Bill Clinton: “No, no, it's not the most important election in my career. But it's very important to me because it will determine how…”

“No, no, it's not the most important election in my career. But it's very important to me because it will determine how much I can do for the American people in the next 2 years. We did very well here in this budget this year. We got a downpayment on our 100,000 teachers; we got programs for hundreds of thousands of kids after school; we fended off a Republican attempt to raid the surplus before we fixed Social Security. But there was so much we did not do. And there is so much we still have to do that if we got a few more Democrats here, we could pass this Patients' Bill of Rights; we could have modernized schools and 100,000 more teachers; we could raise the minimum wage; we could secure Social Security; we could reform Medicare in the right way; we could do something for child care; we could do more for the areas of our country which still haven't felt the economic recovery. And so the last 2 years of my Presidency, I think, would be far more focused on progress, as opposed to this Washington partisan politics. So I would like it very much. It's terribly important to me. But the most important elections were the election and reelection in '92 and '96. Mr. Smiley. Let me follow up on that, and again I ask this respectfully, and I'll move on. I promise. The reason I asked that question in the first place is because you and I both know what you personally have at stake, what personally is riding on this election tomorrow. And you mentioned that the two most important elections were the one when you were elected in '92 and, of course, reelected in '96. And I would expect you to say that. But the reason why I asked whether or not you felt there was more riding on tomorrow is precisely because this election, depending on the outcome, could be the beginning of the undoing, the unraveling of what those two elections were all about.”