George H.W. Bush: “Well, I came prepared with a few cheaters because on this beautiful day it is most fitting and appropriate that we talk…”

“Well, I came prepared with a few cheaters because on this beautiful day it is most fitting and appropriate that we talk about the environment, with the emphasis on those that like the outdoors and believe in multiple use and believe in fishing and believe in hunting and believe in camping. And I do, and my family does. I did want to try this morning, though, to put in perspective before taking questions what I think is a pretty good environmental record. I don't pretend to be able to keep every organization happy. I can't do that because I also have a certain--not only do I feel a sense of obligation to stewardship of the parks and of the wilderness and of the great outdoors, but I also feel a sense of stewardship towards American families that are trying to work for a living. To achieve a balance between growth and the environment is something that I think every President ought to feel an obligation to achieve. And I've tried to do exactly that. But before getting to the questions, and I hope it's not too self- serving, I thought I'd just click off some accomplishments that I think should make a difference to those who share my love of the outdoors. We signed, I guess, the most forward-looking environmental legislation in modern times in a revival and renewal of the Clean Air Act, improvement of the Clean Air Act. I believe that it's going to have a major effect not just on the great outdoors as we all love it but on the cities and everything else. We've assessed more fines for violations of environmental policy, environmental law, than any previous administration. And indeed, more people are incarcerated for actually violating the environmental laws of this country. We've doubled the funding, doubled the funding for national parks, wildlife, and outdoor recreation, and tripled the funds, tripled the funds for States for parks and open space. I think that's a good record. We've proposed or added 20 new national parks, proposed or added 57 new wildlife refuges, added 1.5 million new acres to the national parks, and added 6.4 million acres to the vast Wilderness System. Twenty-seven hundred miles of rivers to Wild and Scenic Rivers System have been added. We've increased wetlands protection from 295 million to 812 million since I've been President. And I'd like to hear from some and maybe answer some questions on the controversy that surrounds the wetlands policy. But I believe our policy of no net loss is good. We've added to the wetlands to compensate for those areas where there has been loss. We've closed off the oil development in certain environmentally sensitive areas of the California coast, the Florida coast, and in New England, isolating them until the year 2000 when we can look at technology and look at the environment. We've established three new national marine sanctuaries, including the most recent one in Monterey Bay, which is, I guess, the largest one ever; increased funding, and this comes as great interest to some here, for fishing, fisheries management, and $80 million added to that and requested full funding for Wallop-Breaux. Let me just say here that when you get in Washington you might have some earmarked funds, but the propensity in the way it works with the Congress is they want to take those earmarked funds and use them for other purposes. I stood up against that because I believe in Wallop- Breaux; I believe that the money ought to be used for what we said it would be used for. And I'm going to keep on fighting for that principle. And we fought for a lot of projects, Superfund and all, where we've not gotten the funding we requested. But I'm going to keep on working to try to do that. So I cite this because as you get into a political year and you get into a subject that has this many variations, environmental protection, you're bound to take some heat. But I'm very proud of the record. The last thing I'd mention is Rio de Janeiro. I do not consider it leadership to go and fall in line with a bunch of other countries who accept standards and don't live up to them. When the United States makes a commitment, we ought to keep our word. Great countries, like great men, should keep their word. That's what a former Justice of our Supreme Court said, and that's the way I feel. So I did not go down there to try to get in line, putting standards and prohibitions on the United States that we couldn't live up to or didn't want to. So we did do well on forestry down there. We did do well on climate control. I have insisted that we don't make more regulations unless we know where the science is on these things. It's very inexact at this point. And yet, underlying it all was my commitment and our administration's commitment to a sound environment. So that's where we stand. I don't know how this is all set up, Val, but I'll be glad to go for questions. Here's one right here.”