TIME - Man of the Year/CompactPublishing-TimeMagazine-TimeManOfTheYear-Win31MSDOS.iso/moy/010493/01049926.000

Text File | 1993-04-08 | 17.3 KB | 400 lines

                                                                                MAN OF THE YEAR, Page 34

BILL CLINTON

"First, We Have to Roll Up Our Sleeves"


BILL CLINTON explains how he will make the hard choices that
lie ahead. And, with his wife HILLARY, he describes a political
partnership without precedent in the history of the Republic.

By HENRY MULLER and JOHN F. STACKS/Little Rock and Bill Clinton
and Hillary Clinton


    Q. It's tempting to compare this moment in history to
F.D.R. in 1932 or J.F.K. in 1960 or even Ronald Reagan in 1980
-- all watershed years. In terms of the task you face, which of
these comparisons seems most appropriate?

    A. Probably somewhere between Roosevelt and Kennedy. The
economy is not as devastated as it was under Roosevelt, and the
changes we need to make don't involve as much Big Government or
Keynesian economics, but they are quite profound. There's a
sense that we need to get the country moving again. That's what
Kennedy brought to the White House. But structurally the things
we have to do here at home are more profound than what we had
to face in 1961.


    Q. You've also been admiring of Reagan.

    A. Substantively, the best thing he did early was to
restore the country's sense of confidence and optimism and
possibility.


    Q. Do you feel you have as much of a mandate to make
changes as any of those three Presidents did when they were
elected?

    A. I guess it depends on how you read the results of the
election. If it had been a two-person race, the popular margin
would have been greater, but the electoral margin might have
been slightly tighter. It's hard to calculate because some
states were so close. I think what I have a mandate to do from
the people who voted for Clinton and Perot, and some of the
people even who voted for Bush, is to try to make the government
work again, to strengthen the economy to solve problems, to
represent the people at large rather than just the people who
are organized and have great wealth.


    Q. Did Perot make your task easier by getting people to
focus on the fact that some of the solutions will be painful?

    A. Maybe. But another thing that was very helpful coming
out of his campaign was this whole emphasis on political
reform. When I became the nominee of the Democratic Party, in
a country that hadn't voted for a Democrat in a long time, there
were all these people who wanted political reform but weren't
sure any Democrat could deliver it. So when Perot got the vote
he got, that really gave me the impetus to stick with the
political reform. I think this will open the system to making
tougher decisions.

    On the deficit thing, what was said helps people to think
about making tough decisions. What they want is for [the
solutions] to be fair and commonsensical. People understand
more and more that at least over the long run, you've got to do
something about it.


    Q. Are there some things that Perot proposed, like the
gasoline tax, that you think might now be more palatable to the
public?

    A. What came out of the economic summit here made me think
that there might be more receptivity to it, and it might be
something we can look at in the context of an overall program
that seemed fair to people. But you've got to understand what
most voters brought to this election, at least most people who
voted for me. They brought a keen awareness that while most of
them were worse off than they were 10 years ago, there had been
a big divergence in income in America. Inequality had got worse,
and all the tax breaks had gone to the people who were doing
better anyway. This is a much more unequal country than it was
10 years ago. I just don't want to see us raise the gas tax
through the roof on top of what has already been done to
middle-class people and small-business people without some
effort to put fairness back in the system.


    Q. Do you think that in the short run you'll ask, say, the
veterans and the older people and whoever is going to have to
take a hit to accept a bit of pain that they might not like?

    A. I expect to lead with a program that will maximize jobs
and income growth as we try to come out of this recession in
the short run and, secondly, will fundamentally change the
patterns of spending not only of government money but, to
whatever extent we can influence it, private expenditures toward
more investment over the long run. And thirdly, we will offer
a multiyear deficit-reduction plan. I might even go, in terms
of the framework, beyond four years in what I recommend. Because
if you look at the numbers we're looking at now, two things have
basically changed dramatically since we got the numbers on which
we put out Putting People First [the Clinton-Gore campaign
book].

    One is that because the recession went on longer than was
anticipated, the short-term deficit is considerably bigger than
anyone thought it was six or seven months ago. (Mrs. Clinton
enters the room and sits in an armchair next to the
President-elect.) The second thing that happened on this deficit
is that in the out years -- that is 1997, 1998 and beyond -- it
also looks bigger than they originally thought, given the
assumptions on health care. Now I think we can fix a lot of
that. People know it took 12 years to get into this trough we're
in. And I think they'll tolerate taking maybe eight years to get
out of it. But I need to put together a framework that goes
beyond the typical discussion of long run.


