Bill Clinton: “Well, the only problem with that is, if you give it all up you have no control on the amount of money being spent. And…”

“Well, the only problem with that is, if you give it all up you have no control on the amount of money being spent. And the argument for the public funding is simply that the Supreme Court has-- that unless you give candidates something, you can't condition how much they spend. So if the object is to control the cost of campaigns, as well as to limit the influence of PAC's, and to open the airwaves, it is difficult to meet all those objectives if you don't have some public funding. They're talking about the various compromises. I don't know whether they can reach one, but that's why I hope that Republicans who voted for the bill last year will think about it. It is essential to limit the overall costs of campaigns, and somehow there's got to be a public funding element to it. Thank you.”