Bill Clinton: “Absolutely. I don't intend to back away at all. But I do intend to say that this is going to be a 21st century…”

“Absolutely. I don't intend to back away at all. But I do intend to say that this is going to be a 21st century organization, that it's more than a debating forum and--that involves a collective decision by the community of free nations to deploy people all across the world, not just in military situations, like peacekeeping, but in other ways, where it's going to have to be run very well and it's going to have to be able to inspire the confidence of taxpaying citizens not only in the United States but throughout the world. But I think--I still think the fundamental fact is that the end of the cold war permits the U.N. to live up to its full potential; that we ought to become--we ought to stay involved, we ought to pay our fair share, and we ought to be very grateful that there are other countries that are willing to spend their money and actually put their people at risk in places where either we wouldn't do it or we don't now have to do it all, we don't have to carry the whole load; and that we ought to be willing to lead in an atmosphere in which we also have to cooperate from time to time, especially when others are making a greater sacrifice and when the problem's in their backyard. And that is--that's the sort of future we ought to want. And we also ought to be mature enough to recognize that as long as human beings are alive on the Earth, bad things will happen, problems will exist, and that there will never be a complete and easy solution to all the problems in the world. This is not--the world will never be problem-free. But far better this course into the future than either having the nuclear cloud hang over the world, as it did in the cold war, or having the U.S. become an isolationist power, as we did between the wars, and run the risk of other terrible things happening all around the world which would drag us back into another war in the future. In other words, the course that I advocate is not problem-free because as long as there are people and as long as bad people can get political power in various places, there will always be problems in the world. But it is far better than the alternative, better than what we went through in the cold war and better than having an American isolationism. Military Base Closings Ms. Yoachum. Sir, one question away from the U.N., and that is the subject of military bases. One of your political allies, Senator Boxer, has asked you to consider sparing some of the bases in California slated to be closed. At the same time, one of your political opponents, Pete Wilson, plans to attack the administration in a speech this evening in New Hampshire for what he says are artificially low target levels that OMB has given the Department of Defense, which has resulted in a need to close more military bases than necessary to meet the budget targets. I'm wondering first, on the political ally side, if there is any chance that you would spare any of the bases in California, and on the political opponent side, what you would say to that criticism by Governor Wilson?”