Bill Clinton: “First of all, we're all tied in knots now over this budget, right? I mean, it's totally unnecessary, but we are. We…”

“First of all, we're all tied in knots now over this budget, right? I mean, it's totally unnecessary, but we are. We shouldn't be. Now, can you imagine if we had no arms control agreements? Let's just suppose we tore them all up tomorrow--nothing, no nonproliferation agreement. Then this same crowd would be coming in and saying. ``Well, now there's no nonproliferation agreements, you know, and here's a list of 12 countries that we think they have two scientists who can figure out how to put together a small nuclear weapon. And there's no Chemical Weapons Convention or Biological Weapons Convention, so they've got those labs chugging right along here. And therefore, we need you to increase the budget for all this to the labs and the Pentagon by another $30 or $40 or $50 billion a year. So, I'm sorry, we'll just have to get out of the business of funding education. We can't afford to invest any more in health care. The American people just have to figure out what to do on their own.'' It would totally erode the fabric of our domestic climate. Meanwhile, what happens overseas? Countries that could be putting money into the education and health care and development of their children, whether they're democracies or military dictatorships or communist countries, will be sitting there saying, ``Well, you know, we'd like to lower the infant mortality rate. We'd like to lower the hunger rate. We'd like to lower the poverty rate. We'd like to raise the literacy rate. But look at what the Americans are doing. Look at what our neighbors are doing. Let's spend half our money on military.'' It would be great for the people that build this stuff, but for everybody else it would be a nightmare. Consider the Japanese, coming out, we earnestly hope, of their long economic slump, having honored, since World War II, their commitment to be a non-nuclear state and to spend a small percentage of their income on defense. What in the world would they do in such a world? And if they had to divert 4, 5, 6 percent of their gross national product to defense, what kind of economic partner would they be? What would happen in Latin America, the area which has been the area that was the greatest growth for us in trade? After we have worked so hard, you've got Brazil to renounce its nuclear program. You've got former adversaries working together in trade agreements. What would happen if they all of a sudden got antsy and decided, ``Well, you know, we have no national status. Our people, you know, we'll have the same elements in our country saying we can't defend ourselves. We've got to have a biological program, a chemical program, a nuclear program.'' I mean, you know, all this sounds good. But the idea that the best way for us to go forward--since right now, at this particular moment in history, we enjoy the greatest wealth and the greatest power--is to build this big old wall and tell all of our friends and neighbors to go take a hike. ``We're not cooperating with them anymore. As far as we're concerned, any might be an enemy, and anything you want to do with your money is fine with us, because we have more money than you do, so whatever you do, we'll do more.'' I think it will be a bleak, poor, less secure world. I don't want my children and my grandchildren or your children or your grandchildren to live in it. They believe that. I will do everything I can to stop it. Yes. Senate Action on the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty”