Bill Clinton: “I do, too. I think what Chicago has done--tells everybody that you've got to go to summer school if you don't measure…”

“I do, too. I think what Chicago has done--tells everybody that you've got to go to summer school if you don't measure up, and if you don't measure up a second time, you can't go ahead; your self-esteem will be hurt more when you're 50 and you can't read than it will be when you're 16 and you have to stay back another year--I think that's great. But let me just say, first of all, I think what you generally just said is absolutely right. The reason I wanted you to come here today is that I hope there will be another series of meetings where we'll get an even more diverse group--I mean, diverse by opinion. Because what I'm trying to get to is--here's my theory about this: I think if we could ever get to the point where we would ask ourselves, can we agree on the objective, and then talk about what means will work, and then look at the things we don't like and say, well, did it do any good and what harm did it do? For example, what I think about affirmative action, a lot of these economic--let's just take the economic affirmative action. What I honestly believe is that it did a profound amount of good for the people who got into the programs who might never have had a chance to be successful business men or women. But I believe the problems with it are twofold. Number one is, once you get in and you start doing it, it's hard to graduate out. This whole theory about graduating out and moving through, going out into the private sector--that theory never really worked very well. And we ought to fess up; those of us who were for it ought to say that's one of the problems that didn't work. The other problem is it doesn't reach the vast majority of the people who have a problem because it doesn't reach down into basically the isolated urban areas with people in the economic underclass. So if we say, okay--you know, we can all say, ``Okay, here are the facts. It was a pretty good thing, but it didn't do everything it was supposed to do.'' So should we argue about getting rid of it; should we argue about doing something else; should we argue about what's going to happen to these people? I mean, I think there's a lot to be said for that. Let me go back to what Steve said about the composition of the police force when you got into the tete-a-tete with the Vice President. Let me just mention three things because Governor Kean mentioned this. The seven white septuplets were delivered by two African-American women doctors. Two days later, two black kids were rescued in a Chicago fire by a white fireman. Nobody feels anything but good about that. Why is that? Or why do all these rich white Republicans pay to go down and watch some black guys play basketball at the MCI Center? I would argue there is something that all these things share in common that don't necessarily get answered in the police--[inaudible]. One is, in the case of pro basketball, here I am--I don't have a doubt in the world that, if I'd been good enough, I could have played pro basketball. I don't; if I'd been good enough, by God, I could have played. I was short, fat, and slow by today's standards. [Laughter] I couldn't play. Doesn't have anything to do with my race; I don't have a doubt in the world. If I have a child, I don't have a doubt in the world that my child can play if he or she is good enough. So that's the first threshold. Without regard to race--I think we can all agree with that. In whatever setting, people have to know if they're good enough, they can play; and if they need a hand up to prepare themselves, that they can get it. The second thing is, in the case of the black women doctors who delivered the septuplets--which is not always the case in the case of police, which is why I agree with the Vice President--in the community which was of a different race, there was no question about whether they could do their job in a way that would be fair to everybody. In the case of the white fireman who risked his life to go in and get the last two black kids in the Chicago fire, he made a statement that was louder than any words I will ever utter, that he was in tune with the people in that community. He was in tune enough that he was willing to lay his life down to save those two little children. Nobody will ever care again whether that guy is on their fire or sitting idly out in front of the fire station, as I hope he will be. So there's two criteria. One is, can you play if you're good enough, whatever the thing is? Two is, does everybody in the community have confidence that the people in the positions, whatever they are, have sufficient concern about them, are consistently involved with them, that whatever is supposed to be done is going to get done? I think in the case of the fireman and the doctors and the basketball players, the answer is yes. I think in the case of huge numbers of urban police departments, huge numbers of the business sector, huge sections of higher education, you can't say that the answer is yes. That's why I'm hung up about it. But I don't think that--I think the reason that I'd get frustrated if the debate is only about affirmative action, is if we win 100 percent of the debate, we're talking about 10 percent of the people. If you win 100 percent of the debate, we're still just talking about 10 percent of the people. What about everybody else? Ms. Chavez. That has been our argument. Ms. Thernstrom. But, why don't you have confidence that we can train policemen the way we train firemen so that when a policeman shows up at the door, it doesn't matter what the race of that policeman is?”