Bill Clinton: “Well, you know, that great humorist Ogden Nash once said, ``Progress may be all right, but it's really gone on too…”

“Well, you know, that great humorist Ogden Nash once said, ``Progress may be all right, but it's really gone on too long.'' [Laughter] And I was thinking that if he were here tonight, he would have to revise his opinion. This has been an astonishing evening for me and for Hillary and I hope for all the American people and the people throughout the world who have been a part of this. I want to thank you both. I want to just leave you with one thought: There are public responsibilities involved here, particularly for basic research. We have been very successful, and never more successful than under the leadership of Dr. Varmus, in getting strong bipartisan, nonpartisan support for investments in health. And I think that it's obvious that we can all see that as in our self-interest and as in the public interest. We want to live forever, and we're getting there. But I think it's quite important also not to forget our responsibilities for basic research in other areas as well. And one of the things that we will come to know as the intersection of your two disciplines, informatics and genomics, come together, then we will have to study even more closely how all this that we know about the human body and its development interacts with changes in the environment. So other areas of research will be also important, into things like global warming and climate change and the sustainability of the environment. And what I hope we can do is to build a broader consensus, as we look into the new millennium, for the whole research enterprise in those areas where it will never be productive in the beginning, or profitable for people like you, to do the beginning. And then we can find these things, and then the American entrepreneurial genius will take off. And so I leave here with a renewed commitment to trying to help people like you get started. We may not understand it, those of us in politics, but we have an obligation to help you find it. And when the first mouse graduates from Princeton, I will invite you both to deliver the commencement address. [Laughter] Thank you, and good evening.”