General Wesley Clark at UAW Local 1314 in Huntsville AL
January 15, 2007
Transcription by Melange
You have to understand also, I taught economics and political philosophy. I’ve worked in the civilian side of the Office of Management and Budget in the White House, I’m a businessman. I have, like, four different businesses. I consult for various different companies and I’ve been around the block a few times. So I’ve got strong ideas.
I believe we need to raise the minimum wage. We need to help small businesses in this country. We need to fix the access to the healthcare system. We’ve got to stop the unfunded mandates, that are running out for the No Child Left Behind Act. We’ve got to raise and enhance teacher pay and morale and performance. We’ve got to get preschool education for every child in America.
In America we’ve got to take a much more proactive role in helping Americans help themselves. Families need help. Families need leadership. Families need an advocate. I’m not talking about someone who hands out dollars or food stamps in a program and who says “Oh, I’m sorry, you don’t meet the criteria for the program.” I’m talking about people who know that family and will stand up and argue for that family. And if the programs don’t work to help our people, they’ll get those programs changed. So, I think we’ve got to really have a broad front program to help this country. If we don’t, we’re not going to be competitive in the larger, global environment. And ultimately, America’s strength, as General Eisenhower said is not our Armed Forces. It’s America’s economy. It’s the men and women who work and the men and women who put those companies together and lead those companies. And it’s teamwork. And it’s about teamwork.
I think our labor unions have a vital role in this. Our labor unions have to be strengthened. We need the ability to do real training,
(Applause)
And real education through the unions.
(Applause)
I think the union movement is the real secret weapon of the American economy. We just have to turn it loose.
Some of you may not believe that, cause you’re not applauding... or maybe you’re stunned in amazement that I’m saying this (laughter). But I’ll tell you why.
Because what I discovered in the Army, was, and I’m not just an Army guy, but I’ve thought about these things, and I’ve watched them through organizations. People have to have a coach. They have to have some help. When you lose a job in America, there’s no one out there for you. Oh, you can go to the state or county employment office and say, “Are there any jobs?” but no one’s really there FOR you.
Our union movement, reaching across this country, knows where job openings are. Knows what skills are required. Can bring people together and provide the training, provide the medical assistance that’s required as transition, aid in the movement of household goods and baggages. You can become, in the union movement, what we do for our soldiers in the Army, you can do for America.
(Applause)
You can make labor mobility real in America.
(snip)
In response to a question about rebuilding New Orleans after Katrina, Clark says:
In one of my business connections, we’re working with the state of Louisiana and we’re trying to fix this. We’re also going to reach out to those people who’ve lost their homes, especially those in the 9th Ward, and try to get them BACK home to New Orleans. This is a tough challenge, now. This is a tough challenge because you’re dealing with the federal government that hadn’t exactly been competent in this. (laughter) So it’s taking a LOT of effort. (Applause)
Question from the audience:
How many years it will take to undo the damage the Bush administration has done to this country.
“I’ve got a question here, he says “How many years it will take to undo the damage the Bush administration has done to our foreign policy?”
I think, first of all, it cannot be undone by the Bush Administration, no matter how many years they stay in office.
(Applause)
I think it CAN be undone by a new administration and a new congress but mostly it can be done by the American people. Because this is about us and who we are as a nation. Who are the American people?
Are we the 6-gun badge, wearing people with the hat that says ‘There’s a new sheriff in town. Stick’em up”?
I don’t think so. I think the American people are people who treat each other with respect, who believe in diversity, who, when they discover that things aren’t fair, they fix it. And I think that the American people when they understand that ‘those people over there’, no matter how they dress or what language they speak; they’re pretty much the same as us. They’ve got families and loved ones. They want to have hope in their future. They want to be treated with respect, and they haven’t been. And they’re pretty courageous people, and if you want to go to war against them they’ll fight back. And their boys are just about as brave as our boys are, and they can use about the same weapons whether they can be from computers and “internets” and so forth. So the best thing we can do is treat people with respect and talk to them. And I think if we do that, and if the American people understand that that’s the way we should conduct ourselves in foreign affairs, we’ll have no problem.
