I'm delighted to be here to talk and this 25th anniversary celebration. Actually, that sounds like a long time. It's very hard for me to believe that when I was at the University of Minnesota. This college was not here. So it's tough. I was I did the graduation today at the University of Minnesota for the law school. And I said I used to identify with the students and I'll find myself identifying more and more with the parents. It's interesting. What time does to one? But anyway, what a wonderful facility and I always feel very very close to community colleges because in Denver, Colorado, I taught at several community colleges and I think they're very vital for any any City for this country for everything and the one issue that you've been discussing in this 25th anniversary thing of diversity. The diversity isWhat a Metropolitan Community College is all about it is very exciting. It is not the stereotypical college student. It is the community that Community Learning from all different walks. And I think that's the most exciting thing you can do. I always say this great country has made a big mistake and fighting diversity so hard I think it's the strongest thing we've got going for us, you know, the one area where we've allowed everybody to participate has been our culture. Obviously, you got to let everybody participate in the culture. There wasn't any way to shut him out like you can shut them out of being on a bank board or shut him out of some of the other things the culture we had to participate and when you look at our culture, that is the one major export we have there's not a country in the world that doesn't want our culture. They love our music. They love our sitcoms. They love the clothes whatever it is now.About it. Is there another place on the planet where Elvis Presley could have come from? You know, I don't think so. Our where rap music could have come from or Prince could have come from or I mean you go through the whole list or Madonna for that life could have come from I mean you really look at the range of our sitcoms of our music of everything and what really makes it so distinctive and so different is it's kind of a melding of a lot of different cultures that transpire here. So I find that a real message to us. And now as we look at our economy and we awaken and find ourselves in a global village boy, we ought to be able to out trade outdo everybody in this Global Village because we got people from every part of the globe and instead we're not using them that wellWhen I first got to Congress, I had several hearings on this and it was very interesting. The first committee I chaired was post office in Civil Service. The Civil Service part of it. We had Foreign Service hearings. We called in the Foreign Service. This is honest to God the truth and said to them excuse us, but why is everybody in the Foreign Service white male and from three universities and they went from the south and we're from the West they weren't for the three universities. Literally it was Peter preppy City and they were telling us things like well, you know, the other people don't like to travel with say what you can do an airport unbelievable things. We went through the tests that they were giving at that time and they were really devastating and nothing to do with foreign policy. There were things like who won the Conn villain Festival 1955. What does that have to do?With a sensible foreign policy. My premise was always we all have the best foreign policy in the world because we have people with roots everywhere in the world and yet if you looked at our state department, you would have never known it and if you looked at our foreign policy, it was really messed up and I just couldn't believe if you let the people with the roots from that part of the world run that part of our foreign policy. It would look anywhere like that. Well, we had other wonderful interesting hearings when we pass Title Nine, which said that women were to be granted the same privileges in universities that got Federal money that men or in any school, you know equal education. We literally had the then Chancellor of the University of Virginia, which is supposed to be a very prestigious distinguished School come and say you just can't do this to us do realize what this is going to cost the University of Virginia and we said cost he said yes because you see women will make it necessary for us to buy.more diminutive furniture He's all have to put in more kitchens because they eat more frequently something. I didn't know and finally he said and it's going to lower the academic standards because if you don't have if you don't have these long stag lines at the Saturday night dance, the men aren't going to work as hard and I'm like what? I don't know. Maybe they still had stag line, but they didn't have stag lines at the University of Minnesota when I was here. What were they talking about? So they were letting women in with with much higher scores than men because they had a very tight quota on women of late. I've been trying to get a little diversity in the armed services. We pointed out that the combat photos that came back from Panama. It looked like the women were in combat. It sounded like they were in combat. And of course the military was into. Oh no, no, no. No, they're just doing word processing. We would never put women in combat. And of course as you know, they turned the whole proposal down very emphatically. I met with some of the women officers and I learned a lot they said did you really think they were going to accept this and I said, well probably not but I had hoped that you know, they could move along and they said let me tell you about the umbrella rule that this is a military. We're in the Army when you are in your dress uniform if it's pouring down rain, you're still not allowed to carry an umbrella. It's too wimpy. They said now if it's 1990 and they still not been able to repeal the ban on umbrellas. How in the world are we ever going to get women in which I thought well, there's a very good point. Yeah, but isn't it interesting? It's like everybody's got their little tree house. You know, I mean you really read some of these Military Officers at this is our little tree house and no girls allowed. You see presidential politics and it's like this is our last Treehouse and no girls allowed you see all sorts of things those all sorts of people still have their little tree houses and they want to put their no fill in the blanks allowed. Whatever it is. They want to keep the way it is and you keep