Senate Journal: Page 1414: Tuesday, April 25, 1995

         In education we are beginning to see the outlines of what I hope
    will be a genuine bipartisan national partnership in education.  In the
    last two years we increased Head Start, we reduced the rules and
    regulations the federal government imposes on local school systems, but
    gave them more funds and flexibility to meet national standards of
    education.   We helped states all ove the country to develop
    comprehensive systems of apprenticeships for young people who get out of
    high school and dont want to go to college, but dont want to be in
    dead-end jobs.

         We are doing more to try to make our job training programs
    relevant.  And we have made literally millions of Americans eligible for
    lower cost, better repyment  college loans under our direct loan
    program, including over 350,000 students and former students in Iowa --
    including all those who are at Iowa State University.  Now, if you
    borrow money under that program, you get it quicker with less paperwork
    at lower cost, and you can pay it back in one of four different ways
    based on the income youre going to earn when you get out of college.
    Believe it or not, it lowers costs to the taxpayers.

         And we have demanded responsibility.  Weve taken the loan default
    costs to the taxpayers from $2.8 billion a year down to $1 billion a
    year.  That is the direction we ought to be going in.

         Weve worked hard to increase our security at home and abroad.  The
    crime bill, which was passed last year by the Congress after six years
    of endless debate, provides for 100,000 more police officers on our
    street.  We have already -- over the next five years -- weve already
    awarded over 17,000 police officers to over half the police departments
    in America, including 158 communities here in Iowa. It strengthens
    punishment under federal law.

         The three strikes and youre out law in the crime bill is now the
    law of the land.  The first person to be prosecuted under this law was a
    convicted murderer accused of an armed robbery in Waterloo last
    November.  If hes convicted, he will go to jail for the rest of his
    life.

         The capital punishment provisions of the crime bill will cover the
    incident in Oklahoma City -- something that is terribly important, in my
    view, not only to bring justice in this case, but to send a clear signal
    that the United States does not intend to be dominated and paralyzed by
    terrorists from at home or abroad -- not now, not ever.  We cannot ever
    tolerate that.

         We are also more secure from beyond our borders.  For the first
    time since the dawn of the nuclear age, there are no Russian missiles
    pointed at Americas children. And those nuclear weapons are being
    destroyed every day.

         We have reduced the size of the federal government by more than
    100,000. We are taking it down by more than a quarter of a million.  We
    have eliminated or reduced 300 programs.  And I have asked Congress to
    eliminate or consolidate 400 more.  We have tried to give more
    flexibility to states -- several states have gotten broad freedom from
    federal rules to implement health care reform.  And we have now 27
    states from cumbersome federal rules to try to help them end welfare as
    we know it.

Iowa General Assembly

Index: Senate Journal (76th General Assembly: Session 1)

© 1995 Cornell College and League of Women Voters of Iowa

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