    Q. So you're basically looking at a tougher situation than
you thought?

    A. On the deficit stuff yes, but the short-run economic
situation may not be quite as bad. The underlying reality has
not changed. The difference between my view of this economy and
[the views of] most people who talk to me about it is that I
do not see the short-term recession, the built-in structural
deficit and the other issues as isolated. I see them as all of
a piece. I'm not trying to avoid what you might call the hard
choices. I'm just trying to say, What we've got to do is to put
all these things together. It's got to be a short-term economic
plan in which everything you do is consistent with the long-term
objectives, which is why you have to be careful about how big
a stimulus you put into this thing.


    Q. What are you most anxious about as you approach the
presidency? What can go wrong?

    A. Three things, I guess. One is that this is a very
troubled world we live in. We are seeing the flip side of the
wonder of the end of the cold war. The bipolar world gave the
U.S. and the Soviet Union a limited capacity to contain some of
what we are now witnessing in Bosnia. I'm worried about what is
happening in Russia. I think it's all eminently predictable that
there would be some setbacks.

    The second thing I worry about is just getting bogged
down. The voters have so much hope now for us to do things. They
want us to get out there and get things done and show some
movement.

    My third concern is purely personal. I want this to be a
good move for our daughter. Hillary and I have talked about
that a lot. [Chelsea] has had a good life here. It's exciting
for her now. She's smart and pretty grownup for her age and
interested in it. But I want her life to unfold without being
destructively impacted by this.


    Q. How much of that is within your control?

    A. We're about to find out.


    Q. Mrs. Clinton, do you share those concerns?

    Mrs. Clinton: Yes, the only other thing I would add is
whether, given the high expectations and the need for change,
you can work out the right balance between moving forward and
not getting caught up in politicizing everything you do, so that
you have a chance substantively to try to make some things work
before people get distracted and thrown into a frame of mind of
skepticism or loss of will. I think that is an endemic problem
now in our society, this whole short-term fixation that we've
got and the incapacity to plan for the long run and to have a
vision of where you're going and to try to stay the course to
get there. I just hope there can be enough momentum and that
people individually feel committed enough so that they take some
responsibility.

    Clinton: I think that was our enduring legacy here. People
here kept voting for me because they knew there was a real
long-term vision. There's a lot of difference between passing
a law and galvanizing people's energies. We've got to seize the
opportunities and really confront these problems. There is a
sense that we have to do it together. Like Hillary, I don't know
how long it will persist. We have to show ways to manifest this
progress.


    Q. One way to keep this feeling going is to stay in touch
with the people. Can you do that the way you did in Arkansas,
with the press and the Secret Service?

    A. But there's a flip side to the press. Everything you do
is magnified. So that if you have an encounter on Georgia
Avenue [in a working-class neighborhood of Washington], it
reverberates across the country in a way it never did when I was
Governor. When I was Governor and went to Crittenden County, it
was not on the front page of the Little Rock newspapers -- "Oh,
Bill's up in the country. That's where he belongs."

    You have to be very disciplined about it too. First of
all, we have to establish the Administration as one that's
rolling up its sleeves and going to work from the President on
down, where there's a serious, passionate commitment to the
interests of the American people. When the work is well in hand,
then I can begin to go back out in the country and do a lot of
these things. But I think that when we travel, both of us, it
ought to be not just to be in touch with people but to be in
touch with them over something that together we can do.

    Mrs. Clinton: The model of the economic conference may be
one that we try to build on. It was open to the public. It was
carried on television. Individuals who were there represented
many people like themselves in many respects. And there was a
sense in which the viewer who watched it on television or read
about it in the paper felt a part of it. If we can keep that
especially around issues, I think people will feel they are in
touch.

    The most important part of all this is results. What are
the outcomes of all this effort? What is it that is happening
that is changing people's lives? We've talked a lot about how
you create a culture within the government, along the lines of
what many companies have tried to do as they restructured,
trying not only to build teams but to create a shared vision and
to have a sense of direction that it keyed to the outcome you
are trying to achieve. It sounds corny, but we'd love it if the
people in the government in the Clinton-Gore Administration go
to work every day and say to themselves on the way to work,
"What am I going to do today that will help Americans?" and at
the end of the day, they'd say to themselves, "What have I done
today to make anyone's life get better?" Those kinds of
questions are markers that will help to create a culture within
the government that we hope will communicate itself to people
so that they will feel their interests are being represented,
even if they don't personally get to see Bill out on the street
doing something.

    Clinton: That reminds me. You asked me earlier what else
had surprised me. I'm a little chagrined to admit this because
it shouldn't surprise me, having been a Governor for 12 years.
But one of the things that has struck me since I won this
election is that there are a huge number of people who work for
the Federal Government and know about all these things I care
about. Many of them have been out there for years, and nobody
has ever asked them for their opinion. There are a lot of really
gifted, devoted people who ought to be given a chance to hook
into this future we are trying to build.