wondering what the point is when you look at the history of this country. It's been positively amazing how it's been Rewritten. It's been Rewritten in a way that Queen Victoria would love it because it fits the Victorian model of how things should be. They never were that way but we wrote them like they were and so a lot of people believe it. I mean you can go back and look at the beginning of this country. There's some image that Phyllis Schlafly tried to put out that the men came on these dangerous sailing ships and women came on cruise ships, you know, they're all sitting around getting their hair done getting their nails done. Well, I mean that's about as far from the truth as you can get if you look at How the West Was Won you look at it. I mean it was men and women together everywhere. You went I often do my women in history series, which is incredible. You can pick any era and at there's some amazing Heroes that we should have right after the Revolutionary War. There was an incredible woman in Massachusetts named mom, but very few people know she existed you got the Massachusetts State History Museum and they have a little carving of her about that big this woman taught herself to read she was black. She was a slave very bright started following this war figured out. It was for Liberty and Independence men at the war was over. She walked into a court in Boston and said, well the war was won and it was for Liberty and Independence and Here sign my papers. I'm now free. The judge was so bowled over he did. She she instantly got many more clients and actually interestingly enough. That's part of how slavery broke down in the North. Because people forget that that's there was slavery in the north to we always just think of the Civil War and somehow think that that line have been drawn in perpetuity. Well, why don't we know her name is a brilliant woman. I always think that Harriet Tubman. I always tell my military friends that Harriet Tubman was probably this one of the smartest military strategist the country ever had because she figured out very rapidly that if they had ever written down on a piece of paper the code to the Underground Railroad where people were escaping from the South if they ever had any listing of the homes they were using or the route they were using somebody would get it leaks. You know, you always hear about leaks and Washington while they've been leaks forever. She figured that out. So what did she do they put it all into code and then they put it into songs and they all learned the songs. So the white folks all thought they were singing songs. They And songs they were singing the code for how the and that's how they ran the Underground Railroad for years and years and years and nobody was ever ready to crack. Nobody's ever cracking even though they try I think that's fairly brilliant and you know the West out where I lived if it hadn't been for Native American women that I never found it, you know, and it never found it. I mean they had them out there showing him how to get there showing them what to do when they got there the whole nine yards. If you look at the West to when the Army was out in the west and the fort's it's very interesting for all of our talk about we do not put women in combat zones. Those forts were certainly combat zones and they had a rule that for every seven men in the fort you had to have one woman to do the laundry. We do put women in combat zones if it means, you know having to deal with ring around the collar very important. So when you look at our history, there's a whole different image that never came out. It's all been kind of suppressed and it does something to us because it makes us then feel like we don't deserve rights because we didn't help when this great country. I've been working with the the women veterans women veterans came back in body bags in World War II and we don't know that all sorts of them came back and we had women all over as nurses as doctors. There was one group that landed behind the lines in Germany and wandered around for like 13 months before they were finally and they all came out of it, you know, and our guys are still worried about where would they go to the bathroom? You know, you like come on, you know, let's grow up. So we did have an awful lot of Heroes at all different levels. I even think that the image of Martha And so positively amazing one because our images we had this wonderful little gray-haired lady who sat home and did needlepoint waiting for George. We all know that's our role right sit there do needlepoint put up preserves or whatever. Actually she spent all three Winters with the Continental Army. The minute the Harvest was over she would get on a horse or whatever and take off to find the Continental Army and be with it all winter long. So we have the oil paintings of George shivering with the troops. They forgot to put Martha and I'm sure she was this called the reason we know she did this is because when the war was over George came to the Congress and insisted they reimburse her and they did and they did now I think that's a very I mean I keep saying if that George could figure it out. Why can't this George figured 200 years later and speaking about that George and this George that George also insisted that women who are in the Revolutionary Army get exactly the same pensions and benefits as men and the only revolutionary soldiers buried at West Point where a couple women and then interesting not a we know that we don't know that no, but it's there go look at the grave some amazing. So I mean he What's fair is fair? One of my very favorite letters that you might dig out some time because I think it's very moving on this diversity issue is the letter that George Washington wrote in 1792 the Hebrew Congregation of the temple in Newport, Rhode Island. Now, I was doing this thing with Fran Lebowitz anyone know her she's really very funny writer. She was saying imagine what fun it was to be a Jew and 1790 and Newport Rhode Island's and I said, yeah, it had to be real tough. In fact history tells us that in this congregation. They were subject to such tension that in the center of the congregation. There was a trapdoor that they could all get out the and a tunnel that went out so they could get two boats and Escape if it got too tough. We all talk about religious freedom, but it wasn't freely practiced here. A lot of people felt very free to go. Because their will on people so here was this very sturdy Della of this very sturdy congregation standing up building their Temple