George H.W. Bush: “May I just say how wonderful it is to have the Prime Minister of Canada here with us today, great friend of the United…”

“May I just say how wonderful it is to have the Prime Minister of Canada here with us today, great friend of the United States. The relationship between Canada and the United States is strong; tremendous trading partner. Prime Minister Mulroney has done an awful lot in all ways in cooperating and working with us. Their leadership in many areas of peacekeeping is one that we respect and admire. He was the one that prodded me to do more on environmental legislation. And so for me and for Barbara, this is a fond farewell as we leave this job. And it's most fitting, in our way of looking at things, that Prime Minister Mulroney and his wonderful family are with us here today. So we're going to talk some business, and then we're going to look around and have a little R&R. The floor is yours, sir. Welcome. Prime Minister Mulroney. Thank you, George. Well, we're delighted to be here. The President has pointed out the strength of the Canadian-American relationship. It's, as you know, a huge and a complicated one and not always an easy one. But it indicates the extent to which neighbors can become friends and mutually assisting partners. Canada is the largest trading partner that the United States has, and you are ours. And so President Bush's visionary initiative in respect to free trade throughout the hemisphere is one part of a very important legacy that he will be leaving. The Clean Air Act that gave rise to the Canadian-American treaty on acid rain is another very important matter that people in both countries had fought for for literally decades. And I can tell you that, because I happened to be there, that his remarkable assembling of the coalition in terms of the Gulf war----”