All-American Presidential Forums on PBS" Moderated by Tavis Smiley

FORUM RESPONSES

"Let me add my voice in thanking Howard University for hosting us this evening and, Tavis, thank you as well. It's an appropriate first question that was asked here. To bring up the issue of education, of discrimination, at this wonderful institution is critically important.

The shame of all of this is that long before the decision was reached today or yesterday in the Seattle cases, the shame of re-segregation has been occurring for years in our country. The reality that our public educational system is today a segregated system and that we have not taken enough leadership over the years to understand the great damage that has done to our country. This evening, there will be many subjects that will be raised and important ones.

None is more important in my view than the issue of education. Whether or not from the earliest educational opportunity to the highest level of educational opportunity, this is the key to equal access to our society. It is something that can never be taken away from you if you get it. To say today that you're going to exclude race as a means of allowing for the diversity in our communities is a major step backwards.

As president of the United States, I would use whatever tools available to me to see to it that we reverse this decision today, get back on the track to see to it that our country once again will identify with the identity of unity as a nation, blind if you will, to the racial distinctions in our society. That's the only way we're going to deal with the new frontiers of the twenty-first century: the barrios, the ghettos, and the reservations of our society. That's what I stand for and that's what we'll achieve as a Democratic administration."

"Thank you, Tavis. As I said at the outset of the first question, I don't believe there's any other issue as important as this one we'll discuss this evening as education. There's a lot of good talk here and I admire the fact that my colleagues here, the candidates, all care deeply about this issue. I stand before you as a candidate. We have to make a decision about who is our best candidate to win the presidency in 2008.

For twenty-six years through five terms of the United States Senate, I have dedicated myself to this issue. I'm very proud of the fact that Marian Wright Edelman of the Children's Defense Fund has come to me over and over again and proud to have authored the legislation to deal with the whole child, that authored the first child care legislation in this country, to begin in the earliest days to make sure that parents have the assurance that there will be a quality place for their child to be, an affordable place, an available place. Then to begin with early childhood education, to see to it that we'd have a good Head Start program.

I'm proud of the fact that I was called the Senator of the Decade by the National Head Start Association. I have walked the walk on these issues. I am committed to these issues. There's nothing that will be a higher priority to me as president of the United States than to see to it that America's children from the earliest days of their arrival, certainly through the upper education branches of our educational system, have the equal opportunity. None of us here can guarantee success, but we have an obligation to guarantee an opportunity to that success. The key to that door is the education of the American child."

"Well, thank you. I want to certainly underscore a number of the suggestions that have been made on dealing with this. I'd add another addition and that is the need for far broader usage of school-based clinics in our society where children have the opportunity to be able to confront and talk with people that may be willing to give them the kind of sound advice they need on sexual education and the like.

But also each and every one of us can play a role in this. There's a job obviously for government here in funding and support, but I believe that each and every citizen bears a responsibility to reach out and do what they can to educate a child. Our churches are doing this in many ways. We need to do a better job in our schools, inviting parents and insisting there be more participation in our school systems.

It isn't just HIV-AIDS. The minority community, the African American community in our country, suffers from a lack of access to a wide variety of health care needs. Infant mortality among the Black community is two and a half times what it is in the white community. The problems of cardiovascular diseases, obesity, diabetes, you go down the long list. It isn't just AIDS. It's a wide range of these issues.

We need to begin to address this issue by understanding that it isn't just universal coverage, but access to that coverage and to understand there's a variety of issues that need to be addressed in addition to HIV-AIDS, but each and every one of us as citizens can make a difference."

"Thank you, Tavis. I happen to believe very strongly that our tax and fiscal policies ought to reflect our moral values. Our tax and fiscal policies ought to be fair, responsible and pro growth as well. We live in a society where obviously it's going to be important to expand our economy so that jobs can be created and businesses can grow and people have an opportunity in this life. I'm deeply disappointed, as many.

We had a very good period of time, I might say, under the Clinton administration where we balanced the budget. We had a tax policy that was much more fair. We need to get back to those days again where we had that kind of fiscal policy. One of the taxes that needs to be addressed because we're losing manufacturing jobs in this country. We today reward industries that leave America by giving them tax breaks. I would like to see us reward companies that stay in our inner cities, go to places where jobs ought to be created. That ought to be a part of our tax policies."

"Well, I agree. I think the mandatory minimum sentencing has been a disaster. I'm a strong supporter of Charlie Rangel's efforts here to eliminate the distinction between crack cocaine and powdered cocaine. That'll have a big difference in terms of who actually goes to jail in this country. Then obviously as well, we need to have a justice department that is not going to be politicized as we've watched this one with U.S. attorneys who do the political work rather than doing the justice's work in our country. As president, I will insist upon that. I'm sure the rest of my colleagues will get better justice with Democrats in the White House."

"New Orleans and Katrina have become a symbol of everything that went wrong with this administration's failure to respond to a people in need. I can think of no better way to have New Orleans and Katrina, that event, become a symbol of what we can do right in this country by giving people the opportunity to come back and the support they will need to regain their lives. This is an American city. Anywhere else in America, we'd want to step up and see to it that people would get that help. This is the least we ought to be able to do to see to it that they get their lives back together."

"It's a huge issue here. The fact of the matter is, we're exporting a lot of valuable jobs in this country and we shouldn't be doing it. I offered legislation that was passed that prohibited the Defense Department from outsourcing contracts going off our shores here when many hardworking Americans ought to be allowed to do those jobs. I talked earlier about providing the tax incentives.

When you have people literally driving to the international airports to fly to some country to provide some funding for a local project in those nations, bypassing the very communities that could very well use those kind of jobs and economic growth, that is wrong. I will continue to do what I can to see to it that we limit outsourcing of American jobs."

"Well, unfortunately, as a result of our conflict in Iraq, the sustaining of a military presence there, we've lost our moral authority unfortunately. As a result of that, our ability to mobilize the world on issues like Darfur has been severely damaged. But the United States should be able to take some unilateral action here in providing the kind of protection for people who are being slaughtered in that country. In the meantime, get our military out of Iraq, as I planned and offered to do, and thus regain that stature which we need to be doing as a nation in this world and to be able to build those coalitions to respond to an issue like Darfur. But in the meantime, the United States ought to act."