and establishing their roots in this country and dig out the letter some time and read it it gives you Goosebumps. I mean George Washington is writing to them and saying, It's about everybody being able to sit under their own tree are their own Vine and not be bothered by other people, you know, this country is about religious freedom. This government does not go for bigotry. It goes for openness and fairness and on and I mean it is just it is wonderful. You can see him sitting there writing this with his quill and 1790 and again wonder why there's a debate going on 200 years later because he really did have the vision of how this country was supposed to be running and what fairness and all of that was about Well what happened what happened? I have a lot of theories. I have a lot of theories. I don't know that we can ever prove them. I really do think the Victorian age had a very strong strong impression on our historians and that we should write things like they should have been because then maybe the next generation will be better or something. It's like, you know, you add a little freedom to tamper with history and leave people out and so forth and so on. I remember when I grew up I think back to the history book and how many women's names that I ever see in my history book. I read something about Betsy Ross made a flag. And I knew that there was a wonderful Martha Washington, but it was like she kind of made cherry pies after he cut down the tree and really beyond that the I think they mentioned Amelia Earhart and they said there was some crazies that went out and got the vote and that was about it. Now. I know we're really Any others listed then you start thinking about well, what about blacks? And you think well, they kind of mentioned Dred Scott and then there was this great void and they said and then there was the civil rights movement and Martin Luther King and that is if you got to that part of the book before the year was over and usually didn't Hispanics Asians. They've kind of said, oh some Asians came and built railroads. We didn't quite tell people how he treated them like they were here and that they did many other things also, but if you know, we just had a few little pigeon holes that we put people in and then that was the end of it but really the majority the history was all about something else. I think it's impacted everything we do. And I think we now have to work very hard to get back to where we were I think the models we have are excellent and there the models people are crying out for right now and if we don't get those models out there, I'm very worried about what will happen in Eastern Europe and other such places. Let me give you an example I sent on armed services. So we get all the threat assessments, you know, they come up with egg and braid and you know charts and maps and and of course, they're all saying we can't take any troops out of Europe because there's some still some tremendous threats. Say that's right. There's still a lot of threats. Tell me what you think the threats aren't General. well When they start ticking them off there probably isn't a one of them. I disagree with they say well, you know all sorts of religious tensions seem to be resurfacing when you don't have this very heavy top down that starts breaking up say that's right all sorts of ethnic tensions resurfacing right border tensions resurfacing right Lithuania Estonia, you know, all them may stand up right I said, I agree with you on every one of those things generals, but let me ask you one thing. What do you do with an army and that situation? I mean, why is that a reason to keep the Army there the Army's there and Lithuania and Estonia and we're not taking sides the Army's there. The Turks are still the Turkish minority still being abused in Bulgaria. We're not taking sides. We're not marching in. What are you doing in our me in that situation those threats are there, but the Army is totally meaningless in that situation. What we need in that situation is people to understand how we've come to deal with diversity in this country. We really need to send over social workers and we need to send over at Ernie's that can explain the Bill of Rights civil rights have a legal system works how you guarantee minority rights what you do about affirmative action and how you start making it work. So we ought to be getting our system back up and going because I could tell you peace in Eastern Europe and other places is very dependent upon our model one of the most moving things that ever happened to me as a Bro Congress was we were flying up to the Pakistani border to see Afghan refugees. We were in a military aircraft and we lost an engine. So we landed in India and we landed on one of their military bases was like a hundred and five degrees. It was very hot. We had a marvelous crew. The military had said, okay, we got congresswoman Schroeder. She wants an affirmative action group will give it to her. We had a woman in charge of the plane very rare and the Air Force and we had blacks Hispanics. They were great. There was a greatest crew I've ever seen and I know that they all sang Opera. So I mean everywhere we went people love them. Well we get there. The plane is got this problem the crew all gets out and the woman is very pragmatic says hundred and five degrees the crews all got to work on this so off of the uniforms on with the shorts, we're going to be comfortable. So they all come tumbling out. We all go off and meanwhile the Indian Air Force stands there and watch this this whole procedure that goes on for two hours in a hundred and five degree heat on the pavement is they fixed the engine the crew puts the engine back together gets it. All right. We come back up when it was over. I went over and I said to one of the Indian generals, you know, I'm amazed just sit out here in the heat thus engines just like yours. Its the 707 basic engine. What in the world is it that you are looking at? And he said you really don't understand. Do you and I said no, I don't understand. So we're not looking at the engine at all. He said do you understand what's going on in India? He said you understand the tremendous religious tension going on. I'm a Sikh two of my brothers have been shot. I may be shot tonight. He said what we're watching is how all these people work together and they like each other and we're totally amazed and he said I think probably all of us are going to go by the US Consulate tonight and see if we can't get papers to emigrate but you know, that is something we forget