The American people are loved around the world. It’s only the policies of this government which are disliked and we can fix that.
(Applause)
Question from the audience:
When you become president, you’re going to inherit a huge problem in the Middle East. What is your solution?
In the Middle East? I think you have to start... This is the Gordian Knot. There are really six inter-related problems. There’s a failing mission in Afghanistan, and there’s a terrorist base in Pakistan that is feeding Al Queda as well as the failure in Afghanistan, there’s a nuclear challenge from Iran, there’s a war going on – that’s a civil war—in Iraq, there’s a government that’s about to fall apart in Lebanon, there’s fighting between the Israelis and the Palestinians and the Syrians want parts of Israel that are probably not going to be given back. I think I’ve hit six there.
All these are inter-related. Now, I know Jim Baker and the Iraq Study Group, former Secretary of State Jim Baker, said what we need to do is to go talk to people and I understand that he went to talk to the Syrian Ambassador.
And I’m told the conversation went something like this:
“What’s it gonna take for you boys to help us out?” Now that may work in a Texas oil deal, but that is NOT diplomacy.
(Laughter and Applause)
I have been in diplomacy, and the way it works is, you send 3 or 4 people over there and you give them an airplane and you say, “Don’t come back anytime soon.” And I did that with Richard Holbrook. We started in the middle of August, in the Balkans, we went to... I started with the National Security Advisor, Tony Lake. I was a 3-star in the Army. We went to seven countries. We went into that area... it took 3 months, and we developed an agreement that stopped a war that had run 2 million people out and killed 250,000 people.
The Middle East will be much tougher. But it MUST start with dialog. You take along some principles to guide the dialog and you take a kit bag. In it, you’ve got some carrots and you’ve got some sticks. And you figure out how you’re going to deploy the carrots and the sticks and what you’re going to be able to produce. There’s no guarantees that it will work but it’s the right place to start and that’s where I would start.
Responding to more questions:
On US drug policy
First of all, with respect, (very quickly) on drugs. I ran the Source Zone interdiction when I was the Commander in Chief of the US Southern Command 10 years ago. I was a 4-star general in Quarry Heights, Panama. I flew all over Colombia, Peru and Bolivia. I saw the coca huts. I saw how they manufactured the paste. I oversaw the plan to strengthen the armed forces in Colombia. That’s only part of the problem.
We’ve got 2 other parts of the problem that are really important. We’ve got to work with our neighbors in Latin America to promote real economic development. You’ve got a lot of poor people down there struggling to survive, and the only crop they can grow is coca. And they’re going to grow it, because there’s a cash demand for it.
And that’s the other side of it. We’ve got to work with our youngsters here in America and we’ve got to turn off the demand side.
On the direction of the US economy
We need some leading sectors that we put money into. And you know that very well here in Huntsville because you’re part of this leading aerospace sector, but we need to work in alternative energy, we need to work on the environmental remediation, we need to work on green construction. We need to new materials and nanotechnology and life sciences and biotechnology and I mean really MAKE IT OUR OWN. We did that with the Military Industrial Complex during the Cold War, but we’re in another struggle now, we’re in a struggle for the future of America. And I believe we can do that.
And going along with that, we’ve got to get our education system tuned up and we’ve got to have our unions in support of us.
On immigration
On immigration, ... I guess they’re going to put a fence across the Southwest border or at least parts of it. You know the thing about a fence is that, if you don’t deal with the issues, the fence is just an eyesore and an embarrassment. In some places, a fence, for a little while, can help. In San Diego, it kept people from just running across railroad tracks and running past the INS, but the real solution is to deal with the government of Mexico.
(Applause)
To actually have a relationship with them.
END of transcript