    Q. John Kennedy said that after he was elected, he began
to think in terms of who it was he had to have in the room when
he made the really big decisions. For him, that was Robert
Kennedy. Who is it for you?

    A. Hillary.


    Q. How does that work? If you disagree, how do you work
that out? Or don't you disagree?

    Both: Oh, yes, we disagree.

    Clinton: It depends. If we disagree and I think I'm right,
I just go on and do what I think is right. And then she tells
me, "I told you so." (Laughter.) We've always had a lot of back
and forth. The only time we really couldn't do it was in
Hillary's law practice, where it would have been inappropriate
for her to discuss some case she had. Otherwise we have always
just talked about our business, her business and mine, and
given our opinions and helped each other to think through
problems. I really respect her judgment. On a lot of these
things, she has this mountain of knowledge and experience.


    Q. How often is he wrong?

    Mrs. Clinton: That's not the way we do it, actually. In
the process of talking about things, which we do all the time,
we change each other's mind a lot. There is just a different
perspective about things that I bring, that he brings. And it's
rare that I think he's wrong. I think that maybe it should have
been done differently or the process might have been something
other than what it was. But I can say that over all these years,
I can't think of anything where I was really upset about what
he did. We think so much alike, and our values are so much
alike. It's more an exploration of all the sides and all the
approaches and the way you should think about something. As he
said, if he decides he's right, then he's right and then he goes
on with it.

    The other part of it is, you know, Bill seeks advice from
everybody. It's not a closed circle by any means. One of the
things that all the members of his Cabinet and Administration
will have to learn is that he can spend an hour seeking their
advice on something and then they'll be walking down the hallway
with him and he'll stop and ask somebody else the very same
thing because he wants to make sure he's getting all the
information he needs to make a decision.

    Clinton: I believe that if you look at the most successful
organizations in this country, that's what they do. Hillary was
on the Wal-Mart board, and I was always fascinated by the way
those executives would sit around and have their meetings and
take some issue and just talk it through to death and get every
angle of it.

    Mrs. Clinton: And not in a hierarchical way, in a team
approach, where people were just as likely to say to Sam Walton,
"I think that's the craziest idea I ever heard," as they were
to say, "Gee, I agree with you, Sam." That had such an impact
upon me personally. It gets back to my culture point. I think
the best organizations encourage that kind of openness, that
kind of cross-fertilization of people's abilities. Yes, there
has to be a decision maker, and there isn't any doubt as to who
the decision maker is on all these issues. There wasn't in
Arkansas, and there won't be in the White House.


    Q. Has anyone said, "That's the craziest idea I ever
heard" since you've been elected?

    Clinton: Most of the people who have any relationship with
me feel free to disagree with me.


    Q. And that hasn't changed?

    Clinton: No, I think what will happen . . .

    Mrs. Clinton: They bow down first, before they disagree.
(Laughter.) They drop to their knees. . .

    Clinton: If I read that in TIME, I'm going to play golf
all during the Christmas season . . .

    Mrs. Clinton: We haven't gone to the mat on the floor yet.
. .

    Clinton: No, I think a lot of the folks who are just
getting to know me will just have to feel that out. But I really
try to encourage that. You know, the trappings and all that
stuff I think is bogus and gets in the way of honest
communication. If they want me to be a successful President,
they've got to tell me what they think. It doesn't offend me
when people disagree with me.


    Q. We can't stop wondering: the morning after the
election, what were the first words you said when you both knew
. . .

    Clinton: . . . that I've been elected President? I looked
at her and just started laughing.

    Mrs. Clinton: That's exactly right.

    Clinton: I woke up. She looked at me, and I looked at her,
and we just started laughing, like, Can you believe that this
happened to us?

    Mrs. Clinton: A friend of ours said it's like the dog that
keeps chasing the car and all of a sudden catches it.


    Q. Do you think about it every minute?

    Clinton: No.


    Q. When do you not think about it?

    Clinton: Oh, when I read my mystery books when I go to bed
at night, and when I'm talking to Chelsea. I'm not obsessed
about it. Look, the genius of democracy, the thing the Founding
Fathers understood, was that by definition most people who could
ever get elected to anything could do most of what they'd have
to do. To be preoccupied with the institution of the presidency
keeps you from thinking about the people who sent you there and
the problems they have. I really do get up every day and just
put one foot in front of the other and not think about "it" as
if it were some disembodied thing. I'm just going to do the very
best I can and try to have a wonderful time doing it.