about no, we're not there. I agree. We're not there. I agree. We've got a long ways to go but doggone it think about how exciting this country is. An and how desperately other countries are struggling with trying to find a model and we ought to get back to making sure doors are open for everyone and making sure our model is the model for the world and then we won't only have one the Cold War. We will win the new war for the economic. War that is going on for In This Global Village. I just think it's really very easy and we're so close to being there. I don't know why we deny it. I just don't know why we deny it little simple things little simple things that have driven me nuts, since I got to the Congress, for example, do you know that your state department when it has a visiting dignitary gives them a gift that probably doesn't surprise you to know what we give them British porcelain bowls. Could you tell me why? I have said to them over and over again. We've got Native American Cooperative Arts thing if they had a contract with the state department, it would mean all you can possibly imagine to them and I cannot think of a European who would much prefer getting a Native American piece of art whatever it is versus a British porcelain well, and we kind of have a colonial mentality. It's kind of like the guys in the green striped pants are still thinking. Oh gosh, isn't it terrible that we you know, we aren't Great Britain, I that we don't have the wines of France so that we don't have that. Well bologna were America were much more excited. They would rather have the bowl so you can tick off all sorts of things like that and say the rest of the world comes here to see our diversity and we're busy trying to look like the rest of the world. What are they talking about? So we have got some very exciting things that are coming up. We have got the Americans with Disabilities Act coming up. That's the Last Frontier of opening up civil rights. And how exciting it is to see so many more people with disabilities out on the street. I'm sure you see it in Minneapolis. I think back 10 years ago when I was first working with groups to get accessible buses and accessible and the difference today is phenomenal. You see people out in the wheelchairs they're moving around. They're doing everything. What is the big fight and this American with disabilities? We've got a lot of people who say well we don't might make in the front door accessible so they can come in and spend their money, but we really don't want to make the back door accessible. So we have to hire them now come on come on, and that's that's outrageous. So that's coming down the pike. We ought to be out front. It shouldn't even be an issue and it should pass. We are trying to restore civil rights to where it was before. We got this Looney Tunes Supreme Court. And that's very important. It's very important and we have got to tell people that their images are absolutely there is an ocean in this country that you can have diversity or you can have excellence in you can't have both and that is absolutely wrong. You can have diversity and you can have excellence and you can have a unique product that no one else will have I mean that the diversity versus Excellence is the issue of the porcelain Bowl versus the Native American Arts. I mean that's really what it is. And I don't know what happened to our minds that they got that Twisted but the did so somehow we got to untwist them and say wait a minute diversity and Excellence are not mutually exclusive. I used to be a labor lawyer before I became a member of Congress. And so I used to go look at the employment test. There's a very famous case in the law the Duke power decision the Duke Power Company in North Carolina was testing its janitors on their knowledge of classical music clearly. I don't know classical music to be a janitor and you can imagine why it was doing that if you had a white face, they usually forgot to test you, you know, the it was Bloody like the spelling test that they used to give when you Time to vote if you had a white face, it would be something like spell cat and if you had a black face, it was spell Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia or something like that. So I mean this was so the government said no no, no, you cannot give job tests that are not job-related course, it never applied to the federal government. That's how we ended up with the state department and all those kind of the they had to be job specific task. So I've spent a lot of time looking at those kind of things and you'll hear people saying, oh, you're attacking our test You're Bringing Down the quality. When you really look at what they're talking about in the tested and everything to do with the quality at all. It has to do with cultural differences. One of the cases I had was one test that was being used by a major airline for airline pilots give you an example. They would show them pictures of homes and say what is unique in this home. Well, what's unique in the home depends on what kind of culture you came from and it was a time test and there was one part that had broken windows, you know, a lot of people that's not unique. Another would be they'd have a coal furnace some people that's not unique. You know, it depends it. So there was a real cultural steering through that and you pick that up and also every one of us has got to be fired up to go out of here and make sure that we don't allow people to say diversity and Excellence are mutually exclusive they are not And our culture is where it shows up over and over and over again. It is the only positive export we've got today except for weapons and I just soon forget about that part of it. But when you look at anything with a favorable balance a tray, that's the one thing we've got. And so there it worked it ought to work and everything else. Imagine what we can have if we had multinationals that looked like America rather than like the Forbes, you know birthday party and Morocco or whatever. So I think that's key now. I think another very important thing that's coming out. Have you read megatrends? You know, John. Nesbitt's new Mega Trends is very interesting. He points out in his last chapter in his new book that there's going to be a tremendous change. In all sorts of professions in the 90s in America because For the First Time a critical mass will be female or different in the workforce by critical mass is somewhere around 25 to 30 percent now for a long time. We said if you put one woman or one black or one Hispanic or