would be done

already.

        I think you've got to start with a safe streets strategy.  The

cities that are safer are those that have neighborhood policing, where

the people that live in neighborhoods look at police as their friends.

They see them every day.  The police know the kids that are in

trouble, or about to be.  They work together to keep harmony and

peace.  We need to help those policemen by giving those kids

something else to do-more one on one relations with successful

adults.

        And when they do get in trouble, instead of sending them off to

jail the first time, they ought to be put in community boot camps

where they can do community service work, have drug treatment

and education.

        And I think we ought to pass the Brady Bill and do something

to get some of these guns off the street.  You need a safe streets

strategy.

        Then you need something for the kids to say, "yes" to.

Everybody wants to be in a gang.  If you go to your church, it's a

gang.  It's just a good a gang.  Makes you feel good to be there on

Sunday.  We are social animals.  We have to be part of something

bigger than ourselves.

        You've gotta take those gangs and give them some way to be

winners as gangs, or give people good gangs to be a part of.  We've

got to give these kids something to say yes to.

        The L.A. Conservation Corps, ought to be a national model.  And

it ought to be dramatically expanded for ways for young people to

work.

        Those are the things we've got to do.  We've got to change lives

from the outside in and from the inside out.  And there's no simple

strategy.  The government can do some things, but people on the

street have to do others.

Arsenio:  The reason I ask you questions like this-these are not

just black questions.  "Mr. Crime", "Mr. Frustration," own cars now.

They'll be coming to the suburbs real soon.  That's why we have to

solve these inner-city problems.

Clinton:  I was in Macomb County, Michigan-which is virtually all

white-outside Detroit.  That's the home of the "Reagan Democrats."

You know, "The Democratic Party left me. I'm tough.  I'm

conservative."  I was there a couple of days after a fifteen year-old

white kid shot another one in the schools.  This is not just race.  It's

about ethics and education, and economics.  And it's about kids being

divorced from the life we want them to live.  There's all these

disconnections.  It's like people's circuits have shorted out.

        People like you-at least you're reaching out and trying to touch

them again.  And what you've got to do is to empower people like all

of the rest of us-people that aren't famous or rich but still have

incredible power to touch other people's lives.

Arsenio:  Yeah.  It's all of ours problem.  Now Hillary, why should

we vote for this man?

Hillary:  Because he's got the right combination of a great heart, and

a great mind, and he understands what's at stake in this country.  If

he were not convinced that we could do better, and that he could

inspire people-particularly young people-to feel good about

themselves and to be committed again to this country, he wouldn't

be in this race.  But he is, and he can.   And that's what we need

more than anything to get America back on the right track.

Arsenio:  I'm not here to tell you who to vote for, but vote for

somebody.  This is Bill-the Clinton family.

End of Transcript