Bill Clinton: “Well, I think the--I think--first of all, let's talk about the pay. We now have the funds from Congress to now resume…”

“Well, I think the--I think--first of all, let's talk about the pay. We now have the funds from Congress to now resume pay increases and to keep it up at whatever the legal level is. And if Congress chooses to raise the legal level--that is, they choose to let us do a little more percentage-wise per year--we'll even be able to keep up with that as long as it's not too much. But now we at least know we can fund pay increases every year up to the legally authorized limit, which is a good thing. And I think what--most people that join the military know they'll never get rich, but they want to know that they're not going to be impoverished, and they want to have a predictable income. So my goal here is to have a predictable income that goes up on a regular basis so that if you join or if you reenlist, you'll know what the 5-year trend is going to be, for example. In addition to that, I think it's important to maintain the educational benefits, both the Montgomery GI bill benefits and to emphasize what I think a lot of people get out of the military, which is that they can do exciting and interesting things and they're almost continually being educated and trained. I mean, if every major company worked on developing the capacity of its people the way our armed services do, we would be even more powerful economically than we are. So I think that--I think the mission is what really attracts people, and knowing that if they join the United States military forces, they'll be the absolute best in the world at what they do and they'll be doing something wonderful for their country. But I believe that maintaining the quality of life issues and keeping the training and readiness up and making sure that people have the chance to be continuously retrained for different things, those issues--based on what the service personnel I have visited with in Europe and Asia, in the Pacific, and all over the continental United States, based on what all those folks have told me, I would say those are the major issues.”