one Asian or one anything that's supposed to change the whole world. You know, it's still one person one vote. But you get a critical mass of 25 to 30% and you really start to see things shift and he really predicts that's going to be one of the big shifts as diversity finally takes hold in the workforce in different areas. I find that very exciting. We passed Landmark legislation this week. It's only landmark in America. Every other country passed it 40 years ago. Family medical leave. What does it say? It says you could be a good employee and a good family member Walla. The United States ideas, you can be a good employee or a good family member, but you can't be both, you know, we're all supposed to have Ozzie and Harriet type families. If you want to have a family get a wife, you know, I'd like one my husband a like one. Everybody would like what there aren't any left and America. So this says that upon birth or adoption of a baby you get job protected Leaf upon the illness of a spouse a serious illness of a spouse or yourself or a parent or a dependent child you get job protected leaf. Well, you heard the White House, they're going to veto it. They went nuts. And you know, it's amazing because in 1988 September 1988 President Bush was out on the campaign Trail and he said every woman should be assured of her job if she takes time off to have a baby. Now I do not understand how you put that together with vetoing a bill but they say they will we passed the child care legislation. It's taken us 18 years when I first got elected I thought oh, oh President Nixon had just vetoed the child care legislation then Senator Mondale and I reintroduce it. We're all ready to go and we kept looking for the troops behind us and there weren't any it's a wonderful feeling of politics or get out there. Okay, and you turned out to hey, wait a minute Fritz. Do you see anyone back there? You know, where are they 18 years later. We're finally catching up. Every other countries had that type of thing. We're so far behind on health care. It's absolutely outrageous. And the cost of college need I say more. I mean, I've had a very sad year this year in Denver where our economy's been down with all sorts of Father's coming to me and saying, you know, I've had to break a covenant with my child my child my child if they got good grades and did all these things boy. I put him through school. Well they did and I've had to say No, we can't afford it. Now. That's a great personal tragedy but it's a tragedy for all of us and our future that child is our future if we're going to go compete in this global economy. We're going to need the smartest kids. We got and to say to the good kids my word. We only read about the bad ones to say the really good ones. Oh, it's great. You did all that, but the joke's on you. You don't get to go because you didn't pick the right parents. It's your fault. You should have done better picking parents. I mean, that's really crazy. So all of those things I think we have got to get in order in the 90s if we're going to compete in the 21st century. We've got to recognize this new diversity. We've got to recognize that single parents are in the workplace that dual working parents are in the workplace that all sorts of people are in the workplace. Not just the man in the gray flannel suit is in the workplace and we've got to give people some support so that we're not putting them through the stress that they've been going through of light. Our number one and drug and alcohol abuse in the world. We ought to ask why I think you began to send. We're number one in divorce in the world. I think we should be asking what I mean. Those are all stressed driven things. I Define a family is wherever you go at night and they got to let you in and you take all those little families units and then you set your government and your Society on top of it. So if a little families are all crumbling the government is crumbling and I think we've really got to get back into supporting that kind of stuff. We're almost like the military who refuses to allow you to take an umbrella even when it's raining because we got to show how much I owe and tough we are well, it's very short-sighted. There are two Notions that are very tough one. You can't be a good employee and a good family member. The other one is That you shouldn't have a family unless you can afford it and by afford it we do mean in the Ozzie and Harriet when you look at the cost of things today, the only way people are going to be able to afford it is if we can make octogenarians fertile because nobody's going to have the bills paid off till they're about that age. I mean people are coming out of school with a lot of debt on their heads and they go, you know houses are much more expensive than they ever were cars College was the whole night. And if you had to figure this all out when you could afford it hoof and again, no one sees a time when wages are going to go back up because wages are getting more and more competitive as we compete in this world market. So those are all very serious things and we ought to be insisting that our government deal with it. Rather than just keep, you know only ten percent of the families look like Ozzie and Harriet in our real Society among our elected leaders in Washington. Only 10% Don't look like Ozzie and Harriet. It's the reverse so they don't quite get it and we've really got to make sure they get it and it isn't really a matter of money. You saw the whole Summit this week, you know, everybody's running around saying we can't say the t word, you know, the president and sinew know and all this, you know, it isn't the t word at all. It's the p word priority work. You spend fifteen point two million dollars a day on the B-2 bomber. That's what we spend per day on the beach who bomber we spend about four hundred thousand a day on helping people who are homeless and about 700,000 on the drug wars. Now are those really our priorities is the B-2 bomber really that much more important than those kind of things and I won't go through education of worried with all of that. That's not the issue. The issue is there's a lot of money in that budget and it's going for a lot of people's pet rocks. And the only reason we're running around doing the t word stuff is because nobody wants to pet rock touched and if you really had said to the American people great project would be to break that whole budget out and figure what you pay per day for each thing in the budget and then say if those are priorities, I think you'll be shocked. I think you'd be very shocked and I think it's a they're not our priorities at all. So forget all this other stuff and get down to how do you really take it on but oh no, we must have the military in Europe because you see we need to they'll be there to help with this. City issue fat chance they deal so well with diversity issue among their own ranks that they'll surely be able to shove the Europeans on handling. You know, we're still saying the Russians are coming. So we need the B-2 bomber the Russians are coming but they're not coming to bury capitalism. They're coming to become capitalist, you know, they're coming with suitcases and Visa cards. So, you know, it's not exactly something you're going to be able to throw a B-2 bomber it so what what are our priorities what is going on? And I think that's what we have to talk about. So, I'm really pleased to be able to be here and talk about this because I think what we need to do is Empower everyone in our society to take that vote. They've got and get into that debate. There's a final thing that troubles me very much in this society. And I mean it very seriously that no one wants to look like they're a beginner. Everybody wants to be cool starts to happen to young males at about 13. You got to be cool, you know young girls have to be go. Everybody's got to be cool. And so you're afraid to discuss military strategy, you're afraid to discuss our agricultural policy or anything because you may not look cool. You may not know everything and Washington plays that game on your we use all sorts of words. So you'll feel inferior. The whole thing is, how can we throw so many words that you that you won't have any idea what it is that you will die and back away and put your Sony Walkman on your ears and quit, that's the game. So when we talk about nuclear weapons and everything, we throw throw away, we throw every big big word we can possibly say your line, huh? I mean the real issue is what do we need it for where we're going to send it on on and so we have got to get over that we have got to feel that we've got to get in the debate to and the debate can't be for Peter preppies only that it's for everyone. That's what it was about and any day that you get lost or get worried about it. Dig out George Washington 1790 letter and read it again because that was his vision and it's about time 200 years later that we start implementing it. Thank you very very much for letting me be here. You ask a very very important question and that is how do we make this change in this diversity? You're right. There's the two ways the old way of the 60s was that will let everybody have their day. You know, we'll have a Spanish culture day, you know, black history week our awareness month or women's history awareness month or whatever and the interesting thing is the only people who go to those meetings are the people who already know it it's the choir and so we've really missed the whole point. And when you say no know what we really want to do is be put the history so it's inclusive of everyone and then they said, oh we have to make up stuff that they did. Well, no, you don't have to make up stuff that they did. You just have to go back and put in the people that they knocked out before that's the real issue and make it more inclusive and to me that is really the core of it because the whole idea of just having a little festival and treat it like Isn't that nice and now we've done it we can put it away. And again you haven't reached the people that are there. It's very serious. So you really go right at it and I think it's got to be the inclusive. It's got to be mainstream and it's got to be everybody understanding how everyone played a role because otherwise all you do is polarize the community and make a man. You know black say we know what we contributed. Why doesn't why community and of them women say we know what we can write? Why don't they understand what we going? Well because we didn't put it into the mainstream and now we're just chasing our tail when we do that. Well, it doesn't stand in very good stead countries. It's kind of like trying to get a Visa card back from my kids after they graduate from college, you know. It got a great deal going and the politicians in those countries all say to me. You don't understand if we had to do more for defense. We would either have to increase taxes or cut services and I say no kidding. You mean it works the same way in your country at Works in us what I mean? I don't understand it's a it's a very tough thing. If you go back and read Eisenhower statements his statements were never that we were going to be the policeman of the world for free forever his statement was we would be there about 10 years and if we still had troops in Europe after 10 years, we've been a failure Europe was on its knees we had no choice but to be there, of course we had to be there. It was the right thing to be there. So that those countries could rebuild they've rebuilt And we're still there and they've got a great deal. I chair the military installations committee. We now start talking about taking a base out of Germany. And you know what you get phone calls from the bürgermeister 's is just like we phone calls from the mayor's if you're going to close the base in the mirror. Oh, you can't do that. You know what this means to our economy yada yada yada yada yada yada yada, you think wow course, it means a lot to their economy and we're pumping Megabucks and kick a box into those again, but why? What if you're spending all that money $1,200 a year of person to defend the Free World and Europe spending three hundred and fifty dollars a year. You're paying way more than your fair share. Canada spending a hundred that's way more than your fair share Japan spending about a hundred. It's way more than your fair share. I mean, yeah, all I'm saying is no one's going to do it voluntarily and we got to be very tough about it. And unfortunately when you bring it up they act like you were a bathing suit the church you're asking us to pay more money. Oh how tacky how terrible how could you do this? No one's ever said it before and I don't just mean in the military area. I think the threats are all changing. I think some of the biggest threats now our Environmental There's terrific threat still in the undeveloped world that they haven't developed so we can say to Japan. Why don't you work instead of on the military part because I don't think we want them rearming and we may not need to have any one rearm but the goal I would see is everybody put the same percentage of their gross national product up for threat eradication be it environment be it developing the third world or be it defense and and everybody sits there senior partners and figures out how you do it. But Japan could be fabulous and dealing with the environmental thing. They probably do much better doing Family Planning programs in Asia than we are. You probably did we know what to do about a lot of these things is plant trees on a plant tree. We know what to do with it. So get them putting up their 6% like we put up our 6% I think that's the Dough's you should pay once you become a developed country. You're that privileged then I think we should all be paying the same kind of dues. But the fact that we pay all the dose then we don't have a Level Playing Field when it comes to trade because while their Military Allies their training competitors, so the more they can get us to do over here than the more money. They've got to channel into everything else high-definition television instead of B-2 bombers, whatever it is and suddenly we wake up and we haven't got anything left to sell to anybody and we're in real trouble and that's kind of where we are. So it's like a wake-up call. It's a wake-up call. You know, let's get this straight. Let's figure it out and let's deal with the p word. Once we deal with the p word. I think we can put it back together. Let me speak to the that issue. I am very troubled about what 1992 looks like our system. I think has become so money-driven that people are terrified and it appears that there's nobody looking at running in 1992. We may have to draft somebody now isn't that amazing that the great democracy of the world can't find anybody to get engaged in the debate? Secondly, I think you got to have a vision you got to have a definition you got to know where you're going. We currently have a president who's made Vision a joke for Saturday Night Live, you know the vision thing and all this. Well, I'm here we are kind of directionless in the one thing we know is he doesn't like broccoli and a few other things but, you know, we're just kind of floundering around and two words and P words, but it's still dr. Feelgood. And yet stronger than ever and no one appearing to surface to challenge it I go to a lot of campuses and give them the this specific I say if you took all of mondale's issues in 1984 and gave him to Reagan and take Reagan's and gave him to Mondale would the outcome be different people say no. They do 88. Well, it's take the caucuses issues and give him to Bush and bush has issues and given to the caucus would the outcome be different if people say no. So and I'm very trouble because what that says to me is we are now into the politics of style and not substance and how do you run them Style? For a woman it's impossible because everybody says you don't look like a president. I know that you know, there's never been a present that looked like me. I understand that but what is this style and I think that's part of Bush's popularity because his style thank goodness is so different than Ronald Reagan's and Barbara Bush's Style thank goodness is so different than Nancy Reagan's that. people assume their different policies and they're not so how do you play in the style game? You know, I came to politics when it was issues. How do you plan the style game? And how do you play the money game? The other thing see that I think is coming out of this SNL issue. Is that for the good people who used to write 25 dollar checks or hundred dollar checks in races there suddenly saying you mean this guy Keating put in millions and millions and millions and suddenly they're thinking why should I write it? I mean that doesn't have anything to do. Obviously. This place is a coin-operated legislative machine in my little coins don't even register on the on the meter of boy is that scary. So I think 1992 is going to depend a lot on what kind of campaign reform we can get. We got to get the fat cats out of this business as fast as possible because the image is really that the fat cats are calling all the shots and you know what it's not far from wrong fat cats are calling an awful lot of the shots. So we got to get the soft money out the PAC money out, you know, all those kind of things. I think it's very very essential that we reclaim our government. I don't think Thomas Jefferson never foresaw political action committees, soft impacts people being able to do independent committees and all that that would help us if we had leveled the playing field because money so key and then the next thing we have to do is find a way we reclaim this presidency with a real Democratic Grassroots movement and you got to figure out how you do that. If we don't figure out how we do it then this is probably the conventional wisdom is such that why would anybody run because you're just like a sacrificial lamb so I think that's what's really keeping everybody back you look for years ago and they were all over the place. You know that because of Baja Minnesota down there they call Iowa, you know by now they were trampling all over. The place right? You couldn't keep them out. They were like locusts now. They can't find anyone to lure in. You know, they keep saying anybody want to run the same way, New Hampshire anybody want to run know everyone's going to know. Thanks, so So that really does bother me and I think that's why and so we really have to figure out how we start turning this around and hopefully that will be the positive Fallout of the Keating and the S&L crisis and all the other things. I mean, not that they're going to be much positive. But at least maybe we can reclaim the process get people back involved and find a way to have a real democracy like the rest of the world thought we were when they all signed up on our side. Let me just end by telling you how I got into this crazy business because I think we have forgotten everybody in this room knows much more about how to be effective than they probably let themselves be in the 80s. I don't know what happened to us in the 80s. We all went on sabbatical but let me tell you I remember the 70s when the environmental groups used to come out and it lists the dirty dozen that Big press conference and they'd say these are the dirty dozen in the Congress the worst members of Congress environmentally and usually 10 mm at least when get reelected guys use the trembled at they were beyond that. I remember because I worked hard in the civil rights movement in the 60s. What we used to do is stand outside the chamber and then make great pictures for the local newspapers. And for the people who would come out after they had voted the ones that have voted with us. We were cheering with the thumbs up in the ones. Who weren't we were. Yeah. Can you imagine that picture going back home? Everybody there knew how they vote in the 80s somehow we all dropped out and we let all politicians Define themselves. And every politician that has one has been against the deficit pro-peace pro-education pro-environment pro-family Pro X. Well, that's a hundred percent. What happened? Well, I mean, it's just funny if you let everybody to find themselves who's going to stand up and say, you know, I like Exxon. I like the way they string those otters up don't they look cute with all that oil in them, you know, nothing like a little greasy otter or something. Yeah. I think I'm going to stand up and say that so we let them all stand up and say how they loved everybody and they were all wonderful and Dido. And so now we can't be surprised. What we've got to do is get back into this process get back with the skills that we have. There's now a whole group of fan of members of Congress who have voted against family issues on daycare on family medical leave on us you ought to have some conferences right before the election and say this these are the most Anti family members in Minnesota. Oh boy. Would that be powerful or whatever? All sorts of things you can do to run for office that breaks through it to one young man ran for office against an incumbent and this is what he did. He had a picture of a TV set with him on it and a little rubber band and he said please hang this on the television because you are going to see me as much on TV as my opponent. I want you to remember me when you see me, right and then on the back it said and here's why because I didn't take money from Exxon and you know, General Dynamics and every other bad guy that you could list very powerful went right to it. We know how to do that kind of stuff. Why have we surrendered and been so passive and sat there and let people sell themselves to us like they were toothpaste and we say well now that one's ad was a little better than this one's add. So I think I vote for me that's baloney. Why haven't we gone back and reclaimed it and done the work the research and and put it back and we can do it and that is God. To be the lesson of the 90s. That's how I learned political science at the University of Minnesota back when you were none free and others were teaching here and he was absolutely right. You gotta organize and you got to tell people what the voting record is because the politician isn't going to tell politician in going to tell you what the voting record is and then you've got to go show it I got into this by running with three posters. They cost me a penny apiece 1972 Denver Colorado poster. Number one, we had the Olympics on the ballot ours is a small state. We don't have much money are silly state was volunteering to put up all this money for the Olympics and we didn't have enough money for child care or anything else. So we had a picture of an elderly woman walking down the street with a cane and it said cheer up the Olympics are coming. What we made everybody and we said the Olympics are very Noble idea. But when we are denying all sorts of services at home where in the world were going to get the money to build all this hotsy-totsy stuff that we will never use again. Just Colorado really need a luge run. Yeah, you know how it is you I got some beefs if we only had a luge run Well, it really made a print we found a migrant worker. And again, we don't normally like to talk about that but we found a child of a migrant worker a very small child about a year old sitting on a dirt floor and that poster said this radical Troublemaker is out to get something from you. Hope and we went right at this child has a right to the best education and medical care and the right to compete in America because that's what America is about and it's not about only the kids who live with the floor. And and have carpet get the chance. It's everybody gets the chance and then our final one was the military cemetery with all the graves from Vietnam Vietnam War was going on and we had a picture of all the Tombstones with a bird flying out over and it said it was a quote from one of Nixon's speeches. It says yes, many of our troops have already been withdrawn very powerful. So nobody asked me where I was on the war. Nobody asked me if I mean, they knew I was out there. I brought those back to Washington DC. I showed him to the Democratic party. They wouldn't even take me around they said these went out. He said, yes. He said don't you understand you're supposed to have a picture of yourself in front of the Dome running down the stairs. So it's have a picture yourself on the phone with your family with a dog on a bike to show you're an environmentalist with a cop to show that you're you know for Law and Order. That's what you're supposed to knock this you've taken positions. You know heaven forbid. Well, for some reason in 1972, our average campaign contribution was seven dollars and fifty cents which is how it should be. No one owns you seven dollars and fifty cents and in the Nixon landslide in Marlboro Country in Denver, Colorado, they turned out the Republican incumbent voted for Richard Nixon and Pat Schroeder. Don't ask me why but it says to me that the American people if you give them a choice, we'll make it. Unfortunately. We haven't been giving them a choice. We've been giving him the same old political pollution. So as we're into our Earth Day thing, let's all stop. So stop the political pollution and Minnesota's the state. That's probably got more political skills than any other state. I know we may have to send you all out on sabbatical to the other 49 to get it but it's very important we do this because if we don't do this in the 90s and turn Priorities around and get this country moving. I don't want to think of what our position is going to be in the 21st century. The rest of the world's already said we can't do it and they're saying the 21st century will either be the European Centre or will be the Asian Pacific Century. Hey, I don't buy into that. I think we can still be a player but we're really getting down now to the final hours of whether we're going to be playing we got ten years to turn the ship around and get these priorities straight and we can't do it with the feel-good stuff. We may have to eat some broccoli. Thank you very very much.